been made at clearing the ground by removing the Fourth Gospel from
the historical field. Lessing had taken this gospel as peculiarly
historical, as did Fichte and Schleiermacher and the main body of
critics after him. Only in England (by Evanson) had the case been more
radically handled. In 1820 Bretschneider, following up a few tentative
German utterances, put forth, by way of hypothesis, a general argument
[1783] to the effect that the whole presentment of Jesus in the Fourth
Gospel is irreconcilable with that of the Synoptics, that it could
not be taken as historical, and that it could not therefore be the
work of the Apostle John. [1784] The result was a general discussion
and a general rejection. The innovation in theory was too sudden for
assimilation: and Bretschneider, finding no support, later declared
that he had been "relieved of his doubts" by the discussion, and had
thus attained his object. Strauss himself, in his first Leben Jesu,
failed to realize the case; and it was not till the second (1863)
that he developed it, profiting by the intermediate work of F. C. Baur.