Cast Out of the Covenant

The Gospel of John presents its readers, listeners, and interpreters with a serious problem: how can we reconcile the Gospel’s exalted spirituality and deep knowledge of Judaism with its portrayal of the Jews as the children of the devil (John 8:44) who persecuted Christ and his followers? One widespread solution to this problem is the so-called “expulsion hypothesis.” According to this view, the Fourth Gospel was addressed to a Jewish group of believers in Christ that had been expelled from the synagogue due to their faith. The anti-Jewish elements express their natural resentment of how they had been treated; the Jewish elements of the Gospel, on the other hand, reflect the Jewishness of this group and also soften the force of the Gospel’s anti-Jewish comments. In Cast out of the Covenant, this book, Adele Reinhartz presents a detailed critique of the expulsion hypothesis on literary and historical grounds. She argues that, far from softening the Gospel’s anti-Jewishness, the Gospel’s Jewish elements in fact contribute to it. Focusing on the Gospel’s persuasive language and intentions, Reinhartz shows that the Gospel’s anti-Jewishness is evident not only in the Gospel’s hostile comments about the Jews but also in its appropriation of Torah, Temple, and Covenant that were so central to first-century Jewish identity. Through its skillful use of rhetoric, the Gospel attempts to convince its audience that God’s favor had turned away from the Jews to the Gentiles; that there is a deep rift between the synagogue and those who confess Christ as Messiah; and that, in the Gospel’s view, this rift was initiated in Jesus’ own lifetime. The Fourth Gospel, Reinhartz argues, appropriates Jewishness at the same time as it repudiates Jews. In doing so, it also promotes a “parting of the ways” between those who believe that Jesus is the messiah, the Son of God, and those who do not, that is, the Jews. This rhetorical program, she suggests, may have been used to promote outreach or even an organized mission to the Gentiles, following in the footsteps of Paul and his mid-first-century contemporaries.

Reinhartz’s final foray into the rhetorical world of the Fourth Gospel is as incisive as ever . . . Her willingness to, at times, lay herself bare—emphasizing her identity and social location—make Reinhartz’s analysis crucial reading, and offers a helpful model for readers to follow., In Cast out of the Covenant, Adele Reinhartz combines the insights of long engagement in the debate with a clear-sighted analysis of locating these various perspectives in presenting a sustained account of the problem and of what is at stake. . . . .This is a both scholarly and readable, engaging book on what remains an important topic for exegesis and for hermeneutics., The present book marks a concluding step on this brilliant Jewish scholar’s long journey of befriending the author of the Fourth Gospel. Reinhartz is not willing to follow the apologetic moves of many of her Christian fellow-exegetes to explain away John’s anti-Jewish polemics as a still inner-Jewish dispute or a merely marginal element of the gospel text. In her view, the anti-Jewish stance is at the core of its rhetorical construction, and thus more closely linked to the tragedies of later Christian anti-Judaism than most exegetes care to admit., With historical-critical precision and literary-critical acuity, Reinhartz dismisses popular reconstructions of a pre-gospel Johannine community, demolishes standard apologetics for John’s vituperations, and convincingly indicts the Gospel for anti-Jewish rhetoric. The volume represents not only the culmination of decades of Johannine studies, it portends a paradigm shift in the field., Regular Reinhartz readers will not be surprised that she has published another book on John that challenges widely held views of its origin and purpose. She is no “compliant reader” of the Gospel, but she presents “Alexandra,” who is. This engaging exploration of John’s rhetoric and its effects almost assures that conversations about John will now be using new terms, such as “affiliation,” “disaffiliation,” “expropriation,” “propulsion theory,” and, yes, “Alexandra.”

Adele Reinhartz is professor in the Department of Classics and Religious Studies at the University of Ottawa.