538 Lars Kierspel the lame certainly qualifies as a “sign” and belongs to the shmei'a (see 12,37; 20,31) (56), it is the first miracle in the Gospel that is characterized as an e[rgon (5,36; 7,21; see 5,17) (57). Being performed on a Sabbath, this healing makes Jesus’ equality with God for the first time explicit outside of the prologue (5,17-18 i[son ... tw/' qew/') and thus initiates a new theme of open conflict (persecution and desire to kill, 5,16) which was merely anticipated before. (e) Finally, both miracles have a comparable progression from a problem (2,3; 4,46) to a request (2,3; 4,47), a sharp rebuke (2,4; 4,48), a reaction (2,5; 4,50) and a consequence (2,6-11; 4,51-53) (58). Further comparisons between Mary and the royal official have been suggested, but these five highly visible observations suffice to correct Kruse’s impression that the ‘Cana to Cana’ unit is “not something the evange- list makes much of in his account” (59). The form of writing in the first century AD lacked “punctuation, pagination, paragraphing, chaptering, and even separation of individual words” (60). Therefore, authors used literary cues such as inclusio to indicate units of thought and the Cana- to-Cana cycle has often been noticed as such (61). 2. New Worship in a New Temple (2,13-22+4,1-42) We suggest next that the cleansing of the temple (2,13-22) constitutes a narrative parallel to Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman (4,1-42). Both stories center around the same theme, that of Jesus replacing physical centers of worship with himself as the new locus of God’s presence and new object of human worship. Jesus’ cleansing of the Jewish temple in Jerusalem is challenged by the Jews with a request for a sign (2,18). Jesus answers, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (2,19). The narrator explains, “But He was speaking of the temple of His body” (2,21), thus indicating how the raising of Jesus’ body on the day of his resurrection will (56) The raising of the lame man (5,1-9) “signifies” that the son of man is able to raise the dead (5,21). So KEENER, The Gospel of John, I, 278. (57) The use of e[rgon / e[rga in the sense of ‘miracle’ is not unique to the Gospel of John: see Matt 11,2-5.19-20; Luke 24,19; Acts 7,22; etc. (58) MOLONEY, “From Cana to Cana”, 190. (59) KRUSE, John, 51. (60) P.F. ELLIS, “Inclusion, Chiasm, and the Division of the Fourth Gospel”, SVTQ 43 (1999) 273. (61) JULIAN (Jesus and Nicodemus, 261) lists many representatives of this view and calls it a majority view among Johannine scholars. P.-B. SMIT, “Cana-to-Cana or Galilee-to-Galilee”, ZNW 98 (2007) 143-149.