The Return of John to Jesus Research Gilbert Van Belle

Abstract. — This article questions whether the Fourth Gospel, critically evaluated, can be considered in investigating the historical Jesus. After providing a review of recent (I) and 19th century research (II) on the historical reliability of the Fourth Gospel, the question of literary unity and the dependence of the John on the Synop- tics is proposed (III). According to the present author, the language and style of the Fourth Gospel is so homogenous and the craftsmanship of the evangelist is so creative that it is impossible to distinguish alternative sources or traditions apart from the Synoptics. The possibility of historical tradition in the Fourth Gospel can neither be denied nor proved.

In the second edition of John among the Gospels (2001) D. M. Smith has included a noteworthy chapter entitled, “John, an Independent Gos- pel.”1 In this chapter he makes a critical observation on the renewed use of the Gospel of John in the recent search for the historical Jesus: “Only recently, … there may be a perceptible turning of the tide as the Gospel of John, critically evaluated, is once again considered in investigating the historical Jesus.”2 In this paper we wish, ﬁ rst, to review whether there is a renewed consideration of the Gospel of John in the search for the historical Jesus. Thereupon, the contemporary approach is compared to Johan- nine research in the nineteenth century. In the third and concluding part, we consider the question of the Gospel’s literary unity and its consequences for the search for the historical Jesus.

1. Dwight Moody Smith, John among the Gospels (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 2001) 195-241. Large portions of the section in this chapter entitled “The Setting and Presentation of Jesus’ Ministry and of His relationships” are drawn from his article “Historical Issues and the Problem of John and the Synoptics,” From Jesus to John: Essays on Jesus and New Testament Christology in Honor of Marinus de Jonge, ed. Martinus C. de Boer, Journal for the Study of the New Testament: Supplement Series, 84 (Shefﬁ eld: JSOT, 1993) 252-267. On D. M. Smith’s studies on “John and the Synoptics,” see Frans Neirynck, “The Question of John and the Synoptics: D. Moody Smith 1992-1999,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses 76 (2000) 122-132; = id., Evangelica III (see below, n. 12), 616-628. 2. Ibid., 202.

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I. The Historical Reliability of the Fourth Gospel

The question about “the historical reliability of John’s Gospel” has naturally everything to do with the authenticity, the integrity and the sources of the Fourth Gospel. Furthermore, the question extends to the Synoptic Gospels, because the similarities and the dissimilarities between John and the Synoptics is “the real heart of the problem.”

1. The Inﬂ uence of P. Gardner-Smith At the start of the twentieth century the general position held by exegetes was that the Gospel of John was dependent on the Synoptic Gospels.3 The tide turned in 1938 with the publication of P. Gardner- Smith’s book, Saint John and the Synoptic Gospels.4 The author argues, on the grounds of an analysis of the similarities and dissimilarities between John and the Synoptics that an independent, non-Synoptic oral tradition lays at the origin of John’s Gospel. A similar view was taken over and developed by, amongst others, R. Bultmann (1941), E. R. Good- enough (1945), B. Noack (1954), J. A. T. Robinson (1959), E. Haen- chen (1959) and C. H. Dodd (1953, 1963).5 According to J. Blinzler

3. For historical surveys on “John and the Synoptics,” see Timotheus Sigge, Das Johannesevangelium und die Synoptiker: Eine Untersuchung seiner Selbständigkeit und der gegenseitigen Beziehungen, Neutestamentliche Abhandlungen, 16/2-3 (Münster: Aschen- dorff, 1935); Hans Windisch, Johannes und die Synoptiker: Wollte der vierte Evangelist die älteren Evangelien ergänzen oder ersetzen?, Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament, 12 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1926); Joseph Blinzler, Johannes und die Synoptiker, Stuttgarter Bibel- studien, 5 (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1965). See also, the articles of Frans Neirynck and the doctoral dissertations of his students, Gabriel Selong and Johan Konings (see below, n. 12); Smith, John among the Gospels; Jörg Frey, “Das vierte Evangelium auf dem Hintergrund der älteren Evangelientradition: Zum Problem: Johannes und die Synoptiker,” Johannes-Evangelium – Mitte oder Rand des Kanons? Neue Standortbestim- mungen, ed. Thomas Söding, Quaestiones Disputatae, 203 (Freiburg/Basel/Vienna: Herder, 2003) 60-118; Michael Labahn & Manfred Lang, “Johannes und die Synop- tiker: Positionen und Impulse seit 1990,” Kontexte des Johannesevangeliums: Das vierte Evangelium in religions- und traditionsgeschichtlicher Perspektive, Wissenschaftliche Unter- suchungen zum Neuen Testament, 175 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004) 443-558. 4. Percival Gardner-Smith, Saint John and the Synoptic Gospels (Cambridge, MA: University Press, 1938). On this book and its inﬂ uence, see Joseph Verheyden, “P. Gard- ner-Smith and ‘The Turn of the Tide’,” John and the Synoptics, ed. Adelbert Denaux, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 101 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1992) 423-452. 5. Rudolf Bultmann, Das Evangelium des Johannes, Kritisch-exegetischer Kom- mentar, 2 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1941); English translation: The Gospel of John: A Commentary, trans. George Raymond Beasley-Murray (Oxford: Blackwell, 1971); Erwin R. Goodenough, “John a Primitive Gospel,” Journal of Biblical Literature 64 (1945) 145-182; Bent Noack, Zur johanneischen Tradition: Beiträge zur Kritik an der literarkritischen Analyse des vierten Evangeliums, Det laerde selskabs skrifter: Teologiske

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(1965),6 C. H. Dodd and R. Bultmann are the most prominent follow- ers of Gardner-Smith’s hypothesis. “Behind the Fourth Gospel,” Dodd writes, “lies an ancient tradition independent of the other gospels, and meriting serious consideration as a contribution to our knowledge of the historical facts concerning Jesus Christ.”7 According to Bultmann, the original gospel would have been composed mainly from three sources: the miracle stories have their origin in the sjme⁄a-Quelle, the Johannine discourses go back to the Offenbarungsreden, a pre-Christian gnostic source, and the suffering and resurrection narratives are traced to a passion source.8 In 1963, D. M. Smith noted on Gardner-Smith’s inﬂ uence: “There is a growing consensus that John’s reliance upon, or use of the Synoptics is to be minimized, if not denied.”9 In the subsequent years it would appear that more authors rejected the direct dependence on the Synoptic Gospels. Particular reference could be made to the commentaries of R. E. Brown (1966, 1970), R. Schnackenburg (1965, 1971, 1975, 1984), L. Morris (1971), J. N. Sanders & B. A. Mastin (1968), B. Lindars

skrifter, 3 (Copenhagen: Rosenkilde og Bagger, 1954); John A. T. Robinson, “The New Look on the Fourth Gospel,” Studia Evangelica: Papers Presented to the International Congress on “The Four Gospels in 1957” Held at Christ Church, Oxford, 1957, ed. Kurt Aland, et al., Texte und Untersuchungen, 73; 5/18 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1959) 338-350; = id., Twelve New Testament Studies, Studies in Biblical Theology, 34 (London: SCM Press, 1962) 94-106; Ernst Haenchen, “Johanneische Probleme,” Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 56 (1959) 19-54; = id., Gott und Mensch, Gesammelte Aufsätze, 1 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1965) 78-113; see also his commentary: Das Johannesevan- gelium: Ein Kommentar aus den nachgelassenen Manuskripten, ed. Ulrich Busse (Tübin- gen: Mohr Siebeck, 1980) (Preface by James M. Robinson); English translation: John 1/2: A Commentary on the Gospel of John, Chapters 1–6/7–21, trans. Robert W. Funk, ed. Robert W. Funk and Ulrich Busse, Hermeneia (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1984); Charles H. Dodd, The Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel (Cambridge: University Press, 1953); id., Historical Tradition in the Fourth Gospel (Cambridge: University Press, 1963). 6. Blinzler, Johannes und die Synoptiker, 22. 7. Dodd, Historical Tradition, 423-432: “Summary and Conclusion,” esp. p. 423. See also Interpretation, 444-453: “Appendix: Some Considerations upon the Historical Aspect of the Fourth Gospel.” 8. For references, see the key words in the index in Johannes, 557-563 (English translation: pp. 733-740): Literarkritik, Quellen: Offenbarungsreden, sjme⁄a-Quelle, andere Quellen, Redaktion des Evangelisten and kirchliche Redaktion. See also Bultmann’s article Johannesevangelium, in Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart 3 (31959) 840- 850, and Theologie des Neuen Testaments (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1948-1953; 21954; 31958; 41959); I cite the 5th edition, 1965, which is practically unchanged; English translation: Theology of the New Testament, trans. K. Grobel, 2 vols. (London: SCM Press, 1952, 1955). 9. Dwight Moody Smith, “John 12:12ff. and the Question of John’s Use of the Synoptics,” Journal of Biblical Literature 82 (1963) 58-64, esp. p. 59; = id., Johannine Christianity: Essays on Its Setting, Sources, and Theology (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1984) 97-105, esp. p. 99.

