I
Note: All scriptural citations in this post are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version 1984 by the International Bible Society
JOHN 3
Perhaps the most challenging chapter in the Gospel of John is the third chapter, the encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus. Chapters one and two of John set stage for the rest of John's Gospel by making it clear that Jesus is the only begotten Son of God and the Jesus is also the Lamb of God who offers himself as the blood sacrifice, the new Passover lamb, whose blood will be spent to save those who are his own - those who are called and chosen by God. The implication in John is clear - some make it into God's kingdom, others don't. This is not only unsavory - It is wrong. In my opinion, this conclusion of John 3 renders it unworthy of the papyrus it was written on and here's why...
Chapter three is a recap of the message chapters one and two is making just in case you haven't figured it out. In chapter three we see Jesus testifying about himself to a person only mentioned in the Gospel of John, Nicodemus.
Nicodemus is thought to be a Pharisee who was also a member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council. He doesn't play much of a role, being mentioned on three different occasions in John; here in the cover of darkness, the second time at Jesus's trial before the Sanhedrin and the third time is mentioned as the one who purchases the spices for Jesus's burial. The significance of Nicodemus may be lost on us. Undoubtedly mention of him in John lends a sense of gravitas to what the authors of John are trying to convey.
Chapter three is a recap of the message chapters one and two is making just in case you haven't figured it out. In chapter three we see Jesus testifying about himself to a person only mentioned in the Gospel of John, Nicodemus.
Nicodemus is thought to be a Pharisee who was also a member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council. He doesn't play much of a role, being mentioned on three different occasions in John; here in the cover of darkness, the second time at Jesus's trial before the Sanhedrin and the third time is mentioned as the one who purchases the spices for Jesus's burial. The significance of Nicodemus may be lost on us. Undoubtedly mention of him in John lends a sense of gravitas to what the authors of John are trying to convey.
If one were to follow the storyline of John, one is led to consider that Nicodemus comes in the cover of darkness presumably because Jesus has earned himself the reputation as a trouble maker in the Temple [see John 2] and Nicodemus, being an official of the Temple, doesn't want to be seen conversing with a rabble rouser. Darkness is also the condition Nicodemus finds himself in. He is intrigued by Jesus but is not able to figure Jesus out. The impression is that he wants to know more. The darkness is symbolic of his unknowing. There is a sense in John 3 that Nicodemus could also represent those being initiated into the mystery of the Christ. He is in some way our guide into this mystery. The thought has occurred that Nicodemus might have been originally intended to be the one who is telling the story Jesus in John, but then was relegated to play a much lesser role.
As an initiate, Nicodemus is faced with a quandary posed by Jesus that takes on a riddle-like quality. In fact, if this were a factual story, which it is not, we really have no idea why Nicodemus was approaching Jesus based on anything Nicodemus says. Nicodemus does not even ask a question but rather makes a statement that no one could do the miracles that Jesus had done unless he came from God. That's as far as Nicodemus gets and that's the point the authors and editors want us to get from Nicodemus - Recognition that Jesus comes from God.
Jesus, as portrayed in John, rarely gives a direct answer or response to anyone's questions or statements. Before Nicodemus has a chance to ask a question, Jesus is giving an answer. The answer actually shapes the question that Nicodemus doesn't ask, but which the authors and editors of John want the reader or listener to ask. The trouble is that most Christians are so indoctrinated how to think about this chapter that very little thought is actually given to it. So let's do some unpacking.
BORN AGAIN
Being born is code for being spiritually remade or reshaped by God's Spirit as a new spiritual creature. Once again John is rewriting the Genesis creation story. This is something that Paul also talked about in his epistles. Early Christians saw the resurrection as the genesis point of a new creation in Christ. By the time John is being written this was or was becoming standard Christian theology. In this sense, some evangelicals and fundamentalists are very much in line with Johannine theology. There is a quasi-intellectualism about this process as explained by Jesus in John; that no one can see the kingdom of God unless one is born again, or to put in language of the time, one has to be initiated into the mystery of Christ to gain spiritual sight. Initiation rites were a big thing at the time of Roman Empire - so many cults had such rites. This would have been easily identifiable to John's audience at the time and readily accepted as proper procedure.
