“They were amazed that he was talking with a woman”
A wide angle view of gender in John’s Gospel
I recently posted an intentionally controversial statement on Twitter/X:
“It’s impossible to be a complementarian and also believe what the Gospel of John says about women, how Jesus treated and commissioned them, and how they were championed by the Johannine community.”
Here I want to set that aside and focus on something related but less controversial. I am convinced that John speaks in unique ways to gender in the family of God, and this week I would like to convince you of this modest thesis. If there is anything to be discerned and gained from the Fourth Gospel regarding questions about gender and ministry in the 21st century church, we must start with a simpler question: does John have anything to say about gender? Decidedly and uniquely, yes. John is doing gender theology in his gospel. That is, John is doing something with gender, and relating that something to the advent, life, death, resurrection and ascension of the Son of God.
Please note that I’m not asking here what John means by his intentional presentation of gender. That question needs to be answered, but I’m emphasizing here the simple fact that John does present his Gospel this way, unique among all the gospels and perhaps all the NT. The question of meaning will have to wait for now (frankly because I’m still asking that myself).
While Jesus is indeed “the Savior of the world” without respect to gender (John 4:42), the interactions between Jesus and the humans of John’s Gospel differ greatly along gendered lines. I hope to illuminate this claim without going in to too much detail. I also won’t be directly citing sources, but see books in the footnote that are guiding my current study of gender in John.1
Comparatively, while the synoptic gospels—Matthew, Mark and Luke—include stories of both men and women, they differ from John in two important ways. First, those stories are usually shorter and the characters are less developed. Second, the characters stand alone from other characters in the gospel.
In contrast to each of these:
First, John’s stories of both male and female characters (many of them at least, though not all) are longer, or at least the character is developed throughout the Gospel (eg the mother of Jesus in ch. 2 and 19, Nicodemus in ch. 3, 7, and 19, Thomas in ch. 11, 14, and 20).
Second, John intentionally juxtaposes stories of men and women so as to invite comparisons and contrasts between them. This second observation is especially important and the focus of the rest of this post.
Examples of John’s comparisons of men and women
Gender in general
The gender of John’s characters is highlighted in general. While the synoptics do refer to characters as “man” and “woman”, there are also many characters who are only referred to by names and titles. In contrast, John’s gendered references are programmatic and intentional:
1:6 “There was a man sent from God whose name was John.”
2:4 Jesus refers to his mother as “woman” both times she appears (2:4, 19:26).
3:1 “There was a man from the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.”
4:7 “A woman of Samaria came to draw water.” The woman highlights her female gender (4:9), Jesus refers to her as “woman” (4:21), the disciples “were amazed that he was talking with a woman” (4:27), and “woman” is used thirteen times total in the narrative (accounting for over half of John’s uses of gyné).
5:5 “One man was there who had been disabled for thirty-eight years.”
8:3 Although a later addition, part of why it makes sense that later editors added the story of the woman caught in adultery is that it fits John’s overall sympathetic portrayal of women. “Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery, making her stand in the center.”
9:1 “As he [Jesus] was passing by, he saw a man blind from birth.”
11:1 “Now a man was sick, Lazarus from Bethany”
Curiously, in light of this pattern, Mary and Martha are not referred to as “woman”. But they are contrasted with male characters in the narrative of ch. 11-12: Caiaphas (11:49-53) and Judas (12:4-6).
Mary Magdalene is referred to twice as “woman”, by the angels (20:13), and by Jesus (20:15).
Narrative comparisons
Nicodemus and Samaritan woman: As mentioned, both Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman are introduced into the narrative by their gender. There are many additional details that clue readers in to this gender comparison. Here are just two: First, Nicodemus came to Jesus “at night” (3:2), whereas “it was about noon” when the Samaritan encountered Jesus at the well (4:6). Given John’s recurring contrast between light/darkness and night/day, these narrative details are symbolic and invite a contrast between these characters, especially after what Jesus says in 3:19-21: “This is the judgment: The light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. [20] For everyone who does evil hates the light and avoids it, so that his deeds may not be exposed. [21] But anyone who lives by the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be shown to be accomplished by God.” Second, whereas Nicodemus silently fades away from the scene after his persistent misunderstanding (3:9), the Samaritan woman initially misunderstands but then comes to belief in Jesus as Messiah (4:29) and furthermore helps bring many others to belief in Jesus by the sowing of her testimony (4:34-42).
