Bulletin for Biblical Research (BBR) 1991
Bulletin for Biblical Research 1 (1991) 89-108
Signs and Faith
in the Fourth Gospel
MARIANNE MEYE THOMPSON
FULLER THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY
The Problem of Signs and Faith in John
wade and an elephant can swim aptly characterizes the issue of the
signs in the Fourth Gospel. In recent years there appears to be no less-
ening of interest in various aspects of the question of signs in the Gos-
pel of John. Monographs on the topic appear regularly.1 Among the
questions which continue to be investigated are the possibility and
shape of a signs source lying behind the Gospel, the historical and
religious provenance of the signs tradition, and John's theological
appropriation of it. Of particular and enduring interest is the question
of the role of the signs in bringing about faith.
That this question persists is surely due to the intrinsic interest of
the question itself, as well as to the ambiguity of the data in the Gos-
pel. How does one square apparently straightforward statements such
as 20:30-31, "Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his
disciples which are not written in this book; but these are written that
you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by
believing you might have life in his name," which suggests that signs
are to lead people to faith, with statements where Jesus seems to dis-
tance himself from people who believed "when they saw signs" (2:23-
25; 4:48; 6:2) or perhaps even rebukes the request for visible evidence
on which to believe (4:48; 20:29)? In recent years, investigation into the
1. In the last five years, for example, the following studies have appeared: H.-P.
Heekerens, Die Zeichenquelle der johanneischen Redaktion: Ein Beitrag zur Entstehungs-
geschichte des vierten Evangeliums, SBS 113.
Zeichen im Johannesevangelium, WUNT 2/26 (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck],
1987); Robert Fortna, The Fourth Gospel and its Predecessor (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988);
Urban C. von Wahlde, The Earliest Version of John's Gospel: Recovering the Gospel of Signs
(Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1989). See also the survey by Robert Kysar, "The Fourth
Gospel. A Report on Recent Research," ANRW ll 25.3 [2398-2402, 2453-56].
90 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
question of signs and faith in John has also been fueled by the trend to
seek literary layers within the text as well as historical stages behind
it, with the hope that alleged tensions between various statements in
the Gospel may be solved by appeal to sources, layers of traditions,
redactors, or some combination of these.2
The present essay also deals with the question of signs and faith in
John. In doing so, it acknowledges an indebtedness to Rudolf Bult-
mann. He was not the first to pose the question of signs and faith in
John, but in doing so he pressed beyond surface questions to deeper
theological issues about the nature of revelation and faith which he saw
as essential to understanding John and, indeed, the entire New Testa-
ment. Bultmann clearly saw that the character of faith was as impor-
tant to the discussion of signs and faith in John as was the question of
the role of the signs themselves, or the resolution of critical problems,
such as the use of sources. Unfortunately, few scholars have followed
his lead in this regard. Although there are numerous studies of signs in
John, and although many have also addressed the question of their role
in producing faith, far fewer have spent as much creative energy in
probing the character of faith in John as they have these other topics
(or, we might add, as did Bultmann). This situation led Robert Kysar to
comment, "The nature of faith itself in the fourth gospel is widely dis-
cussed, but the creative contributions are fewer [than contributions to
the question of the relationship of signs and faith] . . . . Little that has
been written lately on the subject merits our attention here."3
But although Bultmann raised important questions, there is little
agreement that he provided satisfactory solutions to them. At least
one scholar who thought that he did not was his own pupil, Ernst
Käsemann. Indeed, these two scholars represent nearly opposite ends
of the spectrum with respect to the question of signs and faith in John.
In order to show what is at stake in this issue, I would like to begin by
2. In addition to the works by Heekerens, Fortna and von Wahlde and the review
of scholarship by Kysar in note 1, above, see also Jürgen Becker, "Wunder und Chris-
tologie: Zum literarkritischen und christologischen Problem der Wunder im Johannes-
evangelium," NTS 16 (1969-70) 139-48, and "Exkurs 1. Die Semeiaquelle," in Das
Evangelium nach Johannes (Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn; Würzburg: Echter- Verlag, 1979)
1:112-20; Ernst Haenchen, John (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984);
Semeia in the Fourth Gospel: Tradition and Redaction (Leiden: Brill, 1972); Luise Schottroff,
Der Glaubende und die feindliche Welt: Beobachtungen zum gnostischen Dualismus und seiner
Bedeutung für Paulus und das Johannesevangelium (WMANT 37; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neu-
kirchener Verlag, 1969); W. Wilkens, Zeichen und Werke: Ein Beitrag zur Theologie des 4.
Evangeliums in Erzählungs- und Redestoff (ATANT 55; Zürich: Zwingli Verlag, 1969).
3. Robert Kysar, The Fourth Evangelist and His Gospel: An Examination of Contempo-
rary Scholarship (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1975) 229. The situation has not changed
greatly since that time, as a glance at Kysar's "The Fourth Gospel: Recent Research" will
show (see note 1).
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 91
briefly recounting the positions of Bultmann and Käsemann on this
question. This sketch will also serve to show what issues remain to be
investigated in formulating a proposal about the relationship of signs
and faith in John.
Bultmann argued that the Gospel of John used a source which
viewed miracles as manifestations of power and thus as legitimating
credentials for the Revealer, understood as a theios anthropos.4 Al-
though the Evangelist adopted the signs-source, he discarded the
view that miracles are intrusions of the divine into the human world
which produce physiological changes or supply material gifts apart
from the person of the Revealer. Instead, the miracles are symbols of
the giving of the Revealer himself, indicators that "the activity of the
Revealer is a disturbance of what is familiar to the world."5 But that
Jesus' activity is in fact the work of the Revealer of God cannot simply
be read off from external acts. It is known only in the moment of faith,
in the decision by which one overcomes the offense that in the human
being, Jesus of Nazareth, one does indeed encounter the Revealer. For
revelation in Jesus is essentially hidden, and faith is "the willingness to
live by the strength of the invisible and uncontrollable."6 Bultmann's
famous Dass applies to Johannine theology: it is the mere fact that in
Jesus one encounters the Revealer of God that calls for faith. One can
ask for no other content, evidence, or legitimation in order to believe,
for such demands vitiate the very heart of authentic faith, which is the
surrender of everything that seems to provide security. The request
for signs is, in fact, just a quest for security, whereas authentic faith
must discard any such quest.7
Käsemann countered Bultmann's assertions by insisting that no
first century author could have envisioned the manifestation of God,
or of a god, apart from the miraculous or marvelous.8 Extraordinary
happenings inevitably accompany the appearance of deity, and are
the evidence of divine identity and presence. The signs of the Fourth
Gospel serve primarily to reveal the glory (or divinity) of Jesus. Not
surprisingly, John deliberately selects those miracles which heighten
4. For Bultmann's view of the signs, see his The Gospel of John (ET Philadelphia:
tament (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1955), 2:44-45, 56-57, 60; for his discussion
of faith, see Theology, 2:70-92.
