Sacramental Charity, Creditor Christology, and the Economy of Salvation in Luke's Gospel (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament 2.Reihe) 9783161548598

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Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament · 2. Reihe Herausgeber / Editor Jörg Frey (Zürich) Mitherausgeber / Associate Editors Markus Bockmuehl (Oxford) · James A. Kelhoffer (Uppsala) Hans-Josef Klauck (Chicago, IL) · Tobias Nicklas (Regensburg) J. Ross Wagner (Durham, NC)

439

Anthony Giambrone

Sacramental Charity, Creditor Christology, and the Economy of Salvation in Luke’s Gospel

Mohr Siebeck

Anthony Giambrone, born 1977; PhD from University of Notre Dame; 2013–14 instructor in theology at the University of Notre Dame; 2015 assistant professor of New Testament at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, DC; currently professor of New Testament at the École biblique et archéologique française de Jérusalem.

ISBN 978-3-16-154859-8 ISSN 0340-9570 (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament, 2. Reihe) Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliographie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de.

© 2017 by Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, Germany. www.mohr.de This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form (beyond that permitted by copyright law) without the publisher’s written permission. This applies particularly to reproductions, translations, microfilms and storage and processing in electronic systems. The book was printed by Laupp & Göbel in Gomaringen on non-aging paper and bound by Buchbinderei Nädele in Nehren. Printed in Germany.







To the brothers of the École biblique de Jérusalem

















Preface The appearance of several books and articles directly pertinent to the theme of this study, all within the past several months, confirms the considerable interest that the subject of almsgiving presently commands in scholarly circles. It confirms as well the difficulty of staying current. If the aspiration to keep pace with an ever-developing field must be resigned the moment a manuscript hits the press, I found it fitting, nonetheless, to take some account of these most recent studies and make the present work as up-to-date as possible. This effort represents the principal difference between the text presented here and the manuscript of my doctoral dissertation, defended at the University of Notre Dame in 2015. Fortunately, nothing in the latest scholarship makes the research undertaken here redundant. On the contrary, I feel confirmed in thinking that this study offers a distinct perspective and a genuine contribution. The most substantial among the new studies and the one with which I have most actively engaged is David Downs’ volume, Alms: Charity, Reward, and Atonement in Early Christianity, a major survey that has certainly displaced Roman Garrison’s earlier monograph on the same theme. The distance Downs takes from his predecessor aligns him in several places with my own critique, and we are clearly agreed on the fundamental importance of charity within the early Christian context. Still, it is evident that on multiple points Downs’ approach and my own also indulge different perspectives and presuppositions. Such divergences range from the philological to the theological and are not without real consequence. Undoubtedly, integrating the work of this significant interlocutor has enriched the discussion in the following pages. For all that, the dialogue with Downs remains limited and quite general. I have written a more detailed analysis of his work in the Review of Biblical Literature. As a study focused particularly on the question of atonement and covering a wide swath of textual evidence, Downs’ book pursues a very different project than the one I propose. The Lukan passage of greatest interest in his framework is Luke 11:41, while the key parables examined here never figure within his treatment. Such neglect is typical, even of those authors concentrating exclusively on Luke. This is one of the basic justifications for the investigation offered here and is also responsible in some measure for the specific shape this study takes.

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Preface

Before passing to the text itself and allowing the reader to discover a topic that is obviously energizing scholars, it is my obligation and my joy to give public acknowledgement to several people who played an important part in the preparation of this book. In the first place mention must be made of my director, Gary Anderson, whose fertile exegetical mind stands at the origin not only of my own dissertation, but also explains much of the interest in the theme of charity throughout the field. His always prompt and always positive guidance was a model of mentorship. Mention should also be made of my two additional readers, John Meier and Brian Daley, whose singular competence in their proper domains greatly enhanced my own formation and allowed my research to benefit from a uniquely well-rounded team of supervisors. My father, Albert Giambrone, and my sister, Gina Loehr, demonstrated their impressive patience in helping to proofread the long manuscript, as did Nicole Rüttgers who kindly checked the German. Benedict Vivano, OP, was likewise helpful in offering comments on several chapters. My confreres, Raphael Salzillo, OP, and Bruno Shah, OP, gave proof of heroic virtue in another way, in living with me during my period of writing. I would also like to express my gratitude to Paul Hellmeier, OP, and the other friars of St. Cajetan in Munich, where I spent two delightful summers in the course of writing this dissertation. In the final stage of preparation, Nina Heereman, with her uncommon generosity and customary charm, provided indispensible help in executing several very tiresome technical tasks, including the purgatorial labor of compiling the index. Bleistift nahmen wir mit... Finally, a word of thanks to Markus Bockmuehl, whose interest in my manuscript allowed it to be published in this excellent series. Anthony Giambrone, O.P. Jerusalem, Israel September 14, 2016 Exaltatio Sanctae Crucis









Table of Contents List of Abbrevations ................................................................................... XIII Introduction .................................................................................................... 1

Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity ................................................... 5 1.1 A Tour of Recent Scholarship .................................................................... 5 1.1.1 Defining the Agenda ......................................................................... 5 1.1.1.1 The Search for “Coherence” .................................................. 5 1.1.1.2 Inventing the Poor (and Rich) ............................................... 9 1.1.2 Holes in the Discussion ................................................................... 15 1.1.2.1 Lost Threads (Moxnes & Ayuch) ........................................ 15 1.1.2.2 Neglected Themes ............................................................... 21 1.1.2.3 Neglected Texts ................................................................... 24 1.2 Prejudices and Preoccupations ............................................................... 26 1.2.1 Long Shadow of the Reformation ................................................... 26 1.2.1.1 Frühkatholizismus ............................................................... 27 1.2.1.2 Spätjudentum ....................................................................... 30 1.2.1.3 E. P. Sanders’ “Palestinian Judaism” .................................. 31 1.2.2 The Ghost of Marcion: “Anti-Judaism” in Lukan Scholarship ........ 36 1.2.3 Hellenism in the Third Gospel ........................................................ 38 1.2.4 The “Immanent Frame” ................................................................... 46 1.3 Theological Redirection .......................................................................... 49 1.3.1 Refocusing Redemptive Almsgiving ............................................... 49 1.3.1.1 Gary Anderson .................................................................... 49 1.3.1.2 Nathan Eubank .................................................................... 52 1.3.2 Approaching the Poor “Sacramentally” .......................................... 52 1.4 Recovering a Richer Reading of Lukan Charity ...................................... 56

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1.4.1 Methodology ................................................................................... 56 1.4.2 Apocalyptic and Allegory ............................................................... 58 1.4.3 Narrative Theology ......................................................................... 65

Chapter 2: “A Certain Creditor”: Sin as Debt in Lukan Theology........................................................... 67 2.1 Introduction ............................................................................................. 67 2.2 Sins as Debts in the Lukan Context ......................................................... 68 2.2.1 Sins as Debts in Second Temple Judaism ....................................... 68 2.2.1.1 Deutero-Isaiah ..................................................................... 70 2.2.1.2 11QMelchizedek ................................................................. 76 2.2.2 Sins as Debts in Matthew ................................................................ 79 2.3 Debts in the Lukan Our Father ................................................................ 86 2.3.1 “Forgive Us Our Sins” (Luke 11:4): Erasing Debts? ...................... 86 2.3.2 “For We Forgive All Our Debtors” (Luke 11:4): Divine and Human Mercy ............................................................... 89 2.4 Christology and Repentance in the Story of the Sinful Woman (Luke 7:36–50) .............................................................................................. 95 2.4.1 “A Certain Creditor” (Luke 7:41): Lukan Creditor Christology ...... 95 2.4.2 “Because She Loved Much” (Luke 7:47) ........................................ 99 2.4.2.1 The Causal ὅτι ................................................................... 101 2.4.2.2 Love as Charity in Luke .................................................... 104 2.4.2.3 Hospitality as a Redemptive Work of Charity ................... 109 2.5 Christology and Repentance in the Logion Reconciliandum in Via .......................................................... 118 2.5.1 “Settle with Your Opponent” (Luke 12:57–59) ............................. 118 2.5.2 “Coercing Charity” in Luke 12:13 – 13:9 ..................................... 119 2.5.3 Christ the ἀντίδικος (Luke 12:57–59) ........................................... 121 2.6 Conclusion ............................................................................................. 126 2.7 Excursus: Debt Release in the Nazareth Sermon (Luke 4:16–30) ......... 127



Table of Contents

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Chapter 3: “The One Who Showed Mercy”: Love of Neighbor and the Good Samaritan ................................... 140 3.1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 140 3.2 “Love Your Neighbor”: Lukan Variations on an Almsgiving Theme .... 143 3.2.1 Lev 19:18b as a Charity Text ........................................................ 143 3.2.1.1 CD 6:20 ............................................................................. 143 3.2.1.2 Test. Iss. 5:1–3 .................................................................. 150 3.2.1.3 λογική λατρεία (1 John 3:16 and James 1:27) ................... 153 3.2.1.4 Matt 19:16–30 ................................................................... 156 3.2.2 “What is Written in the Law?” Luke’s Adaptation of Lev 19:18b 161 3.2.2.1 Thematic Conjunction ....................................................... 161 3.2.2.2 Adjustments to Mark 12:28–34 ......................................... 163 3.3 “Who Is My Neighbor?” Charity as a Boundary Marker ...................... 171 3.3.1 Naming the Samaritan’s Behavior................................................. 171 3.3.2 Boundary Marking and the Limits of Charity ............................... 175 3.3.2.1 The Greco-Roman Border ................................................. 175 3.3.2.2 Jewish In-Group Focus ...................................................... 179 3.3.3 The Lukan Limits of Charity ......................................................... 183 3.4 “I Will Repay You”: Unraveling the Parable’s End .............................. 192 3.4.1 Charity and Loans ......................................................................... 192 3.4.2 Innkeepers, Loans, and the Lawyer ............................................... 198 3.4.3 The Samaritan’s Return: Christology and the “One Who Did Mercy” .................................. 202 3.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................. 208

Chapter 4: The ΚΥΡΙΟΣ and His Prodigal Disciples: Charity, Resurrection, and Repentance ........................................... 209 4.1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 209 4.2 Resurrection, Repentance, and Charity ................................................. 210 4.2.1 “Almsgiving Saves from Death” (Prov 10:2) ................................ 210 4.2.2 Tobit and the “Resurrection” of Israel .......................................... 214 4.2.3 Meriting the Resurrection in Luke ................................................ 218

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Table of Contents

4.2.3.1 “Worthy of the Resurrection” (Luke 20:35) ...................... 218 4.2.3.2 The Centurion(s) and Tabitha ............................................ 222 4.2.3.3 Sola Caritas: Resurrection, Israel, and the Nations ............ 226

4.3 The Prudently Prodigal Steward ........................................................... 231 4.3.1 The Steward in Context ................................................................. 232 4.3.1.1 Almsgiving and Eschatology ............................................. 234 4.3.1.2 Schwestergeschichten ........................................................ 237 4.3.2 The Kύριος as Christ the Creditor and Sin (Again) as Debt .......... 242 4.3.3 Winning Friends: Self-Interest and Irony ...................................... 252 4.3.3.1 The “Sons of Light” .......................................................... 253 4.3.3.2 Eschatological Self-Interest ............................................... 257 (i) “Unfailing” Mammon ........................................................ 258 (ii) Personalizing the Logic of Deferred Repayment .............. 263 4.4 “Friends in Heaven”: Resurrecting Lazarus ......................................... 266 4.4.1 Luke’s Grammar(s) of Salvation ................................................... 266 4.4.2 Raising Up Children of Abraham .................................................. 271 4.4.3 The Sign of Jonah ......................................................................... 274 4.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................. 279

Chapter 5: Lukan Charity Discourse as “Biblical Theology” ... 283 5.1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 283 5.2 Narrative Soteriology: Luke, the Law, and the Prophets ....................... 284 5.3 New Testament Theology ....................................................................... 288 5.3.1 Luke Among the Gospels .............................................................. 288 5.3.2 Luke and Paul ............................................................................... 292 5.4 Adjusting the “Pressure” ...................................................................... 297 5.4.1 Narrating Nicea ............................................................................. 299 5.4.2 The (Divine and Human) Works of Salvation ............................... 303 Bibliography ............................................................................................... 315 Index of Subjects and Names ..................................................................... 361







List of Abbrevations AB AJP AnB ANRW AS A(Y)BRL BAR BBB BETL Bib BN BVC BZ BZAW BZNW CB CBR CBQ CBQMS CC ConBNT CRINT CSCO CTM DCLS DSD EHS.T EKK ETL ETR EvTh EvQ ExpT FAT FBBS FRLANT HeyJ

Anchor Bible American Journal of Philology Analecta biblica Aufstieg und Niedergang der römische Welt Assyriological Studies Anchor (Yale) Bible Reference Library Biblical Archeology Review Bonner biblische Beiträge Bibliotheca ephemeridum theologicarum lovaniensum Biblica Biblische Notizen Bible et vie chrétienne Biblische Zeitschrift Beihefte zur ZAW Beihefte zur ZNW Cultura biblica Currents in Biblical Research CatholicBiblical Quarterly Catholic Biblical Quarterly – Monograph Series Corpus Christianorum Coniectanea biblica, New Testament Compendia rerum iudaicarum ad Novum Testamentum Corpus scriptorium christianorum orientalium Concordia Theological Monthly Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature Studies Dead Sea Discoveries Europäische Hochschulschriften, Reihe 23, Theologie Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar Ephemerides theologicae lovanienses Études théologiques et religieuses Evangelische Theologie Evangelical Quaterly Expository Times Forschungen zum Alten Testament Facet Books, Biblical Series Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments Heythrop Journal



XIV

List of Abbreviations

HNT HThKAT HThKNT HTR HTS HUCA IBS ICC Int JAAR JBL JETS JJS JQR JR JSJSup JSJ JSNT JSNTSup JSOT JSOTSup JSP JSP JSQ JTS KEK LCL LD LHBOTS LingBib NICNT NICOT NIGTC Neot NovT NovTSup NRT NTA NTD NTS NRTh OBO ÖBS OLZ OTL OTS PRSt RB

Handbuch zum Neuen Testament Herders theologischer Kommentar zum Alten Testament Herders theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament Harvard Theological Review Hervormde Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies Hebrew Union College Annual Irish Biblical Studies International Critical Commentary Interpretation Journal of the American Academy of Religion Journal of Biblical Studies Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society Journal of Jewish Studies Jewish Quarterly Review Journal of Religion Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement Series Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic and Roman Periods Journal for the Study of the New Testament Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series Judea and Samaria Publication Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha Jewish Studies Quarterly Journal of Theological Studies Kritisch-exegetischer Kommentar über das Neue Testament. Loeb Classical Library Lectio Divina Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies Linguistica Biblica New International Commentary on the New Testament New International Commentary on the Old Testament New International Greek Testament Commentary Neotestamentica Novum Testamentum Novum Testamentum Supplement Series La nouvelle revue théologique Neutestamentliche Abhandlungen Das neue Testament Deutsch New Testament Studies Nouvelle revue théologique Orbis biblicus et orientalis Österreichische biblische Studien Orientalische Literaturzeitung Old Testament Library Oudtestamentische Studien Perspectives in Religious Studies Revue biblique

RBL RevQ RHPR RivB RThL SBLDS SBLMS SBLSS SBLTT SBT Sem SJT SHS SNTSMS SNTU ST ST STDJ SVTP TANZ TDNT TDOT TGW ThHKNT TynB TS WBC WTJ WMANT WUNT WW VC VT VTSup ZAW ZNW ZNWKAK ZTK

List of Abbreviations Review of Biblical Literature Revue de Qumran Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuse Rivista biblica Revue théologique de Louvain SBL Dissertation Series SBL Monograph Series SBL Symposium Series SBL Texts and Translations Studies in Biblical Theology Semitica Scottish Journal of Theology Scripture & Hermeneutics Series Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series Studien zum Neuen Testament und seiner Umwelt Summa Theologica Studia theologica Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah Studia in veteris testament pseudepigrapha Texte und Arbeiten zum neutestamentlichen Zeitalter Theological Dictionary of the New Testament Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament Theologie der Gegenwart Theologischer Handkommentar zum Neuen Testament Tyndale Bulletin Theological Studies Word Biblical Commentary Westmintser Theological Journal Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament Word & World Vigilia Christiana Vetus Testamentum Vetus Testamentum Supplement Series Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft Zeitschrift für neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der älteren Kirche Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche

XV



Introduction Pope Leo, the great champion of christian charity, gave vivid form to the legend of Lawrence, the deacon martyr of Rome. The wicked persecutor… demands of the guileless guardian of the sanctuary that the church wealth on which his greedy mind was set should be brought to him. But the holy deacon showed him where he had them stored by pointing to the many troops of poor saints, in the feeding and clothing of whom he had a store of riches which he could not lose, and which were the more entirely safe that the money had been spent on so holy a cause (Sermon 85, On the Feast of St. Lawrence).1

It is true, both the explosion of Lawrence’s cult and the earliest written sources about his life, Ambrose (De officiis 1.41.214–216), Prudentius (Peristephanon II) and the Depositio Martyrum, are fourth century phenomena. Nevertheless, the mortal jest attributed to the deacon about the Church’s wealth being hidden in the poor stands in perfect conformity with the most primitive ecclesial praxis and tradition. Head of the city’s seven deacons and entrusted with the distribution of the community’s goods, 2 Lawrence’s assimiliation to the proto-martyr, Stephen, reveals an embodied ecclesial exegesis of the Acts of the Apostles, dating from the middle twohundreds. Behind the rhetoric of Leo thus lurks a tradition of Lawrence’s lived testimony, and behind the behavior of Lawrence stands the textual witness of Luke. A consequence follows. While Peter Brown and others have chronicled the impressive manner in which the great bishops of the high patristic period set about rhetorically lionizing Christian almsdeeds, one must be prepared to reach back behind the triumphant post-Constantinian Church, and even

1

The original text may be found in CC 138a, 535–6. The translation is taken from Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series 2, Volume 12: Leo the Great, Gregory the Great (Philip Schaf and Henry Wace, eds.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2012) 197. 2 From contemporary sources one may be effectively certain that Lawrence served these functions, as later remembered in the legends. Pope Cornelius’ letter to his Antiochene colleague, dating to the year 251, seven years before Lawrence’s death in the Valerian persecution of 258, catalogues the 254 clerics of the Roman Church, including seven deacons and seven sub-deacons. The charitable duties of the deacons of the period are also clear, e.g., from the letter of Cyprian to the same pope, accusing the deacon Nicostratus of having defrauded the orphans and widows and robbing the Church (Ep. 44, Ad Cornelium).