Nicodemus plays the straight man, the literalist, who questions Jesus how a man can be born again at his age. His role in this chapter is to be the fall guy who asks the question everyone is thinking about. Of course, true to John's form, Jesus continues being enigmatic about the whole thing. His answer is basically another riddle: "No one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit (code for the initiation rite of Baptism). Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 'You must be born again." To further mystify the issue Jesus adds, "The winds blows where it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit."
Hmm... What's John's point in having Jesus say this?
There is an unspoken or subliminal question that John's authors are trying to answer. It's a question that has plagued Christianity from its inception. If Jesus died on the cross to save the world from its sins, to pay the wages of sin, why is there sin in the world and why is the world the same as it was prior to Jesus' death and resurrection? What has changed?
THE SPIRIT
In the book of Genesis, it was God who breathed "his" spirit and made mankind in his image. The authors of John are putting a twist on this. Since the feast of Pentecost, God's Spirit has gone rogue and recreating the world one person at a time, "The wind blows wherever it pleases." The force of the Spirit drives those who have been reshaped, reborn, recreated by the Spirit to wherever the Spirit desires. In John's creation story, the Spirit of God is once again the active force that is making followers of Jesus and has Jesus telling us so himself.
When Nicodemus asks, "How can this be? John's authors are answering a question that was being indirectly poised to rabbinical community of which Nicodemus is a symbol of. The answer Jesus gives in John is to this community, "You are Israel's teacher (code for rabbis) and do you not understand these things?"
Jesus basically let's Nicodemus' question, the rabbinical question, drop by saying, "I have spoke to you of earthly things and you do not believe, how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?" I'm not sure what "earthly things" Jesus was referencing, but in essence what John is having Jesus say, if you can't get it, can't see it, I can't help you, but I will give you clue anyway. Jesus then goes on to say the sign that they already have regarding God's act of salvation in Christ is what happened in the wilderness when Moses raised a snake on a cross like structure so that everyone who saw it would be saved - another riddle? The oddity in this is that the authors of John are engaging in the redactive practice of reading a meaning into a past event and then putting it into Jesus' mouth as a prophecy about his yet to be death [if one were to read John as a linear story about Jesus, which it is not].
JESUS' ODD SOLILOQUY
Perhaps the oddest soliloquy ever written is John 3:16 through 21, the famous "For God so loved the world" passage. It would be a less odd soliloquy if it were said about Jesus by Nicodemus, since he was present at the time or, better yet, if it found its way into one of the letters attributed to John about Jesus. If that were the case, it would have made sense, but John 3: 16 through 21 has Jesus talking about himself as if he were in the third person and uses the past tense to explain the supposed present and intimated future tense; as in, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life."
Is this some form of a first century attempt at rhetorical or literary modesty on Jesus' part, by not referencing himself in the first person?
Talking about one's self in the third person tends to heighten not lessen the narcissistic tone that John 3:16 presents Jesus as having. I doubt that people in the first century would have seen it differently, and it has become (at least for me) one of the key verses in John which has convinced me that this entire gospel is a story or a parable about Jesus made to appear as though Jesus said the things attributed to him in it.
Another possibility is that John 3:16 -21 is a theological commentary made by the authors or editors of John in an attempt to explain what Jesus was talking about and connecting it to chapter one. The original Greek text did not use quotation marks or red letters to let one know when Jesus was speaking. The only reason to think this is Jesus talking comes from verse 10 which simply says , "and Jesus said," after which there is no interruption to the comments being made to indicate it's an insertion beyond the grammatical use of person and tense.
Having said that, I need to get back on track about why this is said. The purpose of having Jesus give this soliloquy is to answer the unspoken question - why the world hasn't changed? Here John gives a nod to the original creation story in this soliloquy. The implication in John 3:16 is clear - God loves the world - the world he created - God's original creation as described in Genesis. This is the tenuous link John maintains with Judaism - that and reading everything in Hebrew Scriptures as a foreshadowing of God's realized intention of saving the world by sending Jesus into the world as his only begotten Son - an intent that was a given from the very beginning of world - a sort of "just-in-case" measure things go south, which they did rather quickly in Genesis.
EVERLASTING LIFE
Now if God loved his original creation, God's remake of that creation from those chosen to become believers in Jesus is, according to John, even better. Since Jesus paid the ultimate wage for the sins of the world, death, and God accepted it by the sign of Jesus' resurrection (implied at this stage in John) they will have everlasting life - if not in this life - then in the life to come. I would add that if this were a literal retelling of Jesus' actual message during his life time, it would have made absolutely no sense to anyone who heard it. This whole passage is written on the presumption that everyone who is listening to this gospel knows Jesus' story. That is the only way this passage makes any sense.
