“But John, the last of all, seeing that what was corporeal was set forth in the Gospels, on the entreaty of his intimate friends, and inspired by the Spirit, composed a spiritual Gospel.” – Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 3.24.7
From at least the second century, Christians have recognised John as an outlier among the canonical Gospels. For Clement of Alexandria, whose words above were cited in the Church historian, Eusebius, the distinction between John and the Synoptics was the difference between a “corporeal” and a “spiritual” one. The other Gospels set forth the plain events of Jesus’ life. John supplied its spiritual meaning.
In New Testament scholarship today, a version of this distinction still persists. To notice it, one need only flick through the index of a book on the historical Jesus. It will be replete with references to the Synoptic Gospels; less so to the Gospel of John.
Why then is John not considered to have the same historical value as Matthew, Mark and Luke? There are many reasons, but the primary one is that John presents a very different portrait of Jesus to his predecessors. Thus, whatever one might make of its individual claims about Jesus, the overall impression of his life is rather different.
It is that impression – ‘the gist’ of Jesus’ life – which I want to focus on in this post. What are some of the most important differences between the Synoptics and John’s portraits of Jesus? And what might these differences tell us about John’s historicity?
1. The Kingdom of God
The first key difference between John and the Synoptics concerns the content of Jesus’ message. In Matthew, Mark and Luke, Jesus proclaims the Kingdom of God/Heaven. Kingdom expressions are used 111 times in the Synoptics. They suggest that that very soon – perhaps even already – God’s rule is breaking into history.
But in John, this ‘Kingdom of God’ language is almost entirely absent. Jesus refers the Kingdom of God in his discourse with Nicodemus (3:3, 5), and to his ‘Kingdom’ in a discourse with Pilate (18:36). Otherwise, the Kingdom language which so dominates Jesus’ depiction in the Synoptics is missing.
We might well wonder: where did it go? How can John have missed this crucial aspect of our earliest source material on Jesus? One answer is that John has substituted it with his own lexis of ‘eternal life.’ In John, Jesus no longer proclaims a Kingdom imminent in the future, but the eternal life on offer in the here-and-now. In the words of Clement, he provides the spiritual meaning of the Synoptics’ account.
2. Jesus’ Miracles
Just as Jesus’ teaching is different in John, so are his miracles. In the Synoptics and their sources, Jesus is presented as an exorcist. Even Jesus’ enemies acknowledge that Jesus was exorcising demons; they merely question by which authority he does so.
Yet in the Fourth Gospel, Jesus’ ministry is gutted of exorcisms. Again, we might ask: where did they go? One popular idea is that John substitutes them with one great exorcism of the devil: ‘Now the ruler of this world will be cast out’ (12:31). John thus links Satan’s defeat more precisely to Jesus’ coming death. Regardless, John has left out a major aspect of Jesus’ ministry in some of our earliest historical sources.
The miracles Jesus does perform in John also differ from the Synoptics. Most notably, the miracles which book-end Jesus’ ministry in John – the Wedding of Cana and the Raising of Lazarus – are missing from the earlier Synoptic Gospels.1 Given the significance of these miracles, it is astounding they are missing from our earliest sources. It is equally suspicious that they are dominated by Johannine concerns.
3. Johannine Dialogue
Yet it is not only Jesus’ message which is of a different character in John. It is also his medium. In the Synoptics, Jesus primarily conveys his teaching in parables and pithy sayings. By contrast, in John, Jesus speaks in figures of speech (παροιμίαν; 10:6) as well as some lengthier speeches. His traditional parables are missing.
Jesus’ teaching in John is also markedly more abstract. Here, Jesus often speaks in metaphors (e.g. water, life, truth) and dualisms (e.g. light and darkness, spirit and flesh, life and death.) This polarising language is also reflected in Jesus’ distinction between himself, ‘the Jews’ and ‘their law’ (10:34). For many commentators, this language more likely reflects the situation and language of Jesus-followers who now distinguish themselves from ‘the Jews’, rather than the historical Jesus himself.
Johannine dialogue also betrays a certain artificiality. One example is the way that Jesus’ metaphors are repeatedly taken literally by his interlocutors. This allows Jesus to correct them, pointing to the spiritual meaning of his words. For instance, when Jesus speaks of being ‘born again/above’ – a double entendre which only works in Greek! – Nicodemus notes that one can’t literally be born again (3:1-21). This enables Jesus to explain that he is talking about being born of water and spirit.
4. Chronological Scheme
John and the Synoptics also differ chronologically. In the Synoptics, the duration of Jesus’ ministry is unclear. But John mentions three Passovers (2:13; 6:4; 12:1), from which is derived traditional idea that Jesus’ ministry was three years long.
John also shakes up some specific Synoptic dates in Jesus’ ministry. Most notably, the cleansing of the Temple – the event which was the stimulus for Jesus’ death in the Synoptics – is moved to the very beginning of the Gospel. Meanwhile, Jesus’ death takes place after the Passover in the Synoptics, but one day before the Passover in John.
In its extended three-year ministry, some scholars have wondered whether John may be more accurate than the Synoptics. Yet it important to bear in mind that John’s chronology is very much a theological one. Throughout the Gospel, Jesus attends and fulfils the symbolism of a whole panoply of Jewish feasts. That this schema is absent from the earlier material should give us pause in granting its historicity.
