Читать книгу Catholicism For Dummies - Rev. Kenneth Brighenti - Страница 88

John was the last one to write a Gospel, and his is the most theological of the four. The other three are so similar in content, style, and sequence that they’re often called the Synoptic Gospels, from the Greek word sunoptikos, meaning “summary” or “general view.”

John, who wrote his Gospel much later than the others, was writing for a Christian audience. He presumed that people had already heard the basic facts, and he provided advanced information to complement the Jesus 101 material covered in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. In other words, the Gospel According to John is like college calculus, whereas the Synoptic Gospels are like advanced high-school algebra.

John sets the tone by opening his Gospel with a philosophical concept of preexistence: Before Jesus became man by being conceived and born of the Virgin Mary, He existed from all eternity in His divinity because He’s the second person of the Holy Trinity. Take a look at the first line from the Gospel According to John: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.”

This is a very philosophical and theological concept. John wanted his audience to see Jesus as being the living Word of God: As he says, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). He was saying that Jesus was the incarnate Word — the Word taking on flesh. The first book of the Bible, Genesis, starts with the same phrase John uses in the opening of his Gospel: “In the beginning.” According to Genesis 1:3, God said, “Let there be light; and there was light.” In other words, by merely speaking the word, God created. John built on that in his Gospel, saying that Jesus was the Word. The Word of God wasn’t a thing but a person. The Word was creative and powerful. Just as God said the word and light were created, Jesus spoke the word and the blind received their sight, the lame walked, and the dead came back to life.