Historiographical Characteristics of the Gospel of John

Abstract

While presupposing the widely accepted conclusion that the Gospel of John, like the other Gospels, is generically a bios, this article examines more distinctive features of this Gospel which it shares with ancient historiography: precise topography, precise chronology, selectivity, narrative asides, and claims to eyewitness testimony. In these respects the Gospel of John would have appeared to contemporary readers more like historiography than the Synoptics would. The problem of historiographical representation of speeches is solved differently by John from the way the Synoptics deal with it, but John's method of composing discourses and dialogues conforms to good historiographical practice as well as does that of the Synoptics.