As to the reason the world continues to be what it always has been, sinful, is that God will not destroy what God has created. Jesus is not sent to destroy or condemn the world but rather to save it, one believer at a time. This, of course, creates a theological conundrum that remains unexplained: If Jesus died to pay the wages of sin for the whole of humankind, why isn't the whole of humankind saved and given eternal life?
Progressive Christian theologians tend to say today that ultimately this is exactly God's plan and intent - everyone is ultimately brought into God's new creation and saved, which I see as an evolving intuition based on the New Testament theology as a whole, but John stops short of that in verses eighteen and nineteen. John tells us that that whoever believes in Jesus will not be condemned and those who don't are condemned already.
Already?
THE LIVING AND THE WALKING DEAD
John's vision of reality is dualistic. There are people of light and those in the dark. There are those who believe and those who don't. There are those who are saved and those who are condemned even as Jesus is speaking. This is the version of reality the authors of John are expressing when John was being written. Things are what they are. It's a version of reality that has much appeal today. It's a literal example of black and white thinking.
The implication in John 3 is that God cannot destroy God's original creation, as in the covenant made with Noah, by which John means humanity. At any rate, it will self destruct eventually; such is the apocalyptic understanding promoted by Johannine school. God has selected those who seek the light to be saved and those who don't cannot be saved, as if to say God will not violate the concept of human choice or will. This throws out any notion of universal salvation. It is also extremely problematic from both a human and theological perspective.
The "already" comment about the condemned paints a hopeless picture. They are as good as dead upon taking their first breath. They are no more than zombies, the walking dead. In my opinion, the authors and editors of John overplayed their hand when they got into this quagmire.
I believe their intent was to discourage the audience of their time from listening to or conversing with those who disagreed with them; namely, the Pharisees who would not have accepted Jesus as divine, much less, God's only-begotten son. I believe discouraging association with the Jewish community to be their intent given the fact that the Pharisees and the Jews are consistently portrayed negatively throughout this gospel.
This approach would have had pragmatic implications as well, since the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. Christians were having a rough time as it were, Jewish communities even more so. Christianity literally, in some places like Rome, started to go underground. In others they figuratively did. With the destruction of the Temple, the visual heart of the then Jewish world was destroyed. This was likely understood by Johannine school as the death knell of Judaism and confirmation of their view of Jesus as God's Son and why John begins with Jesus cleansing the temple.
John doesn't stop with Jesus making his own claim of being God's only begotten son. John once again brings John the Baptist back on stage to reaffirm what Jesus just said about himself. Again there is an unspoken issue being addressed by having John the Baptist saying in verse 30, "He (Jesus) must become greater; I must become less." John the Baptist claims that all authority has been given to Jesus as God's only-begotten and ends by stating once again at the end of Chapter 3, "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God's wrath remains on him."
WOW! We get it, already!!
MAKING SENSE OF JOHN 3
There are several ways to view John 3. One thought that occurs is that it was part of another gospel that was edited into the Gospel of John - a gospel that might have used Nicodemus as the narrator. There is a Gospel of Nicodemus that can be traced to Medieval era. This would have had to been a much earlier gospel. In some ways John 3 reminds me of Genesis 1 and 2; two different but similar creation stories.
Like the wedding of Cana, the Nicodemus story is parabolic in nature. Nicodemus, in this chapter, appears used and abused. His presence is functional to the extent that he allows John's authors to have Jesus say something about himself and to establish the importance of the initiation rite of baptism as necessary for salvation as the only means to being born again. Nicodemus is also used to represent the rabbinical class, the teachers who don't get who Jesus is. Later on, Nicodemus becomes the voice of reason and represents those who honor the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Throughout the centuries Nicodemus has been viewed as a saint in both the eastern and western churches of Christianity.
I mentioned that the authors, in their attempt to make a clean break from Judaism, overplayed their hand when it came to declaring that there are those who will be saved and those who are condemned "already." Progressive theologians would just as soon gloss over verses 18 and 19 of John 3. Those Christians who promote universal salvation; that all will be eventually be saved, have to deal with these verses.
Personally, they make no sense to me as a human being and raise all sorts of theological problems about the Gospel of John, Jesus, and salvation theology as a whole. Personally, I think the Gospel of John is wrong about Jesus and Chapter 3 proves it. I can empathize with John's authors from a historical perspective as to why they portrayed Jesus as they do, but they get it wrong.
