Befriending The Beloved Disciple: A Jewish Reading of the Gospel of John

Adele Reinhartz has been studying and teaching the Gospel of John for many years. Earlier, she chose to ignore the love/hate relationship that the book provokes in her, a Jew, and took refuge in an "objective" historical-critical approach. At this stage her relationship to the Gospel was not so much a friendship as a business relationship. No longer willing to ignore the negative portrayal of Jews and Judaism in the text, nor the insight that her own Jewish identity inevitably does play a role in her work as an exegete, Reinhartz here explores the Fourth Gospel through the approach known as "ethical criticism," which is based on the metaphorical notion of the book as "friend"--not "an easy, unquestioning companionship," but the kind of honest relationship in which ethical considerations are addressed, not avoided. In a book as multilayered as the Gospel itself, Reinhartz engages in 4 different "readings" of the Fourth Gospel: compliant, resistant, sympathetic, and engaged. Each approach views the Beloved Disciple differently: as mentor, opponent, colleague, and as "other." In the course of each of these readings, she elucidates the three narrative levels that interpenetrate the Gospel: the historical, the cosmological, and the ecclesiological. In the latter, Reinhartz deals at length with the so-called expulsion theory, the dominant scholarly notion that the Johannine community, which included believers of Jewish, Gentile, and Samaritan origins, engaged in a prolonged and violent controversy with the local Jewish community, culminating in a "traumatic expulsion from the synagogue."

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments Chapter 1. Prologue 2. Reading as Relationship 3. The Gospel of the Beloved Disciple 4. The Beloved Disciple as Mentor: A Compliant Reading of the Fourth Gospel 5. The Beloved Disciple as Opponent: A Resistant Reading of the Fourth Gospel 6. The Beloved Disciple as Colleague: A Sympathetic Reading of the Fourth Gospe 7. The Beloved Disciple as Other: An Engaged Reading of the Fourth Gospel 8. Conclusion: Befriending the Beloved Disciple Notes Bibliography Index of Ancient Literature Index of Subjects Index of Names

About the Author :
Adele Reinhartz is Professor of New Testament and Second Temple Judaism at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. She is the author of The Word in the World and "Why Ask My Name?" Anonymity and Identity in Biblical Narrative.

Review :
"Adele Reinhartz's long-awaited and elegantly written book enriches our knowledge of emerging Judaism and Christianity. Befriending the Beloved Disciple engaged in a very generous and original reading of the fourth Gospel from a critical but sympathetic Jewish perspective. This is "must" reading for anyone concerned with the long history of anti-Judaism engendered by the Chrsitian Gospels. I highly recommend it."--Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza "Befriending the Beloved Disciple is an invigorating exercise in situated reading. Adele Reinhartz candidly lays out her reader's position in relation to John's Gospel as a Jew and a feminist, and then instructively explores the ways in which a reader so situated might relate to this text that insistently demads of its audience adherence to a particular community of belief. There is much to be learned here both about John and about the reading process."--Robert Alter, University of California, Berkeley "Reading the Gospel unaware of the cogency of alternative readings is ultimately an act of denial that robs the text of its potential to call readers into self-examination and conversation with other readers. By exploring compliant, resistant, sympathetic, and then engaged readings, as a female Jewish New Testament scholar, Reinhartz brings divergent readings of the Fourth Gospel into dialogue withone another and exposes the potential and the problems of each approach. As a result, everyone who reads this book will find that they are able to read the Gospel more knowingly, though less comfortably."--R. Alan Culpepper, McAfee School of Theology "A sensitive and highly perceptive Jewish reading of John." --E. P. Sanders, The New York Review, November 2001 "Sensitive and engaging." --Craig A. Evans, Theological Studies, March 2002 "This book will help rather than hinder Jewish-Christian relations." --Casimir Bernas, Religious Studies Review, April 2002 "Reinhartz has helpfully opened a door to Jewish-Christian exegetical and theological discussion of this Gospel." --Theology Today, July 2002 "This beautifully written and, at times, very personal study is a delight to read. Reinhartz brings both the text and the Beloved Disciple vividly to life (often in ways which Christian readers will find uncomfortable), and the book will prove essential reading for anyone desiring to deepen his or her relationship with both the Beloved Disciple and his gospel." Helen Bond, University of Edinburgh, The Journal of Theological Studies