Gospels In Conflict: John and Thomas - Part 14

[Guest guest]

Dear All,

 

We concluded Part 13 with the following:

 

(p.63) " What John writes about Peter and " the beloved disciple " suggests that

while John accepted the teaching associated with Peter, and even wrote his own

gospel " so that you might believe that Jesus is the messiah, the son of God, "

[108] his own teaching went further. So, while he agrees with Peter--and

Mark--that Jesus is God's messiah, John goes further, and also insists that

Jesus is actually " 'Lord and God'. " [109]

 

John must have known that this conviction branded him a radical among his fellow

Jews--and even, apparently, among many of Jesus' followers. The scholar Louis

Martyn suggests that John himself, along with those in his circle who shared his

belief, had been accused of blasphemy for " making [Jesus] God " and forcibly

expelled from their home synagogue. [110] In his gospel, John dramatizes this

situation by turning a miracle story of Jesus healing a blind man into a parable

for their own situation. [111] Speaking for himself and his fellow believers,

John protested that their only crime was that God had opened their eyes to the

truth, while the rest of the congregation remained blind. Thus in John's

version, when Jesus met a man born blind, he " spat on the ground, made mud with

the saliva, and spread it on the man's eyes, and said to him, 'Go, and wash in

the pool of Siloam.' Then he went and washed and came back able to see. " [112]

(p.64) But what the man had come to " see " was Jesus' divine power, which others

denied; so, John says, " the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessed

Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. " [113] Although the

man's parents--and thus, John implies, an older generation--did not dare to

acknowledge Jesus' power because, he says, they were afraid that " the Jews "

would expel them, the man whose eyes were opened defied the synagogue leaders by

confessing faith in Jesus ( " Lord, I believe " ) and worshiping him. " [114]

 

Beyond Belief (The Secret Gospel of Thomas), Chapter 2, p. 63-64.

 

Notes:

 

[108] John 20:30-31.

 

[109] John 20:28.

 

[110] Louis Martyn's groundbreaking work, 'History and Theology in the Fourth

Gospel' (Nashville, 1979), suggests that the story told in John 9 is, in effect,

that of John's community. Martyn's influential thesis has been modified by the

critique of other scholars who question especially his assumptions about the

formation and use of the so-called 'birkat ha mininm'; see Asher Finkel,

" Yavneh's Liturgy and Early Christianity, " 'Journal of Ecumenical Studies' 18:2

(1981), 231-250; William Horbury, " The Benediction of the Minim and Early

Jewish-Christian Controversy, " 'Journal of Theological Studies' 33 (1982); Alan

F. Segal, " Ruler of This World: Attitudes About Mediator Figures and the

Importance of Sociology for Self-Definition, " in E.P. Sanders, ed., 'Jewish and

Christian Self-Definition', volume II (Philadelphia, 1980), 245-268; and the

very intriguing recently published article by Daniel Boyarin, " The Gospel of the

Memra: Jewish Binitarianism and the Prologue to John, " 'Harvard Theological

Review' 94:3 (2001), 243 ff.

 

[111] John 1:1-41.

 

[112] John 9:7.

 

[113] John 9:22.

 

[114] John 9:38.

 

Here now, is Part 14.

 

Enjoy,

 

violet

 

 

 

Gospels In Conflict: John and Thomas - Part 14

 

(p.64) Thus John's account implicitly places Jesus--and his power to heal and

change lives--into his own time. By showing the man born blind facing expulsion

from the synagogue, this story echoes John's own experience and that of his

fellow believers. They, too, having been " born blind, " now, thanks to Jesus, are

able to " see " --but at the cost of rejection by their own people. So John's

followers are relieved and grateful to hear Jesus' harsh, ironic words at the

end of the story: " For judgment I came into this world, so that those who do not

see may see; and so that those who do see may become blind. " [115] Jesus says

that he alone offers salvation: " All who came before me are thieves and

robbers.... I am the door; whoever enters through me shall be saved. " [116] Thus

John's Jesus consoles his circle of disciples that, although hated " by the

world, " they alone belong to God.

 

Spurred by rejection but determined to make converts, John challenges his fellow

Jews, including many who, like himself, follow Jesus. For John believes that

those who regard Jesus merely as a prophet, or a rabbi, or even the future king

of Israel, while not wrong, nevertheless are blind to his full " glory. " John

himself proclaims a more radical vision--one that finally alienates him from

other Jews, and even from other Jewish followers of Jesus. (p.65) Not only is

Jesus Israel's future king, and so messiah and son of God, but, John declares,

he is " greater than Moses " and older than Abraham. When he pictures Jesus

declaring to a hostile crowd that " before Abraham 'was, I am', " [117] John

expects his readers to hear Jesus claiming for himself the divine name that God

revealed to Moses ( " tell them that 'I am' has sent you " ); [118] thus Jesus is

nothing less than God himself, manifest in human form.

 

John warns those who doubt him that Jesus, acting as divine judge, will condemn

those who reject this " good news, " even if they constitute the main body of the

Jewish people, rather than the handful of the faithful who alone see the truth

and proclaim it to a hostile and unbelieving world. According to John, " the

Jews " regard Jesus himself (and thus his followers) as insane or

demon-possessed. John warns that, just as they wanted to kill Jesus for " making

himself God, " they will hate and want to kill his followers for believing such

blasphemy: " Whoever kills you will think he is doing service to God. " [119] But

John assures Jesus' followers that God judges very differently: " Whoever

believes in him [Jesus] is not condemned; but whoever does not believe is

condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten

Son of God. " [120] For John, Jesus has become more than the messenger of the

kingdom--and even more than its future king: Jesus 'himself' has become the

message.

 

Beyond Belief (The Secret Gospel of Thomas)

Chapter 2, p. 64-65

Elaine Pagels

Vintage Books, New York, U.S.A

ISBN: 0-375-70316-0

 

Notes:

 

[115] John 9:39.

 

[116] John 10:8-9.

 

[117] John 8:58.

 

[118] Exodus 3:14.

 

[119] John 19:2.

 

[120] John 3:18.