What appears to be a sophisticated approach to answering the question of who Jesus is becomes a bungling theological mess that most have sanitized by calling it mystery. John 3 is not a mystery. It is an editorial faux pas that is completely unnecessary to the story and meaning of Jesus' ministry. It is, in a word, "overkill" and will taint the rest of John and has tainted Christianity as an excluding religion.
In the establishment of Christianity as its own religion, one can appreciate the zeal these authors and editors possessed in writing and creating the Gospel of John. By zeal, I do not mean to imply a lack of sincerity. They were undoubtedly sincere in their beliefs about the meaning of Jesus they wanted to portray. In the polytheistic cosmopolitan environment in which they were defining this new religion, they understood the radical nature of what they were saying. What I am saying here is not to question their sincere beliefs or diminish their endeavor.
What I am saying is that Christianity has evolved from where they were and that is my primary point in discussing the Gospel of John, in particular. In a world where atheism was tantamount to insanity, speaking of any form of God or gods came from the perspective of God's existing as separate, other beings, different from humans in any number of ways. Monotheism was a major shift in thinking about the divine and was a giant leap towards a singular view of religion - God is one. Christianity brings this concept to earth in the form of Jesus which the writers of John attempt to meld together by imbuing Jesus with both the divine and human traits and declaring him to be God's only-begotten Son.
This was an extremely radical view and led to Christians being accused of atheism by Roman authorities who understood the emperor to be the son of God. From that perspective, John 3 is setting another agenda about who Jesus is - a defiant agenda against the earthly powers that be. The writers of John could not anticipate the changes that have taken place since their time. They may very well have thought the world in which they lived would be the final version of reality; that it would come to an end very quickly - perhaps within their own life time. Some Christians still think this way today.
In fact the world ending or the end of human life is today more of a scientific probability than a religious belief. The fact that we have scientific proof of the earth's vulnerability and the fragility of life, as a whole, on this planet has changed how many Christians view life on this side of death. They are seeing it as far more precious and much less an obstacle to get through unscathed in order to obtain life on the other side.
John 3 is a dangerous chapter in the New Testament; dangerous if not understood as a theological faux pas based on a world view at the time it was written. It's a time piece whose time has come to be exposed for what it is - bad theology for the 21st century and for the foreseeable future. In the ever evolving religious life of us human beings and of Christianity, in particular, we who are Christian have a responsibility to correct the errors of the past, not eliminate them, but rather own them and understand them compassionately, explain them, and to revisit and, if necessary, to reshape our understanding of all the traditions and beliefs that have been handed down to us.
In some ways and in some parts of the Christian world this is happening, but much of it is happening by glossing over the unsavory parts of scripture rather than calling them for what they are and pointing out the flaws they present. For me the practice of trying to sanitize a flaw is to perpetuate it. A flaw is a flaw. Point it out and fix it by telling why it is flawed.
Monotheists are hung up on their scriptures. They have a tremendously difficult time calling things that are flawed and unsavory in their ancient scriptures as such. They would rather gloss over them, call them a mystery, or not speak about them at all.
Lectionaries are a wonderful means to ignore unsavory parts of scripture. I have yet to hear a sermon or a homily that points out the error of an assigned reading for the day in clear, straightforward language, as in saying, "That was a waste of ink and papyrus and here's why... ." It would be liberating and refreshing.
Until next time, stay faithful
As an initiate, Nicodemus is faced with a quandary posed by Jesus that takes on a riddle-like quality. In fact, if this were a factual story, which it is not, we really have no idea why Nicodemus was approaching Jesus based on anything Nicodemus says. Nicodemus does not even ask a question but rather makes a statement that no one could do the miracles that Jesus had done unless he came from God. That's as far as Nicodemus gets and that's the point the authors and editors want us to get from Nicodemus - Recognition that Jesus comes from God.
Jesus, as portrayed in John, rarely gives a direct answer or response to anyone's questions or statements. Before Nicodemus has a chance to ask a question, Jesus is giving an answer. The answer actually shapes the question that Nicodemus doesn't ask, but which the authors and editors of John want the reader or listener to ask. The trouble is that most Christians are so indoctrinated how to think about this chapter that very little thought is actually given to it. So let's do some unpacking.
