Characters in the Gospel of John quote and re-quote each other frequently, almost excessively, yet their quotations are rarely literal. These characters (including Jesus and the narrator) make changes - some minor, some major - even when they re-quote important sayings of Jesus. Jeffrey M. Tripp examines this often overlooked feature of the Fourth Gospel in the contexts of first century pedagogy and literature, as well as early Christian tradition and practices. Attending to John's direct internal quotations reveals a text at play with its christological and eschatological language, teasing out the fullest extent of its meaning. The Gospel of John emerges as a theological narrative anchored in yet unbound by the ideas of the wider early Christian movement.