2

Introduction

behind the period of the Valerian and prior persecutions, expecting to find in the New Testament itself more than just retroactivated proof texts. Indeed, one must suppose a substantial cultural continuity in the matter of charity towards the poor – aware that the Gospels themselves neither emerge from nor recede into a vacuum. An important new line of research is, in fact, beginning to show that the New Testament vision of almsgiving belongs squarely within a cohesive, antique, religious worldview, rooted in the distant soil of later post-exilic Judaism and flowering brilliantly in both rabbinic and patristic contexts. This monograph investigates the way such Jewish charity discourse is appropriated and developed in Luke’s Gospel. In contrast to previous scholarship, neither the coherence of Lukan “wealth ethics” nor its contemporary actualization defines the study. Instead, the sacramental significance of almsgiving during the Second Temple period, recently brought to light in the work of Gary Anderson, becomes the starting point for a more theologically oriented exegesis. The end result recognizes Luke’s “Christological mutation” of the inherited tradition. The study is organized around three large exegetical probes, each handling parabolic material overlooked or unsatisfactorily treated by earlier scholars: i.e. Luke 7:36–50; 10:25–37; and 16:1–31. Without intending to neglect the importance of social history – the context of early Christian praxis is very consciously borne in mind – this focus upon the parable texts is a deliberate decision, designed to sensitize Lukan studies to the specific literary character of the Third Gospel’s charity traditions. Luke’s diegetic style has various distinctive elements, but it is in a special way marked by his historiographical affinities and parabolic virtuosity. The former touches Lukan charity traditions in various appreciable ways, notably in Acts, but it is his parabolic discourse that is of particular interest in the Gospel. An approach to the parables is here advanced that highlights Christological allegory (metalepsis) as a Lukan narrative device. A break is thus implied with the dominant rationalist constructions of Luke’s parabolic art and ethics, ultimately traceable to figures like Adolf Jülicher and the problematic views of religion (both Christian and Jewish) held by the tradition of scholarship he represents, so deeply rooted in the ideals of the Enlightenment. This calculated break introduces a new theological, i.e. Christological, element into the long-standing discussion of the Gospel’s wealth texts. Also in contrast to a dominant (not unrelated) trend in Lukan studies, stress is laid here upon the author’s Jewish rather than Hellenistic context. Accordingly, to expose the distinctly Jewish character of Luke’s charity theology, each of the three exegetical probes undertaken in this study centers upon a key Old Testament text and line of Second Temple reception closely linked to Luke: i.e. Isa 61:1–2 and 11Q13; Lev 19:18 and CD 6:20; and Prov 10:2 and Tobit. This plotting of Luke within a Wirkungsgeschichte also in-

Introduction

3

cludes attention Matthew’s Gospel and to late rabbinic and patristic traditions, as well, under the conviction that Luke’s Gospel is most accurately viewed when positioned along an interpretative trajectory extending to include the Gospel’s own reception and not terminating arbitrarily at the end of the first century, as though the entire, vast Judeo-Christian charity tradition were but a prolegomenon and footnote to the inscription of a canonical text. The first of the three large exegetical probes seeks to ground Luke’s substantially Jewish pattern of thought. Specifically, it demonstrates the Gospel’s engagement with the foundational and pervasive Second Temple “sin as debt” metaphor. This entails a new reading of Luke 11:4 and overturns a problematic scholarly assumption rooted in Luke’s supposedly Hellenistic orientation. Here a distinct Lukan motif, described as “Creditor Christology,” is identified above all in the parable of the Two Debtors (7:36–50; cf. 12:57– 59). In this connection, Luke’s transmission of an implicit “Devil’s Ransom” theology is also shown (4:16–30; cf. Isa 61:1–2; 11Q13). A fresh interpretation of the parable of the Good Samaritan is proposed in the second exegetical chapter. As a key point of reference, the interpretation of Lev 19:18 as a text referring specifically to almsgiving is first uncovered in a neglected tradition from Qumran (CD 6:20). This is then used to reorient Luke 10:25–37 around charity. Such a perspective helpfully integrates the diverse motifs interpreters have found within the Lukan text, including the traditional Christological reading. At the same time, it gives meaning to the final verses of the parable, so often overlooked. Through the interaction of the Samartian and the Innkeeper and the line of credit there extended a different image is presented than is found in Luke 7:36–50, which one might even call a “debtor Christology.” Though grafted upon the same ground metaphor of debt, the diversity of Luke’s thought is thus brought to light. The third and final exegetical probe pursues a contextualized reading of the parables of the “Unjust Steward” and Lazarus and the Rich Man (Luke 16:1–31). This effort means to disentangle the crux of the former through an allegorical narrative application, which exposes yet another variation on the “debt/sin” release motif. The intersection of resurrection and wealth imagery is here brought to light, and the deep and complex grammar of Luke’s charity soteriology is explored. Specifically, while Luke deploys two distinct soteriological paradigms, i.e. salvation by works of mercy and salvation by divine election – two patterns that parallel the great Second Temple charity grammars of repayment and remission – deference in the Gospel is ceded to God’s divine action. Nevertheless, Luke has modified a God-driven paradigm of apocalyptic dualism to include a place for repentance by the rich. In this way the evangelist breaks from the extremity of texts like 1 Enoch and fuses together in a single broad vision the disparate models of divine predestination and human responsibility. All this is subsumed under a logic rooted in the economic soteriology of Prov 10:2 (“Almsgiving saves from death”).

4

Introduction

Such a rapid overview of the present project is meant only to help orient the reader and provide a condensed statement of the contents, for the text is long. In the following chapter an extensive history of research is offered that will position and present the book’s argument in much more detail. Each of the three subsequent textual studies will also include a brief conclusion, summarizing the chapter’s findings. At the end, a short final chapter will indicate how the exegetical results obtained in the body of the work might be theologically contextualized.



Chapter 1

Reading Luke on Charity 1.1 A Tour of Recent Scholarship 1.1 Tour of Recent Scholarship

Recent research on wealth and poverty in Luke-Acts has been abundant, a testament at once to the sheer number of relevant texts and the wide diversity of perspectives they contain.1 Unfortunately, this ample research has yielded less fruit than one might have wished. After fifty years of focused debate, basic questions remain unanswered.2 Two specific questions, which represent the major preoccupations of the literature, concern the “coherence” of Luke’s vision and his particular understanding of the “poor.” Both themes, in different ways, represent ethical inquiries; and both themes, in different ways, have exposed the need to move beyond merely ethical readings. 1.1.1 Defining the Agenda 1.1.1.1 The Search for “Coherence” Among the issues animating the study of Luke’s view of wealth, much effort has been directed toward the task of determining what precise behavior(s) the Gospel recommends. What coherent framework organizes the variety of economic imperatives Luke records? Who should give how much, to whom, and why? Dispossession, common ownership, hospitality, and almsgiving are all evidently promoted. It is no great exaggeration to say that addressing this practical diversity has in many ways controlled this subfield of Lukan studies. Hans-Joachim Degenhardt, whose redactional study of the wealth/poverty theme in Luke marks the beginning of most Forschungsberichte on the topic,



1 For helpful overviews of the history of research, see John Donahue, “Two Decades of Research on the Rich and the Poor in Luke-Acts,” in Justice and the Holy: Essays in Honor of Walter Harrelson (D. A. Knight and P. J. Paris, eds.; Atlanta: Scholars, 1989) 129–44; and especially Thomas Phillips, “Reading Recent Readings of Issues of Wealth and Poverty in Luke and Acts,” CBR 1 (2003) 231–69. 2 “While there is almost universal agreement on the importance of possessions, there is no consensus on major issues of interpretation, nor any consistent perspective in LukeActs,” Donahue, “Two Decades of Research,” 135.

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

set the framework. He observed a basic textual datum and a problem. 3 He distinguished two distinct sets of Lukan texts and sought an organizing ethical vision to hold them together. On the one hand, Degenhardt identified passages demanding complete divestiture (Luke 14:33; 18:22) or at least radical acts of renunciation (3:11; 19:8). On the other hand, he ranged the texts which only required giving of alms (11:41; 12:33) or suggested the offering of hospitality (9:4–5; 10:5–8). Degenhardt’s response was to reconcile the two counsels by applying these two different levels of moral instruction to two different groups of disciples. Thus, the inner group of “office holders” (Amtsträger), signified by the Greek word, µαθηταί, would be required to leave all their possessions behind, while the outer ring, the λαός, were only asked to practice generosity. Degenhardt’s simple solution has not been accepted as presented – his facile linguistic distinction does not hold up – but the tension in the text and the problem he set out have continued to agitate scholars. Though he did not take the witness of Acts into direct consideration, the “love communism” protrayed there (e.g. Acts 2:44–46; 4:32–35) quickly entered the discussion and intensified the problem with yet another model of Christian economic life. A variety of proposals, all addressing the same essential issue, have been made since Degenhardt’s study, none gaining great support. Chrisopher Hays identifies four different types of solutions, which may be reviewed in quick order.4 (1) First, there are the bi-vocational solutions. These try in various ways to adjust and rehabilitate Degenhardt’s original idea. Thus, for instance, HansJosef Klauck seeks to show that Luke leaves open a variety of vocational options in relation to poverty, just as celibacy was also only one option and not a binding condition for all disciples.5 Kyoung-Jin Kim takes a different line and recasts Degenhardt’s categories as applying to “itinerant” and “sedentary” disciples.6

3

Hans-Joachim Degenhardt, Lukas – Evangelist der Armen. Besitz und Besitzverzicht in den lukansichen Schriften. Eine traditions- und redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung (Stuttgart: Kath. Bibelwerk, 1965). Degenhardt wrote the first full monograph on the theme. François Bovon (Luke the Theologian: Fifty-five Years of Research [Waco,TX: Baylor University, 2006] 442) traces the dawning interest in Luke’s teachings on poverty and sharing goods to the more generalized studies of Albert Gélin, Les pauvres de Yahvé (Paris: Cerf, 1953) and Ernst Percy, Die Botschaft Jesu: Eine traditionskritische und exegetische Untersuchung (Lund: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1953). 4 Christopher Hays, Luke’s Wealth Ethics: A Study in Their Coherence and Character (WUNT II/275; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010) 3–23. 5 Hans-Josef Klauck, “Die Armut der Jünger in der Sicht des Lukas,” in Gemeinde – Amt – Sakrament: Neutestamentliche Perspektiven (Würzburg: Echter, 1989) 160–94. 6 Kyoung-Jin Kim, Stewardship and Almsgiving in Luke’s Theology (JSNTSup 155; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1998).

1.1 Tour of Recent Scholarship

7

(2) The next set of scholars offer what Hays calls interim solutions. These proposals have been numerous and diverse. David Seccombe, for example, contends that the radical renunciation theme belongs only to the thematic framework of the Travel Narrative.7 It thus functions as an expression of the need for the disciples to “die with Jesus,” and belongs to a precise moment in his ministry – not beyond. Vincenzo Petracca, by contrast, while also seeing a temporal distinction separating the forms of economic behavior, draws a generational line between the eyewitnesses, called to radical renunciation, and the later disciples, like Barnabas and Paul, who adhered to another lighter discipline.8 Brigitte Kahl propounds a similar theory, contrasting the radical commands of the Gospel (Armenevangelium) and the respectable Roman ethic in Acts (Heidenevangelium).9 David Kraybill and D. M. Sweetland offer a sociological angle on this perpsective, suggesting a distinction between the rudimentary, enthusiastic phase and the secondary, institutionalized phase of religious movements.10 Kyoshi Mineshige reveals what may ultimately stand behind the popularity of this interim idea, invoking Conzelmann’s “division of the times” Heilsgeschichte schema to divide Luke’s differing economic imperatives.11 (3) A third type of solution is sought at the level of sources. (An affinity with the interim solutions is evident.) Thus, Gerd Theissen connects the more stringent demands of the Gospel with his theory of primitive itinerant radicals, who served as tradents conveying Q material to Luke.12 Wolfgang Stegemann, for his part, suggests that Luke transmits radical materials from an earlier period faithfully, despite the tension they cause with the softer message he crafts for his own affluent audience.13 Friedrich Wilhelm Horn, finally, sifts the relevant texts through a redactional filter, linking Luke’s strong denunciations of wealth with an Ebionite community in the early



7 David Seccombe, Possessions and the Poor in Luke-Acts (SNTU 6; Linz: Fuchs, 1982). 8 Vincenzo Petracca, Gott oder das Geld: die Besitzethik des Lukas (TANZ 39; Tübingen: Francke, 2003). 9 Brigitte Kahl, Armenevangelium und Heidenevangelium: “Sola Scriptura” und die ökumenische Traditionsproblematik im Lichte von Väterkonflikt und Väterkonsensus bei Lukas (Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1987). 10 David Kraybill and D. M. Sweetland, “Possessions in Luke-Acts: A Sociological Perspective.” Perspectives in Religious Studies 10 (1983) 215–39. 11 Kyoshi Mineshige, Besitzverzicht und Almosen bei Lukas (WUNT II/163; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003). 12 Gerd Theissen, “Wanderradikalismus: Literatursoziologische Aspekte der Überlieferung von Worten Jesu im Urchristentum,” ZTK 70 (1973) 245–75. 13 Wolfgang Stegemann and Luise Schottroff, Jesus and the Hope of the Poor (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1986).

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Church.14 While the strict ethics of this constituency appears prominently in the Third Gospel, in Acts we find Luke’s own more moderate vision expressed in his own voice and with a freer hand. (4) The final type of solution is described as personalist. Luke Timothy Johnson is the only proponent Hays identifies.15 Johnson’s suggestion is that the variable disposition of wealth in Luke represents a measure of one’s personal response to Jesus. Such literary symbolism functions within a broader narrative account Johnson styles as the story of “The Prophet and the People.” More than the other explanations, this perspective allows the “incoherence” of Luke’s ethic to stand. As Johnson memorably remarks: “Although Luke consistently talks about possessions, he does not talk about possessions consistently.” Hays himself recognizes that “after fifty years of intense discussion regarding the wealth ethic of Luke, scholarship has grown repetitive, with three dominant proposals washing ashore again and again on the seemingly eternal tide of monographs and articles”: namely, the bi-vocational, interim, and source.16 His own preference is for something between the bi-vocational and personalist approaches, recognizing that a diversity of counsels on wealth (beyond the binary options of divestiture and almsgiving) are present, but disagreeing with Johnson about Luke’s ultimate inconsistency. Instead, Hays envisions an economic code wherein everyone must renounce all their wealth (Luke 14:33) – but in a way calibrated to their own particular vocational circumstance. “Renounce,” in short, means different things for different people. Whether Hays has satisfactorily concluded the debate begun by Degenhardt, it seems that the “coherence” question is exhausted. Here the real importance of Luke Timothy Johnson’s study must be understood. Johnson’s work fits awkwardly in Hays’ framing of the history of research, because, simply enough, Johnson finds the search for an ethical system to be misconceieved. 17 Whether or not a total disinterest in the project can be entirely justified, it remains the case that Luke propounds a “narrative” (διήγησις), built from an at times disorganized deposit of pre-existing source

14

Friedrich Wilhelm Horn, Glaube und Handeln in der Theologie des Lukas (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983). 15 Luke Timothy Johnson, The Literary Function of Possessions in Luke-Acts (SBLDS 39; Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1977). 16 Hays, Wealth Ethics, 184. 17 See especially Johnson’s second book on the topic, Sharing Possessions: Mandate and Symbol of Faith (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011) 13–25, 29. Hays (Wealth Ethics, 7, 17) himself sees the “ground-breaking” importance, “unimpeachable” scholarship, and “remarkable” influence of Johnson’s work. Nevertheless, he contends that Johnson’s narrative approach presents no decisive critique against the casuistic “wealth ethics” model of research.

1.1 Tour of Recent Scholarship

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material; he does not compose a freshly conceived Greco-Roman moral treatise (διατριβαί). One should not, therefore, demand from the Gospel a systematic theological “coherence” unsuited to its literary form. Finding an ethical focus in Lukan thought is unobjectionable, but this must first be approached on the level of the Gospel story. In this regard, one can welcome several studies of wealth in Luke with special sensitivity to his narration.18 Unfortunately, these works tend to be theory heavy, which can limit both their accessibility and utility. The effort of Thomas Phillips, tied closely to the reader response method of Wolfgang Iser, is perhaps the most approachable and significant.19 The problem, however, is less the method, than that in Phillips’ interpretation, as James Metzger complains, “an overemphasis on consistency-building as a goal of the reading process ultimately cancels textual indeterminacy and ambiguity.”20 Phillips’ study thus unwittingly reinforces a certain incompatability of narrative exegesis and the common search for ethical coherence. Metzger’s own reader reponse study, while committed to an overstated post-modern hermeneutic of “indeterminancy” (and addressed to a contemporary ethical cause in “overconsumption”), helpfully challenges this artificial systematizing trend in the scholarship. As a counterpoint to Hays’ pursuit of the coherence question, Metzger thus continues to turn the attention of scholarship in the direction that Johnson first pointed: toward the properly literary nature of Luke’s wealth discourse. Indeed, Metzger has taken an important step beyond Johnson. Where Johnson critically stressed the emplotted nature of the material, Metzger has added a valuable new emphasis on its connection to the parables. 21 This is an important and as yet unexplored aspect of Luke’s presentation of proper behavior with money and possessions. 1.1.1.2 Inventing the Poor (and Rich) Who exactly are the “poor” in Luke’s conception? At an earlier point, before Degendhardt’s redactional study, the identity of “the poor” was more central to the discussion, while in recent times it has become characteristic of

18

See, e.g., Hans-Georg Gradl, Zwischen Arm und Reich: Das lukanische Doppelwerk in leserorientierter und textpragmatischer Perspektive (Forschung zur Bibel 107; Würzburg; Echter Verlag, 2005); and James Metzger, Consumption and Wealth in Luke's Travel Narrative (Biblical Interpretation Series 88; Leiden: Brill, 2007). 19 Thomas E. Phillips, Reading Issues of Wealth and Poverty in Luke-Acts (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 2001). See also Wolfgang Iser, The Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response (Baltimore: John Hopkins University, 1980). 20 Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 13. 21 Ibid., 15–31. Metzger provides a good discussion of the Lukan parables, then proposes reading them through Jesus’ announcement of liberation for the poor in the sermon in Luke 4:16–30.

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

liberationist approaches. 22 This development reflects an increasing preoccupation in the literature with ethical actualization. The category of the “poor” in Luke’s Gospel shows both economic and theological coloring. In a dissertation some years back, Thomas Hoyt pressed the literal, i.e. “real economic” connotations of the Lukan πτωχοί (e.g. Luke 4:18; 6:20; 7:22; 14:13, 21; 16:20, 22; 18:22; 19:8; 21:2–3). 23 Philip Esler similarly insists that the word be rendered “beggars,” since the force “is eviscerated by the translation ‘the poor.’” 24 Linguistically, Esler’s radical interpretation of πτωχός is open to objection. 25 A variety of scholars have, nevertheless, stressed the same basic point, at times allowing a strong, even Marxist dialectic to shape Luke’s portrayal. 26 Such ideological excess is shaded in different degrees, of course. Walter Pilgrim rightly sees “that the Jesus movement cannot be reduced to a sociological phenomenon.” 27 He, nevertheless, still accepts the poor as “those who belong to the lowest social and economic level,” and, while making some provision for a small priestly “middle sector” of society, puts a strong accent on the political, class struggle of rich and poor as the proper background for interpreting the Gospel.28 Recent work on the spectrum of wealth distribution in the ancient world has objected to a “binary tunnel vision” and forced more sociological nuance here than scholars of Hoyt’s persuasion have typically allowed. 29 Peter

22

See Hays, Wealth Ethics, 20–3. Thomas Hoyt, “The Poor in Luke-Acts” (Ph.D. Dissertation; Duke University, 1975). 24 Philip Esler, Community and gospel in Luke-Acts: The social and political motivations of Lucan theology (SNTSMS 57; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1987) 164. 25 See, e.g., the critique of Outi Lehtipuu, “The Rich, the Poor, and the Promise of an Eschatological Reward in the Gospel of Luke,” in Other Worlds and Their Relation to This World (Tobias Nicklas, Joseph Verheyden, Erik M. M. Eynikel, and Florentino García Martínez, eds.; JSJSup 143; Leiden: Brill, 2011) 244–5. 26 Hays (Wealth Ethics, 16) lodges this complaint against Schotroff, Stegemann, Thiessen, and Horn. See Wolfgang Stegemann, The Gospel and the Poor (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981). 27 Walter Pilgrim, Good News to the Poor: Wealth and Poverty in Luke-Acts (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1981) 39. 28 Ibid., 160, cf. 39–56. Esler likewise detects class struggle (within the community) as a major force behind Luke’s specific language. 29 The phrase comes from Walter Scheidel, “Stratification, Deprivation, and Quality of Life,” in Poverty in the Roman World (Margaret Atkins and Robin Osborne, eds.; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2006) 40–59, here 54. The bare word πτωχός does not necessarily imply someone at or below subsistence level income: one of the abject poor who according to Justin Meggitt’s irresponsible exaggeration comprised “over 99% of the Empire’s population” (Paul, Poverty, and the Survival of Rome [Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998] 50, cf. 99). For a similar view, see Géza Alföldy, Die römische Sozialgeschichte (Wiesbaden: Steiner Franz, 1986). Binary treatments of the rich-poor divide have been very common, but not generally helpful. For a much more nuanced treatment of the multiple grades of poverty and wealth in the New Testament world, see Steven Friesen, 23

