We Speak the Truth: Rhetoric, Epistemology, and Audience Participation in John 3:1–21

Abstract

This article explores the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus in John 3:1–21, highlighting the ways omissions, multivalency, and intratextual and intertextual links invite audience participation and encourage listeners to see themselves as re-generated children of God. In this way, persuaded audiences assent not just to the content of the Gospel, but to its epistemology—how it instructs them to receive and seek truth. As classical and contemporary rhetorical theories indicate, when audiences participate to create the world of the Gospel, they are more likely to be persuaded by it and to use it to craft the reality in which they live.