Rethinking Lukeâs Purpose: The Effect of First-Century Social Conflict*
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This article addresses the issue of Lukeâs authorial purpose for the composition of the Luke-Acts literature. Observing that existing theories are inadequate in that they fail to provide a comprehensive cohesive program for the literatureâs content and are anachronistically complex, the article suggests an authorial purpose paradigm natural to the early Jesus movementâs status as a newly emerging society. Through application of Berger and Luckmannâs sociology of knowledge models, this article argues that reading Luke-Acts as the authorâs legitimation of the Jesus movementâs social world is a valid, even preferred reading of the literature. By tracing key elements in the development of Lukeâs legitimation conceptual machinery, the social conflict background is establishedâfurther indicating that it is the social conflicts that motivated the documentâs writing and organized its content. This article lays a foundation for Lukeâs legitimating strategy, which was in response to a purity conflict theme. It is argued that this was Lukeâs primary purpose for writing Luke-Acts.
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4
âPeter Berger, The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (New York: Anchor Books, 1967).
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6
âBerger and Luckmann, Social Construction, pp. 61-62; Berger, Sacred Canopy, pp. 31â32, 35â47.
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8
âBerger and Luckmann, Social Construction, pp. 95-96. âAll the sectors of the institutional order are integrated in an all-embracing frame of reference, which now constitutes a universe in the literal sense of the word, because all human experience can now be conceived of as taking place within itâ.
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10
âBerger, Sacred Canopy, p. 35. âAll legitimation serves to maintain realityâreality, that is, as defined in a particular human collectivityâ.
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14
âFrancis Watson, Paul, Judaism and the Gentiles. A Sociological Approach (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986); Robert L. Brawley, Luke-Acts and the Jews: Conflict, Apology, and Conciliation (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1987).
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19
âIutisone Salevao, Legitimation in the Letter to the Hebrews: The Construction and Maintenance of a Symbolic Universe (London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002). Salevao provides an excellent review and summary of much of the discussion about Christianityâs emergence within and separation from Judaism.
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20
âPieter F. Craffert, âThe Pauline Movement and First-Century Judaism: A Framework for Transforming the Issuesâ, Neotestamentica 27 (1993), pp. 233-62. An increasing volume of scholarship demonstrates that a monolithic and normative Judaism simply did not exist during the first century CE. Instead of speaking of âJudaismâ as defining an Israelite religion, we should speak of âJudaismsâ to represent the numerous groups and movements that comprised Yahweh worship.
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21
âBrawly, Luke-Acts and the Jews, pp. 5, 127-30; Nicholas H Taylor, âJerusalem and the Temple in Early Christian Life and Teachingâ, Neotestamentica 33.2 (1999), p. 454; Philip F. Esler, Community and Gospel in Luke-Acts: The Social and Political Motivations of Lucan Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), p. 150.
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22
âNeyrey, âThe Symbolic Universeâ, p. 277. Compare to Brawly, Luke-Acts and the Jews, p. 130: âThe belief in a specific location for contact between heaven and earth so pervades antiquity, that it provides the vantage point for understanding the place of the temple and Jerusalem in Luke-Acts. Jerusalem stands at the center of salvation-history because it also stands at the central point of the contact between heaven and earth. Almost any of Lukeâs contemporaries would have seen beneath the symbolism of Jerusalem the presupposition that it marked the axis mundiâ.
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26
âMary Douglas, Purity and Danger (New York: Routledge, 1970), p. 158.
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27
âEsler, Community and Gospel, p. 132. Esler states: âThe striking prominence of the Temple in Luke-Acts is, without a shadow of a doubt, a phenomenon which must be taken into account in attempting to understand Lukeâs purpose and strategy. Yet this fact has not been entirely obvious to many scholars who have considered the matterâ.
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31
âNeyrey, âThe Symbolic Universeâ, pp. 271-304. Neyrey presents an excellent analysis of Lukeâs perspective on Jesusâ purity remapping, defining Jesus and his followers as intent on redrawing purity boundaries, not demolishing them. Jesusâ influence as a reformer drew strong reaction from observant Jews motivated to defend the existing purity map. Neyreyâs contention is that conflicts over purity boundaries âaccount for most of the conflictual dynamics in Luke-Actsâ. In other words, it is Jesusâ attempts to reform the Israelite symbolic universe and the temple authoritiesâ resistance to this reform that provides Neyreyâs interpretive model for conflict passages in Luke-Acts.