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(1972), and S. Schulz (1972).10 In 1975, R. Kysar assessed Johannine research as follows: “The past decade has witnessed the near demise of the proposition that the fourth evangelist was dependent upon one or more of the Synoptic Gospels.”11 But, it was at this point in time that the so-called “Louvain School,” under the initiative of F. Neirynck12 and M. Sabbe,13 defended John’s dependence on Mark, Matthew and Luke. In his lecture during the 39th session of the Colloquium Biblicum Lovaniense (1990), Neirynck observed that after his presentation at the Colloquium of 1975, entitled “John and the Synoptics,” “… the general conversion of the Johannine scholars did not follow immediately,” and “the Louvain paper, or at least its title, is widely used to signal the re-emergence

10. Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel according to John: Introduction, Translation, and Notes, The Anchor Bible, 29-29A, 2 vols. (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1966, 1970); see now also id., An Introduction to the Gospel of John. Edited, updated, intro- duced, and concluded by Francis J. Moloney (New York: Doubleday, 2003); Rudolf Schnackenburg, Das Johannesevangelium, Herders Theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament, 4/1-4, 4 vols. (Freiburg/Basel/Vienna: Herder, 1965, 1971, 1975, 1984); English translation: The Gospel According to St John, Herder’s Theological Commentary on the New Testament (New York: Herder, 1968, 1980, 1982); Leon Morris, The Gospel according to John: The English Text with Introduction, Exposition and Notes, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1971); J. N. Sanders and B. A. Mastin, A Commentary on the Gospel according to St John, Black’s New Testament Commentary (London: Black, 1968); Barnabas Lindars, The Gospel of John, New Century Bible (London: Oliphants, 1972); Siegfried Schulz, Das Evangelium nach Johannes übersetzt und erklärt, Das Neue Testament Deutsch, 4 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1972 [12th ed. in the series], 31978). 11. Robert Kysar, The Fourth Evangelist and His Gospel: An Examination of Con- temporary Scholarship (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1975) 45. 12. For Neirynck’s articles on John and the Synoptics, see his ‘Collected Essays’: Frans Neirynck, Evangelica: Gospel Studies – Études d’évangiles: Collected Essays, ed. Frans Van Segbroeck, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 60 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1982) [= Evangelica I]; id., Evangelica II: 1982-1990: Collected Essays, ed. Frans Van Segbroeck, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovanien- sium, 99 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1991); id., Evangelica III: 1992-2000: Col- lected Essays, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 150 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 2001); see also id., with the collaboration of Joël Delobel, T. Snoy, Gilbert Van Belle and Frans Van Segbroeck, Jean et les Synoptiques: Examen critique de l’exégèse de M.-É. Boismard, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 49 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1979) (3-120 = Ephemerides Theo- logicae Lovanienses 53 [1977] 363-478). Before 1974, Frans Neirynck directed the following doctoral dissertations on the problem “John and the Synoptics:” Gabriel Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple in Jn 2,13-22: With a Reconsideration of the Dependence of the Fourth Gospel upon the Synoptics, Louvain, 1971, 3 vols.; Johan Konings, Het johan- neïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek: Historiek – Dossier van Joh., i–x – Redactiestudie van Joh., vi,1-21, Louvain, 1972, 3 vols. See also Joël Delobel, Johannes en Lukas: Het pro- bleem van hun onderlinge verhouding in de hedendaagse exegese (“Licentiaatsverhandeling Godgeleerdheid”), Louvain, 1964. 13. Maurits Sabbe, Studia Neotestamentica: Collected Essays, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 108 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1991).

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of the thesis of John’s dependence on the Synoptics.”14 Indeed, from his overview of 1990 it would appear that “an increasing number of scholars have come to accept that John knew and used the Synoptics, at least for some part, especially in the passion and resurrection narratives.”15 This was clearly conﬁ rmed during the “Carrefour” at the end of the Collo- quium by no one else but D. M. Smith: “The consensus [on the independence of John] is gone.”16

2. A Survey of Some Recent Trends in Johannine Source and Redaction Criticism (a) The hypothesis that John is dependent on the Synoptic Gospels was defended in Halle-Wittenberg by U. Schnelle (1992, 1998)17 and his students, M. Lang (1999) and M. Labahn (1999, 2000). M. Lang studied the passion narrative and reached the conclusion that John used particularly Mark and, to a lesser extent, Luke.18 M. Labahn has concen- trated more on the Johannine tradition underlying the miracle narratives, and acknowledges inﬂ uences from the Synoptics on the level of the “second” oral transmission: the continued narration of the Synoptic miracle stories inﬂ uenced the Johannine miracle narratives.19 (b) Studies on the similarities and differences between John and the Synoptic Gospels usually assume that Mark was written about 70, Matthew

14. Frans Neirynck, “John and the Synoptics: 1975-1990,” John and the Synoptics, 3-62, esp. p. 3; = id., Evangelica III, 3-64, esp. p. 3. 15. Adelbert Denaux, “Introduction,” John and the Synoptics, xiii. 16. Ibid. 17. Udo Schnelle, “Johannes und die Synoptiker,” The Four Gospels 1992: Fest- schrift Frans Neirynck, ed. Frans Van Segbroeck, Christopher M. Tuckett, Gilbert Van Belle, Joseph Verheyden, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 100 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1992) III: 1799-1814; id., Das Evangelium nach Johannes, Theologischer Handkommentar zum Neuen Testament, 4 (Leipzig: Evange- lische Verlagsanstalt, 1998, 22000); id., “Theologie als kreative Sinnbildung: Johannes als Weiterbildung von Paulus und Markus,” Johannes-Evangelium – Mitte oder Rand des Kanons?, 119-145. On Udo Schnelle and Manfred Lang (see below), see Frans Neirynck, “John and the Synoptics in Recent Commentaries,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses 74 (1998) 386-397; = id., Evangelica III, 601-615. 18. Manfred Lang, Johannes und die Synoptiker: Eine redaktionsgeschichtliche Ana- lyse von Joh 18–20 vor dem markinischen und lukanischen Hintergrund, Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments, 182 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999). 19. Michael Labahn, Jesus als Lebensspender: Untersuchungen zu einer Geschichte der johanneischen Tradition anhand ihrer Wundergeschichten, Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft, 98 (Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1999); id., Offenbarung in Zeichen und Wort: Untersuchungen zur Vorgeschichte von Joh 6,1-25a und seiner Rezeption in der Brotrede, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testa- ment, 2/117 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000).

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and Luke in the 80s, and that the Gospel of John, as “Fourth Gospel,” is to be dated after 90. Some authors consider an earlier date for John.20 In his Redating the New Testament (1976), J. A. T. Robinson places the ﬁ nal form of the Gospel of John at about 65 and dates the Synoptics to between 50 and 60.21 Later, in his posthumously published The Priority of John (1985),22 he takes his point of departure in the statements of P. Gardner-Smith and C. H. Dodd. He wishes to assert the “priority” of John and claims that the testimony of John is not secondary to the Syn- optic Gospels. In a similar way, K. Berger (1997) defends that the Fourth Gospel must be dated before 70, and would thus have come into existence at the same time as the Gospel of Mark.23 In Berger’s view, this would hold an important consequence: in this way, the Fourth Gospel becomes an authentic witness of the early transmission of Jesus. (c) The priority of the Gospel of John is also on the agenda of authors who claim that the Gospel of Luke was inﬂ uenced by the Gospel of John. For instance, B. Shellard defended this view in 1995. Along the lines of the studies by F. L. Cribbs (1971, 1973, 1979),24 she concluded “Luke knew and used John and not vice versa.”25 R. Morgan (2003), who studied the theological relation between the gospels of John and

20. For the theory supporting an earlier date for the Gospel of John, see also Hubert Edwin Edwards, The Disciple Who Wrote These Things: A New Inquiry into the Origins and Historical Value of the Gospel according to St. John (London: Clarke, 1953); B. P. W. Stather Hunt, Some Johannine Problems (London: Skefﬁ ngton, 1958); T. C. Smith, Jesus in the Gospel of John (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1959). 21. John A. T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament (London: SCM Press, 1976). 22. Id., The Priority of John, ed. J. F. Coakley (London: SCM Press, 1985); see also J. F. Coakley, “Some Thoughts on the Priority of John,” Mowbrays Journal 123 (1985) 1-2. 23. Klaus Berger, Im Anfang war Johannes: Datierung und Theologie des vierten Evangeliums (Stuttgart: Quell, 1997; 2nd ed., Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2003); see also id., Sind die Berichte des Neuen Testaments wahr? Ein Weg zum Verstehen der Bibel (Gütersloh: Kaiser, 2002); id., “Neue Argumente für die Frühdatierung des Johannesevangeliums,” Für und wider und Priorität des Johannesevangeliums: Symposium in Salzburg am 10. März 2000, ed. Peter L. Hofrichter, Theologische Texte und Studien, 9 (Hildesheim/Zürich/New York: Olms, 2003) 59-72. 24. F. Lamar Cribbs, “A Reassessment of the Date of Origin and the Destination of the Gospel of John,” Journal of Biblical Literature 89 (1970) 38-55; id., “St. Luke and the Johannine Tradition,” Journal of Biblical Literature 90 (1971) 422-450; id., “A Study of the Contacts That Exist Between St. Luke and St. John,” Society of Biblical Literature: 1973 Seminar Papers, vol. II, ed. George MacRae (Cambridge, MA: Scholars Press, 1973) 1-93; id., “The Agreements That Exist Between St. Luke and St. John,” Society of Bibli- cal Literature: 1979 Seminar Papers, vol. II, ed. Paul J. Achtemeier (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1979) 215-261. 25. Barbara Shellard, “The Relationship of Luke and John: A Fresh Look at an Old Problem,” Journal of Theological Studies 46 (1995) 71-98, esp. p. 98; = Für und wider die Priorität des Johannesevangeliums, 256-279, p. 279.

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Luke, also concluded that Luke was written last. Where Luke normally follows Mark, Luke then also consulted the Gospel of John and Matthew, and where he found their information faulty, criticised and corrected it.26 Concerning the passion narrative, R. Matson (1998) emphasises that Luke interprets the Gospel of Mark under the infl uence of the Gospel of John.27 (d) The continued interest in the “signs source” in the USA does not need to be demonstrated. Within the scope of historical Jesus research, we fi nd one variant of the “signs source”28 in the work of J. D. Crossan (1991), who places “an early miracles collection embedded in Mark and John, with a fi vefold sequence” amongst the sources for the reconstruction of the life of Jesus. The following material is assigned to the source Jn 5:1-18; 6:1-15, 16-21; 9:1-7; 11:1-57; cf. Mk 2:1-12; 6:33-44, 45-52; 8:22-26; and Secret Mark.29 One year later R. T. Fortna provided a reconstruction of the Signs Gospel in The Complete Gospels (1992).30 More recently, along with T. Thatcher, he published a collection