5. Jesus’ Self-Proclamation
Finally, there is a major difference in Jesus’ self-proclamation between the Synoptics and John. In the Synoptics, particularly in Mark, Jesus tries to keep his identity hidden. This motif is known as the ‘messianic secret.’ By contrast, in John, Jesus explains to Pilate: ‘I have spoken openly to the world… I said nothing in secret’ (18:20).
The difference also concerns the explicit nature of Jesus’ divine claims. While certain sayings in the Synoptics may imply Jesus’ pre-existence or divinity, Jesus’ own divine claims are far more explicit in John. Thus, Jesus claims to have come down from heaven (6:38); he asks the Father to restore him to the glory they once shared (17:5); and he invites his disciple to ‘abide’ in him, just as he abides in the Father (15:4).
Even more idiomatically, Jesus communicates through a series of ‘I am’ statements, echoing the divine name of the Lord (I am who I am). While the initial inspiration for these sayings may be found in earlier Synoptic material (e.g. Mk. 6:50), John takes this echo of the divine name to a new level. When Jesus pronounces his pre-existence – ‘Before Abraham was, I am’ – the Jews attempt to kill Jesus for blasphemy (8:58).
Did Jesus really go around making these claims, or do they reflect the evangelists’ own reflection on Jesus’ life? For most Jesus historians, it is the latter. Not only is it stunning that these claims are omitted in any of the earliest sources of Jesus’ life, it is in keeping with both John’s overall theological scheme and the freedom of the biographical tradition that Jesus has become the mouthpiece of the evangelist.
John… The First Apocryphal Gospel?
The overall impression of these differences is staggering. In setting a distinctive vision of Jesus’ teaching and miracles within his own theo-chronological scheme, John parts company from the Synoptic presentation of Jesus in a number of ways.
What did Jesus teach? How did he teach it? What miracles did he perform? What did he say about himself? Why did he die? Among the earlier Synoptic materials, the answers to these questions are relatively uniform. In John, they receive a very different response.
What could explain these differences between John and the earliest traditions of Jesus’ life? One explanation might be that John has his own eyewitness tradition (rooted in the ‘beloved disciple’), who has packaged his own memories of Jesus within his own idiom, and within the literary liberties of the biographical tradition.
On this reading, John’s presentation may speak to the ‘historical Jesus’ in certain respects, even if it does so at some remove from the Synoptic presentation. As John himself states, many books could not contain Jesus’ words and deeds (21:25). Perhaps John himself picks up on some of these things left out of the Synoptic accounts.
Yet on another reading, John is something akin to an ‘apocryphal’ Gospel. Like other apocryphal texts, such as the Gospel of Peter, John both revises and expands on the earlier canonical material, and does so in often fantastical ways. This re-writing is relatively free, and advances John’s own understanding of the essence of Jesus’ life.2
Whether or not we see John as rooted in eye-witness testimony, or as something akin to an apocryphal text, the overall impression remains the same: John presents a portrait of Jesus which is sometimes quite at odds with the earlier gospels. In my view – echoing Clement’s – this is because John was engaged in quite a different project. He was not setting forth the Jesus of history in any quotidian sense. He was unravelling the spiritual meaning of Jesus’ ever-present Life.
They are also framed by the evangelist in a different way. While in Matthew, Jesus claims he will offer ‘no signs apart from the sign of Jonah’ (Mk. 8:12), John portrays Jesus’ miracles as ‘signs’ to prompt belief (e.g. 20:30-31).
This is of course not to say that John is identical to apocryphal gospels in every respect. There are senses in which John is closer to a ‘fourth Synoptic’ than ‘first apocryphal’ Gospel. Most notably, John composes a full-scale narrative. But it it say that John betrays the same redactive tendencies as later apocryphal accounts. On this view, John’s departure from the Synoptic accounts may signal a freer style of invention.
That last paragraph had me in tears! 😭🙌🏻 I cannot agree more wholeheartedly. A serious read through John’s Gospel blew the door to Christianity open for me. I can entertain different theories about its history, but I cannot for a second doubt the miracle that it brought to bear within my own soul.
One can get quite far by observing that what is implicit in the Synoptics is made explicit in John. For example, in the Synoptics Jesus offers his disciples the cup, calling it both his blood and the “fruit of the vine,” implying that he himself is the vine—a picture of true Israel (Mt 26:28-29 & pls; cf. Jer 2:21 et al.). In John this becomes explicit (15:1). Occasionally this kind of translational move occurs within the Synoptics, though on a much smaller scale (e.g., Mk 13:14; cf. Lk 21:20). I would advise caution in referring to any of Jesus’s “I am” statements as direct claims of divinity. The LXX Greek of Exod 3:14 is ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ ὤν, “I am the Being,” which Jesus never says. The words at John 8:58 are a claim to eternity, and therefore by implication to divinity (cf. Ps 89:2, LXX; 90:2, MT). A fine distinction, I know, but one worth making. The gospels are strewn with implicit claims to Jesus’s divinity—a big subject of its own, which you have touched on elsewhere.