Abstract
This volume compiles a varied sampling of Francis Moloney’s work on a wealth of Johannine topics, including the addition of six previously unpublished essays. The collection is divided into three sections, the Johannine World, Johannine Theology, and the Johannine Text. The volume does well in featuring research from differing stages of Moloney’s long career interwoven in a topical organization. The front matter’s inclusion of a chronological list of the included essays as complement to the thematic categorization of the table of contents is a helpful detail (pp. xi–xiii).
A particular highlight of the volume is its introductory reflection, in which Moloney offers the insight of a mature scholar in surveying a forty-year career and commenting on the personal development of his life-long study. This introspective introduction paints an evocative picture of the changing locations and circumstances of his career and the diverse influences that directed the growth and development of his research. Further bringing to life the broad experiences appearing in this reminisce, the volume’s previously unpublished essays feature not only an ample knowledge and command of Johannine scholarship but also more ecclesiologically oriented work indicative of the author’s contribution beyond a purely academic context.
The chosen essays exhibit strong engagement with other major scholars, including Brown, Robinson, and Culpepper and explore several ‘hot topics’ in John, such as Eucharistic interpretation of John 6, formulating Johannine ethics, and the role of John 21 in the gospel. Many also highlight Moloney’s skill as a representative of Johannine narrative criticism. His mastery of this methodology lends itself to an overall uniformity of thought and approach in the collection as a whole. Moloney specializes in close narrative readings, frequently framing an essay in a narrative-critical structural outline integrated with his representative research specializations. Among these, most conspicuous are his background in research on the Son of Man and his interest in the relationship between Scripture’s narrative role in the gospel and the self-conscious production of the gospel as a ‘new Scripture’. Those predisposed to these characteristic interests will find much to appreciate here, though the inclusion of three essays on the Son of Man and five covering similar ground on the relationship between Scripture and gospel render certain portions a bit monotonous. All in all, however, this volume helpfully compiles and showcases Moloney’s research career and offers an insightful self-portrait of an accomplished Johannine scholar with considerable breadth, if not without some repetition.