The realism of Jesus' dialogues in John
(Originally published at What's Wrong With the World. Link to original post at 'permalink' below.)
Scholars will sometimes imply that the dialogues in John are artificial by saying that the misunderstandings of Jesus’ interlocutors provide an opportunity for Jesus to develop his theological ideas further. Even when a scholar does not say so explicitly, it is difficult to avoid hearing the implication that John at least partially invented the audience confusions, questions, and interruptions to “set up” Jesus’ further theological expositions, as if the interlocutors are two-dimensional stooges. For example, with reference to how John “develops” Jesus’ “discourses,” Craig Keener says,
As Dodd and others have noted, John develops most of his discourses the same way: Jesus’ statement, then the objection or question of a misunderstanding interlocutor, and finally a discourse (either complete in itself or including other interlocutions). John usually limits speaking characters to two (a unified group counting as a single chorus) in his major discourse sections, as in Greek drama. (The Gospel of John: A Commentary, p. 68)This gives a rather surprisingly artifical impression.
Similarly, Keener says, “Such misunderstanding serves as a dramatic technique allowing the primary teacher the occasion to expound the point more fully” (p. 546). (Digression: As I’ve noted in other posts on John, scholars have a special, just-constructed-for-John use of the term “discourses” that includes conversations. This definition is not applied to the Synoptics, which is then used to argue that there are lots more “long discourses” in John than in the Synoptics--an instance of the kind of strange reasoning with which NT scholarship is unfortunately rife. Keener’s description here shows part of the rationale for this just-for-John definition of “discourses.” Scholars believe that there is a special pattern that unites the conversations and speeches in John that is artificial in appearance and distinctively Johannine.)
Certainly there are cases where Jesus uses the misunderstanding of an interlocutor as an opportunity for further explanation. But so would any good teacher in literal history. It is rather frustrating that the relevance and aptness of Jesus’ answers, even their cleverness, should be taken as an opportunity to imply that the dialogue is constructed rather than naturally occurring. Indeed, it is worth asking what, precisely, a dialogue between a good teacher, known for extremely cryptic statements, and either a confused or a hostile interlocutor would look like if it were recognizably historical, and how that would differ from what we have in John.
In the dialogue with Nicodemus, Nicodemus does ask how a man can enter again into his mother’s womb and be born (John 3.4), and Jesus does answer by saying that one needs to be born of the Spirit (John 3.5). In one of the final conversations with his disciples before his crucifixion, Jesus almost seems deliberately to provoke a baffled question by telling his disciples that they know where he is going and the way to go there (John 14.4). Thomas, in perhaps understandable exasperation, says that this is not so. They do not know where he is going, so how can they know the way? (John 14.5) Jesus immediately picks up on the opportunity to utter, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me.” (John 14.6)
Does the aptness of these bits of dialogue cast doubt upon their recognizable historicity? Not at all. All four Gospels show that Jesus was a rather frustrating person, given as he was to cryptic sayings. He probably knew very well how to interact with his disciples in precisely this way, and did so intentionally.
Moreover, the implication that the dialogues in John appear artificial through an overly pat consonance between question and answer, misunderstanding or interruption, and further explanation rests on cherry-picked data. The dialogues, looked at more carefully, have the somewhat random characteristics of realistic conversation, and there are many places in John where interruptions and misunderstandings do not really further the topic previously under discussion at all. The woman at the well in John 4.19-20 changes the subject entirely. When Jesus gets too close to her personal life, she veers off into flattering him by calling him a prophet and asking him where he thinks they should worship. Jesus allows her to change the subject and follows her into the new topic, prophesying the destruction of Jerusalem (and Gerizim) and saying that the true worshipers are those who worship God in spirit and in truth. In John 7.34, Jesus says that they will seek and not find him. His listeners muse over what he is saying: Is he saying that he will go and teach the Greeks in the diaspora? This misunderstanding does not further the conversation at all. It is the end of that particular discussion.
The so-called “Light of the World Discourse” is a particularly good example of the rocky, realistic properties of the conversations in John. Jesus declares that he is the light of the world, but in John 8.13, the interruption takes the conversation in a different direction from what Jesus was following before. There actually is no dialogue or discourse at all on how or whether Jesus is the light of the world. The hostile listeners “go meta” by accusing Jesus of arrogance for testifying of himself. They may be remembering something Jesus said during a different feast (John 5.31) in which he said that his testimony is not true if he testifies of himself, attempting to use those words against him. As with the woman at the well, Jesus follows them into the new topic and discusses his right to testify of himself. In vs. 21, Jesus says that he is going away and that they cannot follow him. They wonder (vs. 22) whether he will kill himself. In his reply (vss. 23-24), Jesus does not really explain his misunderstood words about going away. By the time we reach vs. 48, some in the crowd are simply angry (probably because Jesus told them that the devil rather than Abraham was their father in vs. 44) and utter a contentless insult. This is not the only time that Jesus encounters hecklers. In this case, Jesus answers the insult (that he is demon possessed) directly and keeps repeating that they are dishonoring him, adding the claim that anyone who obeys his word will never see death. This hardly looks like an artificial dialogue. The disrespect of the crowd in this chapter and Jesus’ sometimes stubborn, angry, and insulting responses hardly give the impression of an unruffled sage engaging in a smooth dialogue with a two-dimensional “chorus” constructed as a literary foil.
Someone in the grip of the theory that John constructs dialogues to give Jesus a chance to develop theological themes might think that Martha’s misunderstanding of Jesus’ promise to raise Lazarus (John 11.24) is too good to be true, a literarily constructed set-up for Jesus to say, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11.25). But upon further reflection, one should realize that it was quite natural for her to think that Jesus was referring to the resurrection at the last day, a common view in Jewish thought at the time, as N. T. Wright has shown. And in the larger picture, Martha’s misunderstandings in the passage as a whole are quite realistic. Her boldness and practicality when she remonstrates with Jesus about opening the tomb, on the grounds that Lazarus’ body must stink by this time (John 11.39), are entirely consistent with her personality as portrayed both in John and in Luke 10.38-42. Martha certainly doesn’t look like a two-dimensional interlocutor that John has constructed for Jesus to bounce sage-like sayings off of.
Cherry picking is one of the major banes of New Testament studies. For example, I've shown that several claims of "development" in the Gospels rely on cherry picking. (See here and here.)
Cherry picking passes without serious challenge in NT scholarship often because too many scholars in the discipline lack the analytical epistemology training to ask whether the data is cherry picked. There is also an unfortunate tendency to assume that, if some scholar can think up a theory, that theory is automatically epistemically respectable. Hence, the mere suggestion that John "develops" his dialogues by "having" the interlocutors ask questions that Jesus can answer, and one or two apparent examples, are treated as enough to make the theory a very live contender indeed.
What all this points to is the need for fresh perspectives on NT studies and a higher degree of rigor in evaluating proposed theories. It would also be extremely helpful if scholars would come out and say more explicitly and clearly what they are getting at and what they think a given evangelist did. Then we could decide whether the theory in question is supported by the evidence. I hope to bring that fresh perspective in my blog posts, Facebook posts, and next two books.
Be on the lookout for The Mirror or the Mask: Liberating the Gospels from Literary Devices, available for pre-order November 20 of this year and coming out physically in December.
This post itself has been a draft of material that is slated to appear perhaps a year later in The Eye of the Beholder, entirely on the Gospel of John.
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