Myth and Metaphysics in the Fourth Gospel: A Dialectical Approach to John's Gospel

Abstract

<p>This thesis is an experiment in using Fredric Jameson's dialectical Marxist henneneutics, particularly as articulated in his The Political Unconscious, to read a specific New Testament text, the Prologue to the Gospel of John. The Prologue shall be read through three semantic horizons: the literary, the narrowly social and the broadly economic. It will be argued that the Prologue contains a co-occurrence of mythic narrative and metaphysical discourse; that this co-occurrence of mythic narrative and metaphysical discourse can be understood as a result of the co-o1ccurrence of lower and higher social strata within early Christian communities; and that this co-occurrence of lower and higher social strata can itself be understand as the: vestigial presence of formerly dominant modes of production within the mode of production that dominated the broader historical context in which these communities were located.</p>