26. Robert Morgan, “The Priority of John over Luke,” Für und wider die Priorität des Johannesevangeliums, 195-211. 27. Mark A. Matson, In Dialogue with Another Gospel? The Infl uence of the Fourth Gospel on the Passion Narrative of the Gospel of Luke, SBL Dissertation Series, 178 (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 1998) 444: “In short, my assessment of the relationship, based on a careful analysis of the text, is that it is very reasonable to read Luke as having used John in addition to Mark.” By the same author: “The Temple Incident: An Integral Element in the Fourth Gospel’s Narrative,” Jesus in Johannine Tradition, ed. Robert T. Fortna & Tom Thatcher (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001) 145-153; John, Interpretation: Bible Studies (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002) 2-3; “The Infl uence of John on Luke’s Passion: Toward a Theory of Inter- gospel Dialogue,” Für und wider die Priorität des Johannesevangeliums, 183-194. 28. On the signs source, see below, n. 81. 29. John Dominic Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jew- ish Peasant (San Francisco, CA: Harper, 1991) 310-313, 429. Regarding Jn 6:1-15, 16-21 (Mk 6:33-44, 45-52), cf. p. 407: “the order of meal and sea in the Miracles Source used by Mark and John may have been reversed…” On the signs source, see also p. 429. On the Secret Gospel of Mark, see also Crossan’s Four Other Gospels: Shadows on the Contours of Canon (Minneapolis, MN: Winston Press, 1985) 91-121, esp. pp. 104-106. On Crossan, see Frans Neirynck, “The Historical Jesus: Refl ections on an Inventory,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses 70 (1994) 231-234, p. 225; = id., Evangelica III, 631-647, p. 636 (against Crossan, The Historical Jesus, 1991, 312): “However, Crossan’s argument is extremely weak: ‘That common sequence could, of course, be sheer coinci- dence, but, at least hypothetically, I hold on to it as the only evidence we have for early collections of miracles…’ (312). It is rather amusing that he sees redaction of the fi nal author in 2,11 and 4,54 (editorial backwards linking, like 21,14) and so doing excludes from the collection the two Cana miracles which are the classic starting point of all Signs Source hypotheses.” See also Neirynck, “John and the Synoptics: 1975-1990,” 50-51 n. 228; = id., Evangelica III, 51-52 n. 228. 30. Robert T. Fortna, “Signs Gospel,” The Complete Gospels: Annotated Scholars Version, ed. Robert J. Miller (Sonoma, CA: Polebridge Press, 1992) 175-193.

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of studies entitled, Jesus in Johannine Tradition (2001), in which four articles on the “Signs Source” appear.31 We continue to have reservations, along with S. S. Smalley (2003), about the existence of such a source, and support his criticism.32

3. History in John? Now, post 1990, how is the historical reliability of the Gospel of John assessed? I start by considering two extreme positions, that of M. Casey (1996) on the one hand and C. L. Blomberg (2001) on the other.33 For Casey, hardly any historical accuracy can be found in the gospel; on the other hand, Blomberg argues that the gospel is fundamentally historically accurate. On the question: “Is John’s Gospel true?” M. Casey provides an unambiguous answer: “The Fourth Gospel is profoundly untrue. It consists to a large extent of inaccurate stories and words wrongly attributed to people. It is anti-Jewish, and as holy scripture it has been used to legiti- mate outbreaks of Christian anti-Semitism. A cultural defence is therefore inadequate.” 34 In his book, “The Historical Reliability of John’s Gospel,”

31. Tom Thatcher, “The Signs Gospel in Context,” Jesus in Johannine Tradition, 191-197; Robert T. Fortna, “Jesus Tradition in the Signs Gospel,” ibid., 199-208; Tom Felton & Tom Thatcher, “Stylometry and the Signs Gospel,” ibid., 209-218; Sara C. Winter, “Little Flags: The Scope and Reconstruction of the Signs Source,” ibid., 219-235. 32. Stephen S. Smalley, in Journal of Theological Studies 54 (2003) 248-250, esp. pp. 248-249: “The uncertainties contained in this literary excavation still remain, in my view, too numerous to allow it to act as a fi rm foundation for the hypothesis which has been built upon it by such scholars. The sources used by the fourth evangelist, especially if he were tapping traditions beneath all four Gospels, are presumably more fl uid than a supposed and fi xed ‘Signs document’ … might embrace. In the same way, even if the methods of stylometry may be a very sophisticated means of measuring the quantifi able literary characteristics of a document, an ancient text like the Fourth Gospel, as Felton and Thatcher admit, challenges the fi nal results because of the very fl exibility of the author’s approach to his work. So what, I wonder, would John have made of the claim that he was writing according to a ‘univariate linear model’…?” 33. Maurice Casey, Is John’s Gospel True? (London/New York: Routledge, 1996); Craig L. Blomberg, The Historical Reliability of John’s Gospel (Leicester: InterVarsity Press, 2001). 34. Casey, Is John’s Gospel True?, 229. Compare pp. 2-3: “Historical inaccuracies may be explained on cultural grounds, so they do not necessarily entail that this Gospel is devoid of spiritual insight, or unfi t to be sacred scripture. Two related points are more serious. Firstly, the Fourth Gospel is vigorously anti-Jewish. This is understandable, but it is nonetheless a basic fact which makes it unsuitable, for too much veneration. What is worse, this Gospel has fostered Christian anti-Semitism. Its anti-Jewish polemic is moreover closely associated with the deity of Jesus. This breaches Jewish monotheism, monotheism which was part of the identity of Jesus of Nazareth and of all the fi rst apostles. The answer to the title of this hook is therefore: ‘No’. The Gospel attributed to John does not give a truthful account of Jesus of Nazareth, nor of his ministry, nor of the Jewish people.”

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Blomberg responds to Casey as follows: “Rather, in answering the question raised by the title of his book, one may affi rm with considerable confi dence that John’s Gospel is true – not merely theologically (as, e.g. Barrett and Lindars) but also historically.”35 Blomberg indicates that “the distinctives of John’s Gospel” from the Synoptic Gospels can be summa- rised in fi ve points: “First, there is John’s selection of material. Second, John’s theological distinctives prove striking. Third, John’s chronology appears to contradict the Synoptics’ outline. Fourth, other apparent historical discrepancies appear. Finally, John’s style of writing differs markedly from the Synoptics.”36 He states that, in light of these characteristics of the Fourth Gospel, we should not be surprised if “contemporary historical Jesus research pays scant attention to John.”37 There are, however, several commentaries and articles in which “a substantial amount of historicity in the Fourth Gospel” is assumed.38

35. Blomberg, The Historical Reliability of John’s Gospel, 294. 36. Ibid., 19-20. 37. Ibid., 20. He refers to Ed Parish Sanders, Jesus and Judaism (London/Philadel- phia, PA: SCM/Fortress, 1985; Ben Witherington, III, The Christology of Jesus (Cam- bridge: Lutterworth, 1995); Crossan, The Historical Jesus; John P. Meier, A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus. Vol. One: The Roots of the Problem and the Person, The Anchor Bible Reference Library (New York: Doubleday, 1991); Nicholas Thomas Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God (London/Minneapolis, MN: SPCK/Fortress, 1996). Gerd Theissen & Annette Merz, The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide, trans. John Bowden (London: SCM, 1998) (German original: 1996). 38. Blomberg makes three remarks suggesting that “the evidence for John’s cred- ibility may not be quite so sparse” (The Historical Reliability of John’s Gospel, 20-21). First, sight should not be lost of the numerous similarities between John and the Syn- optics. Second, the following authors have each shown in their own way that the Gos- pel of John is “more historically reliable than previously thought:” John A. T. Robinson (1959, 1985), Charles H. Dodd (1963), Dwight Moody Smith (1993) (for these three authors, see above, notes 5, and 22), James H. Charlesworth, “The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Gospel according to John,” Exploring the Gospel of John: In Honor of D. Moody Smith, ed. R. Alan Culpepper & C. Clifton Black (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996) 65-97, esp. p. 90; Gary M. Burge, Interpreting the Fourth Gospel, Guides to New Testament Exegesis, 5 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1992) 27. Third, there are several commentaries and articles in which “a substantial amount of historicity in the Fourth Gospel” is assumed. Blomberg refers on the one hand to Frederick Fyvie Bruce, The Gospel of John: Introduction, Exposition and Notes (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerd- mans, 1983); J. Ramsey Michaels, John, New International Biblical Commentary, 4 (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1989); George Raymond Beasley-Murray, John, Word Biblical Commentary, 36 (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1987); Donald A. Carson, The Gospel according to John (Leicester/Grand Rapids, MI: InterVarsity Press/Eerdmans, 1991); John W. Pryor, John: Evangelist of the Covenant People. The Narrative and Themes of the Fourth Gospel (London: Darton, 1992); Leon Morris, The Gospel according to John: Revised edition, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995); Ben Witherington, III, John’s Wisdom: A Com- mentary on the Fourth Gospel (Cambridge: Lutterworth, 1995); Gerard L. Borchert, John, vol. I, New American Commentary (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman,

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4. John and the Third Quest In order to illustrate how the Gospel of John is applied to historical Jesus research two examples will sufﬁ ce. The question, “Whether the Gospel of John likewise offers an independent source of knowledge about Jesus alongside of Mark and Q?,” according to J. P. Meier (1991), is “still hotly debated.” 39 He describes in uncomplicated but impressive terms how this question was answered in Johannine exegesis in the past centuries40 and explicitly rejects the point of view of Neirynck. He places the Gospel of John amongst the most important sources in the search for the historical Jesus. He states: “In my opinion, however, scholars like Dodd and Brown have the better part of the argument. The Johannine presentation of Jesus’ ministry is just too massively different to be derived from the Synoptics; and even where John does parallel the Synoptics, the strange mixture and erratic pattern of agreements and disagreements are best explained by a stream of tradition similar to, but independent of, the