1.1 Tour of Recent Scholarship

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Brown, for instance, observes that “it is largely under the influence of Christian preaching that we tend to think of late Roman society as divided irrevocably between rich and poor and of the poor as living always in a state of abject poverty.” 30 Even before the full patristic accomplishment of such “pauperizing” and “divitizing,” however, the schematic class divison was well established. Luke’s dualistic contrast of rich and poor, therefore – however attuned to real social conditions and the plight of the underclasses – must be understood to be a stylized representation: not a naked description of economic life. The simplistic rhetorical contrast of elite and plebs was widely and unreflectively embedded in Greco-Roman literature (and even law). 31 Luke’s language of rich and poor naturally reflects this presentation; yet it also resonates in another, more specifically scriptural direction.32 In this connection, David Seccombe is insistent that in the language of the “poor” Luke has a covenant category, not an economic profile in mind.33 For Outi Lehtipuu, “the poor are ultimately the good and humble; the insiders who lead the right kind of life.” 34 Warren Heard, among others, more concretely highlights the background of Isaiah 56–66, where “the author intended a deliberate double entendre: both ‘humble’ and ‘poor.’” 35 Given Luke’s double citation of Isaiah 61:1 (‫)לבשר נויםע‬, the Isaianic echoes in πτωχός are hard to deny (e.g. Luke 4:18; 7:22; cf. 6:20). 36 One way or

“Poverty in Pauline Studies: Beyond the So-called New Consensus,” JSNT 26 (2004) 323– 61; and Bruce Longenecker, “‘The Least of These’: Scaling Poverty in the Greco-Roman World,” in Remember the Poor: Paul, Poverty, and the Greco-Roman World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010) 36–59 and 317–32; also idem., “Exposing the Economic Middle: A Revised Economy Scale for the Study of Early Urban Christianity,” JSNT 31 (2009) 243–78. 30 Brown, Eye of a Needle, 78; and on the existence of middling classes, idem., Poverty and Leadership, 49. See also the interesting study of Chirstian rhetorical depictions of poverty in Christel Freu, Les Figures du pauvre dans le sources italiennes de l’antiquité tardive (Études d’Archéologie et d’Histoire Ancienne; Paris: De Boccard, 2007). 31 See, e.g., Greg Woolf, “Writing Poverty in Rome,” in Poverty in the Roman World, 94. On the use of this dualistic contrast in Greco-Roman moralists, see Frederick Hauck, “πτωχός, πτωχεία, πτωχέυω,” TDNT VI, 887. On the legal honestiores-humiliores dichotomy, see Rolf Rilinger, Humiliores-Honestiores: Zu einer sozialen Dichotomie im Strafrecht der römischen Kaiserzeit (München: Oldenberg, 1988). 32 So, e.g., Lehtipuu, “Eschatological Reward,” 245. 33 Seccombe, Possessions and Poor, passim. 34 Lehtipuu, “Eschatological Reward,” 246. 35 Warren Heard, “Luke’s Attitude Toward the Rich and the Poor,” Trinity Journal 9 (1988) 47–80, here 49. See also, e.g., A. R. C. Leaney, Luke (London: A&C Black, 1958) 135; and Heinz Schürmann, Das Lukasevangelium (HThKNT 3; Freiburg: Herder, 1969) 326–8. 36 Mention can here be made of several scholars who believe that Luke had no special interest in poverty and riches, but simply repeated the emphasis of his sources. See espe-

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

another, the whole massive Old Testament interest in issues of wealth and poverty must inform Lukan perspectives on these themes.37 Although objections have been raised to the view that a special “theology of poverty” was actually developed through the Psalms and prophets,38 there remain good reasons to follow Erich Zenger and Nobert Lohfink on this point. 39 And while Horn’s thesis that Luke knows a primitive Christian (Ebionite) community called “the Poor” must be rejected, 40 the Armenfrömmigkeit at Qumran, notably in the Hodayoth, illustrates the basic proximity of this vision to Luke, whose Magnificat belongs to the same essential thought world.41 The affinities of Luke’s notion of the “poor” to that conception cultivated at Qumran are, indeed, striking.42 George Nickelsburg implicitly showed this several decades ago in pointing to the strong

cially David Mealand, Poverty and Expectation in the Gospels (London: SPCK, 1981) 16– 20. Against this problematic position, see Esler, Community and gospel, 164–9. 37 The theme is immense, but for a helpful, systematic overview of Old Testament legal traditions on wealth and poverty, see David L. Baker, Tight Fists or Open Hands? Wealth and Poverty in Old Testament Law (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009). 38 See Johannes Un-Sok Ro, Die sogennante “Armenfrömmigkeit” im nachexilischen Israel (BZAW 322; Berlin: DeGruyter, 2002). 39 See, e.g., Erich Zenger and Frank-Lothar Hossfeld, “Selig, wer auf die Armen achtet’ (Ps 41,2): Beobachtungen zur Gottesvolk-Theologie des ersten Davidpsalters,” in Volk Gottes, Gemeinde, und Gesellschaft (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchner, 1992) 21–50; and Norbert Lohfink, “Von der ‘Anawim-Partei’ zur ‘Kirche der Armen’: Die bibelwissenschaftliche Ahnentafel eines Hauptbegriffs der ‘Theologie der Befreiung,’” Bib 67 (1986) 153–76; and idem., Lobgesänge der Armen: Studien zum Magnifikat, den Hodajot von Qumran und einigen späten Psalmen (Stuttgarter Bibelstudien 143; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk GmbH, 1990) esp. 101–25. 40 For an important rebuttal of the commonly repeated idea that the Christian Urgemeinde in Jerusalem was known as “the Poor,” see Leander Keck, “The Poor Among the Saints in Jewish Christianity and Qumran,” ZNW 57 (1966) 54–78; and Longenecker, Remember the Poor, 157–82. See also the critique of Hays, Wealth Ethics, 15. 41 Lohfink, Lobgesänge der Armen, 13–37. On a proposed metaphorical use of poverty language to describe the inferiority of humans to the angels, see Benjamin Wold, “Metaphorical Poverty in ‘Musar leMevin,’” JJS 58 (2007) 140–53. Benjamin Wright III (“The Categories of Rich and Poor in the Qumran Sapiential Literature,” in Sapiential Perspectives: Wisdom Literature in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Proceedings from the Sixth Internations Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 20–22 May 2001 [John J. Collins, ed.; STDJ 51; Leiden: Brill, 2004] 101–23) claims instead that poverty should mainly be understood in a strict economic sense. 42 The Hodayoth are not strictly apocalyptic texts, but in many ways they operate within this assumed framework. See Carol Newsom, “Apocalyptic Subjects: Social Construction of the Self in the Qumran Hodayot,” JSP 12 (2001) 3–35.

1.1 Tour of Recent Scholarship

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similarities in Rich-Poor rhetoric linking the Third Gospel and 1 Enoch 92– 105.43 The most important way Luke deploys the “poor” is in the motif of the Great Reversal (“bi-polar reversal”), an idea of inversion shared in common with the worldview of 1 Enoch and other apocalyptic texts.44 The Magnificat (Luke 1:42–55), the Lukan Blessings and Woes (6:21–26), and the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man (16:19–31) are of obvious significance here, though other texts reflect the same idea (cf. 2:34; 9:24; 13:30; 14:11; 17:33; 18:9–14). 45 It is significant, however, that, as Mineshige observed, Luke’s Woes do not threaten the rich on account of their unethical deeds, as in 1 Enoch, but rather for having already received their rewards in this life (πλὴν οὐαὶ ὑµῖν τοῖς πλουσίοις, ὅτι ἀπέχετε τὴν παράκλησιν ὑµῶν, Luke 6:24; cf. 6:25–26; 16:25).46 Though Mineshige does not recognize it, such an idea of “taking down one’s balance” belongs directly to treasure in heaven logic. 47 This reveals that the grand metaphor of merit and sin as credit and debit has here intruded and reconfigured the Enochic apocalyptic framework. The significance of this merger must not be missed, for it represents a critical confluence of wisdom and apocalyptic motifs. Nickelsburg appreciates the particular distance of Luke’s more moderated rich-poor dualism from the hardened form found in 1 Enoch and remarks that “the sharp, condemnatory tone in 1 Enoch 92 ff. is somewhat muted in Luke’s openness to the possibility of the rich finding salvation through almsgiving, deeds of generosity, and perhaps the wholesale

43

George Nickelsburg, “Riches, the Rich, and God’s Judgement in 1 Enoch 92–105 and the Gospel According to Luke,” NTS 25 (1979) 324–44; and “Revisiting the Rich and Poor in 1 Enoch 92–105 and the Gospel According to Luke,” in George W. E. Nickelsburg in Perspective: An Ongoing Dialogue of Learning (J. Neusner and A. J. Avery-Peck, eds.; JSJSup 80; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 547–71. The thesis of Aalen that Luke knew 1 Enoch goes far beyond the evidence. While 1 Enoch was presumably not composed by the community at Qumran, the book was valued there. On the significance of 1 Enoch in the context of Qumran, see Gabriele Boccaccini, ed., Enoch and Qumran Origins: New Light on a Forgotten Connection (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005). 44 See John York, The Last Shall Be First: The Rhetoric of Reversal in Luke (JSNTSup 46; Sheffield: JSOT, 1991) 12–25. On the political aspects of Luke’s reversal language, see Amanda Miller, Rumors of Resistance: Status Reversal and Hidden Transcripts in the Gospel of Luke (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014). 45 See, e.g, Leslie Hoppe, Being Poor: A Biblical Study (Good News Studies 20; Wilmington, DE; Michael Glazier, 1987) 153–60. 46 Mineshige, Besitzversicht und Almosen, 30. 47 See Eliezer Diamond, Holy Men and Hunger Artists: Fasting and Asceticism in Rabbinic Culture (New York: Oxford University, 2004), especially Chapter Two, “‘The Principal Remains for the Next World’: Delayed Gratification and Avoidance of Pleasure in Rabbinic Thought.” See also Gary Anderson, Charity: The Place of the Poor in the Biblical Tradition (New Haven: Yale, 2013) 135.

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

giving up of their riches.”48 From this vantage, it is accurate to say that Luke “invents” the rich as a redeemable group much more than he invents the poor, whom he inherited as a ready-made socio-theological category of Second Temple Judaism.49 Luke’s gesture of openness to the rich belongs to a major narrative motif in the Gospel. Bettina Rost quite correctly highlights the fundamental binding of repentance with the theme of charity from rich to poor (e.g. Luke 3:10–14; 19:1–10; Acts 2:42–47; 4:32–37): “Umkehr hat ethische Konsquenzen.” 50 This repentance expressed through ethical imperatives has a timeless aspect and has invited the “actualizing” exegesis that characterizes a great deal of the literature.51 Rost, for her part, is engaged with the question of poverty and the prosperous economy of present-day Germany, seen through the lens of the “weltweite Kluft zwichen Arm und Reich.”52 The ethical power of Luke’s call to conversion thus continues to echo among the privileged of the world. If Luke has become the favored prophet of many contemporary prophetic voices, it is hard to lament their urgent thirst for justice. It reveals the impressive force of the Third Gospel’s challenge to men and women of all times to change their lives radically. One may wonder, nonetheless, whether the ethical vision which emerges from many of these studies – focused on current buzzwords such a “overconsumption” and “globalization” – has truly penetrated the theological depth of Luke’s original call to practice charity towards the poor. God is often strangely missing in modern crusades for

48

Nickelsburg, “Riches, the Rich, and God’s Judgment,” 11. He goes on to comment: “While this nuance may have originated with Luke or his Christian sources, it should be noted that almsgiving is stressed in such wisdom literature as Sirach and especially Tobit [cf. Sir 3:30; 7:10; 12:3; 17:22; 29:8, 12; 35:2; 40:17, 24; Tobit 1:3, 16; 4:7–11, 16; 12:8– 9; 14:2, 10–11]. This may be evidence of a Jewish wisdom influence upon Luke or his sources.” 49 On the place of repentance in Luke’s view of the rich, see Lehtipuu, “Eschatological Reward” 234–7. Samuel Adams (“Poverty and Otherness in Second Temple Instructions,” in The “Other” in Second Temple Judaism: Essays in Honor of John J. Collins [Daniel Harlow, Karina Martin Hogan, Matthew Goff, and Joel Kaminsky, eds.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011) 189–203) explores various responses to wealth among those poor for whom “an other worldly version of the Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang” had made them heirs of an inheritance in the afterlife. In contrast to 1 Enoch but “consistent with most Ancient Near Eastern instructions” 4QInstruction continues to affirm wealth as a sign of divine favor, even while addressing an economically disadvantaged target audience (e.g. 4Q417 2 i 17–19). 50 Bettina Rost, Wohltätigkeit und Armenfürsorge im Horizont Gottes: Eine neutestamentliche Untersuchung zur Besitzethik des Lukas (Saarbrücken: VDM, 2008) 4–12, here 11. 51 See, e.g, Pierre Coulange, L’Option préferentielle pour les pauvres: Parcours théologique et biblique (Studium Notre-Dame de Vie: Parole et Silence, 2011). 52 Rost, Wohltätigkeit und Armenfürsorge, 73–8.

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social justice; and the actualizing fusion of late twentienth and early twentyfirst century constructions of charity with Luke’s first century vision, while a bracing and important task, neverthless often appears to indulge gross anachronisms. To this extent, scholars must continue to strive to better understand Luke’s genuine message for rich and poor. 1.1.2 Holes in the Discussion The scholarship outlined above is very important. It consolidates certain key results and sets essential parameters for the further study of this Lukan theme. One must, nevertheless, register several places where the scholarship has been misdirected and even negligent.53 1.1.2.1 Lost Threads (Moxnes & Ayuch) The course that Lukan studies has taken has unfortunately allowed some important lines of research to be prematurely dropped. Two specific areas might be mentioned, where helpful new directions were at certain points initiated in the literature, but never substantially pursued. (1) Quis Dives Salvetur? Unfortunately, scholars’ preoccupation with defining the Lukan “poor” has not met with an equal precision in understanding the rich.54 It is true the actualizing exegesis of many scholars has engaged the theme. Preoccupation with the nature of Luke’s presumed audience, however, has diverted attention from certain aspects of his actual narrative about these rich. This is evident in the frequent exegetical displacement of the “money-loving” Pharisees (φιλάργυροι, Luke 16:14) of the Gospel story by a wealthy Gentile Christian readership as Luke’s ultimate referrent with the rich (e.g., κράτιστε Θεόφιλε, 1:3).55 Without dismissing the possibility of such readers or making claims about the historical Pharisees, the literary role of the Gospel Pharisees exposes a key theological paradigm

53

Any Forschungsbericht is an interpretative endeavor. Hays’ framing of the scholarship, while helpful, naturally marginalizes important themes unconcerned with establishing “coherence.” The alternative schema of Thomas Phillips (“Reading Recent Readings,” 231–69), who also highlights the problem of “consistency” but whose categories treat the literature from a reader response perspective, inevitably suffers from a similar shortcoming. 54 Brown (Eye of a Needle, 78) is alert to the fact that later Christian discourse had the simultaneous effect of both “pauperizing the poor” and “divitizing the rich.” A similar complementarity structures the Lukan material. 55 “Generally, the literature attests to two consensuses: 1) addressed at least in part to wealthy Christians, the Gospel extends the possibility of salvation to them, but without requiring the divestiture of all property and possessions; and 2) wealthy readers are encouraged to engage in some form of almsgiving, which, if practiced with regularity, will secure a place for them in the kingdom of God,” Metzger, Consumption and Wealth 2.

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

in Luke-Acts, not at all evident when Luke’s intention is reduced to a moralizing message for an hypothesized late first-century community.56 The door to repentance that Luke leaves open for the wealthy (in distinction to traditions like 1 Enoch) is very real. This should not be reduced tout court to good news for his reconstructed audience, however.57 Such an hermeneutical move violates, or at least undervalues the narrative plane, where the prospect of repentance for the rich is first of all opened to a particular sector in Israel. The prospect of repentance for the rich corresponds to a particular vision of Israel in the Gospel, and Luke Timothy Johnson succinctly states the relevant Lukan conception: “Luke does not describe a total or definitive rejection by all the Jews, but a division of the Jewish people.”58 This idea of a division within Israel, which Johnson presents as an important backdrop to Luke’s literary use of the wealth motif, endorses the narrative framework that Jacob Jervell has elaborated – without necessarily commiting us to Jervell’s thesis on the nature of the original audience of the Gospel. 59 Jervell, of course, detected no special link between the division of Israel and the matter of wealth, and Johnson has given no special help in this regard. An important pattern can nonetheless be seen. The binary of rich and poor, specifically, was neither the naked rhetoric of social class nor an undifferentiated covenant category, but a Second Temple trope articulating an end-time division. 60 (Restricted focus on the “poor”

56

On the difference between the historical Pharisees and the characters in Luke’s Gospel, see Halvor Moxnes, The Economy of the Kingdom: Social Conflict and Economic Relations in Luke’s Gospel (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1988) 1–9. Luke’s depiction of the Pharisees is famously “puzzling.” See John Carroll, “Luke’s Portrayal of the Pharisees,” CBQ 50 (1988) 604–21; David Gowler, Host, Guest, Enemy, and Friend: Portraits of the Pharisees in Luke and Acts (Emory Studies in Early Christianity 2; New York: Peter Lang, 1991); Robert Brawley, The Pharisees in Luke-Acts: Luke’s Address to Jews and His Irenic Purpose (Ph.D. Dissertation; Princeton Theological Seminary, 1978). 57 The excesses of this mode of exegesis have been strongly challenged in Richard Bauckham, ed., The Gospel for all Christians: Rethinking the Gospel Audiences (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998). 58 Johnson, Literary Function, 121–2. 59 Johnson (ibid., 122 fn. 1) rightly notes that “the important and valuable insights of Jervell…do not depend for their validity on Jervell’s insistence that the Christian milieu in which Luke wrote contained a Jewish element, which was if not numerically at least theologically decisive.” See Jacob Jervell, Luke and the People of God: A New Look at LukeActs (Minneapolis: Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1972). 60 Social tension between rich and poor was, of course, not unique to Israel in the ancient world, nor was the dream of a radical reversal. This has had the effect of departicularizing Israel’s unique appropriation of the rich-poor motif for many interpreters. The striking Egyptian story of Satme and Si-Osiris identified by Hugo Gressmann (“Vom reichen Mann und armen Lazarus: Eine literargeschichtliche Studie,” Abhandlungen der

