Theology

Lars Kierspel

The Jews and the World in the Fourth Gospel

Parallelism, Function, and Context

[Die Juden und die Welt im Johannesevangelium. Parallelen, Funktion und Kontext.]

2006. XII, 283 pages.

Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2. Reihe 220

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Post-Holocaust theology accuses the Gospel of John of anti-Judaism, if not of anti-Semitism. Lars Kierspel studies the parallelism, context, and function of the Ioudaioi and the kosmos in the Fourth Gospel. He exploits the strengths of narrative criticism by bringing together semantic details and macrostructural observations that challenge an anti-Jewish understanding of the Gospel.
In our post-Holocaust context, the Gospel of John has aroused the suspicion of being a Christian text with an anti-Jewish message. Statements such as »the Jews were persecuting Jesus«, »the Jews were grumbling about him«, or »the Jews said to Jesus, 'You have a demon'« are seen as vicious generalizations that wrongly blame a whole nation. New translations of the Gospel respond to these charges and either omit the term or limit its reference to 'Judeans' or 'Jewish leaders'. Lars Kierspel shows that the Gospel's narrative focus lies not on »the Jews«, mostly used by the narrator, but on the parallel term »the world« which is mostly used by Jesus, the main protagonist. Statements such as »the world … hates me (Jesus),« »the world hates you (the disciples)«, and »the world has hated them (the disciples)« reflect a conflict of the early church with an opponent that cannot be limited to the synagogue. »The Jews« emerge as part of a theodicy which does not stigmatize one particular race but situates the opposition of the historical master Jesus in a post-Easter context of his servants who experience hate and persecution in the larger Greco-Roman world.
Authors/Editors

Lars Kierspel Born 1972; 1998 Masters Degree from Freie Theologische Akademie in Gießen; 2006 Ph.D.; Professor of New Testament at Trinity Bible College and Theological Seminary in Newburgh, Indiana.

Reviews

The following reviews are known:

In: Acta Theologica — 27 (2007), S. 158–161 (Christoph Stenschke)
In: Filologia Neotestamentaria — 20 (2007), S. 150–152 (Christoph Stenschke)
In: Studia Patavina — 55 (2008), S. 649–652 (Guiseppe Segalla)
In: Religious Studies Review — 34 (2008), S. 199–200 (Peter Phillips)
In: Theologische Literaturzeitung — 133 (2008), S. 636–638 (J. Leonhardt-Balzer)
In: Bulletin for Biblical Research — 19.1 (2009), S. 124–125 (Peter H. Davids)
In: Revue d'histoire et de Philosophie Religieuses — 87 (2007), S. 237–238 (Ch. Grappe)
In: Nouvelle Revue Théologique — 131 (2009), S. 121 (J. Radermakers)
In: European Journal of Theology (EJT) — 17 (2008), S. 62–64 (Klaus Bensel)
In: New Testament Abstracts — 51 (2007), S. 386
In: Journal for the Study of the New Testament (JSNT) — 29.5 (2007), S. 73 (Kent Brower)
In: Arbeitskreis f.Evangelikale Theologie — 21 (2007), S. 300–302 (Christoph Stenschke)
In: Theologische Rundschau — 82 (2017), S. 113–154 (Udo Schnelle)
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