BORN AGAIN
Being born is code for being spiritually remade or reshaped by God's Spirit as a new spiritual creature. Once again John is rewriting the Genesis creation story. This is something that Paul also talked about in his epistles. Early Christians saw the resurrection as the genesis point of a new creation in Christ. By the time John is being written this was or was becoming standard Christian theology. In this sense, some evangelicals and fundamentalists are very much in line with Johannine theology. There is a quasi-intellectualism about this process as explained by Jesus in John; that no one can see the kingdom of God unless one is born again, or to put in language of the time, one has to be initiated into the mystery of Christ to gain spiritual sight. Initiation rites were a big thing at the time of Roman Empire - so many cults had such rites. This would have been easily identifiable to John's audience at the time and readily accepted as proper procedure.
Nicodemus plays the straight man, the literalist, who questions Jesus how a man can be born again at his age. His role in this chapter is to be the fall guy who asks the question everyone is thinking about. Of course, true to John's form, Jesus continues being enigmatic about the whole thing. His answer is basically another riddle: "No one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit (code for the initiation rite of Baptism). Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 'You must be born again." To further mystify the issue Jesus adds, "The winds blows where it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit."
Hmm... What's John's point in having Jesus say this?
There is an unspoken or subliminal question that John's authors are trying to answer. It's a question that has plagued Christianity from its inception. If Jesus died on the cross to save the world from its sins, to pay the wages of sin, why is there sin in the world and why is the world the same as it was prior to Jesus' death and resurrection? What has changed?
THE SPIRIT
In the book of Genesis, it was God who breathed "his" spirit and made mankind in his image. The authors of John are putting a twist on this. Since the feast of Pentecost, God's Spirit has gone rogue and recreating the world one person at a time, "The wind blows wherever it pleases." The force of the Spirit drives those who have been reshaped, reborn, recreated by the Spirit to wherever the Spirit desires. In John's creation story, the Spirit of God is once again the active force that is making followers of Jesus and has Jesus telling us so himself.
When Nicodemus asks, "How can this be? John's authors are answering a question that was being indirectly poised to rabbinical community of which Nicodemus is a symbol of. The answer Jesus gives in John is to this community, "You are Israel's teacher (code for rabbis) and do you not understand these things?"
Jesus basically let's Nicodemus' question, the rabbinical question, drop by saying, "I have spoke to you of earthly things and you do not believe, how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?" I'm not sure what "earthly things" Jesus was referencing, but in essence what John is having Jesus say, if you can't get it, can't see it, I can't help you, but I will give you clue anyway. Jesus then goes on to say the sign that they already have regarding God's act of salvation in Christ is what happened in the wilderness when Moses raised a snake on a cross like structure so that everyone who saw it would be saved - another riddle? The oddity in this is that the authors of John are engaging in the redactive practice of reading a meaning into a past event and then putting it into Jesus' mouth as a prophecy about his yet to be death [if one were to read John as a linear story about Jesus, which it is not].
JESUS' ODD SOLILOQUY
Perhaps the oddest soliloquy ever written is John 3:16 through 21, the famous "For God so loved the world" passage. It would be a less odd soliloquy if it were said about Jesus by Nicodemus, since he was present at the time or, better yet, if it found its way into one of the letters attributed to John about Jesus. If that were the case, it would have made sense, but John 3: 16 through 21 has Jesus talking about himself as if he were in the third person and uses the past tense to explain the supposed present and intimated future tense; as in, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life."
Is this some form of a first century attempt at rhetorical or literary modesty on Jesus' part, by not referencing himself in the first person?
Talking about one's self in the third person tends to heighten not lessen the narcissistic tone that John 3:16 presents Jesus as having. I doubt that people in the first century would have seen it differently, and it has become (at least for me) one of the key verses in John which has convinced me that this entire gospel is a story or a parable about Jesus made to appear as though Jesus said the things attributed to him in it.
Another possibility is that John 3:16 -21 is a theological commentary made by the authors or editors of John in an attempt to explain what Jesus was talking about and connecting it to chapter one. The original Greek text did not use quotation marks or red letters to let one know when Jesus was speaking. The only reason to think this is Jesus talking comes from verse 10 which simply says , "and Jesus said," after which there is no interruption to the comments being made to indicate it's an insertion beyond the grammatical use of person and tense.