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alone cannot appreciate this dialogical point.) The emergence of such economic dualism as a marker for two eschatological groups begins to take shape during the period of Seleucid oppression.61 In this context, an implicit typology connecting the “rich” with the Gentiles appears in certain nationalistic wisdom traditions, where Israel herself becomes the corresponding “poor,” whose rights will finally be vindicated by God (e.g. Sir 35:12–36:17; Wis 2:10–11).62 Contact with the prophetic tradition also enabled a different picture to emerge, in which the rich represented the wayward elite within the nation, and the poor those under their power.63 In 1 Enoch and at Qumran the eschatological dimension of this economic division within Israel intensifies and comes to mature expression.64

preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philisophisch-historische Klasse 7 [1918] 1– 91), for instance, has greatly (mis-)colored the understanding of Luke 16:19–31. The universal experience of social class and the related folkloric/moralizing impulse, nevertheless, came to express something distinctly theological and self-conscious in the Jewish context. 61 The dangerous and fracturing power of wealth was, naturally, recognized long before it gained an eschatological coloring (e.g. Amos 2:7–9). 1 Kings 12:1–16 traces the fraternal split between the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah to an extortionist tax policy. See Wayne Brindle, “The Causes of Division of Israel’s Kingdom,” Bibliotheca Sacra (1984) 223–33, esp. 228–30. 62 In Sir 35:12–36:17, the cry of the individual poor man is mapped on to the cry of the nation Israel (36:1–17). Just as God hears the prayer of the poor (πτωχός) downtrodden by the rich, a cry which “pierces the clouds” (35:13, 17) and does not rest until the Lord “breaks the back of the merciless” (35:20), so the Lord “defends the cause of his people” (35:23), who pray that he “raise his hand against the heathens” (36:1–2). In this way, through “the deep theological roots that connect Israelite identity with the social location of the poor, a yearning for God’s vindication of the poor and oppressed individuals within Israel can segue quite seamlessly into the subject of God’s vindication of oppressed Israel among the nations, specifically in this case her Hellenistic overlords,” Bradley Gregory, “The Relationship between the Poor in Israel and Under Foreign Rule: Sir 35:14–26 among Second Temple Prayers and Hymns,” JSJ 42 (2011) 327. 63 A number of texts illustrate the tendency of the LXX edition of Isaiah to depict an intramural division in economic terms (e.g. Isa 5:5–7, 16–17; 6:11–13; 9:3–4). One key passage is Isa 3:12–15, which been recast “to describe Israel’s rulers as ‘fleecing’ the people through heavy taxation, metaphorically depicted as ‘burning my vineyard,’ but also described concretely as ἁρπαγή” (Ronald Troxel, “Economic Plunder as Motif in LXX Isaiah,” Bib 83 [2002] 373–91, here 381). Where the MT describes Israel’s oppressors as “children” (‫ )מעולל‬and “women” (‫ )נשים‬in 3:12a, the Greek has “tax collectors” (πράκτορες) and “creditors” (ἀπαιτοῦντες) domineering the people. Troxel supposes these characters to be Seleucid overlords. In 3:14–15, however, these extortioners are identified explicitly with the “elders” and “rulers” (πεσβύτεροι, ἄρχοντες) of the people, criticized for plundering the poor (ἡ ἁρπαγὴ τοῦ πτωχοῦ ἐν τοῖς οἴκοις ὑµῶν) and disgracing their faces (τὸ πρόσωπον τῶν πτωχῶν καταισχύνετε). 64 The radical division of mankind into the elect and the doomed is nowhere more pronounced than in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is very interesting then that in several documents

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

Luke operates within this decisive apocalyptic framework, though with a variety of accents all his own. In the first place, through his openness to repentance for the rich in the sharing of their goods, Luke orders his discourse towards the healing of the rich-poor division. The particular character of John the Baptist’s preaching (Luke 3:10–14) confirms that charity functions in the last days to accomplish a great reconciliation and “prepare a people ready for the Lord” (1:16–17). The message of showing (to receive) mercy becomes a sign of contradiction, however. It at once intensifies and overcomes Israel’s eschatological schism, both exposing the stubborn rich who will not repent, while also forming from those who do a new people bound in harmony and blessed by God, among whom no needy person is to be found (Acts 4:34; cf. Deut 15:4). While the proclamation of Jesus’ resurrection divides Israel in two in Acts, while also opening a space for welcoming of the Gentiles, matters of money have the same dividing and uniting power in the Gospel. The correspondence is very suggestive of money’s symbolic value in Luke’s theology. The most important and explicit text on wealth as a source of division is Luke 12, an elaborate and varigetaed discourse on wealth, possessions, and almsgiving. 65 Here the idea of a division between two brothers over their inheritance is thematized, played upon, and tightly laced up with Jesus’ own nuanced claims about being (and not being) a “divider” (Luke 12:14, 51–53). More will be said on this in Chapter Two below. The configuration is clear, however. If one’s response to God’s Prophet, Jesus, is indeed, as Johnson argues, realized in one’s relation to wealth, then economic behavior somehow

wealth and poverty functions as a strong marker of this division – but only in the rhetorical context of an eschatological schism (or act of separation) within Israel (wealth being a halakhic concern). The War Scroll’s famous opposition between the “Sons of Light” and the “Sons of Darkness,” for instance, never employs economic language to characterize the army of Belial: an alliance of all the archetypal Gentile enemies of Israel (i.e. Edom, Moab, the sons of Ammon, the Amelekites, the Philistines, and the Kittim of Asshur, Col I, 1– 2; cf. Col II, 10–14). In the Damascus Document (CD 6:14b–17a), by contrast, the “sons of the Pit” are caught in the snares of Belial (4:12b–19a; cf. Isa 24:17). It is the snare of wealth above all that threatens, and the adversaries of the Yahad are “identified primarily by their avarice” (Mark Matthews, Riches, Poverty, and the Faithful: Perspectives on Wealth in the Second Temple Period and the Apocalypse of John [SNTSMS 154; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2013] 97). Scholars agree that in CD the religious elite of Israel are in view. See, e.g., Catherine Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Qumran Community (STDJ 40; Leiden: Brill, 2002) 76–7. In 1 Enoch, the “rich” (regularly designated as “sinners,” ἁµαρτωλοί, ἄδικοι) also represent a group within Israel. Although they behave like pagans – e.g., following idols (1 Enoch 99:7; 104:9) and consuming blood (98:11) – they are said to “alter the true words and pervert the everlasting covenant” (99:2) as false teachers who lead others astray with their lying words (98:15). 65 See Christopher Hays, “Slaughtering Stewards and Incarcerating Debtors: Coercing Charity in Luke 12:35–13:9,” Neotestamentica 46 (2012) 41–60.

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registers the basic lines of one’s religious allegiance. This is why the alternative to serving God is not in the first place serving self or the devil, but money: “You cannot serve God and mammon” (16:13). The classes of rich and the poor (along with the rich on the side of the poor) accordingly plot the great eschatological division between the “sons of light” and the “sons of this world” (16:8). Here Halvor Moxnes’ study on wealth and social conflict in Luke, though much less influential than Johnson’s work, is in many ways more important.66 Moxnes, who consciously advances a narrative reading of the wealth motif, strongly links the wealth topos with the specific Lukan subplot of conflict with the Pharisees. 67 This precision represents a significant development beyond Johnson’s much vaguer handling of Luke’s narrative dynamics. 68 Indeed, at a narrative level, one cannot appreciate Luke’s deployment of rich and poor language without insight into the role of these figures in Israel. Because Moxes’ concern was focused on the socio-economic reality bound up with the narrative, however, the contest over money with the Pharisees has still not been expanded in a properly theological direction. Indeed, the key question has not yet even been posed. Why do the Pharisees, who in Acts stand as opponents to Jesus’ resurrection (notably in the paradigmatic person of Saul), in the Gospel find themselves embroiled in controversy with him over money?69 How is charity a preparation for belief in the resurrection? (2) “Eschatological Vision.” One of the more interesting recent works on almsgiving in Luke has not gained enough notice: Daniel Alberto Ayuch’s dissertation, Sozialgerechtes Handeln als Ausdruck einer eschatologischen Vision.70 The thesis makes several critical points. Most fundamentally, Ayuch

66

Moxnes, Economy of the Kingdom. See also Bruce Malina and Jerome Neyrey, “Conflict in Luke-Acts: Labeling and Deviance Theory,” in The Social World of Luke-Acts: Models for Interpretation (Jerome Neyrey, ed.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1991) 97–122. 67 On this wider pattern, see Frank Matera, “Jesus’ Journey to Jersualem (Luke 9:51– 19:46): A Conflict with Israel,” JSNT 51 (1993) 57–77. It is disappointing that Metzger’s study, though focused on Luke’s Travel Narrative, only mentions Moxnes (who should have been a major interlocutor) twice. 68 Brian Beck (Christian Character in the Gospel of Luke [London: Epworth, 1989]) gives Luke’s presentation of the Pharisees an excessive role in the paranesis and structure of the Gospel. See Mitchell G. Reddigh’s review, PRSt 19 (1992) 121. 69 The Pharisees, of course, object to a realized view of the resurrection, not the idea of resurrection in itself (cf. Acts 23:1–10). It is suggestive that Luke’s post-conversion Paulusbild is colored by the transformed persecutor’s charity: e.g., participation in relief efforts (11:29–30) and almsgiving (24:17). Paul’s dramatic farewell discourse, quite significantly, ends specifically with a boast about being free from all greed and supporting the weak by his work and with a final, closing admonition to generous giving: “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (20:33–35). 70 Daniel Alberto Ayuch, Sozialgerechtes Handeln als Ausdruck einer eschatologischen Vision: Zum Zusammenhang von Offenbarungswissen und Sozialethik in den lukanischen

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defends the Second Temple (“frühjüdische”) roots of Luke’s Sozialethik. While he sees evidence for this background in a wide variety of phenomena, from formal considerations (Gattungen) and the use of parallelismus membrorum to citations of the LXX, he distinguishes two special expressions of this “early Jewish” character in Luke: (i) imitatio Dei and (ii) “apokalyptisch-weisheitliche Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang.” 71 Each of these suggestive topoi opens an unexplored perspective on Luke’s theology of wealth. The first (imitatio Dei) corresponds to a motif seen commonly in the almsgiving discourse of the period (e.g. Letter to Diognetus 10:6; cf. Luke 6:36).72 It is strange, then, that, while a developed imitatio Christi motif has been detected in the Gospel,73 no effort (by Ayuch or others) has been made to identify Luke’s Christological reconfiguration of this early Jewish charity motif in posing Jesus in the traditional, topical place of God. It is, nonetheless, of great interest that not only is the imitatio discipleship motif in Luke connected with the Passion narrative, but also with certain key Besitzverzicht texts (e.g. Luke 14:25–35). The second point – a blending of wisdom and apocalyptic in Luke’s use of the Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang principle – is more foundational and has only recently begun to attract the attention of Lukan scholars. 74 George Nickelsburg, in a retrospect on his 1978 article, flagged this thematic convergence, although only in a preliminary way. 75 Albert Hogeterp, likewise, has very recently explored this convergence directly. 76 Neither scholar interacts with Ayuch, however. Ayuch helps expose the specific context, a blending of wisdom and apocalyptic motifs, in which Luke’s cross-based mimetic Christology took hold. Ayuch summarizes:

Schlüsselreden (MthA 54; Altenberge: Oros, 1998). The book appears nowhere in the bibliogaphy of Hays or in Phillips’ lengthy 2002 research report. 71 Ibid., 208–14. 72 See Bradley Gregory, Like an Everlasting Signet Ring: Generosity in the Book of Sirach (DCLS 2; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010) 254–90. 73 See, e.g., Brian Beck, “Imitatio Christi and the Lucan Passion Narrative,” in Suffering and Martyrdom in the New Testament (William Horbury and Brian McNeil, eds.; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1981) 28–47. 74 On this theme, see Benjamin Wright and Lawrence Wills, eds., Conflicted Boundaries in Wisdom and Apocalypticism (Atlanta: SBL, 2005). Luke is not the subject of any essays in this interesting volume. On the role of Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang as a principle in New Testament wealth metaphors, see Klaus Koch, “Der Schatz im Himmel,” in Leben angesichts des Todes: Beiträge zum theologischen Problem des Todes (Helmut Thielicke, ed.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1968) 47–60. 75 Nickelsburg, “Revisiting the Rich and Poor,” 560–1. 76 Albert Hogeterp, “Immaterial wealth in Luke between wisdom and apocalypticism: Luke’s Jesus tradition in the light of 4QInstruction,” Early Christianity 4 (2013) 41–63.

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Die Schlüsselreden geben den Adressaten anhand der Verheißungen (Lk 3,16; 6:20–26; Apg 20,32) und der Argumentationen (Lk 3,8; 6,35–38; Apg 20,28) die Gewißheit, daß Gott die verkehrte Welt retten will, und entfalten eine entsprechende Sozialethik, die nur aus der Hoffnung auf die verheißene Gottesherrschaft zu verstehen ist. Die Wissensträger der lukanischen Erzählung vermitteln dem Leser eine apokalyptisch-weisheitliche Lebensorientierung, in der das sozialgerechte Handeln als das kluge Verhalten angesichts der eschatoglischen Ereignisse angemahnt wird…Die klugen Schüler der lukanischen Wissensträger erwarten keine sozialethische Reziprozität von ihren Mitmenschen (Lk 6,6,25; 14,12–14) und sind deswegen bereit, alles zu verkaufen und den Armen und Bedürftigen zu geben (vgl. Lk 12,33; Apg 2,44f; 4,34–36), weil sie mit Sicherheit wissen, daß die entgültige Belohnung von dem barmherzigen Gott gegeben wird (Lk 6,38; 11,13; 12,32): Sie werden reich im Hinblick auf die kommende Gottesherschaft (Lk 12,21)…Somit greift der klassiche Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang über die Grenzen der jetzigen Welt hinaus und etabliert sich im Horizont der endzeitlichen Gottesherrschaft.77

The tight integration of Jesus’ (and John’s) apocalyptic proclamation of the Kingdom of God with the wisdom motif of recompense/reciprocation – still a this-worldly principle in the almsgiving ethic of Tobit and Sirach – ultimately permits Jesus’ resurrection, his own reward “über die Grenzen der jetzigen Welt,” to become a pattern for the reward awaiting all who follow him in abanonding all (cf. 4Q418 122 ii+ 126 ii 9–11; also Phil 2:6–11; 3:8–11; 2 Cor 8:9). The eschatological event of Jesus’ resurrection, a paradigmatic ordained effect as irresistable (δεῖ) as any in the Act-Outcome framework (Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang), thus emerges as a decisive reference point in Luke’s (Christological) engagement with charity discourse. 1.1.2.2 Neglected Themes The oft lamented trend towards atomization in biblical studies tends to isolate scriptural data in narrow ways and results in a weakened theological perspective. The theme of rich and poor in Luke has thus, like many other motifs adduced through redaction criticism, been sequestered in problematic ways. It is striking, in fact, how detached most studies are from certain fundamental Lukan themes. No attempt has been made, for instance, to read these texts as part of a Christological pattern or link charity in Luke to wider currents in Lukan soteriology. The motif of repentance has gained some attention, as noted, but the closely related Lukan idea of forgiveness (ἄφεσις) has not been incorporated and deserves a much more central role. In this connection, the Jewish background of redemptive almsgiving must be more intensively explored. Almsgiving has, of course, figured prominently within the discussion of Lukan wealth texts. The framework of ethical “coherence” has governed the discussion, however, so that almsgiving has largely been posed and addressed as an alternative to radical dispossession.

77

Ayuch, Sozialgerechtes Handeln, 213.

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For those scholars who accept the giving of alms as Luke’s counsel for the rich, two basic models emerge. Some envision a pattern of charitable behavior continuous with broad Greco-Roman or even specifically Augustan ideals (e.g. Oakman, Phillips). 78 Others imagine a call to something more disruptive of the social order (e.g. Moxnes, Kim). Within this basic debate, remarkably little substantive engagement with the theological significance of almsgiving in ancient Judaism has been apparent – still less does one find attention to Luke’s special Christological reconfiguration of Jewish almsgiving soteriology. The underlying desideratum has been long noted. In his Forschungsbericht of nearly 25 years ago, John Donahue concluded that in the study of poor and rich in Luke-Acts there was “need for work on ‘alms’ and ‘almsgiving,’ both as a religious practice and social institution.” 79 Happily, this need (concerning both the religious understanding and social significance) is being addressed through a recent surge in the study of almsgiving in antiquity. This work, however, has generally focused on patristic and rabbinic material, rather than New Testament texts. In consequence, an understanding of Luke’s considerable position in the history of this motif remains underdeveloped. Peter Brown’s magisterial opus on wealth discourse in the late antique Latin West, for instance, is massively important for an appreciation of the topic, yet it does little more than peek outside the period of 350–550 CE and isolates fourth century practice too neatly from earlier evidence. 80 Roman Garrison’s study on redemptive almsgiving is more germane in terms of time and place, and he helpfully recognizes the major soteriological signifiance of alms in the first two centuries of Christianity.81 The work gives merely two pages to Acts, however, and treats the synoptic Gospels together in an undifferentiated way in a mere six pages. The recent volume of David Downs is in many ways an extended and updated version of Garrison’s study – albeit

78

See Douglas Oakman, “The Countryside in Luke-Acts,” in Social World of LukeActs, 176–8; and Phillips, Wealth and Poverty, 180–81. 79 Donahue, “Two Decades of Research,” 144 (emphasis added). 80 Peter Brown Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350–550 AD (Princeton: Princeton University, 2012). See also, idem., Poverty and Leadership in the Later Roman Empire (Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 2002); and idem., “Alms and the Afterlife: A Manichean View of Early Christian Practice,” in East and West: Papers in Ancient History Presented to Glen W. Bowersock (T. Corey Brennan and Harriet Flower, eds.; Cambridge: Harvard University, 2008) 145–58; The Ransom of the Soul: Afterlife and Wealth in Early Western Christianity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 2015); and most recently Treasure in Heaven: The Holy Poor in Early Christianity (United States of America: University of Virginia, 2016) 81 Roman Garrison, Redemptive Almsgiving in Early Christianity (JSNTSup 77; Sheffield: Academic, 1993).

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written with different theological presuppositions. 82 The work is thus also occupied with too wide a range of literature, from Daniel and Ben Sira to Cyprian, to offer more than a passing survey of relevant Lukan material (which excludes nearly all the key texts considered in the present study). In the same way, Gary Anderson’s important book on charity in the biblical tradition explores the powerful theological worldview informing ancient Jewish and Christian almsgiving (see §1.3.1.1 below), but is too broadly conceived to give sustained exegetical attention to the Third Gospel.83 The dissertation of Nathan Eubank, finally, is significant since he has applied in a concentrated way the background explored by these others to the Gospel of Matthew (see §1.3.1.2 below); but his engagement with Luke is minimal and disappointing.84 Of the six (no less!) major monographs on Lukan wealth ethics published since Donahue’s report, none is principally concerned with interpreting LukeActs in the context of early Jewish and Christian redemptive almsgiving or investigating how Luke develops a specific Christological soteriology through his wealth discourse. 85 Kim, for instance, focuses on the theme of discipleship/stewardship and devotes but four underwhelming pages to “almsgiving in Judaism.” 86 Hans-Georg Gradl and James Metzger pursue linguistic and literary analyses and do very little direct historical work. 87 Petracca structures his work following Luke’s narrative sequence and never thematizes any broad historical background. He does appreciate the Jewish roots of the “Schatz im Himmel” motif in considering Luke 12:33–34, but no effort is made to track the full influence of this metaphor in the Gospel. 88 Mineshige, likewise, despite a promising title, detects redemptive alms only as an isolated point of reference, interested rather to distinguish the “Zeiträume” (Conzelmann) defining the relation between the “zwei sich widersprechende Tendenzen” in Luke’s presentation of possessions: Besitzverzicht and Almosengeben.89 The overstated tension between these two behaviors – which Luke himself happily holds together repeatedly (e.g. πωλήσατε τὰ ὑπάρχοντα ὑµῶν καὶ δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην, Luke 12:33; πάντα ὅσα ἕχεις πώλησον καὶ διάδος πτωχοῖς, 18:22) – exposes a failure to appreciate

82

David Downs, Alms: Charity, Reward, and Atonement in Early Christianity (Waco, TX: Baylor, 2016). 83 See Anderson, Charity, 62–5, 135, 170–3. 84 Nathan Eubank, Wages of Cross-Bearing and Debt of Sin: The Economy of Heaven in Matthew’s Gospel (BZNW 196; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013). 85 Almost all have been written in the last fifteen years: Kim (1998), Minishige (2003), Petracca (2003), Gradl (2005), Metzger (2007), Hays (2010). 86 Kim, Stewardship and Almsgiving, 277–81. 87 Gradl, Zwischen Arm und Reich; and Metzger, Consumption and Wealth. 88 See Petracca, Gott oder das Geld, 139. 89 Mineshige, Besitzverzicht und Almosen, 263–4.

