John

1
Johns passion narrative third lecture on John

• Glorification -- and identification of Father
  and Son, the Son and his followers

2
Johns last supper discourse

• Chapters 13 to 17 tell a different story from
  Synoptics.
• Not a Passover meal, and no giving of bread and
  wine as body and blood.
• Instead the washing of feet reversal of
  master/servant relation.
• A central theme of the discourse is
  identification of disciples and Jesus, Jesus and
  the Father.
• It is not historical in the sense the Synoptics
  mean to be historical.
• No one took dictation.
• So how does John know this is what Jesus said?
• By the presumed identification of the writer with
  Jesus. Jesus speaks out of time into the present
  of Johns world. (What I mean by channeling.)
• The Father speaks through Jesus gt Jesus will
  speak through disciples gt these disciples
  (therefore Jesus) speak through this later
  disciple gt this disciple speaks to the reader.
• See especially 16 12-15.

3
Last supper discourse how are we to understand
it?

• For John, this is what Jesus really said, who he
  really was.
• History is less important than this mystic
  process of identification.
• Jesus, identified with the Father, identifies
  with disciples, who are identified with the
  writer.
• 14 7, 9, 19-20 15 4-5, 12 16 27-28 17
  10-11, 20-23.
• So John doesnt want us to quibble about mere
  historical fact.
• Hes speaking out of time as well at the end
  (17 20-21) I ask not only on behalf of these
  but also on behalf of those who will believe in
  me through their word, that they may all be one.
• Glorification suggests a transcending of
  history, just as it means a transcending of
  suffering, pain, death.
• Johns gospel is not gnostic (in sense that it
  depends on gnosis, knowledge), but similarly
  depends on a state of consciousness and a
  bypassing of the merely historical.
• This Jesus may sound a bit like the mystical
  teacher of Thomas, even though his message is
  different.

4
Johns passion narrative

• Many of the details of the narrative of Jesus
  death are the same in John as in the Synoptics.
• But his narrative makes its meaning quite
  different.
• Mark tells a story of suffering, grief,
  abandonment by God, and a radical need to find
  the Jesus who is not in the empty tomb.
• Matthew tells essentially same story as Mark,
  though with a firm sense of an historical
  community that comes after.
• Lukes story is one of reconciliation,
  forgiveness, the death of an innocent man who
  forgives those who kill him, then is raised by
  God to fulfill the scriptures.
• By contrast, Johns story is one of fulfillment
  and glorification, passing through death to
  triumph.
• Glorification rather than suffering is the
  central meaning.
• John 12 27-28 Father, glorify your name.
• I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.

5
Synoptic overlap in Johns passion narrative

• Anointing as Messiah/anointing for death (from
  Mark) now transferred to Mary, sister of Lazarus,
  12 3-7.
• Feet rather than head anointed.
• Rides a donkey (just one!) into Jerusalem 12
  12-16.
• Judas betrays, but now Satan entered into him.
  
• Cutting of the ear of High Priest (Mark) by one
  who stood near. In Luke Jesus heals him.
• John assigns the cutting to Simon Peter and names
  the servant, Malchus.
• Purple robe, crown of thorns, mockery of the
  Roman soldiers, as in Mark 1516-20. (Pro-Roman
  Luke omits this.)
• Crucified with two others, one on either side,
  with Jesus between them. (Luke gives repentance
  of one.)
• Inscription on cross. But John adds the objection
  of the High Priests (plural!), and Pilates what
  Ive written, Ive written.

6
Some details unique to John

• Only John has Jesus being taken first to Annas,
  former high priest, who had been deposed by
  Romans he was the powerful father of four high
  priests, father-in-law of another.
• Only John has another disciple with Peter.
• John expands the role of Pilate.
• Only John has Jesus distinguish earthly and
  heavenly kingdoms here (18 35-38).
• Pilates famous (postmodern?) question What is
  truth? (What should the reader remember?)
• Only John has chief priests (still plural!)
  object to Pilates sign in Hebrew, Greek,
  Latin for the whole Med. world.
• The seamless cloak (replacement quotation of
  psalm 22?).
• Only John has Mary, her sister, Mary Magdalene,
  and beloved disciple at cross.

