Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Cast Out of the Covenant: Jews and Anti-Judaism in the Gospel of John

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. Review [W]hat the reader finds is a fresh argument based upon rhetorical analysis that builds upon Reinhartz's previous work and is likely to persuade many to her position that anti-Judaism is part of the constitutive fabric of the Gospel. . . . I approached reading this work as both a compliant reader, insofar as I have great respect for Adele Reinhartz's work, and a resistant reader, insofar as I was not ready to let go of the hope that John's anti-Jewish tenor could be defused. I must, however, concede that Reinhartz's analysis of Johannine rhetoric and her propulsion theory makes sense, not just of bits and pieces of the Gospel, but of the entire fabric of it. I can find no loose threads with which to unravel it. The task at hand now is to acknowledge this anti-Judaism forthrightly when I study, preach, and teach from this Gospel.-- "Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology"Cast Out of the Covenant is a devastatingly compelling book. . . . meticulously argued, coherently structured, and written with clarity. Indeed, the overall presentation of this book is delightful. Even my students who are not familiar with the style of academic monographs found the book engaging. This book serves as a useful introduction to anti-Jewish rhetoric, several important Johannine themes and passages, and the complexities of translating Ioudaioi. It is a superb introduction to Christian supersessionism and the so-called "parting of the ways." Importantly, it meets readers in the present as it continues an important thread in Jewish-Christian dialogue. . . . Cast Out of the Covenant showcases a rare honesty in both voice and approach. Reinhartz bridges (in a few crucial ways) the usual distance between scholar and scholarship. She invites the reader toward her research with determined vulnerability.-- "JJMJS: Journal of the