The Christian Faith Under Modern SearchlightsJohnson, William Hallock
Religion
The Christian Faith Under Modern Searchlights
Johnson, William Hallock
Modernism (Christian theology)
Another mediating position, adopted by those who do not accept the full
Apostolic authorship, is found in a theory of partition, which assigns a
portion of the Gospel to the Apostle. The artistic unity of the Gospel
and the qualities of style which distinguish it from other writings
present a grave difficulty to any theory of partition. As a sort of
half-way house it will scarcely be permanently tenable. Of Spitta's
analysis, which assigns a part of the Gospel to the Apostle, it has been
objected by a critic of more radical sympathies that such an admission
places him outside the limits of scientific criticism.[299]
299: C. A. Bernoulli, in appendix to Overbeck's "Johannesevangelium,"
1911, pp. 504, 505.
The stronghold of the evidence alike for and against the Johannine
authorship is to be found in the facts of the Gospel itself. On the one
hand a powerful argument, such as that which has been developed by
Lightfoot and Westcott, can be drawn to show that the author of the
Gospel must have been a Jew, a Jew of Palestine, a disciple of Jesus,
one of the inner circle of disciples, and in fact none other than the
"beloved disciple" himself. The internal facts of the Gospel are used in
a different way by others to show that the Fourth Gospel differs so
radically in scene, in the style of its discourses, and indeed in its
entire portrait of Jesus, that it cannot be accepted as historical, or
as the work of one of the disciples.
The difference in scene between the Galilean Gospels and the Jerusalem
Gospel presents no great difficulty, but the crux of the problem is in
the difference in style and subject matter. The Jesus of the Synoptics
cannot, it is said, have spoken in the style of the discourses in John.
Before this judgment can be accepted without qualification, several
points deserve to be noticed. The difference in style is in part
accounted for by the difference in subject matter and in the character
of the audience. There are out-croppings of the Johannine style in the
Synoptics, especially where the subject of discourse is similar. The
passage, Matthew xi. 25-30, which, as we have seen, contains the
essential teachings found in John xiv., is a notable illustration. The
Jerusalem audience again was different from the Galilean audience. If it
be said that when the Jesus of the Fourth Gospel speaks in Galilee (John
vi.) He uses the same mystical style as when He speaks in Jerusalem, it
should at least be considered that the discourse in Capernaum is not
given as a sample of the usual synagogue preaching of Jesus. The scene
clearly marks a crisis in the ministry, a crisis indicated in the other
Gospels by the northern journey for retirement which immediately
followed, but made more intelligible by the supposition that the
Capernaum discourse was practically a clearer revelation to the Galilean
audience of the consciousness of Jesus and the spiritual character of
His work. When we recall that such expressions, familiar to John, as
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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