John: Quick Summary

[csberry]

After the redundancy of Luke, I was really worried about being able to remain focused when going through the fourth Gospel. However, John's writing style differs a good deal from the other Gospel authors. Matthew seemed utmost concerned with presenting Jesus's life and words in juxtaposition with quotes and prophesies from the Old Testament. Mark's approach dropped some of Matthew's OT quoting and jumped right into the ministry of Jesus. Luke then added more stories and, IMO, did more to show Jesus and his disciples in a more humanizing way.

John, however, seemed to me less concerned about historical accuracy and more interested in reinforcing what he felt was the important teachings of Jesus. John was the last of the four Gospels written and John wrote it near the end of his life (some time in his 80's, I think). Where the other Gospels are keen on chronological details of what Jesus did when, John frequently just said: "And one day, Jesus...". I'll just blame the ESV translation I listened to, but I think the key phrase for the Book of John is "Truly, Truly." It seemed that nearly every quote of Jesus starts off with "Truly, truly, I tell you..."

Comments

Now that you've read the Gang of Four . . .

[(Anonymous)]

just keep in mind that Mark is the oldest of the Gospels and the rest is just postdiction backfill for the gaps Mark created. I concur; John is the one most guilty of the last three of embellishing quotes attributed to Christ. Short on history and long on atmosphere.