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32
âJames M. Dawsey, âConfrontation in the Temple: Luke 19:45-47â, Perspectives in Religious Studies 11 (1984), pp. 153-65. Dawsey rightly notes that an official representation of the Sanhedrin is indicated here, and their intent was to invalidate Jesusâ teaching. That the challenge fails and actually results in Jesusâ parabolic defense of his authority to the people signals Lukeâs legitimation strategyâthe legitimacy of Jesusâ authority as an intermediary of God is demonstrated, and that over against the authority (and legitimacy) of the temple system.
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33
âG.K. Beale, The Temple and the Churchâs Mission: A Biblical Theology of the Dwelling Place of God. New Studies in Biblical Theology (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2004), pp. 190-91. Whether the inner or outer veil is indicated is irrelevant to this discussion. See Beale for a concise but adequate discussion of this issue. The significant issue to this study regarding the veil is its symbolic role as a boundary between Godâs presence and humanity and the symbolism resulting from its destruction.
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34
âPhilip F. Esler, Community and Gospel in Luke-Acts: The Social and Political Motivations of Lucan Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), p. 150.
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36
âEsler, Community and Gospel, p. 150; Joel B. Green, âThe Demise of the Temple as Culture Center in Luke-Acts: An Exploration of the Rending of the Temple Veil (Luke 23:44-49)â, Revue Biblique 101 (1994), pp. 495-515. Greenâs words are helpful here: âThe torn veil works symbolically to neutralize the dominance of the temple as a sacred symbol of socio-religious power predetermining insider and outsiderâ and âLuke portrays the rending of the temple veil as symbolic of the destruction of the symbolic world surrounding and emanating from the temple, and not as symbolic of the destruction of the temple itselfâ. Contra J. Bradley Chance, Jerusalem, the Temple, and the New Age in Luke-Acts (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1988), p. 122. Chance sees the rent veil as representing for Luke the destruction of the temple.
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37
âDennis D. Sylva, âThe Meaning and Function of Acts 7:46-50â, Journal of Biblical Literature 106.2 (1987), p. 249, n. 25. See also Klaus Balzer, âThe Meaning of the Temple in Lukan Writingsâ, Harvard Theological Review 58 (1965), pp. 263-77. Baltzer argues that God did withdraw his presence from the temple and Jerusalem and bases this conclusion on Luke 13.35. Compare to Nicholas H. Taylor, âJerusalem and the Temple in Early Christian Life and Teachingâ, Neotestamentica 33.2 (1999), pp. 453-54.
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38
âGreen, âThe Demise of the Templeâ, pp. 496, 511. For a concise treatment of the Antiquityâs symbolic association of the Jerusalem temple with the cosmos, see G.K. Beale, The Temple and the Churchâs Mission: A Biblical Theology of the Dwelling Place of God. New Studies in Biblical Theology (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2004), pp. 45-50. It is of no doubt that Lukeâs account of the veilâs destruction signaled cosmic implications.
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39
âBeale, The Temple and the Churchâs Mission, p. 189. For a discussion of recognition found in early literature of the cosmic portents surrounding the crucifixion, see Marinus deJonge, âTwo Interesting Interpretations of the Rending of the Temple-Veil in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchsâ, Bijdragen 46 (1985), pp. 350-62.
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âSee Beale, The Temple and the Churchâs Mission, pp. 205-208; Luke Timothy Johnson, The Acts of the Apostles (SP, 6: Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1992), pp. 45-47.
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44
âPieter W. Van der Horst, âHellenistic Parallels to the Acts of the Apostles 2:1-47â, Journal for the Study of the New Testament 25 (1985), pp. 49-60.
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45
âJoseph A. Fitzmyer, The Acts of the Apostle (AB, 30; New York: Doubleday, 1998), pp. 432-33; Johnson, The Acts of the Apostles, p. 48. Fitzmyer and Johnson make this argument well.