5. Theology, 2:44.
6. Theology, 2:75.
7. Signs can, according to Bultmann (Theology, 2:45) serve to jolt people to pay heed
to the Revealer and thus perhaps lead to faith. But they are only concessions to human
frailty and cannot serve as the basis for true faith.
8. Käsemann's work, The Testament of Jesus (ET Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968), espe-
cially its first chapter, challenges Bultmann's delineation of Johannine theology. For his
discussion of miracles, see particularly 21-23, 52-53.
92 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
the manifestation of Jesus' glory.9 Signs do not merely symbolize the
revelation of glory; they are a necessary and indispensable part of it.
Bultmann's Dass is not enough; in John there is also a content to the
revelation, a Was. And what the signs make known, specifically, is the
unity of the Son and the Father. Indeed, the Gospel takes this to
extremes. Jesus is more than a theios aner; he is in fact "God going
about on earth."10 Accordingly, faith cannot be limited to decision, but
it must include assent to dogma. And, writes Käsemann, "John's
peculiarity is that he knows only one single dogma, the christological
dogma of the unity of Jesus with the Father."11
Here we have two opposing evaluations of signs and their func-
tion in the Gospel of John. On the one hand, signs serve merely to
symbolize the gifts of life offered through the Revealer himself. But
they do not make the identity of the Revealer more apparent or more
easily grasped. Nor do they remove the offense of the hiddenness of
the Incarnation so as to aid the leap of faith. On the other hand, in
Käsemann's estimation, signs function to make Jesus' identity trans-
parent, providing the evidence of his unity with the Father.12 Faith is
assent, believing the dogma of the unity of Father and Son.
In this debate Bultmann's viewpoint has received greater criti-
cism, for it anachronistically interjects into the exegesis of a first cen-
tury document later rationalist discussions about the possibility of
miracles.13 Furthermore, Bultmann not only depends heavily on a
particular existentialist understanding of revelation, but argues that
John holds these assumptions as well. To this point Käsemann
counters that one must interpret historical documents in their proper
historical categories, arguing that the first-century framework sug-
9. Gerd Theissen, The Miracle Stories of the Early Christian Tradition (ET Philadel-
phia: Fortress, 1983) 293, argues that the intensification of the miraculous characterizes
the entire early Christian miracle tradition.
10. Thus the Christology which Bultmann assigned to John's signs source properly
belongs to the Gospel itself. Käsemann's characterization of the Christology of the
Fourth Gospel corresponds exactly to Bultmann's depiction of Markan Christology. In
History of the Synoptic Tradition, 241, Bultmann writes, "In Mark [Jesus] is a theios anthro-
pos, indeed, more; he is the very Son of God walking the earth." For discussions of the
theios aner concept, its relationship to miracles, and its influence on New Testament
studies, see D. L. Tiede, The Charismatic Figure as Miracle Worker (SBLDS 1;
SBL, 1972) esp. 241-92; Carl H. Holladay, Theios Aner in Hellenistic Judaism (SBLDS 40;
11. Testament, 25.
12. On the transparency of miracle, see also Theissen, Miracle Stories, 301.
13. For comment on first-century "skepticism" about miracles, see E. R. Dodds,
Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety (New York: Norton, 1965) 124-26. The question
was not so much whether miracles actually took place, but by what means they were
performed. Bultmann, to the contrary, suggests that John may well have doubted the
factuality of the miracles he reports; see, e.g., John, 119 n. 2.
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 93
gests that the revelatory significance of the signs lies in their demon-
stration of divine power or glory.
But here is where one may justly criticize Käsemann's interpreta-
tion. For to the extent that Käsemann lodged the revelatory signifi-
cance of the signs in the demonstration of Jesus' divine power or
glory, his exposition of the Johannine view of signs is inadequate.
Jesus' signs manifest not his own glory, but that of the Father working
in him, and only in this way do they manifest the unity of Father and
Son. And yet even that assertion does not exhaust the significance of
the signs in John. One must probe further to ask, How do the signs
reveal the unity of Jesus with the Father? For in the answer to this
question one also finds the answer to the question, How do signs
function so as to lead to faith? According to John, how were the signs
to lead people to "believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and
believing have life in his name" (20:31)?
This essay would like to investigate more closely the question how
the signs function so as to lead to faith. For ease of discussion, this
overarching question can be divided quite simply into three parts:
(1) What is a sign in John? (2) What is faith in John? (3) How do the
signs function so as to lead to faith?14 We will take each of these ques-
tions in turn. To the first two questions, I will offer a brief answer in
the form of a thesis statement and a short discussion of that thesis. To
the third question—How do the signs lead to faith?—I will again
propose an answer in the form of a thesis statement and then, in order
to defend that thesis at greater length, turn to an exegetical discussion
of selected narratives. Finally, I will offer some summary and reflec-
tive comments on the character of faith in the Gospel of John.
What is a sign in John?
in John?15 I propose this understanding of a sign in John: A sign is a
14. Here it could be objected that this paper is assuming the very thing that it
needs to prove, namely, that signs do lead to faith. In the opinion of many scholars, the
view that signs lead to faith comes from a source or tradition that John used, and does
not represent John's own theology (see note 2, above). It is argued that John is more am-
bivalent towards, and perhaps even critical of, both the role of miracles and the value of
faith that rests upon them. Elsewhere I have argued that there are few, if any, traces of
this alleged critique of faith based upon signs in the Fourth Gospel; see The Humanity of
Jesus in the Fourth Gospel (Fortress Press, 1988), chapter 3. If signs do not lead to faith,
then the problem of later generations who do not see is not a problem; but John ad-
dresses this issue directly (20:26-31). For a similar assessment of signs and faith, see
Bittner, Jesu Zeichen im Johannesevangelium.
