“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
One need only read the prologue to realize that the Gospel of John is different. The author doesn’t bother with Adam, Abraham, or David to point to Jesus’ origin: he goes back to when everything was void and formless and there was only God.
The Fourth Gospel offers what is known as a high Christology, or study of Christ. High because it starts from above, with the divine Christ.
In the other three, the identity of Jesus is something of a mystery until the resurrection. Jesus himself only hints he is the “Son of Man” — which points the Hebrew speaker to Adam (אָדָם , 'adam, either man, the gender-neutral “human,” or the plural “humankind.”).
In John, we are shown that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14) as Jesus of Nazareth.
The author identifies himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved” in John 21:20–25, but does not give his name. Irenaeus of Smyrna, 2nd-century bishop of modern Lyons, said the disciple was the Apostle John. This meshes with the gospel’s controversial use of “the Jews” for people in conflict with Jesus.
The companions of John who wrote down and edited his story had not lived in the boisterous Jewish bazaar of ideas in pre-70 Palestine seen in Matthew, Mark and Luke. To them, the rabbis and congregants of the Jewish diaspora, who fiercely rejected Jesus as Messiah, were the folks who kicked them out of synagogues and even fingered fellow believers to Roman persecutors.
Add to that their high Christology clashing with the Jewish understanding of a divine Jesus as a blasphemous betrayal of monotheism. “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!” (Deut. 6:4) is even today the most revered affirmation of Jewish faith.
The Gospel of John has also a distinctive structure. Opening with Jesus as the Word present at creation, John offers a series of signs of his extraordinary character during the ministry, concluding with post-resurrection appearances that seal the divine claim as reality.
In sum, the Fourth Gospel is the critical theological text that wraps up the original eyewitness-based preaching about Jesus as God, man and savior.
This is many people's favorite gospel, but I've always struggled with it. You give me some insight into why by explaining that we're in the realm of "high Christology" here instead of good old "begats." And isn't this the same guy who authored the Book of Revelation? Incomprehensible as far as I'm concerned...at least until you tackle it in a future blog.
ReplyDeleteI know not much of John’s gospel, but I have always been intrigued by the designation of God as the W “Word,” and the Spirit, and a non-physical entity beyond the here and now. It makes sense to both my ear and mind.
ReplyDeleteAlso, so appreciate your masterful use of lower case “w” words like “boisterous Jewish bazaar of ideas.” Made me smile and think.
Always been fascinated by the notion of information ontologically preceding matter: a cigot is a maximum of genetic information supported by a minimum of matter, such as the plans for cars, buildings, etc. So in fact "the word becomes flesh".
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