The Johannine ‘Jews’: A Critical Survey
The use of Ioudaioi in the Fourth Gospel (hereafter, FG) has attracted much scholarly attention. It is a consistent conclusion of such investigation that the term Ioudaioi in the gospel has a variety of meanings. It is also noted and generally agreed upon that one of the ways in which the term is used is unique to John among New Testament authors and indeed among ancient authors in general; it is this unique usage of Ioudaioi which has been the focus of the investigation. However if we look only at this peculiarly Johannine use of Ioudaioi we find that scholars have disagreed both about which texts within the gospel constitute this usage and also about the identity of the persons referred to by the term. Some authors have seen this usage as referring to the entire Jewish nation composed of both the common people and the narrower circle of religious authorities. Other scholars have considered the term to refer exclusively to religious authorities.