15. The issue I am addressing here is not the question of which of the things that
happen in John are properly called signs. I believe that John includes the healings, the
94 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
manifestation, through the person of Jesus, of God's work in the world. We
may unpack this thesis thought by thought. First, the word "manifes-
tation" here is intended to imply something that is visible or even tan-
gible.16 There is, in the words of Rudolf Schnackenburg, a solidly
material aspect of the signs.17 Their significance is not to be located
solely in a "spiritual" or "other-worldly" meaning, as is sometimes
proposed, for they are real deeds which happen among real people.18
What it means to say that the signs are the work of God is that they
manifest the very character, or some aspect of the character, of God
(5:19-21, 36; 6:32; 9:3, 33; 10:25, 32, 37-38; 14:8-11; 15:24). Signs are
theological as much as they are christological.19 They are not legitima-
tions of Jesus' divinity, but rather manifestations of the character of
the God who stands behind them. Who God is is made known in these
signs. Moreover, signs are manifestations of God's work in the world.
feeding of the 5000, and the changing of the water to wine under this rubric; but acts
such as the temple cleansing, the discourses of Jesus, the resurrection, and the appear-
ances—including the catch of fish—are less obviously "signs" for several reasons:
(1) The term "sign" is explicitly used in John only in connection with what we call the
miracles (e.g., 2:11) and in no case unambiguously refers to other deeds. (2) Discussions
about or requests for "signs" (2:18; 6:30) come up—ironically—when Jesus has just pro-
vided the kind of sign that has been requested. (3) Summary statements which refer to
signs are probably best taken as referring to the "miracles" which Jesus did. 12:37-38,
for example, could not include the resurrection or appearances. The statement about
signs at 20:30-31 should be read in light of the earlier summaries, and not vice versa. (4)
Finally, the broader term in the Gospel is "work" or "works." Under this term, one may
include other deeds of Jesus. At any rate, the definition of "sign" which I propose would
not be substantially different if one were to take it more inclusively than I have done.
16. Although in John "sight" becomes metaphorical for "insight" or faith (9:39-41),
the metaphor does not eclipse the more literal meaning of "sight" as physically seeing.
Precisely this is the point: when one sees (witnesses) a sign, one must see (understand)
its meaning. But the meaning of the sign depends on both the factuality and nature of
the sign itself. To the dual meaning of "seeing" in John corresponds the dual meaning of
"glory." Glory is both visible manifestation and so also revelation of character or being;
see G. B. Caird, "The Glory of God in the Fourth Gospel: An Exercise in Biblical Seman-
tics," NTS 15 (1969): 265-77.
17. Rudolf Schnackenburg, The Gospel According to John (
1980) 1:525; Theissen, Miracle Stories, 298, 300.
18. In sharp contrast, see Schottroff, Der Glaubende and die feindliche Welt, esp. 26,
248-61. Schottroff argues that there are two parallel realities in the Johannine world, the
spiritual and the material. The material element, the actual deed of Jesus, is irrelevant to
meaning of the sign and so for faith as well.
19. On this point, see C. K. Barrett, "Christocentric or Theocentric? Observations
on the Theological Method of the Fourth Gospel," in Essays in John (
minster, 1982) 1-18. Barrett, in criticism of both Bultmann and Käsemann, writes, "We
must now, without abandoning either anthropology or Christology, go on to speak of
theology in the strict sense of the term. John is writing about, and directing our attention
to, God" (3).
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 95
They are the active and visible manifestation of God's gracious char-
through the person of Jesus. John seems eager to reserve the term for
Jesus and his works and life. There are no stories in John about rival
acter at work for the salvation of the world. Finally, signs are done
exorcists, and no warnings of false messiahs who will come with signs
and wonders. Even the disciples are promised that they will do
"greater works," not greater signs (14:12). A sign is a manifestation,
through the person of Jesus, of God's work in the world.
What is faith in the Gospel of John?
What, then, is faith in the Gospel of John? In keeping with the under-
standing that signs manifest the character of God and show God's
gracious activity at work in the world through Jesus, faith can be
defined as faithfulness in trusting the God who is made known in Jesus
Christ. Again we may examine the components of this definition. First,
faith is faithfulness. There is in the Fourth Gospel an emphasis on the
importance of persevering, continuing, being steadfast in faith. That is
the burden of John's use of the word menein, for example. It is those
disciples who "continue" in Jesus' word who will know the truth and
be set free (8:31); those who "abide" in the vine who will bear fruit
(15:4-7). Jesus' farewell discourses are intended to keep the disciples
from falling away (16:1), from becoming like the disciples of chapter 6
who "withdrew and no longer went about with him" (6:66).
Second, faith is faith in the God who is made known in Jesus Christ.
Even where the person of Jesus seems to be the explicit object of faith
(e.g., 8:25, 28, 58; 17:3; 20:30-31), that faith is directed through Jesus to
God. Jesus alone speaks the words of life (6:68), but those words com-
municate life because the living God has given life to the son who in
turn confers it on believers (5:21-26; 6:32-33, 57). Ultimately life
comes from God, but through Jesus; and faith which leads to life is faith
through Jesus, but in God.
Third, faith is steadfastness in trusting the God who is made
known in Jesus Christ. John's language for faith is language of per-
sonal relationship and experience: one loves (13:34; 14:15, 21, 23-24;
15:12), knows (14:7; 17:30), obeys (14:21-24; 15:12-14; 17:6), lives in
vital fellowship (14:23, 15:1-7) or in personal communion (17:21, 23),
is taught (6:45; 14:25; 16:13), has peace (14:1, 27-28) and joy (14:28;
15:11; 16:20-21; 17:13). John's language borrows from the world of
human experience and life: from childbirth (1:12-13; 3:1-6; 16:21),
family (1:12-13; 8:34-58; 14:18), friendship (15:15), eating and drink-
ing (6:31-58). The language of faith is the language of life (3:15-16,
6:40, 47-51, passim). John insists on the vital and robust character of
faith as entrusting oneself to God.