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the soteriology that underwrites and motivates redemptive almsgiving. The very prospect of gaining treasure in heaven (ποιήσατε ἑαυτοῖς...θησαυρὸν ἀνέκλειπτον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς, 12:33; καὶ ἕξεις θησαυρὸν ἐν οὐρανοῖς, 18:22) by portioning out alms leads by an intractable logic to the thought that a supreme treasure must await the greatest imaginable gift of one’s goods: a total gift. Hays, who specifically sets himself to discover the consistent principles informing Luke’s ethical vision and who, among the recent authors on the theme, provides the best discussion of the Jewish background of almsgiving, has unfortunately not recognized in the “treasure in heaven” framework the key nexus of theological continuity linking almsgiving and dispossession.90 While Hays’ study has much of value to offer and draws some definitive conclusions, central ideas about almsgiving have still not attained their proper place in the study Luke’s Gospel. 1.1.2.3 Neglected Texts One of the recurring patterns in the study of Lukan wealth texts is the rehearsal of the same long series of key passages. Such surveys have their warrant, but are disappointing from at least two perspectives. First, these studies typically undertake the treatment of so many texts that the exegesis tends to be quite superficial. Second, given the conventional (often repetitious) nature of much scripture scholarship, this line of research tends to follow a ready-made syllabus of “relevant” texts. The consequence for the study of Luke-Acts is that a number of important textual data points, for whatever reasons not included in the standard roll call, remain regularly neglected in the literature. The widespread disregard of the later portions of Acts, particularly Paul’s promotion of almsgiving in word and deed (e.g. Acts 19:35; 24:17), has been noted as a problem.91 Treatment of the first half of Acts has also been spotty, however, with some very suggestive texts – notably the stories of Tabitha (9:36–43) and Cornelius (10:1–3) – left almost entirely unexplored (also, e.g.,



90 Hays, Wealth Ethics, 25–49. Hays provides a complete chapter on the Jewish setting of the Gospel and recognizes that among the key motifs adopted by Luke is “a valuation of almsgiving as a means of securing atonement and eschatological reward” (49 fn. 129). This idea, moreover, Hays insists, “is not so late as one might think.” Luke additionally appropriates from the surrounding Jewish culture “warnings about the dangers of wealth, hostility to the rich, characterization of greed as idolatry, threat of eschatological judgment, rhetoric of reversal, [and] endorsement of divestiture.” As seen, however, Hays pursues a broader interest in Luke’s comprehensive system of “wealth ethics” – e.g. attitudes towards the rich, depictions of greed, etc. – and is only tangentially interested in the thought of atonement and eschatological life being made available through works of mercy. 91 See Phillips, Wealth and Poverty, 42.

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3:1–6 and 8:9–24). It is perhaps more striking, however, that such programmatic and high-profile Gospel passages as the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37) have also been consistently underplayed. 92 This neglect is especially hard to justify in the case of Metzger, who has proposed the wealth texts, particularly the parables of Luke’s Travel Narrative as his specific object of interest (i.e. Luke 12:13–21; 15:11–32; 16:1–13; 16:19–31). Here, a contemporary preoccupation with the ethics of “overconsumption” has anachronistically obscurred the integrity of Luke’s own presentation in this section of the Gospel. Overconsumption nowhere appears in the parable of the Good Samaritan, but charity most certainly does. Inattention to this relevance of the Good Samaritan pericope in Luke’s teaching is especially unfortunate, since the high-profile passage functions in such a key way. Given Luke’s explicit link of the scene with his account of the Rich Ruler (“What must I do to gain eternal life?” Luke 18:18–30), the parable casts Jesus’ great double love command in a very special light, intentionally linked to his radical call to give alms. At the same time, the charitable Samaritan, who pays generously from his own purse, highlights a critical link between showing “mercy” and one’s covenantal status (as the story of Cornelius does as well, cf. Acts 10:1–3). Indeed, the open concern for boundary-marking in Luke 10:25–37 inserts Luke’s “works of mercy” discourse into his vital theme of the salvation for the Gentiles, thus exposing a key intersection where almsgiving and soteriology meet in Luke’s vision. Chapter 3 below will explore all these themes in great detail. Another key text overlooked and undertreated in the scholarship is the story of the Sinful Woman (Luke 7:36–50). Here the “relevance” of the text to charity discourse is admittedly less obvious; but this only reconfirms the problem with superficial surveys. Explicit mention of ἐλεηµοσύνη or the abandonment of one’s goods is not the only way Luke’s engagement with Jewish almsgiving soteriology is made manifest. As the following chapter of the present thesis will show, this unique Lukan text opens up an important and untapped Christological dimension of Luke’s almsgiving theology, illuminating a cluster of texts ranging from the Our Father (11:4) to the logion Reconciliandum in Via (12:57–59), as well as the critical Sermon in Nazareth (4:16–30). The foundations of Luke’s almsgiving paradigm as well as his important mediating position between Patristic and Second Temple charity traditions are only made clear through this neglected material.

92

On this point, see Chapter Three, “Introduction.”

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1.2 Prejudices and Preoccupations 1.2 Predjudices and Preoccupations

How has scholarship reached its present state? Much has certainly been gained. Still, given the enormous energy devoted to studying Luke’s views on wealth, it may be surprising that the lacunae outlined above should be so basic. Key texts have still not been examined, important hints have not been followed, and the essential Jewish theological background (along with Luke’s Christian re-appropriation) remains unexplored. Without attempting a full genealogy of the present state of scholarship, this section will suggest several factors that help explain the particular blind spots of modern research – particularly with respect to the foundational Jewish background. Implicit in the presentation are a series of alternative perspectives. 1.2.1 Long Shadow of the Reformation One obvious perspectives shaping the vision of much New Testament scholarship is the inheritance of Reformation theology.93 It is important to recall here that the influential exegetical figures of the last century were formed with considerably more dogmatic training than biblical scholars now receive.94 Consequently, the power of classical doctrines to contour a scholar’s historical and interpretative imagination must be openly acknowledged.95 In

93

The religious commitments of Degenhardt, a Catholic priest and later archbishop and cardinal, have been frequently cited as inducing his implausible two-tiered reading of dispossession and almsgiving in Luke. Degenhardt’s reading is indeed problematic, but it is not only Catholic theology that must be called to account. Reformation theology has in many ways been much more influential (especially in this domain) – even on Catholics (cf. §1.2.1.2 below). On the massive and often hidden influence of the Reformation, see Brad S. Gregory, The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society (Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 2012). 94 Bultmann, for instance, was greatly influenced by the Lutheran Neo-Kantians (e.g. Hermann) at Marburg. Jeremias studied Lutheran theology at Leipzig. C. H. Dodd and W. D. Davies were ordained Congregationalist ministers, etc. See William D. Dennison, The Young Bultmann: Context for His Understanding of God 1884–1925 (New York: Peter Lang, 2008); and Donald K. McKim, Historical Handbook of Major Biblical Interpreters (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2007) passim. On the secularization of a formerly robustly theological field, see Michael Legaspi, The Death of Scripture and the Rise of Biblical Studies (Oxford: Oxford University, 2010). 95 Jonathan Z. Smith (Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity [Chicago: University of Chicago, 1990] 34), the respected historian of Greco-Roman religions, shrewdly remarked that the “pursuit of…the questions of Christian origins takes us back persistently to the same point: Protestant anti-Catholic apologetics” (italics original).

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the present case, the influence of the polemical principle of sola fide, salvation apart from works, is obviously at stake.96 1.2.1.1 Frühkatholizismus97 Theological value judgments have every right to find expression – and yet they must be held accountable. The number of scholars who have registered distress at reward-based principles of morality (“works righteousness”) is sufficient to suggest that this distate has at times obscurred historical judgment.98 Adolf von Harnack, to take a prominent example, was well aware of the massive importance of merit-driven almsgiving in early Christianity; yet he chose to ignore the topic as a debased and un-Christian ethic.99 Such a deliberate abdication of the historians’ task reveals a powerful prejudice. The favoring of a works-free “Pauline” soteriology over the opposing “Jewish” morality of merit has certainly colored the conversation about works of mercy in the New Testament.



96 It is significant that it was a massively influential Lukan scholar, Hans Conzelmann, who co-authored the (unsettling) entry on χάρις in Kittel’s Wörterbuch. On the view attributed to the rabbinical literature, Conzelmann writes, e.g.: “The central problem is the relation between grace and works.... Grace arises only where there are no good works; it is supplementary.... The concept of grace remains caught in the schema of the Law. In the understanding of grace no line can be drawn from the Synagogue to the NT. Judaism cannot accept the alternative of works or grace.” 97 This term is admittedly problematic and can carry both positive and negative connotations. See Christoph Bartsch, “Frühkatholizismus” als Kategorie historisch-kritischer Theologie: Eine methodologische und theologiegeschichtliche Untersuchung (Studien zu jüdischem Volk und christlicher Gemeinde 3; Berlin, 1980); and the important articles of Ulrich Luz (“Erwägungen zur Entstehung des Frühkatholizismus,” ZNW 65 [1974] 88– 111) and Ferdinand Hahn (“Das Problem des Frühkatholizismus,” EvTh 38 [1978] 340– 57). It is used here in its typically Protestant association with a Verfallstheorie. See Hermann-Joseph Schmitz, Frühkatholizismus bei Adolf von Harnack, Rudolph Sohm, und Ernst Käsemann (Düsseldorf: Patmos, 1977). 98 Günter Bornkamm (Der Lohngedanke im Neuen Testament [Bensheimer Hefte 15; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1961] 3) gives extraordinary expression to the situation: “Wir befinden uns dem Lohngedanken des Neuen Testamentes gegenüber in einer merklichen Befangenheit. Erzogen in dem Kantischen Begriff der Pflicht, verbinden wir sofort mit dem Begriff Lohn die Vorstellung eines unterwertigen Eudämonismus, der die Reinheit sittlicher Gesinnung trübt.” In a similar vein, Klaus Koch (“Der Schatz im Himmel,” 52) remarks: “Ein Vorrat von guten Werken im Himmel, der einst im Eschaton ewiges Leben schenkt – für die Protestanten eine abscheuliche Vorstellung.” 99 “It is not our business to follow up this aspect of almsgiving, or to discuss the amount of injury thus inflicted on a practice which was meant to flow from a pure love to men,” Adolf von Harnack, “The Gospel of Love and Charity,” in The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, Vol. I (London: Williams & Norgate, 1904) 192.

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Although exegetes have at times stoutly resisted seeing the merit principle in some seemingly obvious texts, 100 the recognition that early Christians, including New Testament authors, attribute salvific efficacy to certain works, especially alms, is not an extreme view. The perspective has, nevertheless, been classified as a second (and second class) stage in New Testament thought. Roman Garrison’s study, for instance, readily acknowledges the presence of the motif in the New Testament.101 His evaluation of this fact, however, is typical and revealing. The Presbyterian minister is not so aggressive as some, who chastise almsgiving as a primitive fall from the genuine Christian doctrine of grace (Verfallstheorie). He nevertheless joins Martin Hengel in seeing the evidence of redemptive almsgiving as a later “development” and “compromise” away from the earliest stage of Christcentered soteriology, represented by the Pauline letters. 102 The Pauline doctrine of salvation by the cross alone was, in other words, displaced by the introduction of charity as a secondary means of purging sins.103 The doctrine of forgiveness through acts of charity Garrison thus explains as a kind of pastoral expedient, occasioned by the delay of the parousia and responding to a dual crisis posed by post-baptismal sin and the growing ranks of wealthy Christians. As a kind of Frühkatholizismus theory, Garrison’s position is reminiscent of Käsemann: a loss of eschatological energy and institutionalizing of Christ’s saving work – at the expense of Pauline theologia crucis. 104 A lurking Kanon im Kanon, such as Käsemann promotes, is near at hand. 105

100

See, e.g., Thomas F. Torrence, Doctrine of Grace in the Apostolic Fathers (Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1948) 37, 108, 132. John Lawson (A Theological and Historical Introduction to the Apostolic Fathers [New York: Macmillan, 1961] 15) describes Torrence’s treatment of the apostolic fathers “a good example of the neoReformation attack upon the ancient Church.” 101 Garrison, Redemptive Almsgiving, 60–73. 102 Ibid., 21. See Martin Hengel, The Atonement (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981). The approach of Downs (Alms, 6–7) departs here from Garrison. See §5.4.2 below. 103 Garrison admits that his research was “provoked” by the apparent incompatibility of redemptive almsgiving with the death of Jesus as “the unique atonement for sin” (Redemptive Almsgiving, 11; see also 60). 104 See, e.g., Ernst Käsemann, Exegetische Versuche und Besinnungen: 1. und 2. Band, (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1970). See also Schmitz, Frühkatholizismus, 145– 59, 205–7. Käsemann is largely responsible for bringing the discussion of Frühkatholizismus from Church history and the history of dogma into New Testament studies. 105 See Ernst Käsemann, Das Neue Testament als Kanon (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1970); Schmitz, Frühkatholizismus, 197–201; and Wolfgang Schrage, “Die Frage nach der Mitte und dem Kanon im Kanon des Neuen Testaments in der neueren Diskussion,” in Rechtfertigung: Festschrift für Ernst Käsemann zum 70. Geburtstag (Johannes Friedrichs, ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1976) 415–42.

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Whatever one’s response to such a theological and hermeneutical outlook, Garrison’s fundamental thesis is ultimately unsatisfactory because it is historically implausible. In the first place, Garrison greatly underestimates the importance of the idea of redemptive alms in Second Temple Jewish thinking. Indeed, though he acknowledges the Jewish background in principle, he nevertheless describes the idea in the New Testament as an “abrupt appearance”! A similar, but more subtle error is replicated in Downs’ study, for despite his much more thorough attention to the Second Temple sources and his fundamental thesis that atoning almsgiving arose in Christian circles as a result of scriptural exegesis, he has failed to grasp the central logic at work in the Jewish texts (e.g. Dan 4:27 [MT 4:24]; Tobit; Sirach).106 If this generates a difficult transition to the early Christian texts,107 Garrison, whose treatment permits more of a ceasura in jumping to this material, invents the need to posit a special pastoral crisis as the key to almsgiving’s ontogenesis; whereas simple continuity with Jewish praxis and theology explains the presence of the motif in the early Christian sources and practice with greater efficiency and probability. Admittedly, there may have been real occasions for a vigorous new promotion of the idea in the Christian context, as Garrison suspects.108 But just here his assumption that almsgiving soteriology must displace Christology misleads him and obscures another range of possibilities. Indeed, considering theological ideas as an historical dynamic in their own right, one in fact finds in the early Christian texts a distinctly Christological preoccupation behind the growing prestige of almsgiving. 109 While the teaching of Christ in the Gospels naturally played an important role,110 the Christology behind Matthew 25 is the critical factor Garrison has



106 See §5.4.2 below. See also the reviews of Gary Anderson, “Treasure in Heaven,” Books & Culture (July/August 2016) 38–9; and Anthony Giambrone, RBL, forthcoming. 107 Anderson (“Treasure in Heaven,” 39) remarks in his review: “From the last page of his book to the opening pages of those by Brown stands a deep chasm. The story Downs wishes to tell leaves us unprepared for the world Peter Brown has so brilliantly described.” 108 On this see, e.g., Brown, Ransom of the Soul. 109 “By the end of the fourth century in the Western Church two significant motives had emerged for the giving of alms: (1) the identification of Christ and the poor and (2) the atonement for sins,” Boniface Ramsey, “Almsgiving in the Latin Church: The Late Fourth and Early Fifth Centuries,” TS 43 (1982) 226. This Christological motivation was not confined to the West, nor was it unknown prior to the fourth century. See, e.g., Rudolf Brändle, “Jean Chrysostome – L’importance de Matth. 25,31–46 pour son éthique,” VC 31 (1977) 37–52. 110 See, e.g., Bronwen Niel, “Blessed is Poverty: Leo the Great on Almsgiving,” Sacris Erudiri 46 (2007) 143–56.

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overlooked.111 “Whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me” (Matt 25:40). The key question, then, at once historical and theological, is how this precise charity-centered Christology develops within the established Jewish soteriology of redemptive almsgiving. Is it merely repackaged hellenistic piety, a Baucis and Philemon story introduced like a foreign body into an otherwise Jewish ethos, or has Christian belief instead activated some specific potentiality in the Jewish notion of the poor (enabled perhaps in part by hellenistic influence)? Without an informed appreciation for the theological contours of Jewish thinking about charity, even an almsgiving Christology will appear like some form of second-stage corruption. 1.2.1.2 Spätjudentum Alongside the label Frühkatholizismus belongs another problematic term: Spätjudentum, a Wellhausian construct widely taken as Paul’s theological foe.112 Correcting this slanted depiciton of first-century Judaism has been an important preoccupation of many recent scholars – and with good reason.113 It is not difficult to see the misguided judgments that the dim view of Jewish religion bound up with this term have often engendered. The study of Willhelm Pesch (a Redemptorist priest) is an excellent example, for it illustrates that not only Protestant exegetes, with their particular theological inheritance and reading of Paul, but also the wider New Testament establishment has labored under a deep distrust of merit-based

111

The importance of Matt 25:31–46 in the patristic period is not to be underestimated. “Parmi les textes bibliques qui ont formé la pratique de l'église chrétienne la péricope matthéenne du jugement dernier (25,31–46) occupe une place tout à fait exceptionelle,” Brändle, “L’importance de Matth. 25,31–46,” 37. See Luz, Matthäus 3, 526–8. Augustine says of the passage: “I confess that in God’s scripture this has moved me the most.” See Andrew Hofer, “Matthew 25:31–46 as an Hermeneutical Rule in Augustine’s Enarrationes in Psalmos,” Downside Review 126 (2008) 285–300. 112 See Julius Wellhausen, Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels (Berlin: Reimer, 1905) 399–402, 420–24; and idem., Einleitung in die drei ersten Evangelien (Berlin: Reimer, 1905) 104–15. Wellhausen’s depiction of post-exilic Judaism as a decadent, even dead religion is often startling: e.g. “Erkennt man an, das der Kanon das Judentum vom alten Israel scheidet, so erkennt man auch an, das die schriftliche Thora das Judentum vom alten Israel scheidet. Das Wasser, das in der Vergangenheit gequollen war, faßten die Epigonen in Zisternen” (emphasis added). 113 The term “early Judaism” has frequently replaced “late Judaism” as a designation of the same historical phenomenon – an impressive sign of shifting scholarly perspectives. See, however, the comments of Hans Conzelmann and Andreas Lindemann (Interpreting the New Testament: An Introduction to the Principles and Methods of N. T. Exegesis [Siegfried Schatzmann, trans.; Peabody, MA; Hendrickson, 1988] 130) who reject both “late Judaism” and “early Judaism” as value-laden terms, preferring “Judaism in late antiquity” or “Judaism in the Hellenistic-Roman era.”

