Biblica_1_Layout 1 20/01/12 11:44 Pagina 593 593 PROSOPOPOETICS AND CONFLICT: SPEECH AND EXPECTATIONS from the accumulation of the narrative sequence. They hear of Jesus’ origins, ministry experiences and travels, his speeches, and finally his death and resurrection as a whole instead of only being “present” for brief episodes. This cumulative vantage point allows the audience to feel the rhetorical weight of the entire narrative, thereby enabling moments of confusion the chance to experience later clarification and development. The characters in the text, who appear in brief episodes, do not have the same opportunity for such an experience since they do not have access to the narrative whole. Most significantly, the Gospel audience is privileged from the out- set of the narrative with the prologue. John’s prologue offers the most complete and crucial revelation of Jesus’ identity in this bios. Ac- cording to the prologue, Jesus is the logos of God who has become flesh. He is the one who initiated life at the moment of creation and apart from him no life exists (1,1-5). Moreover, as the logos of God in human form, Jesus is entirely focused on the Father and has the ability to reveal God’s glory as no other person can (1,14-18). He is the monogenh/j of the Father and, as such, he manifests God’s glory and grants greater access to the Father by enabling those who believe to become “children of God” (te/kna qeou=, 1,12-13). As a means to support these extraordinary claims, the evangelist incorporates allu- sions to Israel’s scriptures and insists that, as the unique embodiment of God’s glory, Jesus has authority greater than those who have ap- peared before his incarnation including John (the Baptist) and even Moses (1,6-8.15-18). According to the prologue, these figures only appear to have preceded Jesus, since the logos has no true beginning but rather exists eternally 36. It is with this introduction that the Gospel audience first begins to formulate Jesus’ character and, therefore, their expectations for his behavior throughout the narrative. Unlike the characters within the story-world of the text, the audience learns Jesus’ true, heavenly ori- gins, his real “age” as the logos of God, his unique relationship with the Father as his monogenh/j, and his role in creation. All of these 36 The various aspects of Jesus’ character discussed in John’s prologue correspond to various topics (topoi) outlined in progymnastic instructions on the presentation of characters in encomia (and invectives). For a developed discussion on these topoi and their relationship to the Johannine prologue, see: A.D. MYERS, Characterizing Jesus. A Rhetorical Analysis on the Fourth Gospel’s Use of Scripture in its Presentation of Jesus (LNTS 458; London forthcoming).