Gospel of John Archives - Page 9 of 9

Two Pools in Jerusalem – Bethesda and Siloam

At the 2010 meeting of the Near Eastern Archaeological Society, James Charlesworth gave a brief report on the two pools mentioned in the gospel of John, the pool of Bethesda (Bethzatha, John 5:2) and the Pool of Siloam (John 9:7). Because these two pools were unknown until recently, scholarship has occasionally dismissed John’s Gospel as non-historical. For example, since Bethesda was said to have five “roofed colonnades,” medieval commentaries took this as an allegory for the five books of the Law. In fact, there were two connected pools with a shared colonnade between them, hence five in all.

Siloam was thought to be the pool at the end of Hezekiah’s tunnel, but it is now virtually certain that a nearby pool was the pool of Siloam.

Pool of Siloam (Source: bibleplaces.com)

Charlesworth cited Ronny Reich as claiming both pools were mikvoth, pools used for ceremonial cleansing before going up to the Temple. In both cases there are stairs leading to a platform, which is consistent with other mikvoth around Jerusalem. What is missing is the divider found on most of these pools. Charlesworth indicated that there were other mikvoth which did not have the divider, even though it is a common feature. Charlesworth speculated that the pool was a reservoir which was re-configured during the Herodian period to serve as a mikveh.

If these identifications are correct, then the pool of Siloam was a massive mikvoth at the southern approach to the Temple mount. The pool is fed by the Gihon spring (providing living water) and could have serviced the thousands of pilgrims which came to Jerusalem during the feast days. That Jesus would heal a man and send him to a mikvah is significant. The blind man is healed, ritually cleansed, and then he goes up to the Temple to worship.

The pool of Bethesda was likely another water reserve re-configured as a mikvah. The pool may have been built by Simeon, a high priest who lived about 200 B.C. (Sirach 50:3). Charlesworth showed several snake figures excavated at the pool, indicating that the area also housed an Asclepeion, a pool dedicated to the healing god Asclepius. It is possible then the blind, lame, and paralyzed were not waiting for the God of Israel to heal them, but rather the god Asclepius. If this is true, then there is a tension in the story: who are you going to believe can heal you, the god Asclepius, or the God, Jesus?

In both cases, the identity of these pools help to illuminate the stories as they appear in John. The writer of John is not simply familiar with major features of Jerusalem, these locations are critically important to the point of these two healings.

Raymond Brown and the Johannine Community

Is it possible John wrote his gospel and then revised it many years later? Raymond Brown suggested the Gospel of John is the product of a Johannine Community which produced the gospel over a period of time.

In most multiple edition theories there was a single base document which underwent several revisions, possibly at the hand of the original author, over a number of years. Analogies for this sort of work abound in modern scholarly writing where an author revisits his book 20 or 30 years later and revises the book to reflect additional learning or thinking, possibly to bring it up to date. Brown himself is an example of this as he was in the process of revising his commentary on John after 30 years when he died.

Like multiple-source theories, these sorts of theories can become rather complex. W. Wilkins, for example, saw four stages for the gospel of John. First, a Book of Signs, 4 in Galilee and 3 in Jerusalem. Seven Discourses were later added to the signs and then another writer added 3 Passover stories (2:13-22, 6:51-58, 12:1-7). A final redactor added chapter 21, completing the book as we have it today. While this accounts for the whole Gospel of John, it is nearly impossible to know if any of these revisions of the book actually happened – there is no documentary evidence for this sort of a theory. Urban C. Von Wahlde has an even more complex explanation of the various voices in the Gospel of John in his three-volume commentary on the Gospel and letters of John (Eerdmans, 2010).

Brown suggested a more plausible multiple edition theory. The natural first stage was the actual public ministry of Jesus and his disciples. After the resurrection, the twelve apostles publicly preached the resurrection of Jesus. The synoptic gospels reflect this apostolic preaching. The tradition that Mark preserve the preaching of Peter may indicate that the outline and content of the book as the content to of the apostolic “trust.” Matthew and Luke make use of Mark, and possible Q (or Matthew has the Q material, either way, Matthew and Luke reflect the Galilean disciples of Jesus).

According to Raymond Brown, John reflects the preaching and teaching of the disciples of Jesus in and around Jerusalem. This accounts for the different sorts of information that was remembered and passed along, for difference sin tone and language, for the emphasis on Jerusalem and the Jewish festivals, and possible (so says Brown), the Light / Dark theme that is parallel to what we read in the Qumran materials.

It is possible the Johannine Community included Samaritans, based on John 4 and 8:48 (Jesus is accused of being a Samaritan). Jews and Samaritans sharing fellowship in a single religious community would have been scandalous, especially in pre-70 Judea. Brown suggests that Jews that accepted Jesus as the Messiah convinced in synagogues.

