Negotiating Complexity within the Dialectical and Cosmopolitan Johannine Situation

Abstract

Download PDFsettingsOrder Article Reprints Open AccessArticle Negotiating Complexity within the Dialectical and Cosmopolitan Johannine Situation by Paul N. Anderson 1,2ORCID 1 School of Theology, George Fox University, Newberg, OR 97132, USA 2 Faculty of Theology, North-West University, Potchefstroom 2531, South Africa Religions 2024, 15(6), 633; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15060633 Submission received: 26 February 2024 / Revised: 13 May 2024 / Accepted: 14 May 2024 / Published: 21 May 2024 (This article belongs to the Special Issue Exploring the Complexity of Identities and Boundaries within the New Testament World) Downloadkeyboard_arrow_down Browse Figure Versions Notes Abstract While understandings of Johannine Christianity have been many and varied, single-issue analyses no longer suffice. Things were more complex than simply inferring that synagogue-Johannine tensions, pneumatizing Gnostics, heretical secessionists, or Petrine ecclesiasts was the lone issue. Nor is a two-level reading of the Johannine narrative plausible, as there is no evidence of alien material underlying John's story of Jesus. Thus, the early, middle, and later phases of the Johannine tradition must be taken into consideration, as an autonomous memory of Jesus is best seen as developing in a first edition, which was finalized later by the Johannine Elder after writing the Epistles. Within that perspective, Social Identity Complexity Theory is well applied as a means of understanding a number of partners in dialogue within the Johannine Situation, including the stances of Jesus remembered by the Fourth Evangelist and Johannine Elder, who addressed no fewer than seven crises over seven decades within the cosmopolitan Johannine Situation.