The Synoptic Christologies might actually have a Jesus claiming to be divine to the same [or near same] degree as GJohn. The reason why we often think Jesus' statements about His divinity are very much higher in GJohn than in the Synoptics is because we often read them in light of the pre-interpretation given by the author who says in the very beginning of his gospel that Jesus was "God" (John 1:1-3). But if you actually read Jesus' statements on their own [not letting the introduction flavor or taint them], while they do clearly have Him *claiming* He is Divine, they don't actually have Him *saying* or *stating* [at least explicitly] that He is Divine. The author of the GJohn expects his *readers* to understand Jesus' statements to be claims to Deity [given his introduction of Jesus being God], but the author also expects readers to understand that the original audience of Jesus couldn't always tell whether Jesus was or wasn't claiming to be Divine. Often in GJohn Jesus uses language which could be interpreted either way. Either interpreted in a way that is a claim to Deity, and in another way that could be interpreted as not being a claim to Deity. This is why His hearers sometimes didn't know how to react to Him. Or were frustrated by His wording and (apparent intentional) ambiguity. Not just on His Deity, but His messiahship and other topics (e.g. John 10:24; 11:12-14; 16:25-29). For example, Jesus says in John 8:24 "Unless you believe that I am [ego eimi], you will die in your sins." That could be interpreted by the original audience to be a claim to deity. Or just a claim to being the messiah, when He says "I am [he the messiah]." It's only at John 8:58 that His hearers have enough data and confidence that Jesus was probably claiming deity that they felt justified in taking up stones to stone Him to death. Even though, Jesus' statement, per se, could still be interpreted in a way that's not claiming Deity. For proof, see the arguments Unitarians (who reject the full Deity of Jesus) use to argue that the correct interpretation is one of no claim to Deity on Jesus' part. However, while Jesus' statement even there could be construed by His original audience in a way that doesn't have Him necessarily claiming Divine status, I think it's clear that the author of GJohn would have his *readers* understand it actually IS a claim of Deity. The same could be said of many other places in John (e.g. John 13:19; 18:5-6, passim). When one sees GJohn in this way, and combines it with an understanding of how much higher the Christologies of Jesus are in the Synoptics as is usually recognized [see my blogpost Markan Christology], the seeming alleged discrepancy [or difference, or disparity or their being disparate in nature] in the Johannine Christology and the Synoptic Christologies is greatly diminished or eliminated.
See also my blogpost:
Why Don't the Synoptics Have Jesus Claiming to be the "I Am"?
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