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“Jewish” morality (Werkheiligkeit).114 Proceding from the assumption that a decadent “late Judaism” had lost track of the real religious meaning of the reward principle (Lohngedanke), Pesch endeavors to exculpate Jesus from an association with such unworthy thinking. Im Spätjudentum hatte sich aber eine Lohnauffassung durchgesetzt, die Jesus scharf ablehnen und bekämpfen mußte, weil sie das religiöse Dienstverhältnis jedes Menschen zu Gott verkannte und mit rationalistischen Schemata Verdienst und Mißverdienst genau abschätzen wollte… Damit hat Jesus nicht nur die Redeweisen vom “Schatz im Himmel” und vom “Lohn Gottes” in die religiöse Sphäre personaler Gott-Mensch-Begegnung zurückgeholt, sondern er hat damit auch entgegen aller Veräußerlichung und Werk-heiligkeit die ausschlaggebende Wichtigkeit der Gesinnung und der Herzensentscheidung des Menschen betont.115

The apology at work here functions according to a similar logic and prejudice seen in Garrison, although the historical lines have been differently drawn. Paul is no longer the measure of right religion against Jewish distortions. The synoptic Jesus has instead become the (Catholic) bulwark against Pharisaic religion. 1.2.1.3 E. P. Sanders’ “Palestinian Judaism” Against this background, one measure of the achievement of E. P. Sanders’ Paul and Palestinian Judaism is the radical “New Perspective” it has brought about in New Testament studies.116 While the paradigm shift signaled in this label is generally applied to a movement in Pauline studies, Sanders’ book represents even more fundamentally a major event in the reconceiving of Judaism in New Testament scholarship.117 All contemporary students of the

114

Wilhelm Pesch, Der Lohngedanke in der Lehre Jesu verglichen mit der religiösen Lohnlehre des Spätjudentums (Münchner theologische Studien 7; Munich: Karl Zink, 1955). 115 Pesch, Lohngedanke in der Lehre Jesu, 142. 116 See E. P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1977). On the discussion initiated by Sanders, see James Meek, “The New Perspective on Paul: An Introduction for the Uninitiated,” Concordia Journal 27 (2001) 208–33. 117 The reception of the book has often split Sanders down the middle, rejecting his thesis about Paul, while heartily agreeing on Palestinian Judaism. In fact, the characterization of Pauline theology in many ways appears as an afterthought, and the disproportionate weight given to Jewish sources in Paul and Palestinian Judaism is often noted. Sanders’ more definite statement on Paul is contained in his later book, Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983). The debate over Paul is obviously complex. For multiple reasons it proves difficult to marginalize Paul’s justification language as Sanders seeks to do, and, despite finding many enthusiastic followers, in other quarters his account of Paul is strongly criticized. See, e.g., Karl T. Cooper, “Paul and Rabbinic Soteriology: A Review Article,” Westminster Theological Journal 44 (1982) 123–39; Thomas

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New Testament have certainly felt the influence of Sanders’ work. Indeed, his effort to “destroy” the legalistic caricature of Judaism, long enshrined in the New Testament establishment, has been remarkably successful.118 There are few today who would champion the old construct of Jewish Selbsterlösung, chastised now as a “massive perversion and misunderstanding.”119 Sanders, in fact, hoped with his study to turn the New Testament discipline from what he perceived to be a deeply distorting, anti-Jewish bias. Undoubtedly, the specific German Protestant exegetical culture targeted by Sanders was guilty of many indefensible prejudices. 120 Unfortunately, however, as Jacob Neusner complains, Sanders’ own rehabilitation effort is accomplished largely by refashioning Pharisaic Judaism as a kind of Calvinist Christianity, on the unexamined assumption that any works based soteriology is somehow problematic and derisible. 121 In other words, Sanders springs to Judaism’s

Best, “The Apostle Paul and E. P. Sanders: The Significance of Paul and Palestinian Judaism,” Restoration Quarterly (1982) 65–74; and Thomas Schreiner, “Paul and Perfect Obedience to the Law: An Evaluation of the View of E. P. Sanders,” WTJ 47 (1985) 246−79. 118 Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism, xii and 59, 513. In many ways Sanders simply amplified and won a hearing for the older views of George Foot Moore, “Christian Writers on Judaism,” HTR 14 (1921) 197–254. 119 The title of the festschrift produced by Sanders’ students nicely captures the essential significance of his work: Redefining First-Century Jewish and Christian Identities – accent on the Jewish. See Fabian E. Udoh, Susannah Heschel, Mark Chancey, and Gregory Tatum, eds., Redefining First-Century Jewish and Christian Identities: Essays in Honor of Ed Parish Sanders (Christianity and Judaism in Antiquity; Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame, 2008). 120 See Anders Gerdmar, Roots of Theological Ant-Semitism: German Biblical Interpretation and the Jews, from Herder and Semler to Kittel and Bultmann (SJHC 20; Leiden: Brill, 2009); Karl Hoheisel, Das Antike Judentum in christlicher Sicht: Ein Beitrag zur neueren Forschungsgeschichte (Studies in Oriental Religion 2; Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1978); Wayne Meeks, “A Nazi New Testament Professor Reads His Bible: The Strange Case of Gehard Kittel,” in The Idea of Biblical Interpretation: Essays in Honor of James Kugel (Hindy Najman and Judith Newman, eds.; JSJSup 83; Leiden: Brill, 2004) 513–43; Susannah Heschel, “The Image of Judaism in Nineteenth-Century Christian New Testament Scholarship in Germany,” in Jewish-Christian Encounters over the Centuries: Symbiosis, Prejudice, Holocaust, Dialogue (Marvin Perry and Frederick M. Schweitzer, eds.; New York: Peter Lang, 1994) 215–40; and Johann Vos, “Antijudaismusantisemitismus im theologischen Wörterbuch zum Neuen Testament,” Nederlands theologisch tijdschrift 38 (1984) 89–110. 121 Jacob Neusner, “Mr. Sanders’ Pharisees and Mine,” Scottish Journal of Theology 44 (1991) 73–95. The irony here is that Sanders (Palestinian Judaism, 43) had identified a similar fallacy in the work of Paul Billerbeck, who essentially faulted Judaism for not being Christianity. For a more appreciative view of Billerbeck, who was actually a determined opponent of anti-Judaism – perhaps more successful than Sanders himself – see Martin Hengel and Roland Deines, “E. P. Sanders’ ‘Common Judaism,’ Jesus and the Pharisees,” JTS (1995) 68–9.

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defense by insisting that Jewish “works righteousness” is a figment of Christian scholars’ imagination, not by saying that such works-based soteriology might be worthy of respect. Here the laudable intentions driving Sanders’ successful demolition work must be measured against his positive construal of early Judaism.122 On this front there are larger questions than many recognize, and a number of imposing experts have voiced some serious critiques. Neusner, as indicated, has lodged a quite forceful and ongoing objection, charging Sanders’ systematic mishandling of the rabbinic source material. 123 Martin Hengel and Roland Deines have more respectfully challenged Sanders’ reconstructions of firstcentury Judaism as historically compromised in a number of basic ways.124 Most recently, the high-powered, multi-authored project engineered by D. A. Carson has confirmed, across a huge range of Second Temple literature, the need for greater nuance in using Sanders’ category of “covenantal nomism.”125 Several monographs and dissertations have significantly advanced the soteriological discussion, as well, headlined by the hefty tome of Friederich Avemarie. 126 Avemarie’s major corrective, stressing the saving value of works in rabbinic sources, is complemented by Mark Adam Elliott’s effort to

122

Sanders (Palestinian Judaism, xii) lists 6 goals for his book, including “to destroy the view of Rabbinic Judaism which is still prevalent in much, perhaps most, New Testament scholarship” and “to establish a different view of Rabbinic Judaism” and “argue a case concerning Palestinian Judaism…as a whole.” 123 Jacob Neusner, “Comparing Judaisms,” History of Religions 18 (1978) 177–91; and also Judaic Law from Jesus to the Mishnah: A Systematic Reply to Professor E. P. Sanders (Atlanta: Scholars, 1993). Neusner has not minced words in attacking Sanders (“worthless,” “ignorant,” “profoundly flawed,” etc.). Sanders has responded in kind; see “Puzzling out Rabbinic Judaism,” in Ancient Judaism II (W. S. Green, ed.; Brown Judaic Studies 9; Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1980) 65–79. For a recent statement of the ongoing debate, see Neusner, “The Debate with E. P. Sanders since 1970,” in In Quest of the Historical Pharisees (Jacob Neusner and Bruce Chilton, eds.; Waco, TX: Baylor, 2007) 478–9. 124 Hengel and Deines, “‘Common Judaism,’” 1–70. 125 See D. A. Carson, Peter T. O’Brien, and Mark A. Seifrid, Justification and Variegated Nomism: Volume 1 – The Complexities of Second Temple Judaism (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2001). See also Don Garlington, “The Obedience of Faith”: A Pauline Phrase in Historical Context (WUNT II/38; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991). 126 See Friedrich Avemarie Tora und Leben: Untersuchungen zur Heilsbedeutung der Tora in der frühen rabbinischen Literatur (Texte und Studien zum Antiken Judentum 55; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996; also “Erwählung und Vergeltung: Zur optionalen Struktur rabbinischer Soteriologie,” NTS 45 (1999) 113; and “Die Werke des Gesetzes im Spiegel des Jakobusbriefs: A Very Old Perspective on Paul,” ZTK 98 (2001) 282–309. Avemarie intends to offer a major refutation of Sanders, but has no intention of returning to the old model: “Für die systematische Zuordnung von Erwählungsgnade und Vergeltung scheint aber weder Sanders’ noch Billerbecks Modell eine vollauf befriedigende Lösung zu bieten.”

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qualify too sunny a picture of pure ethnic election. 127 Simon Gathercole, finally, has critiqued the New Perspective, offering a balanced re-vision of Second Temple soteriology in critical dialogue with Sanders.128 In the end, he determines that “while there is considerable emphasis on gracious election in Jewish literature, this was by no means incompatible (at least, in the texts) with obedience also being a basis for vindication at the eschaton.”129 On the matter of early Judaism, then, Sanders’ interpretative accuracy, historical awareness, and analytic precision, at times, all pose real concerns. In multiple instances his overheated polemics are the problem. Particularly troublesome is his hardened dichotomy of either election or autosoterism: an apologetic opposition simply alien to the relevant texts. To be sure, a strong emphasis on the covenant as a principle of elective grace is perfectly sound;130 and most scholars remain more or less comfortable with the language of covenantal nomism. 131 It is hard, after all, to object to the “selfevident” (Neusner) conjunction of covenant and Torah as a description of

127

Mark Adam Elliott, The Survivors of Israel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000). Elliott stresses the importance of remnant theology and challenges Sanders’ portrayal of m. Sanh. 10.1 (“All Israel has a share in the age to come”) as the commonly shared view of Second Temple Judaism. See also Timo Eskola, “Paul, Predestination, and ‘Covenantal Nomism’ – Reassessing Paul and Palestinian Judaism,” JSJ 28 (1997) 390–412. 128 Simon Gathercole, Where Is Boasting? Early Jewish Soteriology and Paul’s Response in Romans 1–5 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002). 129 Ibid., 263–4. 130 N. T. Wright (The New Testament and the People of God [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992] 260) remarks that, “As Sanders has shown – so conclusively that one wonders how any other view could ever have been taken – covenantal ideas were totally common and regular” in Second Temple Judaism. On the pervasiveness of the covenant theme, see Scott Hahn, Kinship by Covenant: A Canonical Approach to the Fulfillment of God’s Saving Promises (AYBRL; New Haven: Yale, 2009). 131 Generally, the contributors to Carson’s Justification and Variegated Nomism seem reasonably comfortable with some version (albeit nuanced) of “covenantal nomism.” Daniel Falk (Prayers and Psalms), Peter Enns (Expansions of Scripture), Robert Kugler (Testaments), Donald Gowan (Wisdom), Philip Alexander (Tannaitic Literature), Martin McNamara (Targums), and Marcus Bockmuehl (1QS) all give at least some qualified endorsement of Sander’s category of “covenantal nomism.” Alexander is most hesitant. Richard Bauckham (Apocalypses) actually finds IV Ezra to be less works oriented than Sanders does. The only real hesitations come from Philip Spilsbury, who suggests “patronal nomism” to characterize Philo’s Judaism (not considered by Sanders); and Mark Seifrid, whose objection is to Sanders’ use of “righteousness” terminology. Hahn (Kinship by Covenant, 239–41) raises the good objection that, in overlooking Second Temple traditions impressed with the idea that major obstacles had been introduced by Israel’s sin into the covenant relationship with God, “Sanders paints a picture of first-century Judaism in which covenant is primary, but there is no internal tension or predicament for which Paul’s Gospel of Jesus Christ provided the solution. Thus his famous but hapless conclusion: ‘This is what Paul finds wrong with Judaism: It is not Christianity.’”

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Jewish religion. Contextually defined in Sanders’ work, however, covenantal nomism is essentially “his alternative to merit theology.”132 It signifies “getting in” by grace and “staying in” by obedience, which partitioning he imagines to resolve the (perceived) theological problem posed by works.133 Though this schema does helpfully highlight the priority of divine initiative, it is, nevertheless, in the end simply too reductionistic. 134 It naively apportions divine and human agency and fails to comprehend the deeper aspirations of religion.135 Ultimately, Sanders seems unwilling to acknowledge an amply evident esteem in the source material for the saving value of works.136 This position nicely suits Sanders’ particular polemic strategy. Unfortunately, the denial of merit-based soteriology simply runs contrary to the facts. Menahem Kister has challenged its fundamental accuracy, for instance, in adducing a very interesting Tannaitic counterexample from the Siphra having deep Old Testament roots and close links to Paul’s argument in Rom 5:12–21.137 If this specific text is noteworthy for its direct expression of the transfer of merits,

132

Carson, Variegated Nomism, 544. Sanders, Palestinian Judaism, 75, 84–124, 236, 422. As a theological solution, Sanders’ proposal looks rather childish against the sophistication of the 16th –17th century de Auxiliis debate and the earlier anti-Pelagian controversies. See, e.g., Ulrich Lehner, Die scholastische Theologie: Zeitalter der Gnadenstreitigkeiten (Nordhausen: Bautz, 2007); and Alexander Hwang, Brian Matz, and Augustine Casiday, eds., Grace for Grace: The Debates after Augustine and Pelagius (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America, 2014). 134 See Andrew Das, “Beyond Covenantal Nomism: Paul, Judaism, and Perfect Obedience,” Concordia Journal 27 (2001) 234–52. 135 See Jason Maston, Divine and Human Agency in Second Temple Judaism and Paul: A Comparative Study (WUNT II/297; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010). Hengel and Deines (‘Common Judaism,” 2 fn. 2) rightly ask: “Is a pattern of religion adequately described when only the absolute minimum goal of ‘staying in’ has been kept in view? No religion…can rest content with such a minimal goal, which indeed amounts to nothing more than the maintenance of the status quo.” 136 It is striking that Sanders’ accent on the grace of the covenant requires his admission that this motif is not directly mentioned but only presupposed: “I would venture to say that it is the fundamental nature of the covenant conception which largely accounts for the relative scarcity of appearance of the term ‘covenant in Rabbinic literature. The covenant was presupposed” (Paul and Palestinian Judaism, 420–1, emphasis original). Such e silentio reasoning evidently cuts the opposite way when it comes to evaluating the “treasury of merits,” however. This idea Sanders (too) emphatically assures “never” appears; there is “no evidence” and “no mention” of it: “There is nowhere in Tannaitic literature a reference to a treasury of merits (ibid., 191, 193, 197, 198, emphasis original). And just in case we missed the point he apodictically asserts: “In short, the Tannaitic discussions of zekut do not accord it any place in ‘Rabbinic soteriology.’” 137 Menahem Kister, “Romans 5:12–21 against the Background of Torah Theology and Hebrew Usage,” HTR 100 (2007) 391–424, esp. 391–9. 133

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Avemarie has devastatingly exposed the more basic inadequacy of Sanders’ view, documenting that the saving significance of a man’s deeds was widely held among the Tannaim (e.g., m. ’Abot 3:15; y. Qidd. 61d; b. Sanh. 81a; t. Sanh. 13:3; t. Qidd. 1:14).138 Gathercole has likewise added ample evidence from Second Temple texts (e.g. 1 Enoch 38:1–2; 41:1; Pss Sol. 2:34–36; 2 Macc 7:36; Wis 15:1–4; 2 Bar 48:22–24; 51:7; Test. Jos. 18:1), so that any case against judgment by merit in the major expressions of early Judaism may be considered to be decisively refuted. This material belongs in various ways to the Second Temple Jewish worldview and it forces a serious reassessment of “pure grace” cartoons of Jewish thought.139 If Sanders has thereby missed (and misrepresented) something basic to the deep grammar of Jewish soteriology, his noble enough apologetic preoccupation must be put to blame. His impassioned purpose led him to overstate his case, while his survey of sources was simply too exclusive (“too well chosen” Neusner says).140 The special irony of the situation is that Sanders was not only laboring on behalf of a friendlier view of Judaism. He was likewise endeavoring to pry Pauline scholarship loose from specific anti-Catholic Reformation polemics. Sanders saw very clearly the anachronistic isomorphism mapping first-century Palestinian Judaism onto sixteenth-century Roman Catholicism. In one regard, then, Sanders’ attempt to rescue New Testament scholarship (and its perception of Judaism) from the distorting lens of the Reformation has resulted in an exaggerated reflex. But the still whirling sixteenth century winds, while dangerous in a great many obvious ways, may be more subtle and substantial than Sanders saw; for Sanders himself remains locked within a Reformation value judgment. The case of New Perspective scholarship thus illumines a deeply written shadow prejudice infecting New Testament scholars. What manifests as anti-Judaism may at another historical level be antiCatholic – and full self-awareness of this fact is hard to find. 1.2.2 The Ghost of Marcion: “Anti-Judaism” in Lukan Scholarship The growing sensitivity to anti-Judaism in New Testament research – greatly aided by E. P. Sanders’ own efforts, however flawed – might responsibly be



138 See Avemarie, Tora und Leben, 39–40; and Sanders, Palestinian Judaism, 131, 139, 141. 139 See Robert Gundry, “Grace, Works, and Staying Saved in Paul,” Bib 66 (1985) 1−38. 140 See William Horbury, “Paul and Judaism: Review of E. P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism,” ExpT 89 [1977–78] 117; and Seyoon Kim, The Origin of Paul’s Gospel (WUNT II/4; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1984) 347.

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described as a mainstream trend.141 Problematic Christian views of Judaism are nothing new, of course, and, through Marcion, Luke has been implicated in this long history from its inception. Joseph Tyson has shown just how deeply embedded certain anti-Jewish prejudices are in the history of interpretation of Luke-Acts.142 The issues are complex, bearing on a wide variety of unresolved exegetical questions, but two major (related) patterns should be identified. Each contributes to an inherited insensitivity in Lukan studies to the Jewish character of Luke-Acts, and by extension to the Jewish culture of charity Luke inscribes. (1) Luke and Paul. Marcion’s canon, reduced to Luke and Paul, reveals a fateful pairing. Luke’s close association with a strongly marked “Pauline” perspective has been a major recurring theme in the interpretation of LukeActs.143 The specific characterization of this relation between Luke and Paul has, admittedly, been subject to contradictory descriptions: from the claim that the two hold a shared theology (e.g. Bauer), to the opposite contention that they stand as polar opposites.144 The yoking of Luke’s message with that of Paul is not without serious warrant, of course; but it also carries certain obvious risks. For many, beginning with Marcion, Paul’s theology has taken a problematic precedence.145 More concretely troubling is the assumption that Luke must somehow conform to a particular anti-Jewish reading of Paul’s “works of the Law” (cf. Acts 13). Obviously, if the contours of Lukan

141

See, e.g., Terrence Donaldson, Jews and Anti-Judaism in the New Testament: Decision Points and Divergent Interpretations (Waco, TX: Baylor University, 2010); Paula Fredriksen und Adele Reinhartz, Jesus, Judaism, and Christian Anti-Judaism: Reading the New Testament after the Holocaust (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2002). 142 Joseph Tyson, Luke, Judaism, and the Scholars: Critical Approaches to Luke-Acts (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina, 1999); Marcion and Luke-Acts: A Defining Struggle (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina, 2006); and “Jews and Judaism in Luke-Acts: Reading as a Godfearer,” NTS 41 (1995) 19–38. See also Luke-Acts and the Jewish People: Eight Critical Perspectives (Joseph Tyson, ed.; Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1988). 143 See Tyson, Luke, Judaism, and the Scholars, 15–27. 144 “Der Verfasser des dritten Evangeliums, das im 19. Jahrhundert von der Tübinger Tendenzkritik noch als das ‘paulinische’ Evangelium (im Gegensatz zum ‘petrinischen’ Mt) gesehen wurde, Lukas, ist inzwischen zum Kronzeugen des Frühkatholizismus geworden” (Bernhard Weiss, Die Evangelien des Markus und Lukas [KEK I 2; Göttingen, 1901] 261). See also F. C. Bauer, Kritische Untersuchungen über die kanonischen Evangelien (Tübingen: Ludwig Fr. Fuest, 1847) 462. In Bauer’s dialectic reconstruction, the Pauline (Gentile) and Petrine (Jewish-Christian) factions are reconciled “in the common hatred of both toward the unbelieving Jews.” Paul Vielhauer’s influential study (“On Paulinism in Luke-Acts,” in Studies in Luke-Acts, 33–50) stressed the distance between Luke and Paul identified four major points of difference: natural theology, the Law, Christology, and eschatology. 145 Marcion’s reading of Galatians 1–2 provided the rubric by which he understood what was the true “gospel.” See Tyson, Marcion and Luke-Acts, 36–48.

