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What the Fathers say
Eastern Fathers
John Chrysostom
Whom Jesus loved. This John says to show his own innocence, and also why it was that Peter beckoned to him, inasmuch as he was not Peter's superior: Simon Peter therefore beckoned to him, that he should ask who it should be of whom he spake. Peter had been just reproved, and therefore, checking the customary vehemence of his love, he did not speak himself now, but made John speak for him. He always appears in Scripture as zealous, and an intimate friend of John's.
Theophylact of Ohrid
All are in anguish, and even the chief Peter himself is in trepidation, while John, as if in joy, reclines on the Lord's bosom. Why is this? And further—why does he speak of himself as "whom Jesus loved"? John reclined for the following two reasons. First, because he was loved more than all the others, and a sign of love was reclining next to the Lord. Second, because by his boldness and confidence he wanted to show that he was free from the accusation of betrayal. …
Western Saints
Augustine of Hippo
"Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom, one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved." What he meant by saying "in His bosom," he tells us a little further on, where he says, "on the breast of Jesus." It was that very John whose Gospel is before us, as he afterwards expressly declares. …
Bede
That he lay in the bosom, and upon the breast, was not only an evidence of present love, but also a sign of the future, (non occ.). viz. of those new and mysterious doctrines which he was afterwards commissioned to reveal to the world.
Thomas Aquinas
Next (v 23), the disciple's question is stated. First we see the intimacy he had with Christ; secondly, what led him to ask (v 24); thirdly, his question (v 25). The disciple's intimacy with Christ is shown by the fact that he was lying close to him. He says, one of the disciples was lying close to the lap of Jesus. This was John the Evangelist who wrote his Gospel. He wrote of himself in the third person to avoid boasting. In this he followed the custom of others who wrote Sacred Scripture. …
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