96 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
Faith is also steadfast trust because it is committed to the God
made known through Jesus, and to no other God. For there is no other
source of life (3:15-19), no other revelation of God (1:18: 14:9-11), no
other avenue to God (10:8-10; 14:6-7), no other source of knowledge
of God (1:18; 3:32). The finality of the revelation of God through Christ
also serves to define faith in the Fourth Gospel, for it shows both to
whom and through whom faith is to be directed, as well as to empha-
size the character of faith as steadfastness. For the implication of the
finality of revelation is the steadfastness required of faith: one may
turn nowhere else for life.
Such a definition of faith does not entirely agree with the twofold
insistence found often in Johannine studies today that faith in John is
dogmatic and christocentric in character, that faith is primarily
believing certain dogmatic propositions about Jesus. This definition of
faith misses the heart of what faith is in John. Statements which are,
on the surface, most radically christocentric are seen, on closer exami-
nation, not to call for faith in Jesus, but for faith in God mediated
through Jesus. Thus Jesus is the bread of life given by God (6:32); Jesus
is the way to the Father (14:7); Jesus has been granted authority by
God to raise the dead and give life (5:21, 24-29; 11:25-26); and Jesus is
the only Son who makes the Father known (1:18). In the end, sayings
which point to Jesus' unique role and function are first and foremost
statements about knowing God and receiving life and salvation from
God, and not "dogmatic" assertions about Jesus. The Gospel's chris-
tology really stands in the service of its soteriology and not in the ser-
vice of formulating doctrine about the person of Jesus. If the Incarnate
Word makes available the status of "children of God" (1:12-13), one
gains this status not by believing that certain things are true about
Jesus, but by being reborn by the power of the Spirit of God (1:13; 3:5–
8 ), the Spirit which Jesus bears and brings (3:34).
This understanding of faith is simply a corollary of the previous
definition of signs. If Jesus' signs are manifestations of God's work
through him, then it follows that if they are to lead to faith at all, they
are to lead to faith in the God whose work they are. This does not
imply that the agent through whom they are done is simply dispens-
able. The signs are also truly the signs of Jesus. But here we are
already anticipating the third question—How do signs lead to faith in
John?—and it is to this question that we now turn.
How do signs lead to faith in John?
Again let me begin by advancing and unpacking a thesis. Jesus' signs
lead to faith when one discerns in them the manifestation of the character of
God as life-giving and responds to Jesus as mediating that life. With Käse-
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 97
mann we may assert that true understanding of Jesus' works as the
works of God includes the recognition that they are carried out with
God's authority and power. But that recognition is in turn based on
understanding the character of God's work as work which heals,
restores, grants wholeness, gives life. God grants life through these
works, and it is the character and work of God—and of God alone—
to give life. This is the key. God alone gives and restores life, and if the
signs confer life, then Jesus' works are the works of God. Because
Jesus' signs impart life and manifest God's life-giving character, one
should "believe the works" (10:38; 14:11), that is, believe that they are
God's own works of healing and restoration.
The words "impart" and "manifest" are deliberately chosen,
rather than the words "symbolize" and "reveal." Jesus' signs do more
than symbolize the gift available through him, as though the sign in
itself were irrelevant to understanding him or that it were not part of
the gift of life itself. Jesus' works do indeed point to the fact that he
himself is life, but they do so because they themselves are also gifts of
life. What the signs manifest and bring to men and women is, in
Johannine terminology, life. Signs do not merely symbolize or point to
the availability of eternal life through Jesus; they themselves offer life
in the present. They effect what they promise. They are part and par-
cel of the substance of the gift of life. A helpful analogy is that of the
signs which accompanied the Exodus. The plagues and wonders
wrought by God through Moses foretold and promised the coming
deliverance from
behalf of the people of
and are part of the liberation of the people from captivity.20
Too often Jesus' deeds are regarded merely as pictures or illustra-
tions of spiritual realities. On this view the real significance of the
Johannine miracles lies not in the deed which was actually done, but
in the spiritual or mystical reality which Jesus is also able to impart.
The "bread of life" which Jesus promises is actually spiritual food,
eternal life. A blind man is healed, but it is infinitely more important
that he receives spiritual sight. Likewise, Lazarus symbolizes the rais-
ing of the spiritually dead. But we may justifiably ask, how is it that
feeding 5000 guarantees or even suggests that Jesus can give that kind
20. In the LXX sēmeion appears as the preferred rendering of the Hebrew word ôth.
Frequently the term ôth is connected with mōphet, in the plural translated as sēmeiai kai
terata, "signs and wonders." This is a formulaic designation for God's acts, especially in
conjunction with the Exodus and with the salvation of his people. The plagues of
are "signs" (Exodus 8:23; 10:1-2), effected by God's power through Moses, but so are the
rod that became a serpent, and Moses' hand which became as white as snow (Exodus 4).
But the word ôth, sēmeia, need not be limited to the mighty intervention of God. The
symbolic prophetic actions were also called signs.
98 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
of food which will ease the pangs of spiritual hunger? And what is the
connection between raising a man from the grave and the grand
promise that those who believe in Jesus will "never die"? Certainly
bringing the dead back to life is extraordinary; but is even such a
marvelous act a sufficient basis for believing the promise that Jesus
can also bestow eternal life? One may grant that these acts are sym-
bols; but are they adequate for their purpose? They are if they are
understood, like the Mosaic wonders and the prophetic signs, to effect
what they promise.
Second, just as the word "symbolize" can mislead when applied
to the Johannine signs, so can the word "reveal," since it is sometimes
taken as implying the communication of new information or some-
thing previously hidden or unknown.21 That God is gracious and
works to bring health, freedom, and life to
God, the common ground between John and his partners in debate,
the datum against which Jesus' works could be tested and under-
stood, and on which John's appeal was based. In fact, the continuity of
Jesus' work with that of the God of Israel is one of the assumptions
upon which John's argument is based. Jesus' critics did not deny that
he worked signs; but they denied that his works were in keeping
with, and could only be, the work of God.