1985); Herman Nicolaas Ridderbos, Het evangelie naar Johannes: Proeve van een theologische exegese. I. Hoofdstuk 1–10. II. Hoofdstuk 11–21 (Kampen: Kok, 1987, 1992); Andreas J. Köstenberger, Encountering John: The Gospel in Historical, Literary and Theological Perspective (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1999); Rodney A. Whitacre, John (Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 1999). On the other hand he mentions the contributions of Donald A. Carson, “Historical Tradition in the Fourth Gospel: After Dodd, What,” Gospel Perspectives, vol. II, ed. Robert T. France & David Wenham (Shefﬁ eld: JSOT, 1981) 83-145; E. Earle Ellis, “Background and Christology of John’s Gospel: Selected Motifs,” Southwestern Journal of Theology 31 (1988) 24-31; id., “Background and Christology of John’s Gospel,” Perspectives on John: Method and Interpretation in the Fourth Gospel, ed. Robert B. Sloan & Mikeal C. Parsons, NABPR Special Studies Series, 11 (Lewiston, NY/Queenston/Lampeter, Mellen, 1993) 1-25; Moisés Silva, “Approaching the Fourth Gospel,” Criswell Theological Review 3 (1988-89) 17-29; A. García-Moreno, “Autenti- cidad y historicidad del IV Evangelio,” Scripta Theologica 23 (1991) 13-67; Stephen Barton, “The Believer, the Historian and the Fourth Gospel,” Theology 96 (1993) 289- 302; Craig L. Blomberg, “To What Extent Is John Historically Reliable?,” Perspectives on John, 27-56; Thomas D. Lea, “The Reliability of History in John’s Gospel,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 38 (1995) 387-402; Marianne Meye Thompson, “The Historical Jesus and the Johannine Christ,” Exploring the Gospel of John, 21-42; David Wenham, “The Enigma of the Fourth Gospel,” Tyndale Bulletin 48 (1997) 149- 178; id., “A Historical View of John’s Gospel,” Themelios 23 (1998) 5-21; A. de la Fuente, “Trasfondo cultural del cuarto evangelio: Sobre el ocaso del dilema judaísmo/ gnosticismo,” Estudios Bíblicos 56 (1998). 491-506; Francis J. Moloney, “The Fourth Gospel and the Jesus of History,” New Testament Studies 46 (2000) 42-58. 39. Meier, A Marginal Jew, I: 44. 40. Ibid.: “Early in this century it was largely taken for granted that John knew and used the Synoptic Gospels. P. Gardner-Smith challenged that view in 1938, claiming that John represented an independent tradition. This position was worked out in detail by C. H. Dodd and was accepted by such major commentators as Raymond Brown, Rudolf Schnackenburg, and Ernst Haenchen. It is probably the majority opinion today, but by no means the unanimous one. For instance, the great Louvain exegete Frans Neirynck holds that John is dependent on Mark, Matthew, and Luke.”

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Synoptics. In short, our survey of the Four Gospels gives us three sepa- rate major sources to work with: Mark, Q and John.”41 P. Fredriksen (2000) refers the Gospel of John continuously in her book, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.42 According to her, the choice between the sources for the life of Jesus is not between one gospel (Jn) versus three (Mt, Mk, Lk), but rather between one (Jn) and one (Mk), because Matthew and Luke are dependent on Mark. She assumes that regarding the events after the arrest of Jesus, preference should be given to the Johannine version above the Synoptic story. 43

5. Conclusion We conclude the ﬁ rst section with the assertion that in recent exegesis the Gospel of John has indeed been used as a source for the reconstruction of the life of Jesus. Nevertheless, I am not so conﬁ dent that we can speak of a “Return of John to Jesus Research,” as D. M. Smith (2003) claims.44 Even in the period of “No Quest,” Bultmann indicated that certain facts in the Gospel of John are historical, but this does not imply that we therefore meet the historical Jesus.45

41. Meier, A Marginal Jew, I: 44. See also pp. 174-175: “The criterion of multiple attestation (or ‘the cross section’) focuses on those sayings or deeds of Jesus that are attested in more than one independent literary source (e.g., Mark, Q, Paul, John) and/ or in more than one literary form or genre (e.g., parable, dispute story, miracle story, prophecy, aphorism). The force of this criterion is increased if a given motif or theme is found in both different literary sources and different literary forms. One reason that critics so readily afﬁ rm that Jesus did speak in same sense of the kingdom of God (or kingdom of heaven) is that the phrase is found in Mark, Q, special Matthean tradition, special Lucan tradition, and John, with echoes in Paul, despite the fact that ‘kingdom of God’ is not Paul’s preferred way of speaking;” p. 189 n. 29: “Once again I must stress that I do not accept the a priori exclusion of John from consideration as a possible source for knowledge of the historical Jesus.” 42. Paula Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews: A Jewish Life and the Emergence of Christianity (London: Macmillan Publishers, 2000) 34. 43. Ibid., 223-224. 44. See the title of one of the sections (p. 3) in his unpublished paper entitled “John a Source for Jesus?” delivered at the “John, Jesus, and History Consultation” during the 2003 SBL Annual Meeting SBL Meeting in Atlanta, GA. 45. Bultmann, Kerygma und Mythos, vol. I, p. 133: “Weder Paulus noch Johannes vermitteln eine geschichtliche Begegnung mit dem geschichtlichen Jesus.” In Jesus, Die Unsterblichen, 1 (Berlin: Deutsche Bibliothek, 1925) 13, Rudolf Bultmann notes: “Das Johannesevangelium kommt als Quelle für die Verkündigung Jesu wohl überhaupt nicht in Betracht und ist deshalb in der folgenden Darstellung gar nicht berücksichtigt worden.” Later in “Johannesevangelium,” Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart 3 (31959) 840-850, esp. cc. 841-842, he writes: “Die Entfernung von der Geschichte Jesu und der Urgemeinde schliesst nicht aus, dass das J[ohannesevangelium] im einzelnen zu verlässige historische Daten erhalten hat. Dazu gehören zwar nicht die Festreisen Jesu, die nur ein redaktionelles Mittel zur Gliederung des Stoffes sind, wohl aber sehr wahrscheinlich

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II. John and Historicity in the Nineteenth Century

1. The question concerning the historical reliability of the Fourth Gospel is not new46 and is closely connected with the so-called “Johannine question.” In general, one could say that the Johannine question has to do with the origin of the gospel, the identity of the author and whether the author was an eyewitness. But, moreover, it also concerns the question: How is it possible that a gospel that claims to be the account of an eyewitness could differ so much from the Synoptic Gospels? The Johannine question has stimulated heated debates amongst exegetes, and one could write a compelling history about it which could commence with the Probabilia of C. G. Bretschneider (1820).47 He doubts the originality of the Fourth Gospel on external and internal grounds and emphasises

die Datierung der Kreuzigung Jesu auf den 14. Nisan statt auf den 15. wie bei den Syn- optikern. In den zahlreichen Ortsangaben, die eine gewisse Kenntnis Palästinas verraten, spiegelt sich vermutlich die Geschichte des alten palästinischen Christentums wider.” See also Johannes, 353-354 n. 6; = John, 465 n. 1: “Nor is the historical question, which of the two datings is correct (perhaps the Johannine), of any importance for the interpretation of John.” See also Rudolf Bultmann, “Das Verhältnis der urchristlichen Christus- botschaft zum historischen Jesus,” Sitzungsberichte Heidelberger Akademie Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Klasse, 3. Abhandlung (1960) 9; = id., Exegetica: Aufsätze zur Erforschung des Neuen Testaments, ed. Erich Dinkler (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1969) 445-469, p. 450: “Johannes betont mit allem Nachdruck die Menschheit Jesu, gibt aber keinen der Züge der Menschlichkeit Jesu wieder, die etwa den synoptischen Evangelien zu entnehmen waren.” In parenthesis I wish to quote a signifi cant footnote in Bultmann’s commentary. Regarding the wine miracle he notes: “The question whether the Evangelist believed the miracle to have been an actual historical occurrence may not, it seems to me, be answered so obviously in the affi rmative as usually happens; but here we may leave it on one side;” cf. Bultmann, Johannes, 83 n. 4; = John, 119 n. 2. 46. For this historical survey, we made use of Albert Schweitzer, Geschichte der Leben-Jesu-Forschung. Zweite, neu bearbeitete und vermehrte Aufl age des Werkes Von Reimarus zu Wrede (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1913); English translation: The Quest of the Historical Jesus, fi rst complete edition, ed. John Bowden (London: SCM, 2000); Eugène Jacquier, Histoire des livres du Nouveau Testament. IV. Les écrits johanniques (Paris: Lecoffre, 31908, 51923); Maurice Goguel, Introduction au Nouveau Testament. II. Le quatrième évangile (Paris: Leroux, 1923); Wilbert F. Howard, The Fourth Gospel in Recent Criticism and Interpretation (London: Epworth Press, 1931, 21935, 31945, 41955 [rev., ed. C. K. Barrett]); Windisch, Johannes und die Synoptiker; Sigge, Das Johannesevangelium und die Synoptiker; E. D. Johnston, A Re-examination of the Relation of the Fourth Gospel to the Synoptics, diss. Southern Baptist Seminary, Louisville, KY, 1955; Blinzler, Johannes und die Synoptiker; Werner Georg Kümmel, Das Neue Testament: Geschichte der Erforschung seiner Probleme, Orbis Academicus: Problemgeschichten der Wissenschaft in Doku- menten und Darstellungen (Freiburg: Alber, 1958); Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple; Konings, Het johanneïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek; Smith, John among the Gospels; Schmithals, Johannesevangelium und Johannesbriefe. 47. Carolus Theophilus Bretschneider, Probabilia de evangelii et epistolarum Joan- nis apostoli, indole et origine eruditorum judiciis modeste subjecit… (Leipzig: Sumptibus J. A. Barthii, 1820). See among others Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, I: 1-2.

