The so-called “realized eschatology” of John’s Gospel is typically thought to be distinctive, to differentiate it from other early Christian sources, and so to stand in need of special explanation. Yet despite undeniable differences, there is no clean break from earlier tradition. John rather adopts and extends interpretive conventions in place before him. Indeed, the Fourth Gospel inherits, to a significant degree, a decades-long process of reinterpretation of the traditions about Jesus, a process going back to year one of the post-Easter period. Parallels from the history of religion illuminate the process of reinterpretation.
Bernhard Lang (Sun,) studied this question.