Having said that, I need to get back on track about why this is said. The purpose of having Jesus give this soliloquy is to answer the unspoken question - why the world hasn't changed? Here John gives a nod to the original creation story in this soliloquy. The implication in John 3:16 is clear - God loves the world - the world he created - God's original creation as described in Genesis. This is the tenuous link John maintains with Judaism - that and reading everything in Hebrew Scriptures as a foreshadowing of God's realized intention of saving the world by sending Jesus into the world as his only begotten Son - an intent that was a given from the very beginning of world - a sort of "just-in-case" measure things go south, which they did rather quickly in Genesis.
EVERLASTING LIFE
Now if God loved his original creation, God's remake of that creation from those chosen to become believers in Jesus is, according to John, even better. Since Jesus paid the ultimate wage for the sins of the world, death, and God accepted it by the sign of Jesus' resurrection (implied at this stage in John) they will have everlasting life - if not in this life - then in the life to come. I would add that if this were a literal retelling of Jesus' actual message during his life time, it would have made absolutely no sense to anyone who heard it. This whole passage is written on the presumption that everyone who is listening to this gospel knows Jesus' story. That is the only way this passage makes any sense.
As to the reason the world continues to be what it always has been, sinful, is that God will not destroy what God has created. Jesus is not sent to destroy or condemn the world but rather to save it, one believer at a time. This, of course, creates a theological conundrum that remains unexplained: If Jesus died to pay the wages of sin for the whole of humankind, why isn't the whole of humankind saved and given eternal life?
Progressive Christian theologians tend to say today that ultimately this is exactly God's plan and intent - everyone is ultimately brought into God's new creation and saved, which I see as an evolving intuition based on the New Testament theology as a whole, but John stops short of that in verses eighteen and nineteen. John tells us that that whoever believes in Jesus will not be condemned and those who don't are condemned already.
Already?
THE LIVING AND THE WALKING DEAD
John's vision of reality is dualistic. There are people of light and those in the dark. There are those who believe and those who don't. There are those who are saved and those who are condemned even as Jesus is speaking. This is the version of reality the authors of John are expressing when John was being written. Things are what they are. It's a version of reality that has much appeal today. It's a literal example of black and white thinking.
The implication in John 3 is that God cannot destroy God's original creation, as in the covenant made with Noah, by which John means humanity. At any rate, it will self destruct eventually; such is the apocalyptic understanding promoted by Johannine school. God has selected those who seek the light to be saved and those who don't cannot be saved, as if to say God will not violate the concept of human choice or will. This throws out any notion of universal salvation. It is also extremely problematic from both a human and theological perspective.
The "already" comment about the condemned paints a hopeless picture. They are as good as dead upon taking their first breath. They are no more than zombies, the walking dead. In my opinion, the authors and editors of John overplayed their hand when they got into this quagmire.
I believe their intent was to discourage the audience of their time from listening to or conversing with those who disagreed with them; namely, the Pharisees who would not have accepted Jesus as divine, much less, God's only-begotten son. I believe discouraging association with the Jewish community to be their intent given the fact that the Pharisees and the Jews are consistently portrayed negatively throughout this gospel.
This approach would have had pragmatic implications as well, since the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. Christians were having a rough time as it were, Jewish communities even more so. Christianity literally, in some places like Rome, started to go underground. In others they figuratively did. With the destruction of the Temple, the visual heart of the then Jewish world was destroyed. This was likely understood by Johannine school as the death knell of Judaism and confirmation of their view of Jesus as God's Son and why John begins with Jesus cleansing the temple.
John doesn't stop with Jesus making his own claim of being God's only begotten son. John once again brings John the Baptist back on stage to reaffirm what Jesus just said about himself. Again there is an unspoken issue being addressed by having John the Baptist saying in verse 30, "He (Jesus) must become greater; I must become less." John the Baptist claims that all authority has been given to Jesus as God's only-begotten and ends by stating once again at the end of Chapter 3, "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God's wrath remains on him."
WOW! We get it, already!!
MAKING SENSE OF JOHN 3
There are several ways to view John 3. One thought that occurs is that it was part of another gospel that was edited into the Gospel of John - a gospel that might have used Nicodemus as the narrator. There is a Gospel of Nicodemus that can be traced to Medieval era. This would have had to been a much earlier gospel. In some ways John 3 reminds me of Genesis 1 and 2; two different but similar creation stories.
