Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence (Studying the Historical Jesus) by Van Voorst Robert E

Author:Van Voorst, Robert E.
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Eerdmans Publishing Co - A
Published: 2000-02-29T16:00:00+00:00

Table 3

The Contents of the Signs Source in John

Fortna gives a brief discussion of the character of SQ.304 It was a written book, as its conclusion, now in John 20:30-31, makes explicit. A “gospel” in the same sense that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and even John are gospels, it presents a connected story of Jesus from the beginning of his ministry through his passion to its end in resurrection. All this is presented as a message to be believed, which its conclusion makes explicit. Because it has no developed teaching of Jesus, it is a “rudimentary gospel, but a gospel nevertheless.”305 SQ is Jewish-Christian for reasons of Greek style and especially content. It has no concern with the Gentile question and no controversy about keeping the Law of Moses. Moreover, although Fortna does not make this explicit, its purpose indicates that the community that produced it was in active missionary contact with the wider Jewish community. Its social setting is hard to determine: “Whatever its roots, the Greek-speaking community which used the source as a gospel could have existed in almost any part of the Hellenistic world.”306 Fortna cannot date SQ with any precision; it could have been written before or after the first Jewish revolt in 66-70 C.E.

According to Fortna, SQ was designed to function as a missionary book with the sole intent of showing that Jesus is the Messiah, presumably to potential Jewish converts.307 Fortna explicates the theology of SQ as thoroughly christological. Jesus’ miracles are signs of his messianic status, and the passion account is “christologized” in SQ by the addition of sayings of Jesus that call attention to his messianic standing. SQ gives many titles to Jesus—Messiah/Christ, Son of God, Lamb of God, Lord, “King of the Jews”—but the first of these is central to all the rest. There is a consistent emphasis on the fact of Jesus’ messiahship to the complete exclusion of any explication of its nature. This would indicate that both SQ and the wider Jewish community it was missionizing had a common understanding of what messiahship entailed, an understanding that evidently centered around the notion that the Messiah would prove himself by miracles. SQ is indeed (to use Fortna’s characterization) “narrow” and “rudimentary” when compared to the canonical Gospels. Its narrowness may owe to its singular, strictly executed purpose: to convince its readers that Jesus is the Messiah in whom they should believe.

Urban von Wahlde’s source-critical work roughly confirms Fortna’s efforts. He seeks, as his title indicates, to recover “the earliest version” of John’s Gospel. This method entails first detecting the literary seams in the present Gospel. Then von Wahlde exploits four “linguistic differences” such as terms for religious authorities, miracles, and Judeans. Next he applies nine “ideological criteria” such as stereotyped formulas of belief, reaction of Pharisees to signs, division of opinion about Jesus, and especially “the predominance of narrative.” Theological criteria come next, including christology and soteriology. Finally, five miscellaneous criteria are employed. His analysis yields thirty-seven units covering almost all of Fortna’s source, and extending it by about one-third.

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