But wherein lay the continuity between the work of God as made
known to
this claim to be believed? It was not to be believed solely on the basis
of Jesus' own claims, nor to be known only in believing, in the leap of
faith itself, nor by virtue of his working of miracles as tokens of divine
power. Jesus was to be known by the kind of work he did. Jesus was
to be known by the way in which he brought the mercy of God into
the world. He was to be recognized because his signs manifested the
character of God as the creator and sustainer of life. The response
which is called for, then, is faith in this God who creates and sustains
life, a faith which is construed as worship, trust, and obedience, and
which is mediated through the person of Jesus.
Much has been asserted here that needs further exploration. In
order to support this understanding of how signs lead to faith, we
need first to test the thesis that the signs themselves confer life. The
statement that signs confer life implies both that "life" is the sub-
stance of what they offer and that they are not simply pointers to
another plane of life, whether that be construed as a "spiritual" life or
"everlasting life." In order to test this thesis, we will examine several
of John (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1970) 54, who uses revelation in this way.
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 99
of the Johannine narratives of Jesus' signs. Second, following the dis-
cussion of what is offered through the signs, we can then take up
somewhat more briefly the question of the relation between signs and
faith.
Two healings
We begin with the paired healings of the official's son (4:46-54) and
the man at the pool of
each story illustrates the truth of the statement, "The hour is coming,
and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and
those who hear will live" (5:25). Jesus gives the boy life when death
threatens. His promise, "Go; your son will live" (4:50; 53; cf. 51)
becomes a word of life. And although death does not threaten the
invalid at the pool, Jesus restores him to fullness of physical life in
granting him health and strength.22 Second, the healing of the man at
the pool takes place on the Sabbath. Together these two factors—the
kind of work Jesus does and the day on which he does it—lay the basis
for the discourse that follows (5:17-47). Here Jesus argues the point
that he works even as his Father works. With this statement Jesus
defends his Sabbath healing, but he also characterizes the kind of work
that he does. For he performs the kind of work reserved for God alone:
he gives life (5:21, 26), as has been twice demonstrated.23 The dis-
course of chapter 5 also speaks of Jesus' power to judge, which is sim-
ply another way of speaking of his power to grant eternal life (5:22,
27-29, 30), as the following statement makes clear: "he who hears my
word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; he does not come
into judgment, but has passed from death to life" (5:24).
Thus two stories where someone has "heard Jesus' word" and has
been granted life are used to introduce the claim that Jesus grants
eternal life.24 But what is the relationship between the gift of physical
life and the granting of eternal life? Are the healings merely illustra-
tions of the gift of eternal life? The interpretation of signs as "symbols"
suggests that physical life serves as a symbol or figure of eternal or
22. See the discussion in C. F. D. Moule, "The Meaning of 'Life' in the Gospels and
Epistles of
122.
23. There is a stimulating discussion of these passages and their parallels in Philo
in Jerome Neyrey, An Ideology of Revolt: John's Christology in Social-Science Perspective
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988) 25-29.
24. On the significance of "hearing Jesus' word," see the recent study by Craig
Koester, "Hearing, Seeing, and Believing in the Gospel of John," Biblica (1989) 70:327-48.
Koester argues that authentic faith in the Gospel of John is based on hearing, but never
on seeing; signs confirm faith that is engendered through hearing (332). The emphasis on
Jesus' word is not unlike that found in Bultmann, Theology, 59-69 and Jürgen Becker,
100 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
spiritual life. But on what basis can the claim be made that the one
guarantees the other? The answer that John supplies is the answer of
the OT prophets: there is one God who provides and nurtures life. For
this reason, healing often images salvation in the OT. We are
reminded, for example, that after the celebration of the crossing of the
God, "I am Yahweh your healer" (Exod 15:26), surprising only because
one might have expected an identification of Yahweh as deliverer or
protector. Hosea is replete with the refrain, "who will heal
one of the most poignant laments of the book we read, "Yet it was I
who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms. But they did
not know it was I who healed them" (Hos 11:3). Throughout Hosea,
the image of healing is used for both the disciplining and the salvation
of the people of God. Jeremiah similarly employs the image of God as
healer. Jeremiah is somewhat skeptical that God will indeed keep the
promise to heal (14:19). But God does promise healing (30:17-22), an
all-encompassing healing, which includes both the restoration of
physical well-being and the granting of the knowledge of God in a
renewed covenant (31:33). Jeremiah's prayer, "Heal me, 0 Lord, and I
shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved" (17:14), shows both that
healing could be used as an image of salvation, and that healing was
also part of salvation.25
Healing images salvation, because both are the work of the one
Creator God. If we turn to the Gospel of John, we are reminded that
the world was created by God through the Logos (1:10) and there is
"life in him" (1:4). The Word is the agent or instrument of bringing the
world to life. Subsequently, Jesus' healing of the official's son and of
the man at the pool confer physical life. Thus Jesus is the agent of
bringing life to the world, sustaining the world even on the Sabbath as
does the Lord God of
ment and raise people in the resurrection to eternal life. From begin-
ning to end, his work is characterized as bestowing life from God. It is
hard to escape the conclusion that John wants us to understand the
Word, incarnate in Jesus, as the mediator of both physical and spiritual
"Exkurs 1. Die Semeiaquelle," and "Wunder und Christologie." Koester's interpretation,
however, rightly does not play off Jesus' word against the signs, as do Bultmann and
Becker. And yet one wonders whether it does not dismiss too quickly (1) the problem of
those who will not see (20:20-31) and (2) the summary statements in 12:37-38 and
20:30-31, which draw a direct link between signs and believing. 12:37-38 especially
asserts the guilt of those who do not believe. This is hard to understand unless the signs
were to lead them to faith, and not merely to confirm faith they already had.
25. See the summary in Howard Clark Kee, Medicine, Miracle and Magic in New Tes-
tament Times (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986) 14.
