Back when I was a seminarian at Yale Divinity School, I had a discussion with a rabbi who was studying for his Ph.D. in New Testament, an unusual combination! He mused that if Christians had just stuck with the gospel of Mark, Jews (who are willing to recognize Jesus as a great teacher) and Muslims (who recognize Jesus as a great prophet, perhaps second only to Mohammed) could probably get along with us Christians a lot better. My rabbi friend suggested that while Matthew and Luke pushed the line, John stepped across the line with impunity by equating Jesus with God.