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46
âWatson, Paul, Judaism and the Gentiles, p. 40. Watson, in articulating models for the analysis of reform movements and their transformation into sects, states that reinterpretation of a movementâs traditions is vital to an emerging sectâs âideology legitimating its separation from a societyâ and âthe traditions must therefore be reinterpreted to apply exclusively to the sectâ. This is not to suggest Luke is legitimating the Jesus groupâs separation from the greater Israelite society, but to reinforce Lukeâs inclusion of Stephenâs speech as a common, even necessary, legitimating element within his conceptual machinery.
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48
âBrawley, Luke-Acts and the Jews, p. 281. Brawley challenges Shepherdâs characterization of the Holy Spirit in Lukeâs narrative. Shepherd argues that the Holy Spirit is the on-stage presence representing the off-stage God. Brawleyâs contention is that Luke uses the Holy Spirit as the on-stage God, participating in the narrative.
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49
âDavid DeSilva, Honor, Patronage, Kinship & Purity: Unlocking New Testament Culture (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2000), pp. 250-53.
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54
âJohnson, The Acts of the Apostles, pp. 54-55. Johnson, while not promoting the legitimation value of Peterâs speech, reviews Lukeâs sophisticated rhetorical construction in this speech, effectively reinterpreting Israelâs Scriptures as uniquely applying to the recipients of Pentecostâs cosmic convulsions.
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57
âEdvin Larsson, âTemple-Criticism and the Jewish Heritage: Some Reflections on Acts 6â7â, New Testament Studies 39 (1993), pp. 379-95. Larsson senses the legitimating purpose of Stephenâs speech in his statement that Stephenâs speech is âLukeâs way of depicting the fundamental difference between (unbelieving) Judaism and Christianity. In this sense it could be seen as an apology ⦠for the churchâ.
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58
âT.L. Donaldson, âMoses Typology and the Sectarian Nature of Early Christian Anti-Judaism: A Study of Acts 7â, Journal for the Study of the New Testament 12 (1981), pp. 27-52.
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59
âDonaldson, âMoses Typologyâ, p. 33. Donaldson, in characterizing Stephenâs speech within a discussion considering its possible Samaritan source, states that Stephenâs speech is in âopposition to any form of localized center of worshipâ.
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60
âFrancis D. Weinert, âLuke, Stephen, and the Temple in Luke-Actsâ, Biblical Theology Bulletin 17 (1987), pp. 88-90.
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61
âBruce Malina and John J. Pilch, Social-Science Commentary on the Book of Acts (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2008), p. 60. On resorting to violence as an admission of defeat in public challenge-riposte, see also Bruce J. Malina and Richard L. Rohrbaugh, Social Science Commentary on the Gospel of John (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), pp. 191-92.
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62
âAndy Reimer, Miracle and Magic: A Study in the Acts of the Apostles and the Life of Apollonius of Tyana (JSNTSup; London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), pp. 90, 94.
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63
âMax Weber, The Sociology of Religion (trans. Ephraim Fischoff; Boston: Beacon Press, 1963), pp. 46-47. Weber describes the sociological characteristics related to performing miracles (by individuals proclaiming a religious doctrine or divine commandment) thus: âthe bearers of new doctrine practically always needed such validationâ.
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Rethinking Lukeâs Purpose: The Effect of First-Century Social Conflict*
In: Journal of Pentecostal TheologySearch for other papers by Randy J. Hedlun in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
This article addresses the issue of Lukeâs authorial purpose for the composition of the Luke-Acts literature. Observing that existing theories are inadequate in that they fail to provide a comprehensive cohesive program for the literatureâs content and are anachronistically complex, the article suggests an authorial purpose paradigm natural to the early Jesus movementâs status as a newly emerging society. Through application of Berger and Luckmannâs sociology of knowledge models, this article argues that reading Luke-Acts as the authorâs legitimation of the Jesus movementâs social world is a valid, even preferred reading of the literature. By tracing key elements in the development of Lukeâs legitimation conceptual machinery, the social conflict background is establishedâfurther indicating that it is the social conflicts that motivated the documentâs writing and organized its content. This article lays a foundation for Lukeâs legitimating strategy, which was in response to a purity conflict theme. It is argued that this was Lukeâs primary purpose for writing Luke-Acts.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 631 | 136 | 9 |
| Full Text Views | 65 | 4 | 0 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 60 | 9 | 0 |