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 101
life.26 The signs, then, are not simply illustrations or figures of another
kind of life-giving power Jesus has. They confer or bring life. More-
over, the signs give life because they are ultimately wrought by the
one God (5:19; 21, 26; 10:38; 14:11) who is the source of all life. The
life-giving signs of Jesus are ultimately the life-giving work of God.27
Two gift miracles
We turn from these two healings to two signs in John which fall under
the rubric of "gift" or "supply miracles." The feeding of the 5000 is
common to all four Gospels; the changing of the water into wine is
unique to John. Yet there are interesting overlaps. In neither of these
stories can it be said that Jesus actually improves the "quality of life"
of those involved, or that he saves them from imminent death. In each
case the provision of food and drink becomes symbolic of or points to
something else that Jesus also provides.
This is clearly visible in the story of the feeding of the 5000 in
chapter 6. Jesus feeds the multitudes, and interprets his action as rep-
resentative of a ministry that brings the bread of life to the world.
Jesus supplies that which is necessary to meet physical need, but the
discourse of chapter 6 makes no claims about Jesus' ability to continue
to meet such needs. Instead, it uses this deed to advance Jesus' claims
that he satisfies spiritual hunger as well. The discourse, in fact, seems
to move quickly away from the actual deed of feeding hungry people
to another level of meaning. Typical of Johannine misunderstandings,
the discourse builds on the fact that Jesus' audience hears his promise
to give them living bread in a crassly materialistic way, whereas Jesus
is actually talking about quite another kind of bread and hunger.
Jesus feeds people who are spiritually hungry.
And yet while this understanding of Jesus' act is true insofar as it
goes, one must not neglect the historical and Biblical allusions so
important to understanding this story. For the narrative and discourse
of chapter 6 deliberately echo themes of the first Passover and the
Exodus from
cession (6:30-31) to the grumbling of the people in the wilderness
(6:41, 52).28 Clearly the point is that God now provides the true bread
27. Theissen, Miracle Stories, 226-27 writes, "There is no relativisation of miracles
in John; on the contrary, they are a continuation of God's work of creation (5:17), and in-
deed surpass it (5:20). They are unique. No-one else can perform them (15:24; 3:2)."
28. For discussions of Exodus motifs behind chapter 6, see the studies by Bertil
Gartner, John 6 and the Jewish Passover (ConNT 17; Lund: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1959); Peder
Borgen, Bread From Heaven. An Exegetical Study in the Concept of Manna in the Gospel of
John and the Writings of Philo (NovTSup 10; Leiden: Brill, 1965).
102 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
(6:32), the bread which brings life. But the analogy carries conviction
because it rests on the story of the first Exodus, when God gave the
people bread in order to sustain life.29 Through Jesus, the same God is
at work to sustain and grant life. But the provision generously sur-
passes the need. Here John strikes the note of messianic fulfillment
and abundance as well. The extravagant provision for the people calls
to mind promises of the messianic age, and the feeding itself suggests
the return of the treasury of manna from on high in the age to come.30
In many ways, then, John depends on the assumption of the continu-
ity of Jesus' signs with the work of God: it is the same kind of work,
work which sustains life, and it fulfills the promise given by God to
raise up another prophet "like Moses" (Deut 18:15-18).31
One may also recall the changing of the water to wine at
Here there is need, but less urgent than that of the multitudes in the
wilderness, for wine to celebrate a wedding scarcely falls under the
category of "daily bread." Again Jesus' provision is more than ade-
quate; it far surpasses the need. As one writer notes, "What is striking
in this story is the utterly gratuitous nature of this deed . . . It is pre-
cisely this gratuitous generosity that is the glory revealed in this
sign."32 Or, as John notes, "from his fullness have we all received,
grace upon grace" (1:16). John may again be calling on the promises
that the coming age of deliverance would be an age of abundance of
both physical and spiritual blessings, including both the abundance of
the harvest and of the revelation of the glory of the Lord (e.g. Isa
66:11). The signs link the actions of Jesus to the promises and work of
God, and show that the same faithfulness and goodness is manifested
now as then, but in surpassing abundance and fullness. But the signs
do not simply promise or symbolize God's gifts of life; they also offer
those gifts. For God is the creator, sustainer, and giver of all life.
29. Borgen (Bread from Heaven, 7-10) discusses six texts from the Palestinian mid-
rash and Philo which state that God reversed the natural order in making bread come
down from heaven, rather than up from the earth. Assumed here is God's sovereignty
over the natural order, as well as his ability to change it in order to provide for the Isra-
elites who are "so much beloved by Him" (Mek. Ex. 16.4).
30. See Gärtner, John 6, 14-20; Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John
(Garden City: Doubleday, 1966) 1:265. None of the texts cited by Brown are as early as
John, but they may nevertheless illumine the passage, if the traditions preserved can be
traced back to the first century. On this point, see also Aileen Guilding, The Fourth Gospel
and Jewish Worship: A Study of the Relation of
tem (Oxford: University Press, 1968) 61-68.
31. On the promise to raise up a "prophet like Moses," see Wayne Meeks, The
Prophet-King. Moses Traditions and the Johannine Christology (NovTSup 14;
1967).
32. Rodney A. Whitacre, Johannine Polemic: The Role of Tradition and Theology
(SBLDS 67; Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1982) 109.
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 103
Common to both these narratives is what has been called the
"spontaneity" of the act.33 Jesus takes the initiative in these deeds. In
fact, the Johannine narratives also repeatedly show Jesus as taking the
initiative in healing. Where someone approaches him with a request to
act or to heal (2:3, 4:47, 11:30) he first distances himself from the peti-
tioner (2:4, 4:48, 11:4-5), showing that he acts only in his own hour
and only at his Father's bidding.34 In all other narratives, Jesus takes
the initiative in acting (5:6; 6:5-6; 9:3-7). The theme of Jesus' sponta-
neity and sovereignty in initiating the signs is a corollary to the belief
that God alone is the source of all life, and that life is a gift to be
received from the gracious and sovereign hand of God.
The healing of the man born blind
We come then to the narrative of the healing of the man born blind, a
story unique to John and obviously a carefully fashioned narrative.