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thought must be adapted to this negative understanding, the character of Luke’s teaching on works of charity will be distorted or obscured. (2) Conzelmann-Haenchen Consensus. The interpretation of Luke-Acts in the second half of the twentieth century cannot be understood apart from the work of Hans Conzelmann and Ernst Haenchen. 146 If Marcion initiated a profoundly supercessionist reading of the Third Gospel, the scholarship of Conzelmann and Haenchen echoes this theme in an influential thesis: namely, that, in Luke’s presentation, the Jewish refusal of the Gospel message is the reason for the Gentile mission, and that, in Luke-Acts, in some real sense, “the Jews are written off.”147 While a certain measure of nuance can be seen in the ultimate development of both Conzelmann and Heanchen’s work, an unsustainable notion of the displacement of the Jews has certainly distorted Lukan scholarship. A range of possible positions is certainly in play,148 but Jacob Jervell’s attempt to provide a “New Look” at Luke-Acts must be specifically appreciated as a necessary (if at times overstated) corrective to this reigning consensus. Without such a corrective it is easy to see how Luke’s emphasis on redemptive aspects of Jewish piety, such as alms, by which a prospect of repentance was left open, might be lost from view in his grand narrative of salvation. 1.2.3 Hellenism in the Third Gospel To this point, an implausible theory of theological innovation (§1.2.1.1) and two alternately disastrous misconstruals of Palestinian Judaism (§§1.2.1.2–3), all largely born of Reformation discomfort with works-based righteousness, have been identified as contributing to (and arising from) a general discomfort in New Testament studies with robust expressions of almsgiving. In the specific case of Luke, another factor also contributes to the eclipse of this



146 Hans Conzelmann, Die Apostelgeschichte (HNT 7; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1972); The Theology of St. Luke (NY: Harper & Row, 1961); and Ernst Haenchen, Acts of the Apostles: A Commentary (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1971). See Tyson, Luke, Judaism, and the Scholars, 87–8. 147 The expression is Haenchen’s. See Ernst Haenchen, “The Book of Acts as Source Material for the History of Early Christianity,” in Studies in Luke-Acts (Leander Keck and J. Louis Martyn, eds.; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1961) 278. Jack T. Sanders (“The Jewish People in Luke-Acts,” in Luke-Acts and the Jewish People, 53), noting Franz Overbeck and Alfred Loisy, suggests that this view is “almost as old as critical New Testament scholarship.” Its widespread influence, however, owes much to Conzelmann and Haenchen. 148 See, e.g., the various essays in Tyson, Luke-Acts and the Jewish People. See also, Robert Brawley, Luke-Acts and the Jews: Conflict, Apology, and Conciliation (SBLMS 33; Atlanta: Scholars, 1987); and David Tiede, Prophecy and History in Luke-Acts (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980).

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Jewish theme: the shadows of anti-Jewish interpretation (§1.2.2). One final circumstance should now be mentioned. The Hellenistic elements of Luke-Acts cannot – and have not – been ignored. From the first words of the Gospel (Luke 1:1–4), a classical note is struck.149 Both in structure and in detail, the points of contact between Luke’s Doppelwerk and the Greco-Roman world are too numerous to be disputed.150 The conventions of ancient historiography are, of course, of first importance:151 the classical plan of Luke’s work (cf. Lucian), for instance;152 his

149

On this general point, see Edouard Delebecque, “Sur un hellénisme de Saint Luc,” RB 82 (1980) 590–3. The historiographical interpretation of the preface has been widely supported: see, e.g., H. J. Cadbury, “Commentary on the Preface of Luke,” in The Beginnings of Christianity: Part I, The Acts of the Apostles: Volume II: Prolegomena II Criticism (F. J. Foakes Jackson and K. Lake, eds.; London: MacMillan, 1922) 482–510; Erhardt Güttgemanns, “In welchem Sinne ist Lukas ‘Historiker’? Die Beziehungen von Luk 1,1–4 und Papias zur antiken Rhetorik,” LingBib 54 (1983) 9–26; Folker Siegert, “Lukas – ein Historiker, d.h. ein Rhetor? Freundschaftliche Entgegnung auf Erhardt Güttgemanns,” LingBib 55 (1984) 57–60; Terrence Callan, “The Preface of Luke-Acts and Historiography,” NTS 31 (1985) 576–81; and Michael Wolter, “Das Proömien des lukanischen Doppelwerks (Lk 1,1–4 und Apg 1, 1–2),” in Apostelgeschichte im Kontext antiker und frühchristlicher Historiographie (Jörg Frey, Claire Rothschild, Jens Schrörter, eds.; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2009) 476–94. Other backgrounds have also been explored, however. See Vernon Robbins, “Prefaces in Greco-Roman Biography and Luke-Acts,” PRSt 6 (1979) 94–108; and “The Claims of the Prologues and Greco-Roman Rhetoric: The Prefaces of Luke and Acts in Light of Greco-Roman Rhetorical Strategies,” in Jesus and the Heritage of Israel: Luke’s Narrative Claim Upon Israel’s Legacy (David Moessner, ed.; Harrisburg, PA: Trinity International, 1999) 63–83; Loveday Alexander, “Luke’s Preface in the Context of Greek Preface Writing,” NovT 28 (1986) 48–74; and The Preface to Luke’s Gospel: Literary Convention and Social Context in Luke 1:1–4 and Acts 1:1 (SNTSMS 78; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1993); and John Moles, “Luke’s Preface, the Greek Decree, Classical Historiography, and Christian Redefinitions,” NTS 57 (2011) 462–82. 150 Frederick Danker, Jesus and the New Age: A Commentary on St. Luke’s Gospel (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1988) 3–4. Gregory Sterling, Historiography and Self-Definition: Josephos, Luke-Acts, and Apologetic Historiography (NovTSup 64; Atlanta: SBL, 1992) 369–74. 151 Among the broad studies of this theme, see, e.g., Eckhard Plümacher, Lukas als hellenistischer Schriftsteller: Studien zur Apostelgeschichte (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1972); Conrad Gempf, ed. The Book of Acts in the Setting of Hellenistic History (WUNT 49; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1989); Sterling, Apologetic Historiography; and David Balch, “Acts as Hellenistic Historiography,” in Society of Biblical Literature 1985 Seminar Papers (Kent Harold Richards, ed; Atlanta: Scholars, 1985) 429–32. The question of Luke’s accuracy as a historian is a closely related, but distinct issue. On this debate, see especially Ward Gasque, A History of the Interpretation of the Acts of the Apostles (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1989); and Martin Hengel, Acts and the History of Earliest Christianity (John Bowden, trans.; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979) especially 3–68. 152 Jacques Dupont, “La question du Plan des Actes des Apôtres à la Lumière d’un Texte de Lucien de Samosate,” NovT 21 (1979) 220–31.

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employment of secondary prologues (cf. Diodorus Siculus); 153 the extensive use of well-crafted speeches;154 the embedding of short novella-like accounts (cf. Josephus, A.J. 12 §160–222);155 the description of the Christian movement on the model of religious and philosophical institutional histories;156 and also all the various appeals to Roman political history (e.g. Luke 1:5; 3:1; Acts 18:12).157



153 Kenneth Sacks, “The Lesser Prooemia of Diodorus Siculus,” Hermes 110 (1982) 434–43. 154 Klaus Berger, “Hellenistische Gattungen im Neuen Testament,” in Religion (Vorkonstantinisches Christentum: Leben und Umwelt Jesu: Neues Testament [Kanonische Schriften und Apokryphen]) ANRW II 25.2 (Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1984) 1275–77, esp. 1276; Plümacher, Lukas als hellenistischer Schriftsteller, 32–79; Sterling, Apologetic Historiography, 372–4; Jerome Neyrey, “The Forensic Defense Speech and Paul’s Trial Speeches in Acts 22–26: Form and Function,” in Luke-Acts: New Perspectives from the Society of Biblical Literature Seminar (Charles Talbert, ed.; New York: Crossroad, 1984) 210–24; Frederick Veltman, “The Defense Speeches of Paul in Acts,” in Perspectives in Luke-Acts (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1978) 243–56. Edward Schweizer, “Concerning the Speeches in Acts,” in Studies in Luke-Acts, 208–16. See also William Kurz, “Luke 22:14–38 and Greco-Roman and Biblical Farewell Addresses,” JBL 104 (1985) 251–68; and Bruce Winter, “The Importance of the Captatio Benevolentiae in the Speeches of Tertullus and Paul in Acts 24:1–21,” JTS 42 (1991) 505–31. 155 Franz Dornseiff, “Lukas der Schriftsteller: Mit einem Anhang: Josephus und Tacitus,” ZNW 35 (1936) 129–55. 156 See Charles Talbert, “The Acts of the Apostles: monograph or bios?” in History, Literature, and Society in the Book of Acts (Ben Witherington, III, ed.; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1996) 58–72; and Hubert Cancik, “The History of Culture, Religion, Institutions in Ancient Historiography: Philological Considerations Concerning Luke’s History,” JBL 116 (1997) 673–95. 157 The wide literature on Luke’s general posture towards Rome is very important. See, e.g., Benjamin Hubbard, “Luke, Josephus and Rome: A Comparative Approach to the Lukan Sitz im Leben,” in Society of Biblical Literature 1979 Seminar Papers (Paul Achtemeier, ed.; Missoula, MT; Scholars, 1979) 59–68; Friedrich W. Horn, “Die Haltung des Lukas zum römischen Staat im Evangelium und in der Apostelgeschichte,” in The Unity of Luke-Acts (Joseph Verheyden, ed.; Leuven: Leuven University, 1999) 203–24; Martin Meiser, “Lukas und die römische Staatsmacht,” in Zwischen den Reichen: Neues Testament und Römische Herrschaft (Michael Labahn and Jürgen Zangenberg, eds.; TANZ 36; Tübingen: Franke Verlag, 2002) 166–83; Gary Gilbert, “Roman Propaganda and Christian Identity in the Worldview of Luke-Acts,” in Contextualizing Acts: Lukan Narrative and Greco-Roman Discourse (Todd Penner and Caroline Vander Stichele, eds.; SBLSS 20; Atlanta: SBL, 2003) 233–56. One may add in this general connection, Luke’s specific attention to Roman legal protocol. See Heiki Omerzu, Der Prozess des Paulus: Eine Exegetische und Rechtshistorische Untersuchung der Apostelgeschichte (BZNW 115; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2002); Erika Heusler, Kapitalprozesse im lukanischen Doppelwerk: Die Verfahren gegen Jesus und Paulus in exegetischer und rechtshistorischer Analyse (NTA 38; Münster: Aschendorff, 2000); Allison Trites, “The Importance of Legal Scenes and Language in the Book of Acts,” NovT 16 (1974) 278–84; Henry J. Cadbury, “Roman Law and the Trial of Paul,” in The Beginnings of Christianity: Volume 5 (F. J.

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Characteristic features of bios literature 158 and Greco-Roman romance 159 (e.g. sea adventures [periploi]; Acts 27:1–43)160 are also evident in Luke. To this, one may add the presence of prominent Hellenistic cultural forms, such as symposia (Luke 5:29–39; 7:36–50; 11:37–54; 14:1–24) 161 and classical allusions (e.g. Aratus, Homer, Plato, Thucydides? Euripides?),162 as well as appeals to Greco-Roman ethics and philosophy163 and signs of progymnastic

Foakes-Jackson, K. Lake, and Henry Cadbury, eds.; London: MacMillan, 1933) 297–338. A further instance of the political resonance of Luke’s work is the designation christianoi (Acts 11:26), which evokes Roman political categories. See Erik Peterson, “Christianus,” in Frühkirche, Judentum und Gnosis: Studien und Untersuchungen (Freiburg: Herder, 1959) 64–87; Elias Joseph Bickerman, “The Name Christians,” HTR 42 (1949) 109–24; and Justin Taylor, “Why Were the Disciples First Called ‘Christians’ at Antioch?” RB 101 (1994) 75–94. 158 See David Barr and Judith Wentling, “The Conventions of Classical Biography and the Genre of Luke-Acts: A Preliminary Study,” in Luke-Acts: New Perspectives from the Society of Biblical Literature Seminar (Charles H. Talbert, ed.; New York: Crossroad, 1984) 63–88; and Richard Burridge, What are the Gospels? A Comparison with GraecoRoman Biography (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004). 159 See especially, Richard Pervo, Profit with Delight: The Literary Genre of the Acts of the Apostles (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987); but also Stephen Schierling and Marla Schierling, “The Influence of the Ancient Romances on Acts of the Apostles,” The Classical Bulletin 54 (1984) 31–55; and Susan Marie Praeder, “Luke-Acts and the Ancient Novel,” in Society of Biblical Literature 1981 Seminar Papers (Kent Richards, ed.; Chico: Scholars, 1981) 269–82. 160 See, e.g., Vernon Robbins, “By Land and By Sea: The We-Passages and Ancient Sea Voyages,” in Perspectives on Luke Acts (Charles Talbert, ed.; Danville, VA: Association of Baptist Professors of Religion, 1978) 215–42. 161 See, e.g., E. Springs Steele, “Luke 11:37–54 – A Modified Hellenistic Symposium?” JBL 103 (1984) 379–94; and X. de Meeus, “Composition de Luc XIV et Genre Symposiaque,” ETL 37 (1961) 847–70. 162 See Kirsopp Lake, “Your Own Poets,” in The Beginnings of Christianity: Volume V, 246–51; Margaret Mitchell, “Homer in the New Testament?” JR 83 (2003) 244–60; Sterling, Apologetic Historiography, 371; and Haenchen, Acts, 594–95. 163 See, e.g., H. Hommel, “Platonisches bei Lukas. Zu Acta 17.28a (Leben-BewegungSein),” ZNW 48 (1957) 193–200; Gerald Downing, “Ethical Pagan Theism and the Speeches in Acts,” NTS 27 (1981) 544–63; Clayton Croy, “Hellenistic Philosophies and the Preaching of the Resurrection (Acts 17:18, 32),” NovT 39 (1997) 21–39; and David Balch, “The Areopagus Speech: An Appeal to the Stoic Historian Posidonius against Later Stoics and the Epicurians,” in Greeks, Romans, and Christians: Essays in Honor of Abraham J. Malherbe (David Balch, ed.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1990) 52–79. See also, Gerald Downing, “Common Ground with Paganism in Luke and Josephus,” NTS 28 (1982) 546−59.

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training. 164 Finally, in numerous points of diction, Luke’s language aligns him with other Hellenistic authors.165 The evidence is overwhelming. Luke clearly belongs to a profoundly Hellenized world. As a consequence, Lukan scholars have long tended to gravitate towards classical studies and have quite naturally pursued Luke’s many contacts with the classical world – to the neglect or downplaying of his Jewish affinities.166 Recognition of the evangelist’s noteworthy interest in themes such as the Jerusalem Temple has not been an adequate counterweight to this tendency.167 The effect has been a lopsided perception of Lukan thought and an often-facile contrast between the “Jewish-Christian” perspective of Matthew and Luke’s “Gentile” orientation.168

164

See Michael Martin, “Progymnastic Topic Lists: A Compositional Template for Luke and other Bioi?” NTS 54 (2008) 18–41. 165 See, e.g., P. W. van der Horst, “Hellenistic Parallels to the Acts of the Apostles: 1:1– 26,” ZNW 74 (1983) 17–26; “Hellenistic Parallels to the Acts of the Apostles (2:1–47),” JSNT 25 (1985) 49–60; “Hellenistic Parallels to the Acts of the Apostles (Chapters 3 and 4),” JSNT 35 (1989) 37–46. See also A. W. Argyle, “The Greek of Luke and Acts,” NTS 20 (1973–74) 441–5; Nigel Turner, “The Quality of the Greek of Luke-Acts,” In Studies in New Testament Language and Text: Essays in Honour of George D. Kilpatrick on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday (J. K. Elliott, ed.; NovTSup 44; Leiden: Brill, 1976) 387–400. The discussion of Luke’s linguistic affinities to medical writers could not ultimately demonstrate the author’s identity as the “beloved physician,” but it does help illustrate the general register of his language. See, e.g., Henry Cadbury, “Lexical Notes on Luke-Acts: II: Recent Arguments for Medical Language,” JBL 45 (1926) 190–206; ibid., “Lexical Notes in Luke-Acts: V: Luke and the Horse Doctors,” JBL 52 (1933) 55–65. 166 Such downplaying often takes an explicit form. See, e.g., Bradley Billings, “‘At the Age of 12’: The Boy Jesus in the Temple (Luke 2:41–52), the Emperor Augustus, and the Social Setting of the Third Gospel,” JTS 60 (2009) 70–89. Billings contends that the proper interpretative background for his text is not “the rituals and symbols of late Second Temple Judaism, but those of imperial Rome, and, in particular, the legacy and cult of the first imperial princeps, that of Augustus.” Ronald Hock (“Lazarus and Micyllus: GrecoRoman Backgrounds to Luke 16:19–31,” JBL 106 [1987] 447–63) has likewise challenged what he characterizes as the narrow use of an “Oriental-Semitic specifically Palestinian Jewish milieu” in interpreting Luke’s parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, highlighting instead Greco-Roman comparative material. 167 See, e.g. J. Bradley Chance, Jerusalem, the Temple and the New-Age in Luke-Acts (Macon, GA: Mercer University, 1988); Francis Weinert, “Luke, the Temple, and Jesus’ Saying about the Abandoned House (Luke 13:34–35),” CBQ 44 (1982) 68–76; James Dawsey, “The Origin of Luke’s Positive Perception of the Temple,” PRSt 18 (1991) 5–22; Geir Otto Holmås, “My House Shall Be a House of Prayer: Regarding the Temple as a Place of Prayer in Acts within the Context of Luke’s Apologetic Objective,” JSNT 27 (2005) 393–416; and Ron Fay, “The Narrative Function of the Temple in Luke-Acts,” Trinity Journal 27 (2006) 55–70. 168 A confusion of the context of composition and the putative audience of the Gospels has intensified this type of pigeonholing. See Bauckham, Gospel for All Christians, 9–49. It may be acknowledged that studies specifically focused on Lukan theology have been

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Luke’s view of wealth is obviously implicated in this trend (see §2.3 below).169 The interpretation of the community of goods in Acts illustrates the situation nicely, for it occupies a central place in discussions of Luke’s economic ideal and it has long been customary to interpret the summary statements (Acts 2:42–47; 4:32–35) in purely Greco-Roman terms. 170 Scholars have debated whether Luke adopts classical utopian imagery (e.g., Plato, Rep. 462c; 416d; 457cd; Leg. 737bcd; Iamblichus, VP 167–8) or friendship discourse (κοινὰ τὰ τῶν φίλων; ψυχὴ µία; cf. Aristotle, Eth. nic. 8.9, 1159b31; 9.8, 1168b8; Pol. 2.2, 1263a31; Cicero, Off. 1.51 [amicorum esse communia omnia]; Martial, 2.43.1, 16; Seneca, Ben. 7.41; 7.12.1); but the essential cultural background has not generally been in doubt.171 As Luke Timothy Johnson asserts, “The Hellenistic provenance of the language in the passage has been repeatedly affirmed and can be said to have the nearly unanimous approval of scholars.”172 The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, notably the Community Rule (1QS) with its description of a community of common ownership, stimulated a reappraisal of this long-held conclusion, as multiple scholars sought to establish a firm Jewish link.173 Unfortunately, as Hays shows, efforts to anchor Luke’s

understandably more sensitive to the Gospel’s Jewish and Old Testament background. See Todd Penner, “Madness in the Method? The Acts of the Apostles in Current Study,” CBR 2 (2004) 223–93. The fact that Luke’s vision of almsgiving has fallen prey to a superifical “Hellenistic” perspective indicates the extent to which this Lukan theme has not yet been considered theologically. 169 A substantial body of Greco-Roman wealth discourse exists, and a connection has frequently been made with Luke. See, e.g., Yan Yang, “The Comparison between Luke 12:16–21 and Greco-Roman Moral Exhortation,” Sino-Christian Studies 15 (2013) 81–110; and Hock, “Lazarus and Micyllus,” 447–63. 170 See, Johann Jakob Wettstein, Novum Testamentum Graecum II (Amsterdam: Domerian, 1792) 470; and Hugo Grotius, Annotationes in Novum Testamentum V: Ad Acta Apostolorum (Gronigae: W. Zuidema, 1828) 21–2, 33. 171 See, e.g., Plümacher, Lukas als hellenistischer Schriftsteller, 16–18; Conzelmann, Die Apostelgeschichte, 24; David Mealand, “Community of Good and Utopian Allusions in Acts,” JTS 28 (1977) 96–9; Johnson, Sharing Possessions, 21–23, 119–32; and Gerhard Schneider, Die Apostelgeschichte (HThKNT 5.1; Freiburg: Herder, 1980) 106. 172 Johnson, Literary Function, 3. See, e.g., Alfred Loisy, Les Actes des Apôtres (Paris: Emile Nurry, 1920) 259–61; Henry J. Cadbury, “The Summaries of Acts,” Beginnings of Christianity: Volume V, 399; Heinrich Zimmermann, “Die Sammelberichte der Apostelgeschichte,” BZ 5 (1961) 81–2; Jacques Dupont, “L’Union entre les premières Chrétiens dans les Acts des Apôtres,” NRT 91 (1969) 902; Conzelmann, Die Apostelgeschichte, 37, 44; and Rost, Wohltätigkeit und Armenfürsorge, 15–8. 173 See, e.g., Birger Gerhardsson, “Einige Bemerkungen zu Apg. 4:32,” ST 24 (1970) 142–9; and the review of authors given in Herbert Braun, Qumran und das Neue Testament I (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1966) 143–9; and Joseph Fitzmyer, “Jewish Christianity in Acts in Light of the Qumran Scrolls,” Studies in Luke Acts, 233–57.