Mary of Bethany and Judas: Mary of Bethany is clearly contrasted against Judas (12:1-8). Whereas she properly discerns Jesus’ approaching death, and enacts that discernment with loving devotion, Judas shows that the only one he loved was himself.
Mary Magdalene, Peter and BD, and Thomas: In the resurrection scenes of 20:1-18, John begins and ends with a focus on Mary, with Peter and the beloved disciple in the middle. This invites comparison between the woman and the two men. And in the comparison, Mary comes out ahead in importance and significance as the first one to see the risen Jesus, the first one to be commissioned to proclaim the Johannine gospel of becoming children of God (20:17), and the first one to announce eyewitness testimony of the risen Lord (20:18).
There is an additional juxtaposition between Mary and Thomas. Jesus has direct, personal interaction with each of them, addresses their unique struggles, and leads them to newfound faith in his resurrected identity.
Intentional reversals:
John reverses some common expectations for Jesus’ disciples according to their gender.
As noted above, Mary Magdalene is afforded the privilege of witnessing first to Jesus’ resurrection, something other NT authors attribute to Peter (cf Luke 24:34; 1 Cor 15:5). Along these lines, while male disciples do tell others about Jesus (John 1:40-41, 45; 21:7), there are only a few examples of what we might call evangelical proclamation. One of those is a man: John the Baptist (1:29). The other two are women: the Samaritan woman (4:28-42), and Mary Magdalene (20:17-18).
As I wrote about last Fall regarding the Samaritan woman, I believe the sowing/reaping and receiving pay/gathering fruit of John 4:36-37 is a reversal of the punishment on Adam in Gen 3:17-19. Whereas many complementarian interpreters use Adam’s punishment to support the doctrine of gender roles, the Samaritan woman joins Jesus, a man, in laboring for and eating food, without pain and sweat but instead enjoying eternal life.
We could add to this section the many instances where Jesus is portrayed with feminine imagery/symbolism. I want to reiterate here that I’m not asking what John means by this and other features of gender, only that he is doing this. John 12-13 provides an easy example: placing the foot-washing in ch. 13 after Mary’s anointing of Jesus’ feet in ch. 12 invites a comparison between the two acts. Both prefigure Jesus’ death, and while it is common to associate Jesus as doing something a servant would do, coming right after ch. 12 it seems that John portrays Jesus as doing something a woman did just do.
If John is doing something unique with gender, why?
If I’ve hopefully made you at least curious that John is portraying gender intentionally, the next important question is why John does this. More on that next time. The short answer, I believe, is related to two of John’s big overarching typological themes: creation and exodus.
Quote from Raymond Brown
“In researching the evidence of the Fourth Gospel, one is still surprised to see to what extent in the Johannine community women and men were already on an equal level in the fold of the Good Shepherd. This seems to have been a community where in the things that really mattered in the following of Christ there was no difference between male and female—a Pauline dream (Gal 3:28) that was not completely realized in the Pauline communities. But even John has left us with one curious note of incompleteness: the disciples, surprised at Jesus’ openness with a woman, still did not dare to ask him, “What do you want of a woman?” (4:27). That may well be a question whose time has come in the church of Jesus Christ.”
Question
What do you think of all this? What further questions arose from reading this? Concerns? Criticisms?
Bruno Barnhart, The Good Wine: Reading John from the Center
Sandra Schneiders, Written that you may Believe: Encountering Jesus in the Fourth Gospel
Dorothy Lee, Flesh and Glory: Symbolism, Gender and Theology In The Gospel of John
Colleen Conway, Men and Women in the Fourth Gospel: Gender and Johannine Characterization
Raymond Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple: The Life, Loves and Hates of an Individual Church in New Testament Times
Margaret Beirne, Women and Men in the Fourth Gospel: A Discipleship of Equals
So glad you’re writing about this! My pastor’s been preaching through John this year. When we reached John 12 earlier this spring, I suggested to him that perhaps Jesus was inspired by Mary’s example to wash his disciples’ feet. After all, the 12 would not have recognized Mary’s action as an example for them to follow, since she was a woman. So Jesus does a similar action of humble washing at the last supper and explicitly tells the disciples that it is an example for them to follow. My pastor was very receptive to the idea!
I’m in the early stages of a research paper regarding John’s letter to the “elect lady” in 2 John. This adds new layers to explore and ponder!