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more pertinently than his predecessors48 that one cannot hold as true both the image of Christ of the Gospel of John and that of the Synoptics.49 Bretschneider insisted that the author of the Fourth Gospel could not have been an eyewitness. In the discourses placed in the mouth of Christ we ﬁ nd clearly the views of the evangelist, who is engaged in a contro- versy against the Jews and is defending Christianity. The external witnesses are either imprecise or far too recent. Bretschneider does not dare to identify the sources John used with the Synoptic Gospels.50 2. Bretschneider’s criticisms safely restored the originality and authenticity of the Fourth Gospel. But it was especially F. D. E. Schleier- macher (1845)51 who claimed that the Gospel of John was the oldest of

48. Bretschneider refers on p. vi n.* to Erhard Friedrich Vogel, Der Evangelist Johannes und seine Ausleger vor dem jüngsten Gericht, 2 vols. (Hof: Grau, 1801; 1804); Georg Konrad Horst, “Über einige anscheinende Widersprüche in dem Evangelium des Johannis in Absicht auf den Logos, oder das Höhere in Christo,” Museum für Religions- wissenschaft in ihrem ganzen Umfange 1 (1804) 20-46; by the same author: “Lässt sich die Ächtheit des johanneischen Evangeliums aus hinlänglichen Gründen bezweifeln, und welches ist der wahrscheinliche Ursprung dieser Schrift?,” Museum für Religionswissenschaft in ihrem ganzen Umfange 1 (1804) 47-118; Herman Heimart Cludius, Uransichten des Christenthums nebst Untersuchungen über einige Bücher des Neuen Testaments (Altona: Ham- merich 1808); H. C. Ballenstedt, Philo und Johannes, oder neue philosophisch-kritische Untersuchung des Logos beym Johannes nach dem Philo, nebt einer Erklärung und Übersetzung des ersten Briefes Johannes aus der geweiheten Sprache des Hierophanten (Braunschweig: F. B. Culemann, 1802); id., Philo und Johannes, oder fortgesetzte Anwendung des Philo zur Interpretation des Johanneischen Schriften, mit besonderer Hinsicht auf die Frage: Ob Johannes der Verfasser der ihm zugeschriebenen Schriften sein könne (Göttingen: H. Dieterich, 1812). 49. Bretschneider, Probabilia, vii, 113. 50. Ibid., 66: “Quos autem libros habuerit, et an non scripta magis traditione quam scripta usus fuerit, deﬁ nire non potest. … Putaverim potius, illum nostra evangelia non habuisse, quia alioquin Jesu sermonibus in iis conscriptis, quodam modo saltem usum esset, seque ad illos accomodasset, neque vero etiam his libris toties contradixisset.” 51. Schleiermacher is presumed to be reacting against Bretschneider in “Erläute- rungen zur fünften Rede” in the third edition (1831) of his Über die Religion: “Nichts verräth wol weniger Sinn für das Wesen des Christenthums sowol, und für die Person Christi selbst, als auch überhaupt historischen Sinn und Verstand davon, wodurch grosse Ereignisse zu Stande kommen, und wie diejenigen müssen beschaffen sein, in denen solche ihren wirklichen Grund haben, als die Ansicht, welche sonst etwas leise auftrat mit der Behauptung, Johannes habe den Reden Christi viel Fremdes beigemischt von seinem eignen; jezt aber, nachdem sie sich in der Stille gestärkt und sich mit kritischen Waffen versehen hat, eine derbere Behauptung wagt, dass Johannes das Evangelium gar nicht geschrieben, sondern dass erst ein Späterer diesen mystischen Christus erfunden.” In the critical edition of 1995, G. Meckenstock (p. 309) refers to the Probabilia and comments: “Vielleicht denkt Schleiermacher auch an Hermann Heimart Cludius, … 1808, und an [Erhard Friedrich Vogel] …, 1801-1804; beide Werke erwarb Schleierma- cher im November 1820 wohl für seine im Wintersemester 1820/21 gehalte Vorlesung ‘Das Evangelium Johannis’.” See Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, Über die Religion – Monologen, ed. Günter Meckenstock, Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Abt. 1: Schriften und Entwürfe, 12 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1995).

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the gospels and that it was the account of an eyewitness.52 According to him, the Gospel of John was the only gospel that can be harmonised with his Glaubenslehre. Not only does Schleiermacher defend the authenticity, but he also maintains that John did not know the Synoptic Gospels nor could he know them because they were written later.53 The chronological order, according to Schleiermacher, is: John – Matthew – Luke – Mark. Mark knows Matthew and Luke. In his Vorlesungen über das Leben Jesu, held at the University of Berlin in 1832 and published posthumously (1864)54, the Gospel of John plays a prominent role.55 Similarly, K. A. Hase (1829) argued that John the only reliable witness.56 His miracle stories are based on autopsy.57 After evaluating the different sources for the “life of Jesus,” the author gives preference to the Gospel of John (written by the apostle John), then Matthew (a gospel that can be traced to an Aramaic text written by the apostle), and then Mark and Luke.58 F. Bleek (1862)

52. Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, Einleitung ins Neue Testament (Berlin: Reimer, 1845) 317: “überall als ein von einem unmittelbaren Augenzeugen herrührendes darstellt.” 53. Ibid.: “Johannes von unsern drei Evangelien nichts gewusst hat und Nichts wissen konnte, da sie in ihrer gegenwärtigen Gestalt nur später können entstanden sein, als das des Johannes.” 54. Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, Vorlesungen über das Leben Jesu, ed. K. A. Rütenik (Berlin: Reimer, 1864). 55. Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, 59-60, writes on these lectures: “From the fi rst it was no favourable star which presided over this undertaking. It is true that in 1819 Schleiermacher was the fi rst theologian who had ever lectured upon this subject. But his Life of Jesus did not appear until 1864. Its publication had been so long delayed, partly because it had to be reconstructed from students’ notebooks, partly because immediately after Schleiermacher had delivered the course for the last time, in 1832, it was rendered obsolete by the work of Strauss. For the questions raised by the latter’s Life of Jesus, published in 1835, Schleiermacher had no answer, and for the wounds which it made, no healing. When, in 1864, Schleiermacher’s work was put on view like an embalmed corpse, Strauss accorded the dead work of the great theologian a dignifi ed and striking funeral oration.” Schweitzer refers to David Friedrich Strauss, Der Christus des Glaubens und der Jesus der Geschichte: Eine Kritik des Schleiermacherschen Lebens Jesu (Berlin: Duncker, 1865). 56. Karl August Hase, Das Leben Jesu zunächst für akademische Studien (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1829, 21835, 51865). 57. Along with Schleiermacher, Hase belongs to Rationalism. Both are unable to free themselves from rational explanations of the miracles, but more than the truly rational, they dare to ask questions. Schweizer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, 57: “Here crops up the dangerous antirationalistic intellectual supernaturalism which sometimes brings Hase and Schleiermacher very close to the frontiers of the territory occupied by the disingenuous reactionaries.” Concerning the resurrection, Hase claims that no con- vincing proof for the actual death can be provided, because nowhere is the decay of the corpse mentioned, which is a specifi c sign of death. Thus, it is possible that the resur- rected re-entered life from an apparent death. But from the sources, it must be concluded that a supernatural event took place. Faith can be reconciled in both views.” 58. Hase, Das Leben Jesu, 2. See also 5: “Bei den Verschiedenheiten des äusseren Verlaufs hat Johannes das Vorrecht des Augenzeugen.” Hase later reviewed his opinion.

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to some degree took up the views of Schleiermacher. He argues for the apostolic origin of the Gospel of John and that Mark is the last of the canonical gospels. In line with J. J. Griesbach, but also to a further extent, Bleek defends the position that Mark used Matthew, Luke and John.59 The Gospel of Matthew was written about 70, clearly precedes John and was used by John.60 Like Schleiermacher, Bleek emphasises the historical value of the Gospel of John to the detriment of the Synoptic Gospels.61 Mark is hardly of any historical value.62 Bleek prefers the Johannine chronology above the chronology in the Synoptics.63 Later, ignorant of the previous investigations of Schleiermacher and Bleek, O. Wuttig (1897) and K. Bornhäuser (1928) also argued for an early date for the origin of the Fourth Gospel. According to O. Wuttig the apostle John wrote the Fourth Gospel by 62-63 in Phoenicia or Syria with the purpose of proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah.64 In K. Bornhäuser’s view, the terminus ad quem of the composition of the gospel is by the year 70 and the gospel was written by John the apostle to serve as a mission book for the conversion of Israel.65 3. Apostolic authenticity of the Gospel of John was generally accepted before 1820.66 After Bretschneider threatened the apostolic authenticity in his Probabilia, the publication of D. F. Strauss’s Leben Jesu (1835-36)67

In Geschichte Jesu: Nach akademischen Vorlesungen (Leipzig: Vlg. Breitkopf & Härtel, 1876), he defends that the Fourth Gospel was written by a disciple of the apostle. 59. Friedrich Bleek, Einleitung in das Neue Testament, Einleitung in die Heilige Schrift, 2 (Berlin: Reimer, 41886 [ed. Wilhelm Mangold]), 186-206. 60. Ibid., 401: “Hier is nun aber zuvördest das Marcus-Evangelium auszunehmen, da dieses höchst wahrscheinlich erst nach dem Johanneischen geschrieben sei; bei Lucas-Ev. lässt sich schwerlich sicher entscheiden, ob es vorher oder nachher verfasst ist, … Mit grösserer Wahrscheinlichkeit lässt sich dies vom Matthäusev. vermuthen.” 61. Ibid., 401. 62. Ibid., 234. 63. Ibid., 299, 303. 64. O. Wuttig, Das Johanneische Evangelium und seine Abfassungszeit: Andeutungen zu einer veränderten Datierung des vierten Evangeliums (Leipzig: A. Deichert, 1897) 122- 123. The Synoptic Gospels (and John 21) were written A.D. 70 with the intention, particularly Luke, of supplementing the Fourth Gospel; cf. Wuttig, Das Johanneische Evangelium und seine Abfassungszeit, 96-102. See the reaction to the thesis of Wuttig, by Hermann Gebhardt, Die Abfassungszeit des Johannes-Evangeliums (Leipzig: A. Deichert, 1906). 65. Karl Bornhäuser, Das Johannesevangelium, eine Missionsschrift für Israel, Bei- träge zur Förderung christlicher Theologie, II, 15 (Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1928) 163, 172. 66. Reference could be made to the commentaries of J. Maldonatus (1596), F. Toletus (1603), A. Calmet (1715) and F. A. Lampe (1724-1726). 67. David Friedrich Strauss, Das Leben Jesu kritisch bearbeitet, 2 vols. (Tübingen: Osiander, 1835, 1836).

