Roland

I just got back from spending Thanksgiving with my fundamentalist Christian brother (it shames me to say that I "converted" him to Christianity about 25 years ago when I was myself a firm believer and have regretted it ever since).

This morning I picked up an exegetical book about the Gospel of John and I couldn't get past the first few pages before throwing it away in disgust. For instance, it kept referring to Jesus' baptism scene in John, when no such scene exists. Then it made the rather outlandish claim that "most scholars" believe Jesus first went to the wedding at Cana BEFORE heading off to spend 40 days and nights in the wilderness. This is supposed to explain how Jesus could have gathered his disciples and attended the wedding three days after the "baptism" (2:1) and still have gone "immediately" to the wilderness as per the account in the Synoptics.

Actually, as with most of John, I find the account of Jesus' gathering of the disciples so radically different from how it is portrayed in the Synoptics as to make it practically irreconcilabe with Matthew, Mark and Luke's versions.

aa5874

The reason its radically different is because it is a different story. Although the author of John uses the same name, Jesus, as the Synoptics, it is clearly evident that this author writes about some-one else.

andrewcriddle

The passage in chapter 1:32-33 where John claims to have witnessed the descent of the Spirit 'like a dove' upon Jesus, in the light of the baptism accounts in the synoptics, probably implies that John is supposed to have witnessed this at the baptism of Jesus.

Andrew Criddle

Roland

Why would anyone assume that? Would John expect readers of his gospel to have already read one or more of the Synoptics? It's "implied" only because we all know the other accounts. It seems to me that if John meant for Jesus to be baptized, he would have had Jesus baptized.

andrewcriddle

Many scholars think that John found it troublesome to say explicitly that John the Baptist baptized Jesus (it might suggest some sort of superiority of John over Jesus) Hence he keeps the reference to the descent of the Spirit but does not explicitly mention the Baptism.

Similar unease can be seen in Matthew 2:13-17 where John and Jesus discuss the issue explicitly and in Luke 3:21-22 which mentions Jesus being baptized but avoids saying in so many words 'baptized by John'.

John's Gospel appears to take this somewhat further.

Andrew Criddle