Die Authentifizierung der Vergangenheit

The Gospel of John recounts events of the past with a claim to historical referentiality. This is achieved on the one hand through literary strategies that construct the authenticity of the events narrated, and on the other hand through strategies that counteract this constructed authenticity. Susanne Luther explains how readers are thus led to perceive the story of Jesus as a representation of real historical events and the Incarnation as a profoundly earthly-historical event, while at the same time recognizing Jesus of Nazareth as the Christ, the incarnate Son of God, due to the "breaking" of earthly-historical authentication. The Johannine historiography thus brings to bear a central Christological concern that goes beyond a historiographical-biographical narrative.