Document shared: Gospel of John per R. Bultmann

Apologies for the lateness of this. I actually felt mostly normal today, which is good, so I completed Version 1 of the Gospel of John reconstruction.

I've done about 20 - 30 mock-ups of commentators' reconstructions of things like the sources of the Gospels, or Paul's letters, or the Evangelion. Rudolf Bultmann's reconstruction of the Gospel of John has been by far the most complicated and confusing to do. The reason is that he doesn't systematically identify which line belongs to which source; you have to piece that together by carefully reading each footnote. Having looked at this in-depth, I can say with the utmost confidence that he was doing it that way to avoid criticism by others who might have disagreed with his reconstruction. 

The main features of his reconstruction of John are:

1. The chapter order is 4, 6, 5 instead of 4, 5, 6

2. Chapter 8 should be fragmented and blended in among 7, 9, and 12

3. Parts of Chapters 10 and 12 are shifted around

4. The Farewell Discourse is returned to the rough order of 13, 17, 15, 16, 14

5. The original author ("the Evangelist") used (a) a Discourse Source, (b) a Signs (Semeia) Source, (c) sources common to the Synoptics, (d) and some other sources

6. Most of Jesus' speeches in the Gospel of John consist of material from the Discourse Source with the Evangelist's comments in and around

7. In Bultmann's view, the Ecclesiastical Redactor had quite a limited role, only added a sentence or two here and there, or maybe a short paragraph, and ultimately adding John 21

To-do list for future versions:

1. parallels to Egerton papyrus

2. parallels to G. Peter and Synoptics in the Passion Narrative

3. Mandean parallels

4. Odes of Solomon parallels

5. Johannine Epistles parallels