• English Mobster@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    John is sort of a weird gospel because it was written independently of the other three.

    Typically it’s assumed that Mark is oldest of the gospels and written independently. Matthew and Luke are both based on Mark. John, however, remains its own thing and was also written independently, potentially by multiple authors at different times. John was also originally written in Greek and not a translation, as it does wordplay that only works in Greek (see John 3, which makes no sense in English or Aramaic but has a double meaning in Greek).

    One of the ways John is so different from the others is because John plays up the supernatural aspects a bit more. In John, Mary absolutely knows about Jesus’ powers and basically begs Jesus to “blow his cover” as it were, to allow the wedding to save face.

    It’s implied that Mary has always known about Jesus’ “special powers”, especially in John. Mark is much more “down-to-earth” when it comes to describing Jesus’ powers, while Matthew and Luke (as mentioned) copy Mark and add embellishments (the virgin birth, describing the resurrection). Matthew and Luke give Jesus magic powers that he “should” have, whereas John is very explicit about “yeah this is God and he has God powers” in ways the others do not.

    Side note: John is also weird in that Mary and Joseph are basically described as Jesus’ parents. Mary is never mentioned by name, and the virgin birth is never stated. In John, Joseph is also explicitly said to be Jesus’ father, despite, you know… the rest of the New Testament saying he wasn’t. So John is just strange.