SOURCE: Pruitt, Donald B. “St. John and Bulgakov: The Model of a Parody of Christ.” Canadian-American Slavic Studies 15, nos. 2-3 (summer-fall 1981): 312-20.

In this essay, first presented in 1977, Pruitt argues that Bulgakov's treatment of the story of Christ is based on the version by St. John.

Mikhail Bulgakov's account of the trial of Jesus of Nazareth (“Ieshua ha-Notsri”) before Pontius Pilate is considerably better-organized and more logical than any of the accounts of that event in the New Testament. The four gospel versions—those of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—show a kangaroo court and a vacillating viceroy who yields to the pressure of the mob and then disposes of his own guilt by the cynical act of washing his hands in public. Bulgakov shows an orderly legal procedure conducted by a clear-sighted, cold blooded viceroy whose primary shortcoming is his cowardice, yet who is sufficiently human to...