John as Divine Romance - (Biblical Interpretation) by Eric Foster-Whiddon (Hardcover)

About the Book

Informed by semiotic theory, this comparative literary study reads the Gospel of John with Callirhoe to observe how the ancient novel might inform an understanding of the structural and rhetorical shape of the Fourth Gospel.

Book Synopsis

Why does the Gospel of John tell its story of Jesus the way that it does? Informed by semiotic theory, Foster-Whiddon reads the Fourth Gospel in comparison with the Greek novel Callirhoe, observing how recognition, beauty, travel, and love function in both narratives as intertextual frames that pressure the reader to infer meaning. Analysis of these intertextual frames informs a hypothetical recovery of the cultural encyclopedia from which authors and (more importantly for this study) readers in first-century western Asia Minor would draw when composing or interpreting a story like the Gospel of John or Callirhoe.

About the Author

Eric Foster-Whiddon (Ph.D., St Andrews) is Assistant Professor of Biblical Studies and Director of Graduate Studies in Ministry at Tabor College. He researches the New Testament and early Christian writings in their ancient philosophical and literary contexts.