Like the wedding of Cana, the Nicodemus story is parabolic in nature. Nicodemus, in this chapter, appears used and abused. His presence is functional to the extent that he allows John's authors to have Jesus say something about himself and to establish the importance of the initiation rite of baptism as necessary for salvation as the only means to being born again. Nicodemus is also used to represent the rabbinical class, the teachers who don't get who Jesus is. Later on, Nicodemus becomes the voice of reason and represents those who honor the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Throughout the centuries Nicodemus has been viewed as a saint in both the eastern and western churches of Christianity.
I mentioned that the authors, in their attempt to make a clean break from Judaism, overplayed their hand when it came to declaring that there are those who will be saved and those who are condemned "already." Progressive theologians would just as soon gloss over verses 18 and 19 of John 3. Those Christians who promote universal salvation; that all will be eventually be saved, have to deal with these verses.
Personally, they make no sense to me as a human being and raise all sorts of theological problems about the Gospel of John, Jesus, and salvation theology as a whole. Personally, I think the Gospel of John is wrong about Jesus and Chapter 3 proves it. I can empathize with John's authors from a historical perspective as to why they portrayed Jesus as they do, but they get it wrong.
What appears to be a sophisticated approach to answering the question of who Jesus is becomes a bungling theological mess that most have sanitized by calling it mystery. John 3 is not a mystery. It is an editorial faux pas that is completely unnecessary to the story and meaning of Jesus' ministry. It is, in a word, "overkill" and will taint the rest of John and has tainted Christianity as an excluding religion.
In the establishment of Christianity as its own religion, one can appreciate the zeal these authors and editors possessed in writing and creating the Gospel of John. By zeal, I do not mean to imply a lack of sincerity. They were undoubtedly sincere in their beliefs about the meaning of Jesus they wanted to portray. In the polytheistic cosmopolitan environment in which they were defining this new religion, they understood the radical nature of what they were saying. What I am saying here is not to question their sincere beliefs or diminish their endeavor.
What I am saying is that Christianity has evolved from where they were and that is my primary point in discussing the Gospel of John, in particular. In a world where atheism was tantamount to insanity, speaking of any form of God or gods came from the perspective of God's existing as separate, other beings, different from humans in any number of ways. Monotheism was a major shift in thinking about the divine and was a giant leap towards a singular view of religion - God is one. Christianity brings this concept to earth in the form of Jesus which the writers of John attempt to meld together by imbuing Jesus with both the divine and human traits and declaring him to be God's only-begotten Son.
This was an extremely radical view and led to Christians being accused of atheism by Roman authorities who understood the emperor to be the son of God. From that perspective, John 3 is setting another agenda about who Jesus is - a defiant agenda against the earthly powers that be. The writers of John could not anticipate the changes that have taken place since their time. They may very well have thought the world in which they lived would be the final version of reality; that it would come to an end very quickly - perhaps within their own life time. Some Christians still think this way today.
In fact the world ending or the end of human life is today more of a scientific probability than a religious belief. The fact that we have scientific proof of the earth's vulnerability and the fragility of life, as a whole, on this planet has changed how many Christians view life on this side of death. They are seeing it as far more precious and much less an obstacle to get through unscathed in order to obtain life on the other side.
John 3 is a dangerous chapter in the New Testament; dangerous if not understood as a theological faux pas based on a world view at the time it was written. It's a time piece whose time has come to be exposed for what it is - bad theology for the 21st century and for the foreseeable future. In the ever evolving religious life of us human beings and of Christianity, in particular, we who are Christian have a responsibility to correct the errors of the past, not eliminate them, but rather own them and understand them compassionately, explain them, and to revisit and, if necessary, to reshape our understanding of all the traditions and beliefs that have been handed down to us.
In some ways and in some parts of the Christian world this is happening, but much of it is happening by glossing over the unsavory parts of scripture rather than calling them for what they are and pointing out the flaws they present. For me the practice of trying to sanitize a flaw is to perpetuate it. A flaw is a flaw. Point it out and fix it by telling why it is flawed.
Monotheists are hung up on their scriptures. They have a tremendously difficult time calling things that are flawed and unsavory in their ancient scriptures as such. They would rather gloss over them, call them a mystery, or not speak about them at all.
Lectionaries are a wonderful means to ignore unsavory parts of scripture. I have yet to hear a sermon or a homily that points out the error of an assigned reading for the day in clear, straightforward language, as in saying, "That was a waste of ink and papyrus and here's why... ." It would be liberating and refreshing.
Until next time, stay faithful
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