jan 1, 90 - Gospel of John

Description:

85-95 CE

John's gospel was once thought to naturally be the latest because it presupposes a "High Christology," but a similar christology also obtains in the letters of Paul. And dependence on the synoptic gospels cannot be determined clearly. And conjectures over a "community history" encoded in the gospel's account, especially with regard to its stories of expulsion from the synagogue (9:22; 12:42; 16:2), are tenuous at best and misleading at worst, since they over-extend the evidence and usually make reference ot the "cursing" tradition in much later Jewish liturgy. Adele Reinhartz concludes: "The most persuasive evidence for the date of the Gospel of John is textual. The earliest material evidence for the Gospel is a small Egyptian codex fragment of John 18:31-33, 37-38, known as the Rylands Library Papyrus 52. This fragment is dated to 135-160. Because circulation of the Gospel from Asia Minor, where it was likely written, to Egypt would have taken a few decades, the existence of this fragment suggests a late 1st or early 2nd century dating for the final version of the Gospel. For these reasons, John's Gospel is generally thought to have been completed between 85-95 CE." (Reinhartz, Introduction to John in the Jewish Annotated NT)

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