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caused a new storm.68 According to Strauss, the Gospel of John had its origin in the mythical symbolic power of the early Christian “Gemein- sage,” and therefore was not the work of an eyewitness. He indicates, along with his predecessors, that the external witnesses are insufﬁ cient in proving the apostolic origin of the gospel. Thus, nothing hinders a mythical interpretation of the Johannine narratives. The interpretation of Johannine discourses appears to be a complex undertaking. Strauss observes that the discourses of Jesus in the Gospel of John are similar to the discourses of John the Baptist, the First Letter and the words of the evangelist himself.69 Moreover, the discourses differ so much from the words of Jesus in the Synoptics concerning form, style and content, that one could only claim either the one or the other as authentic.70 Principles of the original teachings of Jesus can be traced in the Gospel of John, but then “in alexandrinischem oder überhaupt hellenistischem Geistes weitergebildet.”71 Strauss indicates, with a reference to Bretschneider, that the discourses in John revolve around the person of Jesus and his higher nature, resulting in a one-sided dogmatism in the Johannine discourses as compared to the theoretical practical content of the Synoptic discourses. Therefore, according to Strauss we have “an den johanneischen Reden Jesu im Ganzen freie Compositionen des Evangelisten” before us.72 Authors like B. Bauer (1841-42, 1850-51), F. C. Baur (1844, 1847), A. Hilgenfeld (1849, 1854, 1868, 1875) and C. Weizsäcker (1864) further broke down the arguments in favour of the apostolic origin and defended the dependence of John on the Synoptics.73 Several commentaries were

68. Through the authority of Schleiermacher, the authenticity of the Gospel of John is defended, but a new storm is announced. Cf. Schweizer, The Quest of the His- torical Jesus, 80-81: “It is true that, at the end of the eighteenth century, some doubts as to the authenticity of this Gospel had been expressed and Bretschneider, the famous rationalist General Superintendent at Gotha (1776-1848), had made a tentative collection of them in his Probabilia. The work made some stir at the time. But Schleiermacher threw the aegis of his authority over the authenticity of the Gospel, and it was the favourite Gospel of the rationalists because it contained only a few miracles. Bretschnei- der himself declared that he had been taught to know better. After this episode the Johannine question had been shelved for ﬁ fteen years. The excitement was therefore all the greater when Strauss reopened the discussion. He was opposing a dogma of scholarly theology which even now defends its dogmas more tenaciously than the church defends its own.” 69. Strauss, Das Leben Jesu, 644ff. 70. Ibid., 648. 71. Ibid., 676. 72. Ibid., 35. 73. Bruno Bauer, Kritik der evangelischen Geschichte des Johannes (Bremen: Schüne- mann, 1840); id., Kritik der evangelischen Geschichte der Synoptiker, vols. 1-2 (Leipzig: Braunschweig, 1841); id., Kritik der evangelischen Geschichte der Synoptiker und des Johannes,

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written defending the independence and authenticity of the Fourth Gospel.74 Complete monographs were also dedicated to the defence of the apostolic origin of the Gospel of John,75 because apostolic origin is a most cher- ished possession of Christianity.76 Authenticity and historicity go hand in hand. When one is sacriﬁ ced, the other is also lost.77 The Catholic Church responded to the questions of authenticity (and historicity) in the Answers of the Biblical Commission of 29 May 1907. In summary, the declaration states: external and internal evidence proves that the apostle John is the author of the Fourth Gospel. The narrated deeds of Jesus are not merely allegories or symbols of religious truths; the sermons are not free theological creations that were placed in the mouth of Jesus by the author.78

vol. 3 (Leipzig: Braunschweig, 1842); id., Kritik der Evangelien und Geschichte ihres Ursprungs, vol. 1 (Berlin: Hempel, 1850; vols. 2-3, 1851; vol. 4, 1852); Ferdinand Christian Baur, “Über die Composition und den Charakter des johanneischen Evange- liums,” Theologisches Jahrbuch 3 (1844) 1-191, 397-475, 615-700; id., Kritische Unter- suchungen über die kanonischen Evangelien, ihr Verhältniss zu einander, ihren Charakter und Ursprung (Tübingen: Fues, 1847); Adolf Hilgenfeld, Das Evangelium und die Briefe Johannis, nach ihrem Lehrbegriff dargestellt (Halle an der Saale: Schwetschke, 1849); id., Die Evangelien nach ihrer Entstehung und geschichtlichen Bedeutung (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1854); id., “Das Johannes-Evangelium nicht interpolirt,” Zeitschrift für Wissenschaftliche Theologie 11 (1868) 434-455; id., Historisch-kritische Einleitung in das Neue Testament (Leipzig: Fues, 1875); Carl Weizsäcker, Untersuchungen über die evangelische Geschichte, ihre Quellen und den Gang ihrer Entwicklung (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1864, 21901). 74. See e.g. the following commentaries: Friedrich Lücke, Commentar über das Evangelium des Johannes, Commentar über die Schriften des Evangelisten Johannes, 2 vols. (Bonn: Weber, 1820, 1824; 21833, 1834; 31840, 1843); Ludwig Friedrich Otto Baumgarten-Crusius, Theologische Auslegung der Johanneischen Schriften, 2 vols. (Jena: Luden, 1843, 1845); Joseph Knabenbauer, Commentarius in Quatuor S. Evangelia Domini N. Iesu Christi. IV. Evangelium secundum Ioannem, Cursus Scripturae Sacrae, I/4 (Paris: Lethielleux, 1898, 21906). 75. From Catholic side we mention Achilleus Camerlynck, De Quarti Evangelii auctore (Louvain: Van Linthout, 1899) (dir. T. J. Lamy); from Protestant side we refer to H. P. V. Nunn, The Authorship of the Fourth Gospel (Eton: Alden and Blackwell, 1952). 76. See Lücke, Commentar über das Evangelium des Johannes, 1840, I: 99: “Das christliche Herz war dabey mit im Spiele. Einen durch Jahrhunderte theueren Besitz giebt Niemand gern auf.” 77. Cf. François-Marie Braun, Évangile selon Jean traduit et commenté, La sainte Bible, 10 (Paris: Cerf, 1935, 21946) 308: “Lorsque l’historicité du quatrième évangile est mise en doute, on commence toujours par écarter l’Apôtre. Tout le monde sent bien que, dans le cas présent, historicité et authenticité, vont de pair.” Also in protestant conservative milieu, it is not possible for a believer according to Archibald Thomas Robertson, The Fourth Gospel – The Epistle to the Hebrews, Word Pictures in the New Testament, 5 (Nash- ville, TN: Broadman, 1932) ix: “to be indifferent to modern critical views concerning the authorship and historical value of this Holy of Holies of the New Testament.” 78. Cf. Enchiridion Biblicum: Documenta Ecclesiastica Sacram Scripturam spectan- tia auctoritate Pontiﬁ ciae Commissionis de Re Biblica edita (Naples/Rome: D’Auria, 1954) 75-77 (nos. 187-189); Heinrich Joseph Dominic Denzinger & Adolf Schönmetzer, Enchiridion Symbolorum Deﬁ nitionum et Declarationum de Rebus Fidei et Morum… (Freiburg i. Br.: Herder 371991), 930-931 (nos. 3398-3400).

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4. Generally, it could be maintained that the defenders of John’s authenticity reject the theory of literary dependence. These defenders argue that literary dependence cannot be reconciled with the apostolic origin of the Fourth Gospel. They argue that the Fourth Gospel is based on information that does not come from the author’s predecessors, but is based on his personal experiences. Not a small number of authors maintained the eyewitness status of the Fourth Gospel and defended, implicitly or explicitly, the independence of John.79 5. There is a tension between the narratives and the discourses in the Fourth Gospel. On the one hand, stories of the Jesus who lived on earth are found: these are told in the third person, are brief and full of expression and exhibit several similarities with the Synoptic Gospels. Moreover, the narratives are seen to contain a “primitive Christology:” Jesus is presented as a “miracle worker” and he manifested himself as Messiah, in whom we must believe. On the other hand, the discourses of Jesus demonstrate a different style from the Synoptics: they are presented in either the ﬁ rst or the second person, and appear to be timeless, more elaborate, repetitive and solemn. The discourses are also shown to contain a “high Christology:” Jesus is presented as the one sent by the Father, the one who is executing the commandments given to him by the Father. The tension between narrative and discourse material forms the point of departure of the most renowned hypothesis of Johannine source criticism, the so-called sèmeia-hypothesis.As we mentioned above, 80 this

79. See the list of authors mentioned by Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, 76- 121: F. Lücke (1820, 1824), J. H. Kistemaker (1823), H. Klee (1829), K. Hase (1829, 1835), H. Olshausen (1832), H. A. W. Meyer (1834), A. Tholuck (1837), W. M. L. de Wette (1837, 1846), L. F. C. Baumgarten-Crusius (1843), A. Maier (1843, 1845), F. X. Patritius (1853), H. Ewald (1855), E. W. Hengstenberg (1861-1863), L. Klofutar (1862), F. Godet (1864, 1865), A. Bisping (1869), A. Crampon (1872), C. E. Luthardt (1874, 1886), J. Corluy (1878), A. Plummer (1880), C. F. Keil (1881), B. F. Westcott (1881), P. Dehaut (1884), P. Schanz (1885), W. Beyschlag (1885-1886), R. Cornely (1886), B. Weiss (1893), T. Zahn (1987-1899, 1908), J. Knabenbauer (1898), L.-C. Fillion (1889). From the twentieth century, Selong mentions: F. C. Ceulemans (1901), J. MacEvilly (1902), T. Calmes (1904), J. E. Belser (1905), M. Lepin (1910), F. Vigoroux & A. Brassac (1910- 1914), P. Dausch (1911), B. Heigl (1916), F. Tillmann (1921), H. Höpﬂ & B. Gut (1922- 1923), J. T. Ubbinck (1924), C. F. Nolloth (1925), J. Sickenberger (1925), M.-J. Lagrange (1925), C. Bouma (1927), J. T. Beelen & A. Vander Heeren (1927), A. Durand (1927), A. T. Robertson (1932), G. Campbell Morgan (1933), G. W. Bloomﬁ eld (1936), F. Büch- sel (1934), T. Sigge (1935), H. Lusseau & M. Collomb (1935), F.-M. Braun (1935), L. Bouyer (1938), P. Beeckman (1941), E. Stauffer (1941), W. Lauck (1941), P. Benoit (1943), W. Michaelis (1946), M. C. Tenney (1948), D. Buzy (1949), A. Wikenhauser (1949), H. Strathmann (1950), P. Feine & J. Behm (1950), H. P. V. Nunn (1952), D. Mollat (1953), W. Hendriksen (1953, 1954), R. A. Edwards (1954), M. Balagué (1955), D. Lamont (1956), A. Feuillet (1959), H. Van den Bussche (1959-1961), I. Powell (1962), P. Guichou (1962). 80. Cf. above p. 25.

