Background on the Gospel of John

Why:

The book of John has always been the first book of the bible that I recommend for new Christians to read. In fact it is probably the first book of the bible that I memorized any scripture from at a young age. Of course it was the scripture "For God so Loved the World." John is the gospel that we see plastered on poster board at sporting events. However even with is primacy in those areas it is a book easily ignored in church since in our culture we seem to favor the more 'straightforward' approach of the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke). So why do I (we) suggest that Gospel of John is the first place to start?

The reason is that the gospel of John is a book that doesn't let us get away from who Christ is. We are constantly brought to face the fact that Jesus is God's son and what is accomplished by his life, death and resurrection are the most important things in the world. The gospel of John keeps us grounded in our faith at the same time it allows us to soar to the heights of theology in ways that most of us can understand and keep up with.

Who:

For the sake of this bible study I will refer to the author of the book of John as John. I am making the assumption, with the early church, that this is in reference to John the Apostle. There is no conclusive evidence from the book of John to support this claim, nor do other books in the New Testament lend any real support to this claim. In fact the language in 1, 2, and 3rd John as well as Revelation, which are all traditionally understood to be written by John the Apostle, all very significantly from each other and from the Gospel of John. Aside from the linguistic differences there are huge theological differences between the works, leading many to assume that they were all written by different individuals. For me it does not matter who the writer is. This is the primary reason why I use the traditional identification of John the Apostle.

What:

The book of John is known as a Gospel. In the ancient world 'gospel' meant good news. Often this original meaning has been lost as we approach the gospels out of a sense of duty or boredom (i.e. "I've heard this story before.") We have to strive to capture that original sense of Good News.

Contrary to popular belief the gospels are not strictly speaking historical documents. While there are historical elements written within them they are primarily the work of theological reflection on the historical teachings and life of Jesus. Because of that, the gospel of John is able to make huge theological connections that wouldn't be possible or acceptable in a modern historical document. For instance you can't help but read the opening verses, "In the beginning was the Word" and not mentally, spiritually and theologically make connections to the book of Genesis "In the Beginning." This is obviously intended by the author and is meant so that we can begin to understand Jesus' place in life and in the broader theological world.

Where/When:

Traditionally the Book of John is thought to have been written in Ephesus where John lived with Mary (the mother of Jesus) after the disciples left Jerusalem. This is by no means certain the only thing we can do is make some deductions about who the audience of John is from the gospel itself and hope that leads us to where the book was written.

It appears that the Gospel of John was written to a congregation of mixed heritage. Meaning it was written to both Jewish and Greek Christians. We can also make the assumption that the audience was very familiar with the Old Testament scriptures which are always referred to in a positive light. One of the reasons for assuming that there were Greek Christians is because John repeatedly explains Jewish terms or practices. This would mean that the audience is not familiar with the practice.

One item of importance to talk about is how John talks about the Jewish community. It seems that the book of John was written sometime after 70 C.E. after the destruction of the Temple. The destruction of the temple caused the Jewish community to define itself more sharply and one of the results of that was the Christians were then kicked out of the Jewish communities. This is the reason that John often doesn't speak favorably about "the Jew's". He was a part of a community that had been seriously hurt because of being kicked out.

To put this into perspective, Judaism was one of the few religions that had special rights under the Roman Empire to worship as it chose. When the Christians would have been forced out of the synagogues they would have been subjugated to the rules of worshiping the emperor and other deities. This would have meant participating in acts that they would rather die than participate in.

While it is understandable that John and his community were speaking out of and dealing with pain it is unacceptable how the church through the centuries has used John and his communities’ pain as justification for persecution of Jewish people. This is unacceptable and is not to be tolerated in any way.

Our study of John will deal with the Gospel in eight different and rather large sections. This study is encouraged to be a time of personal and communal reflection on who God is and what God is doing in our world and in our lives. The sections will be , 1:1-51, 2:1-5:47, 6:1-10:42, 11:1-12:50, 13:1-17:26, 18:1-19:42, 20:1-31, 21:1-25. Each lesson will focus on a theme verse and attempt to tie the whole sections together.