The Theology of the Gospel of John By Alicia D. Myers

This new book by Alicia D. Myers follows the earlier authoritative volume on the subject by D. Moody Smith in the preceding series, published 30 years earlier. Whereas Smith addressed the epistemological character and origin(s) of John’s theological tensions, drawing in discussions of potential sources underlying and overlaying the evangelist’s work, as well as issues related to inferred dialogues with inferred audiences, the approach taken by Myers advances an analysis of John’s theology within a synchronic inference of its final composition. Myers examines the climactic and transformative revelation of God as narrated in the ministry and reception of Jesus as the Messiah/Christ, noting especially the rhetorical work of the evangelist within his narrative theology (Part 1), featuring theological themes (Part 2), leading to John’s theological contributions over the centuries (Part 3). Chapter 1 (‘John’s Theology: Past and Current Approaches’, pp. 3–23) covers well the history of Johannine scholarship, from the spiritualized appraisal of Clement to Martyn’s and Brown’s inferences of dialectical relations with late first-century Judaism. Despite being seen as a soaring eagle above the ministry of Jesus, Myers notes Frey’s reference to John as ‘a retrospective memory of Jesus; authorized by the Spirit as the real ‘author’ of the gospel’s proclamation (p. 7). John’s theology is thus expressed through Christology, as the Son reveals the Father, and that content is conveyed via John’s narrative theology (following Culpepper’s Anatomy of the Fourth Gospel [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983]).