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literary theory, which was presented by R. Bultmann in his commentary of 1941, and now more than sixty years later is still the most important literary theory on the Gospel of John, especially among American and German exegetes. The hypothesis has a long ancestry.81 The tension between narrative and discourse still dominates literary criticism of the Fourth Gospel. This tension was studied ﬁ rst by J. C. R. Ecker-mann in 1796.82 According to him, the apostle John wrote down Jesus’ teachings. One of the apostle’s disciples edited the discourses of Jesus after his death and added the narrative texts (particularly the passion narrative) and arranged the material chronologically. In 1838, C. H. Weisse also proposed this point of view,83 and at the beginning of the twentieth century, H. H. Wendt argued that the discourses formed the older core of the gospel.84 The situation changed with J. M. Thompson (1915, 1916).85 According to him, the narrative texts and not the discourses were the oldest. He holds the opinion that the evangelist used an older gospel that consisted principally of narratives as its source. We ﬁ nd the “basic gospel” in chapters 1–12. It concludes with 12:36b-43 and 20:30-31. Some authors, like J. Jeremias (1941), E. Schweizer (1951), R. E. Brown (1966) and G. R. Beasley-Murray (1987), restrict the source to a short signs source containing only the two Cana stories: 2:1-11, 12; 4:46- 54.86 Other authors are convinced that these Galilean miracle stories were secondary inclusions to a Judean Grundschrift, a pre-Johannine

81. Cf. Gilbert Van Belle, De Sèmeia-bron in het vierde evangelie: Ontstaan en groei van een hypothese, Studia Novi Testamenti Auxilia, 10 (Louvain: Peeters, 1975); id., The Signs Source in the Fourth Gospel: Historical Survey and Critical Evaluation of the Semeia Hypothesis, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 116 (Louvain: Uni- versity Press/Peeters, 1994). 82. Jakob Christoph Rudolf Eckermann, Über die eigentlich sichern Gründe des Glaubens an die Hauptthatsachen der Geschichte Jesu und über die wahrscheinliche Entste- hung der Evangelien und der Apostelgeschichte, Theologische Beiträge, 5/2 (Altona: Ham- merich, 1796) 106-256. 83. Christian Hermann Weisse, Die evangelische Geschichte kritisch und philosophisch bearbeitet, 2 vols. (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1838). 84. Hans Hinrich Wendt, Das Johannesevangelium: Eine Untersuchung seiner Entstehung und seines geschichtlichen Wertes (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1900); Die Schichten im vierten Evangelium (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1911). 85. James Matthew Thompson, “Is John XXI an Appendix?,” The Expositor, 8th ser., 10 (1915) 139-147; id., “The Structure of the Fourth Gospel,” The Expositor, 8th ser., 10 (1915) 512-526; id., “The Composition of the Fourth Gospel,” The Expositor, 8th ser., 11 (1916) 34-46. 86. Joachim Jeremias, “Johanneische Literarkritik,” Theologische Blätter 20 (1941) 33-46; Eduard Schweizer, “Die Heilung des Königlichen: Joh. 4,46-54,” Evangelische Theologie 11 (1951-52) 64-71; Brown, The Gospel According to John; Beasley-Murray, John.

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gospel. A. Schweizer already suggested this in 1841.87 He suggests that a later interpolator included Galilean material into a Judean Grundschrift. Chapter 21, in which the secondary nature is clear, forms his point of departure. He indicates comparative but smaller additions to the gospel that must have been made by the same author, namely, 19:35-37; 18:9; 16:30; 2:21-22. He also expresses his suspicion that 20,19-29 was added later. Analogous to the mentioned passages, Schweizer also accepts larger interpolations: the Galilean pericopes in 2:1-11; 4:44-54; 6:1-26. Espe- cially the ﬁ rst two passages (the two Cana miracles), and the story of the miraculous catching of ﬁ sh in chapter 21, played an important role in the history of the sèmeia-hypothesis: for their secondary inclusion, Schweizer provides multiple criteria, which were applied later by the proponents of the signs source. F. Spitta (1910) and M. Goguel (1923) followed the interpolation theory of Schweizer:88 the three Galilean miracles (2:1-11, 12; 4:46-54; 21:1-14) originate from an older Galilean gospel document and are included in the Grundschrift by a redactor. More recently, since 1977, H. Thyen (1977) and his students, W. Langbrandtner (1977) and H.-P. Heekerens (1984) have reconsidered Spitta’s hypothesis.89 Finally, A. Mayer (1988) has defended Schweizer’s theory for the inclusion of the Galilean miracles.90 6. What can we learn from the historical overview presented in the two sections above? (a) We can conclude that the contemporary hypotheses

87. Alexander Schweizer, Das Evangelium Johannes nach seinem innern Werthe und seiner Bedeutung für das Leben Jesu kritisch untersucht (Leipzig: Weidmann’sche Buch- handlung, 1841). 88. Friedrich Spitta, Das Johannes-Evangelium als Quelle der Geschichte Jesu (Göt- tingen: Vandenhoeck, 1910); Goguel, Introduction au Nouveau Testament, vol. II. 89. Hartwig Thyen, “Entwicklungen innerhalb der johanneischen Theologie und Kirche im Spiegel von Joh 21 und der Lieblingsjüngertexte des Evangeliums,” L’évangile de Jean: Sources, rédaction, théologie, ed. Marinus de Jonge, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 44 (Gembloux/Louvain: Duculot/University Press, 1977, 21987) 259-299; Wolfgang Langbrandtner, Weltferner Gott oder Gott der Liebe: Der Ketzerstreit in der johanneischen Kirche: Eine exegetisch-religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung mit Berücksichtigung der koptisch-gnostischen Texte aus Nag-Hammadi, Beiträge zur biblischen Exegese und Theologie, 6 (Frankfurt/Bern/New York: Lang, 1977); Hans- Peter Heekerens, Die Zeichen-Quelle der johanneischen Redaktion: Ein Beitrag zur Ent- stehungsgeschichte des vierten Evangeliums, Stuttgarter Bibelstudien, 113 (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1984). Following F. Neirynck and M. Sabbe (cf. above, n. 11 and 12), H. Thyen now defends John’s dependence on the Synoptics. Cf. “Johannes und die Synoptiker: Auf der Suche nach einem neuen Paradigma zur Beschreibung ihrer Beziehungen anhand von Beobachtungen an Passions- und Östererzählungen,” John and the Synoptics, 81-107; see esp. his commentary: Das Johannesevangelium, Handbuch zum Neuen Testament, 6 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005). 90. Allan Mayer, “Elijah and Elisha in John’s Signs Source,” Expository Times 99 (1987-88) 171-173.

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on the origin of the Fourth Gospel and its historicity were also dealt with in Johannine exegesis in one form or another since the beginning of the nineteenth century. (b) It is quite clear from these samples that there has been no consensus in Johannine exegesis up to the present. J. Konings reaches the same conclusion in his historical overview of the literary criticism of the Johannine narrative (1969). He observes: “There is still no consensus on the answer to a very important question: Was John himself an eyewitness (or acquainted with an eyewitness), and did he write the gospel inde- pendently whether or not he knew one or more of the other gospels? Or, is the Fourth Gospel nothing other than a midrash, an extremely free meditation on the Synoptic tradition while the unique Johannine material was created by the evangelist or his community? Did John draw his stories from the traditions of congregations that existed on the perimeter of the greater Church, or did he notarise particularly valuable traditions coming from the not yet destroyed Jerusalem, the heart of the primitive church? Was the author of the Fourth Gospel a Hellenist – one who hardly knew Jewish customs, or was he an indigenous Jew – a Judean who could describe the geographic and chronological details of Jesus’ life and the growing Church far more concretely than the other evangelists? And lastly: Is the Fourth Gospel truly a ‘seamless robe’, or could two, three, or even more, phases of composition and composers be discovered?” 91 (c) In the third place, it needs to be remembered that in the amal- gamation of opinions and hypotheses that every term receives its own meaning depending on the hypothesis within which it is used:92 1. “tradition” is a loaded term: it could refer to: “historical tradition,” “Gemeinde- bildung,” or even “heterodox origin;” 2. “Redaction” could refer to either the hand of the evangelist or the hand of a stubborn editor; even to a falsiﬁ er, and could indicate both “originality” and “inauthenticity;” 3. the word “evangelist” could indicate a disciple of Jesus or a witness of Jesus, alternatively, an important interpretation of the church’s tradition, a dramaturge, or an impassionate collector of different traditions. 7. The fact that consensus cannot be reached cannot serve as an argument to reject literary criticism. Literary and historical criticisms are essential for the interpretation of the Fourth Gospel. The Fourth Gospel can only be understood if an idea can be formed as to whether John is a witness of his own tradition, which is either conﬁ rming or contradicting the Synoptics, and as to whether it is an interpretation of the Synoptic tradition or one or more of the Synoptic Gospels.

91. Konings, Het johanneïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek, I: 285-286. 92. Ibid., 286.

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III. Historicity and Literary Unity in the Fourth Gospel

1. In order to point out the relation between the literary unity and the historical reliability of the Fourth Gospel, I wish to refl ect on the exegetical method that was taught to me in Louvain, and which I still consider to contain the most feasible working hypothesis.93 This working hypothesis is governed by two principles.94 First, exegetical inquiry can under no circumstances be based on dubious preconceptions but rather must be organized from the known to the lesser known. Concretely, this means “instead of beginning with some a priori consideration (the affi rmation of the authenticity or of the historical value of the Fourth Gospel), one should start with the study of the text; in place of trying to recover a presumed primitive order of the text, one has to make an effort to under- stand and to explain that order as it lays before us; instead of resorting to unknown conjectural sources or traditions, attention must be given fi rst of all to the Synoptics as the possible sources of the Fourth Gospel.”95 Secondly, “no entity” can be postulated unless there is suffi cient reason.96 2. I now wish to describe the working hypothesis through the presentation of a few guidelines. The Fourth Gospel is, in the fi rst place, a theological work and not a history. The evangelist deliberately chose the literary genre “gospel” as the vehicle of his message, a genre originating in early Christianity.97 Therefore, corresponding to the “gospel” genre, John describes the life and teachings of Jesus in a connected narrative from the teaching of John the Baptist to Jesus’ death and resurrection.98 But John is not simply a narrated account of Jesus’ career and teachings; rather, the Fourth Gospel is an interpreted account of the signifi cance of Jesus’ person and teachings. As such, the Johannine narrative is a dramatic presentation of the

93. For some of the following guidelines, see Howard M. Teeple, “Methodology in Source Analysis of the Fourth Gospel,” Journal of Biblical Literature 81 (1962) 279- 286; Dodd, The Interpretation of Fourth Gospel, 444-453; Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, II: 123-127; Konings, Het johanneïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek, I: 285-306; Frey, Das vierte Evangelium auf dem Hintergrund der älteren Evangelientradition, 79-82. See also Gilbert Van Belle, “Tradition, Exegetical Formation, and the Leuven Hypothesis,” What We Have Heard from the Beginning, ed. Tom Thatcher (Waco, TX: Baylor Univer- sity Press, 2007) 325-337. 94. Konings, Het johanneïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek, I: 285. 95. Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, II: 124. 96. Cf. the razor of Occam: “Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessita- tem.” 97. Dodd, The Interpretation of Fourth Gospel, 444. 98. Frans Neirynck, “Gospel, Genre of,” The Oxford Companion to the Bible, ed. Bruce Metzger & Michael D. Coogan (New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993) 258-259.

