Why is the Gospel of John so different from the synoptic gospels?

[tonychanyt]

Dr. John Oakes:

John purposefully chose material not in the synoptics. Most scholars agree that he wrote at least ten years after the other gospels were composed, and perhaps as much as thirty years later. The reason John used Jn 14-16 is because it happened and it was important to John, both personally, and for the thematic purposes he was using it. John includes many more personal one-on-one interactions of Jesus than the synoptics. I like to imagine John asking himself what things in the life of Jesus are really important, but not found in Matthew, Mark or Luke. OK, I will include that!!! Obviously, Jesus had many of these interactions, and the fact that John emphasized these does not reflect in any way on whether they actually happened or not. I assume that they actually happened and that John chose to include them for his own reasons (under the inspiration of God, of course).

Jn 14-16 contains Jesus' farewell discourse at the end of the Last Supper.

Why is the Gospel of John so different from the synoptic gospels?

John read the other gospels and decided to supplement them with his own gospel without repeating their accounts.

 

[d taylor]

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The Gospel of John was written to anyone who has not believed in Jesus for Eternal Life. So John's Gospel is focused on showing/proving, that Jesus is the resurrection and the life, the promised Messiah (from The Tanakh's prophecies), The only begotten Son of God (Messiah and Son of God are the same titles).

That is why the book is different.

 

[sandman]

John read the other gospels and decided to supplement them with his own gospel without repeating their accounts.

I don’t know if that statement is your assessment or Oakes… but it think it’s partially wrong ….because it takes God or (revelation from Jesus Christ) out of the equation, and that is not how those guys rolled

Either all scripture is given by inspiration of God from Genesis 1:1 to Revelation 22:21 or its not …

It is very likely John did read the other writings. But to insinuate that John filled in the blanks or wrote of his own volition would be contradictory to the Word.

 

[Euthymios]

The Gospel of John is independent of the Synoptic Gospels, and focuses on Jesus' deity.

 

[Euthymios]

As a side note, the New Testament scholar William Lane Craig stated that as far as he can tell, all Johannine scholars (scholars on the Gospel of John), from Rudoplh Bultmann (died 1976) to Bart Ehrman (still alive), believe that the author of the Gospel of John believed that Jesus is God. This is fascinating, and I hope will serve to you edification.