7
Voluntary submission to betrayal and arrest

• Contrary to Synoptic tradition, arrest,
  crucifixion take place before Passover (Jesus
  crucified on eve of Passover).
• Notice that Jesus essentially gives permission
  to Judas to hand him over (13 26-27)
• And at the arrest, Jesus is in control of his
  arrest (18 4-11).
• The I am he of v. 5 is actually, again, I am
  in Greek, which recalls the other I ams
  truth, way, living water, good shepherd, vine,
  before Abraham etc.
• At the cutting of the ear of Malchus, Jesus
  rebukes Peter Am I not to drink the cup . . .
  ?
• Jesus carries his cross by himself no Simon
  of Cyrene.
• No despair, no crying out.
• Instead, it is finished, that is, completed,
  fulfilled.
• Whos in control in this crucifixion?

8
Why Johns different chronology in regard to
Passover?

• Recall John the Baptists Here is the Lamb of
  God (1 29). (Unique to this gospel.)
• Now connected to 19 31-37.
• Blood and water from the side of crucifixion
  victim perhaps not surprising?
• But for John the significance lies in Exodus 12
  46 you shall not break any of its bones.
• This is the preparation day for Passover, the day
  the lambs were slaughtered.
• So Jesus becomes the Passover lamb, with all this
  means.
• Passover victim to be eaten completely.
• What to make of the water, blood? How many
  symbols in John connect to these images?
• So one must eat this Passover lamb? How?
• Identification and unification that had been part
  of last supper discourse?

9
Resurrection appearances in John

• First to Mary Magdalen, testifying to her
  significance for Johns community.
• Then to disciples, minus Thomas if you forgive
  the sins of any . . . (20 22-23).
• Then to Thomas, the rebuke of whom applies to the
  late first-century reader of John blessed are
  those who have not seen and yet have come to
  believe (20 29).
• Conclusion of 20 30-31.
• Then more resurrection appearances to Peter and
  others (overlap with Luke?)
• Maybe to correct emphasis on beloved disciple
  and return prominence to Peter?
• Then prophecies of deaths of disciples.
• And finally the infinity of Jesus deeds and a
  second conclusion.

10
What to make of Johns themes?

• The various signs from the first half of the
  gospel.
• Who else is the man born blind who is expelled
  from synagogue, and comes to see? (9 35-38).
• Who else is Lazarus?
• Jesus had said, "Loose him and let him go
  again fraught with significance for reader?
• Early Christians painted this scene on tombs.
• Lots of symbolic drinking and eating in this
  gospel
• Best wine saved for last, the living water at
  Samaritan well, the multiplied bread for the
  5000, the injunction to eat Jesus body, drink
  his blood.
• Finally the sacrificial lamb of Passover.
• How can one eat this lamb?
• The idea of identification of final discourse
  Father gt Jesus gt disciples gt reader.
• The cruelest form of death becomes glorification.

11
The trans-historical character of John

• The radical difference of this gospel from
  Synoptic tradition.
• And its trans-historical character.
• Does John want us to worry about this?
• For John perhaps not so much that Synoptics got
  it wrong, but they didnt see enough.
• They didnt see in this mystical way.
• Channeling the essential sense of what Jesus
  is, what he means.
• The only ethical injunction in John love one
  another as I have loved you.
• So, identification and paradoxical glorification.

12
Eschatology the final exam

• Identifications (of another sort) be clear about
  the essential nature of the texts weve read,
  their narrative differences from one another.
• Be able to identify scenes or moments from texts.
• Be able to identify the particular (and
  different) ways Jesus is portrayed, understood in
  the texts.
• Note the differences among the words of Jesus on
  the cross and what they mean in terms of the
  individual gospels.
• And finally, an essay, where again the emphasis
  is likely to be on differences among texts,
  differences in narrative character, difference in
  the approach to the reader.