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theological signifi cance and meaning of the incidents narrated, including even the events of the Passion. The narrative elements are, furthermore, treated as ‘signs’ or symbols of unseen realities and this symbolical character goes very deeply into the whole scheme of the work.99 Moreover, and perhaps most importantly, it must be emphasised that the uniqueness of the Fourth Gospel is located in the fact that it fi nds the eternal reality conclusively revealed and embodied in an historical Person, who actually lived, worked, taught, suffered and died, with actual and direct historical consequences. “The concise formula for this fact is kaì ö lógov sàrz êgéneto.”100 Textual criticism is a crucial part of our ‘working hypothesis’ since it is the evangelist’s text, and not the text of a given scribe, that we are concerned with. Therefore, an attempt should be made to establish, provi- sionally at least, the most probable reading of the passage in question.101 Consideration must also be given to the “variant readings,” because they might refl ect on the earliest textual interpretations.102 The so-called “aporias” (“abrupt changes in the fl ow of the narrative, artifi cial transitions, inconsequences in grammar or logical sequence”) are also important considerations in assessing the relationship between literary unity (and literary criticism) and historical reliability since they could indicate that the evangelist used material “which originally stood in a different context, or a combination of material deriving from the source and material coming from the Evangelist, or the use of material taken from two different places of the source.”103 This point brings to the fore the issue of source criticism and the Gospel of John. In stark contrast to the many attempts to uncover hypothetical sources that stand behind the Fourth Gospel, we insist that John should fi rst be compared to the Synoptics, not only because they have the “gospel genre” in common, but also because they have the structure and content in common, far more than with any other known, that is to say not postulated, document.104 Furthermore, an “early date” for the Fourth Gospel cannot threaten the literary dependency of the Fourth Gospel on the Synoptics since stylistic, theological and historical research has indicated with some certainty that John was written after the break with Judaism.105

99. Dodd, The Interpretation of Fourth Gospel, 444. 100. Ibid. 101. Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, II: 124. 102. Ibid. 103. Ibid., 124-125. 104. Konings, Het johanneïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek, I: 301. 105. Ibid.

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The creativity of the Fourth Evangelist should not be restricted from the start, for, just as the authors of the Synoptics went about their work freely and creatively, so also did the fourth evangelist.106 As Selong points out, “many of the attempts to fi nd out a primitive source or an independent tradition behind the Fourth Gospel seem to stem from a certain a priori limitation of the redactional freedom of the Evangelist or, in other words, from the fear of making him responsible of ‘inventing episodes and sayings of Jesus out of the air’ (E. C. Hoskyns).”107 With Selong, we argue that there may in fact be another alternative than the one between ‘a careless or a capricious evangelist’ and ‘an independent tradition’ (R. E. Brown) or between an ‘arbitrary and irresponsible’ change and such a tradition (P. Gardner-Smith).”108 We can very briefl y describe this other alternative as follows: The evangelist reworked the Synoptic material in various ways, within the boundaries of his creative freedom. Thus he distributed elements of particular passages from the Synoptics in his gospel.109 In other places he combines different passages of the Synoptics into one scene.110 The evangelist’s creativity and freedom that characterises his work can be illustrated clearly by studying his use of the Old Testament. He uses the same freedom when he refers to the words of Jesus in his gospel.111 As for material that is unique to John (and thus not found in the Syn- optics), the possibility should not be dismissed out of hand that this material might refl ect important theological interests of the evangelist. In fact, this should be expected in a work that aims at interpreting the theological signifi - cance of the life and ministry of Jesus.112 When the differences between John and the Synoptics are established, it is necessary to determine whether or to what degree these refl ect upon the terminology, style and motives char- acteristic of the Evangelist.113 Thus, such material cannot be seen “as devoid

106. Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, II: 124-125. 107. Ibid., 125. 108. Ibid. 109. Thus, e.g., Mk 6:1-6 and parallels; see Gilbert Van Belle, “The Faith of the Galileans: The Parenthesis in John 4,44,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses 74 (1998) 27-44. 110. Thus, e.g., in Jn 2:13-22. The scene that John narrates has parallels in: (1) Mk 11:15-19; Mt 21:10-17; Lk 19:45-46; (2) Mk 11:27-28 and par.; (3) Mk 14:58; Mt 26:61; see also Mk 15:29; Mt 27:40 and Acts 16:14. 111. See my study on Jn 18:9: Gilbert Van Belle, “L’accomplissement de la parole de Jésus: La parenthèse de Jn 18,9,” The Scriptures in the Gospels, ed. Christopher M. Tuckett, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 131 (Louvain: University Press/Peeters, 1997) 515-521. 112. Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, II: 125. 113. Ibid., 125.

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of theological or doctrinal tendencies (M. Lepin) or as ‘motiveless’ and having ‘no theological signifi cance’ (C. H. Dodd).”114 In general, in order to ascertain John’s possible employment of sources and possible transformation of those sources, it is crucial to pay particular attention to the author’s vocabulary, grammar, style characteristics, literary tendencies (use of synonymous words, dramatization, parenthetic comments, etc.), themes, motives (of reminiscence, of misunderstanding, for instance), ways of thinking etc. This being said, it is nevertheless important to note that the uniqueness of vocabulary, which arises from uniqueness of subject matter, does not necessarily indicate the presence of a special source.115 The priority of the Synoptics in the interpretation of John that we have argued for leads us to elucidate the proper place, in our view, of the use of other background material for the interpretation of John, namely: Only after comparisons have been made between John and the Synoptics is it feasible to make comparisons with other texts (such as the apocrypha, gnostic literature, texts from Qumran and Nag Hammadi, Hellenistic, Jewish and Rabbinic literature) and to use such texts in the interpretation of the Fourth Gospel.116 3. On the grounds of using this working hypothesis, the most signifi cant results of our research can be formulated briefl y as follows: the language and style of the gospel is so homogenous and the craftsmanship of the evangelist is so creative that it is impossible to distinguish alternative sources or traditions apart from the Synoptics. The homogenous Christological and theological language of the evangelist, his symbolism, and the structure of the text, leads us to see, within the framework of Christology and Soteriology, the word made fl esh, that is, not the historical Jesus, but the faith of the Johannine community: Jesus is the Messiah, the “Son of God,” who was sent to the world for our salvation. I can neither deny nor prove the possibility of historical traditions in the Fourth Gospel. For these reasons, I can accept the cautious point of view of C. M. Tuckett (2001) on the historical reliability of the Fourth Gospel: 117

114. Selong, The Cleansing of the Temple, II: 125. 115. Ibid., 126. Selong further notes: “Thus, v.g., the terms ‘Tiberias, Caphar- naum, sea, boats’ associated with Galilean accounts do not necessarily demonstrate John’s indebtedness to a Galilean source, as suggested by P. Parker. Uniqueness of vocabulary which might well have occurred in other parts of the Gospel, might indeed indicate the presence of a source.” 116. Konings, Het johanneïsche verhaal in de literaire kritiek, I: 302. 117. Christopher M. Tuckett, “Sources and Method,” The Cambridge Companion to Jesus, ed. Markus N. A. Bockmuehl, Cambridge Companions to Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001) 121-137, esp. pp. 126-127. Tuckett gives the following examples: “John’s note that Jesus baptised people (John 4.1) may well be authentic and explain rather more readily why Christians adopted water baptism as their rite of initiation.

11252-08_LouvainStud_02.indd252-08_LouvainStud_02.indd 4477 001-09-20081-09-2008 16:14:3816:14:38 48 GILBERT VAN BELLE

These differences [between John and the Synoptics] make it very diffi cult to see both John and the Synoptics as equally accurate refl ections of the historical Jesus … the teaching of the historical Jesus is likely to be more accurately refl ected in the Synoptic tradition than in John’s Gospel. This does not mean that John’s Gospel is historically worthless in terms of any quest for the historical Jesus. Some details of John’s account appear more historically plausible than the synoptic accounts and may well be historical.

Gilbert Van Belle is professor in ordinary of New Testament at the Faculty of Theology of the K.U.Leuven. He is general editor of the journal Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses, the series Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium and the series Biblical Tools and Studies. He is the author or (co-) editor of the following books: Les parenthèses dans l’évangile de Jean (1985); Johannine Bibliography 1966-1985 (1988); The Signs Source in the Fourth Gospel (1994); Luke and His Readers: Festschrift A. Denaux (2004); In Memoriam Mau- rits Sabbe (2004); Theology and Christology in the Fourth Gospel: Essays by the Members of the SNTS Johannine Writings Seminar (2005); The Death of Jesus in the Fourth Gospel (2007). His research focuses on the style, the Christology, the theology, and the history of interpretation of the Fourth Gospel. Address: Faculty of Theology, Sint-Michielsstraat 6, B-3000 Leuven, Belgium.

Similarly, John’s dating of the passion deserves serious consideration; and his picture of Jesus being in Jerusalem for considerably longer than the single hectic week implied by the Synoptics is inherently more plausible – and indeed may be implied by the words attributed to Jesus in the Synoptics themselves at his arrest (Mark 14.49: ‘day after day I was with you in the Temple teaching’).”

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