Here favorite Johannine terms such as light, darkness, seeing and
believing, judgment and guilt, play such important roles that one can-
not help but read the narrative on two levels: as the concrete act of the
man Jesus, but also as evocative of realities that go beyond what is
actually seen and experienced through the healing itself. That is, this
is clearly a story about healing in the physical realm, but it is the story
of another kind of healing as well. The question is how these two
healings are related.
To answer the question, we must turn to the narrative itself.
Again we may note several features for comment. First, when Jesus
heals the blind man, he restores to him, by miraculous power and
divine authority, a normal faculty. The man receives his sight, and in
so doing receives entry into the fullness of human life. He is now "the
man who used to sit and beg" (9:8). Second, John evokes the creation
narratives of Genesis in showing how Jesus brings light from dark-
ness, and in referring to the astonished man's statement, "Never since
the world began has it been heard that any one opened the eyes of a
man born blind." Third, the narrative ends with this man's confession
of faith in Jesus. Ultimately the man receives not merely sight, but the
33. Theissen, Miracle Stories, 103-4, 227. Theissen comments that the motif of spon-
taneity is particularly strong in the gift miracles of the Gospels. We might add that
while this also characterizes the Johannine narratives of gift miracles, the theme of
Jesus' sovereignty recurs throughout John; see, e.g., 7:30, 44-46; 8:20, 59; 10:18, 39.
34. For a discussion of Jesus' "distancing" himself from petitioners who come to
him, see Charles H. Giblin, "Suggestion, Negative Response, and Positive Action in
211; and Thompson, The Humanity of Jesus in the Fourth Gospel, 72-73, and the references
there.
104 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
insight of faith. What is important to note is how this insight comes to
the man, for there is clearly a link between the healing and the man's
coming to faith. The physical healing does not simply illustrate or
symbolize spiritual healing, nor are the two healings simply simulta-
neous with each other. Insight comes in discerning in the healing the
very action of God. Thus the question which weaves its way through-
out the discourse is the question whether the work which has been
done attests that Jesus is from God (9:16, 17, 24, 29, 31, 33), whether
this healing is in fact the very work of God. The man receives both
sight and insight, but he receives insight when he recognizes that ulti-
mately God was at work through Jesus in healing him (9:30-33).
But how does such recognition come about? Here we must
remember that the narrative of the healing of the blind man begins
with the question of the disciples, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his
parents, that he was born blind?" Jesus' statement that the man was
not born blind because of any sin probably does not intend to dispel
the connection between sin and disease. Rather, Jesus asserts that the
man was born blind that God's works might be made manifest in him.
This enigmatic response does not mean that the man was born blind
in order to serve as an object lesson in which God's magnificent power
might be displayed. We may quote the conclusions of a recent study
on John: "The disciples' question, and the viewpoint behind it, are
rejected altogether. They see suffering as an occasion for moralizing
about the victim. Jesus sees it as an occasion for doing the works of
God, that is, for relieving the suffering . . . . The 'work of God,' it turns
out, is not punishing sinners with suffering but overcoming the
suffering. . . . Simply, the world is blind, and it is God's work to heal
it."35 God's life-giving and restoring work are to be manifested in
healing this individual. Those who do not discern in the sign God's
own work have not seen in it the manifestation of God's character as
life-giving. This interpretation is supported by the fact that the dis-
course which follows immediately upon this healing is that of the
good shepherd who "lays down his life for the sheep," who has come
that people may have "life, and have it abundantly" (John 10:1-18).
By way of summing up these exegetical remarks, we may say that
through the signs God is at work restoring to health the very world
which was made through the Logos who became incarnate as a
human being. The tangible gifts of food, healing, and life which the
signs bring are not to be understood only as symbols of "spiritual" or
"other-worldly" realities. Signs are manifestations of God's provision
and care for his people, as much as the signs of the Exodus are. God
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 105
provides manna and drink for
ers
and saves the people of
ance at the
ize protection and preservation: they are preservation, protection,
guidance, and salvation. So too one can say that Jesus' healings do not
simply betoken God's favor and blessing, they are the concrete mani-
festations of that benefaction, the very gifts of God, and thus the very
works of God. The prophets speak of and long for God's healing—
freedom from their oppressors, a recapturing of humility and service
to the Lord, restoration to fullness of life. Physical and spiritual bless-
ings are woven into one fabric, because there is one creator and one
Lord.
Certainly this is John's understanding as well. Where life is given,
God is at work, for God alone gives life. Thus it is artificial to speak of
the signs as symbols of God's activity, for they are God's activity.
Signs are not symbols of the life God gives: they are life from the hand
of God. Jesus' signs do not picture the eternal life available with God
in another realm or on another plane. Rather, they confer life from the
generous and life-giving God. It is scarcely surprising that a Gospel
which opens with the affirmation that the Word became flesh should
also assume that God's gifts of life are granted in the material realm
as well.
We may turn, then, to a discussion of the function of signs in lead-
ing people to faith. The foregoing discussion has argued that the life-
giving character of the signs provides the basis for discernment of
God's work and decision for or against Jesus. The signs force one to
choose for or against Jesus.36 But why do they force such a choice?
One author notes, "A semeion is a demonstration which asks for reac-
tion. In the case of positive reaction, the principal question is, how-
ever, What power and authority do you believe to be demonstrated
here?"37 Obviously the correct response is that the power and author-
ity demonstrated through Jesus is God's power and authority. But
that is recognized not simply by the sheer manifestation of power;
rather, it is known through what is offered in and effected by the
signs, and that is life. And the response sought is not simply awe or
amazement, but trust and obedience.
36. Gerd Theissen (Miracle Stories, 297) notes that this is true of the NT as a whole,
"Miracles in the New Testament invariably force one to choose."
37. Marinus de Jonge, Jesus: Stranger from Heaven and Son of God: Jesus Christ and the
Christians in Johannine Perspective (ET Missoula: Scholars Press, 1977) 122.
106 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
Again the OT provides the crucial backdrop for understanding
John. In Deuteronomy Moses says to the people of
seen all that the Lord did before your eyes in the
aoh and to all his servants and to all his land, the great trials which
your eyes saw, the signs, and those great wonders, but to this day the
Lord has not given you a mind to understand, or eyes to see, or ears to
hear" (Deut 29:2-4). Even those who were witnesses to and benefici-
aries of God's acts of deliverance did not understand their implications
or hear their call to obedience. Similarly, Jeremiah laments that the
signs and wonders which God had done did not lead the people to
repentance or obedience (32:20-23). It will be necessary for God to
establish a new covenant, written on the hearts of the people (31:33).