There were debates within the synagogues which generated a number of “homilies” preserving Jesus’ teaching that were attempts to convince Jews that Jesus was the Messiah. It is possible that some time before 70 these Christians were expelled from the synagogue, ostracized and persecuted. (See 1:11, 10:28-29; 15:18, 16:2 and the“not of this world” theme in 15:18, 16:3, 16:33). John therefore could be aimed at Jewish Christians that are still in the synagogue (“crypto-Christians” in Brown) who are not fully “Christian” in the opinion of the author. They need to come out and be separate from the Synagogue.

A second goal of the Gospel would therefore be to convince Jews and Jesus was the Messiah. This fits well with the purpose of the Gospel as stated in John 20:30-31:

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

If Brown is on the right track, then it is possible to read John as a reflection of the “parting of the ways” between Judaism and Christianity in the mid-90’s A.D. This theory accounts for the Jewishness of John’s Gospel while also reflecting a fairly well-developed Christology.

Are there specific elements in John that are more “Jewish” than often assumed? Are there other ways we might evaluate Brown’s thesis?

See also my reviews of David A. Lamb, Text, Context, and the Johannine Community (LNTS 477; T&T Clark 2013) and Sonya Shetty Cronin, Raymond Brown, ‘The Jews’ and the Gospel of John (LNTS 504; T&T Clark 2015)

Did John Know the Synoptic Gospels?

Scarcely is there a subject in Johannine studies that is fraught with more mines in the field than the relationship between John and the Synoptics. G. L. Borchert, John 1-11 (NAC 25a Nashville: Broadman & Holman), 37.

One of the reasons that the Gospel of John seems so different is that the three synoptic gospels are so similar. Because of the similarities between Matthew, Mark, and Luke some theory of literary dependence must be given to explain the close relationship. John appears to be quite independent of the synoptics. There are a number of key omissions in John’s gospel. For example, there is no birth or baptism story, nor is there a temptation in the wilderness. Jesus casts out no demons nor are there any real parables (although there are some parabolic actions). There is no “communion” established at the Last Supper. Instead, John describes Jesus washing the feet of the disciples (13:1-16.)

Remarkably, there is no prediction of the fall of Jerusalem. I find this interesting since one of the key arguments for a date after A.D.70 is this predication placed on Jesus’ lips. The Gospel of John is universally thought to be written in the 90’s, well after Jerusalem was destroyed. If the gospel writers were inclined to create things to make Jesus appear to be a prophet, where is any hint of the coming Jewish war? Perhaps this is related to another issue, the complete lack of prophecies concerning a second coming. Instead, Jesus promises to send the Paraclete to the disciples after he returns to heaven (14:25-26, 16:7-15). Where is the Olivet Discourse in John’s Gospel? I suggest that this material was omitted since it was included in the Apocalypse of John.

Stanley Porter lists four possible positions on John and the synoptic Gospels:

John knew the synoptics, or at the very least he knew Mark, which he used in writing his gospel, This “restricted dependence” theory is often complicated by arguing that it was not a canonical Mark he read, but rather a proto-Mark. Few (if any) advocate this position today.
John and the Synoptics used interlocking sources. This “flexible dependence” is advocated by D. A. Carson, C. Blomberg, D. M. Smith, B. de Solages, and G. Beasley-Murray. John may not have used the synoptics, but he was aware of them. Some things are made more clear in John (that Jesus knew his disciples prior to their call, how did Peter get into the courts, why did people think he was going to destroy the temple?) Some things in John are more clear after reading the synoptics (Jn 12, why is Philip hesitant to bring a Gentile to Jesus? Mt 10:5, do not go to the Gentiles)
John used a combination of written and oral sources, some of which were known to the writers of the synoptics. This is a semi-independence theory, advocated by Gordon Smith, C. K. Barrett). A potential problem is that it is hard to imagine that independent oral traditions continued well into the 90’s if the synoptic gospels were well used by the churches.
John used written or oral sources that the synoptic gospels did not know. This is a complete independence theory. C. H. Dodd (1958, 1963) is the chief commentary here, there is no literary use of the synoptic tradition at all!

Even if the gospel of John is independent of the other three Gospels, it is hard to imagine John was not aware of the preaching of the gospel (the kerygma) at the foundation of the synoptic Gospels. Carson and Moo call this an “interlocking tradition.” The Gospels use each other without betraying dependence. So John was most likely aware of the contents of the three synoptic Gospels and this accounts for the large amount of unique material. What the other three Gospel writers chose to omit John chose to include, but some details were added with help the reader to understand the three earlier Gospels. For example, Jesus already knew the disciples before he called them (John 1), a fact overlooked in Matthew, Mark and Luke.

These differences may include the more advanced theological agenda found in John compared to the synoptic Gospels. The idea of who Jesus was has developed from the time of Mark, perhaps as many as thirty years of thought has gone into who Jesus was and what Jesus did on the cross! John is interpreting the life of Jesus with the understanding that some 60 years have passed since the crucifixion – providing a theological hindsight to understand the words and deeds of Jesus more clearly.

Bibliography: D. M. Smith, John Among the Synoptics: The Relationship in Twentieth-Century Research (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992).

Stanley Porter, “The Sources of John’s Gospel,” an unpublished paper read at the 2003 meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society.