The Fourth Gospel and the Church

Abstract

There are two important chronological questions in the history of the Fourth Gospel: the date of its composition and the date of its acceptance by the church. The solution of the first depends in large measure on the question of John's use of the synoptic gospels. Did he use them at all? And, if he did, in what way? There can be no doubt that if he knew them he had little interest in their historical value. But does this mean that he had more authentic historical data? Or that he was interested not in history but in theology?