Clearly, signs were to elicit obedience and faithfulness. But they evoke
faith because they are God's redemptive acts on behalf of his people.
They are not magnificent displays designed to coerce faith, but tokens
of God's gracious and redeeming love on behalf of the people. In this
sense, the relationship between God's acts and the people's faithfulness
is indirect rather than direct, circuitous rather than linear.
The Gospel of John summarizes Jesus' ministry by quoting two
passages from Isaiah which show the reality of unbelief (6:10; 53:1).
Neither of these speaks explicitly of signs. But it is clear that in John's
view the unbelief of which Isaiah spoke has its counterpart in the
unbelief which Jesus encountered. John writes, "Though [Jesus] had
done so many signs before them, yet they did not believe in him; it
was that the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:
'Lord, who has believed our report, and to whom has the arm of the
Lord been revealed?'" John also cites from Isaiah 6:10 the passage
quoted in the Synoptics in conjunction with Jesus' parables: "He has
blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, lest they should see with
their eyes and perceive with the heart, and turn for me to heal them."
Blindness does not consist of failing to believe that miraculous deeds
have been done, but in the failure to respond to God's deeds with
repentance and obedience: they have not "perceived with the heart,"
and have not "turned" to be healed. The decision which is called for is
obedience to God who manifests his grace and mercy in the signs.
The Fourth Gospel understands the signs of Jesus to be a continu-
ation and manifestation of the mercy and grace of God. Because the
signs are God's works, deeds of grace and deliverance, they serve to
call people to repentance, obedience, and faith. Thus the Fourth Gos-
pel also understands the signs of Jesus to be a continuation and mani-
festation of the activity through which God calls out a people. Here
we again raise a question against Bultmann's interpretation of signs,
for his discussion is highly individualistic in tenor. But John is not just
about disparate individuals coming to faith; it is about the gathering
THOMPSON: Signs and Faith in the Fourth Gospel 107
together of the children of God. Not only do Jesus' signs confer life
from God, they are also integral to the activity through which God
calls out a people.
Indeed, the role of the signs as judging is the other side of their role
in gathering together God's people. For the gathering of a flock implies
the separation of those who are not part of the flock. If the signs serve
to gather together, they will also serve to separate and judge. But the
sign has not failed when it serves to judge. Neither in the OT nor in
John is unbelief an indication that signs have failed; rather, unbelief is
an indication of judgment. The purported "failure" of the signs is actu-
ally a failure of seeing, of discernment, of faith. Unbelief and disobe-
dience are not surprising, though in light of God's gracious deeds on
the people's behalf, they are surely culpable and guilty of sin.
Summary Comments: Faith in the Gospel of John
In summary, I would like to repeat the three thesis statements offered
earlier. (1) A sign is a manifestation, through the person of Jesus, of
God's work in the world. (2) Faith is faithfulness in trusting God as
made known in Jesus Christ. (3) Jesus' signs lead to faith when one
discerns in them the character of God as life-giving and responds to
Jesus as mediating that life.
We may for a moment dwell on the nature and character of faith
in the Gospel of John and, in light of these exegetical remarks, expand
on the definition of faith suggested earlier. For there are several corol-
laries to that understanding of faith which arise out of the function of
the signs argued for in this paper. I will suggest these below.
(1) Faith entails discernment, both about the nature of Jesus'
work and about the kind of God to whom faith is directed. The deci-
sion to follow Jesus, to entrust oneself to him, is based on the under-
standing that he does the life-giving work of God. Faith further
discerns that the God whom it trusts is the God who creates and sus-
tains life, who heals, who restores and raises to life. Faith is not
directed to a void, but to the living God, the God of life.
(2) Faith has a corporate or communal dimension. One shares in
believing with all those who have also received life from God through
Jesus. John does not envision the gift of life as granted to scattered indi-
viduals. Those who have received life are also gathered into one fold,
one people, knowing one God and Creator. Thus faith and love are
closely linked in Johannine theology. If faith denotes the response of
the people to God, love denotes their response to each other.38 Just
38. Oddly enough, the Fourth Gospel never speaks of believers loving God or com-
mands that they should.
108 Bulletin for Biblical Research 1
as in faith one passes from death to life, so in love one overcomes the
hate and death-dealing power of the world.
(3) Faith entails a commitment to life in the midst of death, to
love in the midst of hate, to truth in the midst of error, to God in the
midst of the world. Thus faith can never will suffering or evil for oth-
ers; it seeks to bring them to life. The promise of salvation in John 3:16
is paralleled in the Johannine community by the call to love of one's
fellow believer in 1 John 3:16-18. For faith which is directed to the
God of life cannot abandon others to the realm of death.
(4) Faith stands before the Creator and Sustainer of life with the
recognition of human frailty and utter dependence upon God. The
faith which Jesus seeks, to which the signs call people, is the recogni-
tion that all that they are and have comes from God. Through the
Logos the world was created, is healed and sustained, and will be
raised to life. Thus faith is essentially gratitude, gratitude to God for
grace, mercy, healing, wholeness; gratitude for life itself. Faith knows
peace, for it trusts that all things are in God's hands.
(5) Because God is the source and destiny of life, faith is faithful-
ness in trusting God, for God was before all human life and always
lives. God is the living God. The life which believers receive endures
even beyond the grave, for it comes through the Logos who was in the
beginning with God, and has life from the Father himself. To such a
God corresponds a faith which perseveres, for to whom can it turn but
the God who speaks words of life?
(6) Finally, in the Fourth Gospel faith is faith in God, mediated
through the person of Jesus. The question to John's readers is whether
Jesus continues, manifests, and carries out a work which brings heal-
ing and liberation, whether he brings life. In recounting the signs as
the life-giving work of God in Jesus, the Gospel reminds its readers
that there is no other bread of life, no other shepherd, no other way or
truth. Indeed, this is already said in the simple words of the prologue,
"In him was life."