Introducing John’s Prologue

The Gospel of John – Prologue

In this course, Dr James Carleton Paget (University of Cambridge) explores John 1:1-18 (The Prologue). In the first module, we introduce The Prologue, and the debate concerning the authorship of The Prologue in relation to the authorship of John’s Gospel. In the second module, we unpack John’s presentation of Jesus in terms of his references to the Hebrew Bible, Greek syntax, soteriology, and Christology. In the third module, we examine the Jewish background to John’s Prologue, before looking at the possible Hellenistic/Greek background in the fourth module. In the fifth and final module, we view John’s Gospel as a polemic based on John’s presentation of the figure of John the Baptist and John’s deployment of citations from the Hebrew Bible.

Introducing John’s Prologue

In this module, we introduce John’s Prologue, focusing in particular on (i) the theological character of the opening of the Gospel of John, and its distinction from the Synoptic Gospels (ii) breaking down the verses of John’s Prologue (iii) the debate concerning the authorship of The Prologue in relation to the remainder of the text (iv) the presence of John the Baptist as possible evidence for alteration of The Prologue (v) concepts unique to The Prologue, and other concepts unique to the remainder of John’s Gospel as possible evidence for adaptation (vi) the case for the consistency of the authorship of John (vii) the importance of The Prologue for the reading of John in Christian theology.