e to one reason-ableconclusion from looking at the question from a historical perspective: Johnwrote his Gospel primarily for Jewish Christians whose faith was wavering, whowere under attack by the synagogue for believing in Jesus, and who, because ofJewish persecution, were tending to either remain in or return to the synagogue andthereby apostasize from their faith in Jesus (i.e. in Paul's terminology, "fallen fromgrace," Gal. 5:4). In brief, John's primary audience among Christians was that groupof Christian Jews who were straddling the fence between the Christian communityand the Jewish synagogue (cf. the Book of Hebrews).John's secondary audience was that group of Jewish Christians who belongedto Christian communities but who were wavering in their faith because of persecu-tionand the threat of death (16:1-4). For these he records the words of Jesus: "Thesethings I have spoken to you, that you may be kept from stumbling" (16:1).Therefore, in conclusion, the Gospel as an edificatory piece, we may bereasonably sure that John wrote his Gospel for weak Christians both in hiscommunity and in the synagogue. His Gospel encourages Christian Jews who werestraddling the fence between Jesus and the synagogue (1) because they fearedexcommunication from the synagogue (cf. 9:22; 12:37-43; 16:2); (2) or because theyfound Jesus' teaching about the Eucharist a hard saying and could not accept it (cf.6:59ff.) (3) or because they could not accept the high Christology of John and hiscommunity (cf. 5:1-47; 7:--8:59, especially 8:31; 10:22-29; and perhaps 2:23-25;11:46); (4) or, possibly but not certainly, because they had been disciples of John theBaptist and could not easily accept Jesus as greater than the Baptist (cf. 1:19-34;3:22--4:3). For all of these, the Gospel as a whole, with its massive emphasis on.Page 8 Introductionwitness to Jesus and response of faith in Jesus, provided a powerful appeal for adefinitive decision concerning the Messiah ("...