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specific language in the scrolls remain unconvincing.174 Likewise, the claim that the Christian community described in Acts practiced a fully communitarian model of possession, like that at Qumran, is hard to insist upon.175 Less likely still is the suggestion that a primitive Ebionite source, stemming from a Qumran-like community of the “Poor” in Jerusalem, supplies Luke with his material.176 Clearly the way of life prescribed in 1QS and the Armenfrömmigkeit attested at Qumran provide important cultural background to the presentation in Acts and Luke’s general conception. Few would dispute that much. One must be careful, though, how the whole Lukan project is thus conceived. The characterization of Luke as essentially speaking Jewish ideas in Greek categories is misleading. Hays is quite typical in advancing the broad thesis that “Luke remolds his essentially Jewish [wealth] ethic for a significantly Gentile readership.”177 This dynamic may indeed in real ways be at work, yet one should avoid misleading descriptions and an outmoded form of the debate. 178 The work of Martin Hengel has for more than a generation represented the decisive rebuttal of a false, but influential Hellenistic-Jewish dichotomy that has bedeviled Lukan scholarship quite as much as Pauline.179 Louis Feldman is probably right that Hengel at times pushes the penetration of Greek life into Palestine too far. 180 Nevertheless, the question of some predominant affinity (Jewish or Greek) in the thought forms of the Gospel is no longer helpful and new analytic categories should be sought. To that end, perhaps the most accurate thing to say is that Luke’s vision is consistently scriptural

174

175

Hays, Wealth Ethics, 196–9. Hays (ibid., 200–1) has plausibly argued that use rather than ownership is in view in

Acts.

176

See Leander Keck, “Poor Among the Saints,” 54–78; and Longenecker, Remember the Poor. See also the critique of Hays, Wealth Ethics, 15. See also Un-Sok Ro, Die sogennannte “Armenfrömmigkeit.” Un-Sok Ro opposes the view (especially of Erich Zenger and Rainer Albertz) that a special “theology of poverty” is developed in the Psalms and prophets, but his thesis has been criticized by several scholars. 177 Hays, Wealth Ethics, 50, cf. 51–69. 178 See, e.g., Daryl Schmidt, “The Historiography of Acts: Deuteronomic or Hellenistic?” in Society of Biblical Literature 1985 Seminar Papers (Ken Harold Richards, ed.; Atlanta: Scholars, 1985) 417–27; and Gregory Sterling, “Athletes of Virtue: An Analysis of the Summaries in Acts (2:41–47; 4:32–35; 5:12–16,” JBL 113 (1994) 679–96. 179 Martin Hengel, Judaism and Hellenism: Studies in Their Encounter in Palestine during the Early Hellenistic Period (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1974). 180 See Louis Feldman, Judaism and Hellenism Reconsidered (JSJSup 107; Leiden: Brill, 2006). Feldman, nevertheless, recognizes Hengel’s work as “a truly remarkable milestone.” Craig Hill (Hellenists and Hebrews: Reappraising Division within the Earliest Church [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992) likewise values Hengel’s contributions, but indicates how he also reinscribes Bauer’s dichotomous Tübingen schematic, despite mounting some rhetorical opposition.

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45

– in the Septuagint mode (not necessarily understood exclusively as a text form, but rather as a landmark in the tradition of inter-biblical exegesis).181 This articulates best the point where the evangelist’s concentrated Greek and Jewish sensibilities most concretely intersect. It also ensures a heavy accent on the Jewish end of this polarity. If in some real sense Luke is a “cultural translator” with the Hellenistic world, his principal model and point of reference is the Greek scriptures, not figures like Berossus.182 The deep scriptural orientation of Luke’s composition is clear even in this most classically colored text of Acts 4:32–35; for Luke not only echoes culturally Greek friendship language. He also configures his summaries with the specific language of the Septuagint.183 Most importantly, he evokes Deut 15:4 (οὐδὲ γὰρ ἐνδεής τις ἦν ἐν αὐτοῖς, Acts 4:34). This fact has been greatly underappreciated, and the massive importance of Deut 15:1–11 in the development of almsgiving in Jewish thought and praxis is important to observe (see Chapter Two §2.2 and Chapter Three §3.4.1 below).184 Luke may indeed have tapped a Hellenistic topos in Acts 4, but that should not eclipse his direct engagement with the charity legislation of the Torah – as it has. What holds true here holds a fortiori in other less classically resonant texts, though the point is still not made with enough force. Throughout Luke’s work – and very much in connection with his charity ideals – Israel’s scriptures anchor and shape his thought.185



181 See, Carl Holladay, “Luke’s Use of the LXX in Acts: A Review of the Debate and a Look at Acts 1:15–26,” in Septuagint und das frühe Christentum – The Septuagint and Christian Origins (Thomas Caulley and Hermann Lichtenberger, eds.; WUNT 277; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011) 233–300; Mogens Müller, “Die Lukasschriften und die Septuaginta,” Septuaginta – Entstehung, Sprache, Geschichte (Siegfried Kreuzer, Martin Meisner, Marcus Sigismund, eds.; WUNT 286; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) 465–79. Sidney Jellicoe (“Saint Luke and the Seventy(-two),” NTS [1960] 319–21; “Saint Luke and the Letter of Aristeas” JBL 80 [1961] 150–1) suggested Luke’s use of the Letter of Aristeas. The tradition of 70/72 disciples as an image for Gentiles certainly suggests the (diverse) Septuagint tradition. See also Joseph Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke IIX (AB 28; New York: Doubleday, 1979) 113–27; William Most, “Did Saint Luke Imitate the Septuagint?” JSNT (1982) 30–41; and recently, Takamitsu Muraoka, “Luke and the Septuagint,” NovT 54 (2012) 13–5. 182 Pace Sterling, Apologetic Historiography. 183 Luke’s addition of the biblical καρδία to the Hellenistic formula (ἦν καρδία καὶ ψυχὴ µία) echoes memorable texts such as Deut 6:5. See, e.g., Degenhardt, Evangelist der Armen, 170; and Dupont, “L’Union,” 904. 184 See, e.g., Moshe Weinfeld, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and in the Ancient Near East (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995) 162–74; and Anderson, Charity, 43, 50, 149. 185 See, e.g., Craig Evans and James A. Sanders, Luke and Scripture: The Function of Sacred Tradition in Luke-Acts (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993); and Kenneth Duncan Litwak, Echoes of Scripture in Luke-Acts: Telling the History of God's People Intertextually (JSNTSup 282. London: T. & T. Clark, 2005).

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“Hellenism” is a problematic term that has misdirected Lukan scholarship away from the evangelist’s profoundly scriptural mode of thought.186 David Lambert’s important and long awaited study on repentance in Judaism and Christianity is the most recent victim of this trend and disappoints at least in this regard. While specifically studying the notions of ‫ שוב‬and µετάνοια as a biblical inheritance, he continues to plot Luke in this traditional, one-sidedly “pedagogical and ultimately Hellenistic framework.”187 For Lambert’s Luke, repentance is thus a “philosophical trope to structure membership in the movement.”188 The perpetuation of this familiar image derives not only from the established views of Lukan scholarship, however. It owes just as much to Lambert’s own failure to integrate the embodied language of almsgiving within the biblical repentance mechanism he so brilliantly exposes. 189 In order to apprehend Luke’s place within this “systematization of repentance” properly, it is thus necessary to rethink a variety of established scholarly categories, from Hellenism to µετάνοια, and to practice a sort of “reversed heuristics.” 190 Charity behavior and the systematic, scriptural Tun-ErgehenZusammenhang logic on which it was built represent key reference points in such a repositioning of Lukan thought. 1.2.4 The “Immanent Frame” Some significant factors hindering a full recognition of the presence of almsgiving themes, both generally in the New Testament and specifically in Luke’s Gospel, have been described: theological bias against works/reward based soteriology; historical misrepresentations of first-century Judaism; antiJewish readings of Luke-Acts; and a preoccupation with Lukan Hellenism. As a final point, one should attend to a characteristically modern habit of mind that greatly challenges one’s understanding of the theological signifi-



186 On ambiguities in use of the term “Hellenism,” see Anders Gerdmar, Rethinking the Judaism-Hellenism Dichotomy: A Historiographical Case Study of Second Peter and Jude (ConBNT46; Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2001) 19. 187 David Lambert, How Repentance Became Biblical: Judaism, Christianity, & the Interpretation of Scripture (Oxford: Oxford University, 2016) 184. 188 Ibid. 189 “The whole theory of repentance operates around the claim to the existence of a certain mechanism, one by which regret for a past deed or way of life produces a transformative effect within the penitent agent. Thus we find John the Baptist’s charge: ‘bear fruit worthy of repentance’ (Matt 3:8) and a similar one in Acts: ‘do deeds consistent with repentance’ (Acts 26:20). Indeed, the necessary relationship between the negative and positive elements of ‘repentance’ is well encapsulated in what might be referred to as the ‘dual formula,’” ibid. 190 Gerdmar (Judaism-Hellenism Dichotomy, 21) develops what he names reversed heuristics: to “look for ‘Jewish’ things in a ‘Hellenistic’ text, which may have been overlooked due to the dichotomy.”

1.2 Predjudices and Preoccupations

47

cance of alms in early Christianity: a mental pattern conveniently captured in Charles Taylor’s description of “the immanent frame.”191 The immanent frame is a vast “picture” defining the space of our contemporary experience and severing us radically from our pre-modern ancestors, particularly in the matter of religion. It is the secular picture of a “disenchanted world” in which it has somehow become “so hard to believe in God … while in 1500 it was virtually impossible not to.”192 The immanent frame is “itself not usually, or even mainly a set of beliefs which we entertain about our predicament, however it may have started out; rather it is the sensed context in which we develop our beliefs.”193 Taylor’s special interest is in identifying different facets of what he recognizes as a single massive “coming of age” narrative by which the present, radically immanent worldview is made to seem “obvious, unchallengeable, and axiomatic.”194 Taylor’s challenge of the unchallengeable is terribly important, but for present purposes his description of the “horizontal/closed world” mindset is more important. Two particular points help expose this modern imaginative framework, within which all contemporary exegetes must labor. These indices at the same time suggest the colossal anachronism that has often threatened present day interpretations of ancient almsgiving. (1) “Excarnation.” A key theme that Taylor develops is the disembodied character of modern religious experience. This reverses a deeply rooted earlier perception of divine interaction with and indeed involvement in the historical-material order (i.e. from incarnation to “excarnation”). The shift translates into a peculiarly modern difficulty in understanding a hierarchically composed order of space and time: an arrangement in which “certain places and moments grant us more access to God than others.”195 For Jews of the first century, however, the notion of pilgrimage to a sanctum, or the idea that certain persons, actions, and objects were holier than others, was the “axio-

191

See Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA: The Belknapp Press of Harvard University, 2007) especially 539–94. Taylor’s work is massive, complex, and not always clear; but he has given a helpful description of secularity. See D. Stephen Long, “How to Read Charles Taylor: The Theological Significance of A Secular Age,” Pro Ecclesia 18 (2009) 93–107. Other commentators on the secular experience give broadly similar accounts: e.g., Michael Buckley, At the Origins of Modern Atheism (New Haven: Yale University, 1987); Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame, 1990); and John Milbank, Theology and Social Theory (Oxford: Blackwell, 2006). 192 Taylor, Secular Age 539, cf. 25. 193 Ibid., 549. It is the “unchallenged framework” that “we have trouble thinking ourselves outside of, even as an imaginative exercise.” 194 Ibid. 195 Long, “Theological Significance,” 102.

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matic” and “obvious” perspective. Almsgiving seems to have been just such a privileged locus of encounter with the divine, as shall be seen. (2) Impersonal Moral Order. In Taylor’s estimation, “providential Deism” exerted a tremendous secularizing power. 196 It effected an “anthropocentric shift in the ends of human life” and eclipsed the earlier understanding of the relationship between God and creation.197 Inasmuch as a “deep-seated moral distaste for the old religion that sees God as an agent in history” stands behind this “slide to Deism,” the result for ethics has been a conception of impersonal Laws as the governing structure of morals, rather than an interaction with God as person and agent.198 This displacement of “communion” with the divine has engendered a view of our human moral agency as “entirely free, unconstrained by authority” – excepting the authority of a naked Kantian Pflicht.199 But this impersonal view has also made it increasingly difficult in the present age to distinguish the moral order from mere social progress.200 The utilitarian re-conception of moral behavior has made this last confusion particularly apparent. A vast gulf thus separates the utilitarian deontologism that drives, for instance, Peter Singer’s radical commitment to wealth distribution – ordered explicitly to world transformation – from the materially similar commitment to charity characteristic of Thomas Aquinas (whom Singer unconvincingly invokes as an ally). 201 Contemporary exegetes must thus strain a bit to access imaginatively the more personal and “communion” oriented paradigm of pre-Deistic thinkers, including Jewish and Christian

196

See Taylor, Secular Age, 223–69. “Deism can be seen as a half-way house on the road to contemporary Atheism” (270). 197 Ibid., 274. 198 Ibid. 199 Ibid., 280. 200 In this connection, Long (“Theological Significance,” 100) highlights that secularism lacks the resources to accept a word like Mark 14:7 (“The poor you will always have with you”): “One of its [the secular mindset’s] main tenets is to tend to the suffering, but instead it tends to put an end to the sufferers. It does not have means to affirm a place for those whose suffering cannot be remedied other than to put an end to them.” The moral order of charity shifts from the personal to the structural. 201 See Peter Singer, “Famine, Affluence, and Morality,” Philosophy & Public Affairs 1 (1972) 229–43. Singer’s article on charity (a moral designation he disputes) is among the most famous in contemporary ethics. With respect to the basic moral framing of almsgiving, Aquinas and the Gospels stand closer to one another than either does to Singer. On Aquinas’ view, see Terrence O’Connor, The Obligation of Almsgiving in Common Necessity According to St. Thomas (Meinrad, IN: Abbey, 1959). Michael Legaspi (“Treasury in Heaven,” First Things 246 [2014] 61), in his review of Anderson’s Charity, nicely captures this common, utilitarian mentality: “Charity is good because it decreases suffering, and it should be practiced insofar as it contributes to the happiness and well-being of an ever greater number of people.”

1.3 Theological Redirection

49

authors of antiquity. Johnson’s insight into the “personalist” character of Luke’s interest in possessions sets scholarship broadly on the right track.

1.3 Theological Redirection 1.3 Theological Redirection

1.3.1 Refocusing Redemptive Almsgiving The considerable neglect and misconstrual of almsgiving as a theme within New Testament studies is coupled with a generally negative and anachronistic estimate of the theological vision of this “pattern of religion” (Sanders). It is desirable, therefore, to find a more sympathetic and objective approach. Recent research has made important progress in this direction, and the work of two scholars is worthy of special note in positioning the present thesis. Both scholars help to expose the profound theological potential implicit in Luke’s preoccupation with charity. 1.3.1.1 Gary Anderson The most important contemporary effort at redirecting the discussion of almsgiving is found in the work of Gary Anderson. 202 As reviewers have noted, his work has wide implications.203 His two major treatments (Sin: A History and Charity: The Place of the Poor in Biblical Tradition) have focused on different aspects of economic metaphors and the theology of almsgiving in early Judaism and Christianity, but three broad points can be briefly underlined here. (1) Pervasive. A first key point, which Anderson successfully shows, is the massive diffusion of the metaphoric logic of merit as credit (‫זכותא‬/‫ )זכות‬and sin as debt (‫חובא‬/‫)חוב‬. 204 Contrary to Sanders’ claim that such thinking is foreign to the Jewish sources, Anderson, drawing on the well-known work of

202

Gary Anderson, Sin: A History (New Haven: Yale, 2009). See also idem., “From Israel’s Burden to Israel’s Debt: Towards a Theology of Sin in Biblical and Early Second Temple Sources,” in Reworking the Bible (Devorah Dimant, Ruth Clements, Esther Glickler Chazon, eds.; Leiden: Brill, 2005) 1–30; idem., “‘Treasury of Merit’ in Early Jewish and Christian Tradition,” Letter and Spirit 3 (2007) 37–67; idem., “Faith and Finance,” First Things 193 (2009) 29–34; idem., “Redeem Yours Sins through Works of Charity,” in To Train His Soul in Books: Syriac Asceticism in Early Christianity (Robin Darling Young and Monica Blanchard, eds.; Washington, DC: Catholic University, 2011) 57–65; idem., “Giving to be Forgiven: Alms in the Bible,” Christian Century 130 (2013) 26–7, 31–3. 203 Anderson’s work has been very favorably received. For an appreciative estimate, see Benjamin Sommer, “Hedgehog and Fox: Anderson as Historian and Philologist,” HTR 103 (2010) 373–82. See also Anthony Giambrone, “Charity: The Place of the Poor in the Biblical Tradition,” TS 75 (2014) 451. 204 See especially Sin, 27–39 and 135–51. See also below, Chapter Two §2.2.

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Lakoff and Johnson on metaphors, reveals just how significantly this linguistic pattern, in fact, controlled soteriological thought from Second Temple to rabbinic times. 205 He illustrates, in addition, how the metaphoric paradigm naturally translated into an equally pervasive attention to charitable deeds.206 It is mistaken, therefore, to imagine that the canons of propriety of Reformation piety in any way inhibited ancient Jewish and Christian writers from a full embrace of redemptive almsgiving in their soteriology.207 (2) Positive. Perhaps the most fundamental theme articulated in Anderson’s work is that this robust Jewish and Christian interest in almsgiving is intelligible and attractive in its own right and does not equate with some sinister Selbsterlösung. On the contrary, meritorious works of charity give expression to a very particular faith commitment and must be recognized as fully compatible with a broader attention to divine grace.208 The significance of Prov 19:17 is highly illustrative in this connection: “Whoever is kind to the poor lends to the Lord, and will be repaid in full.” 209 As Anderson nicely explains, risking one’s wealth in good works on the promise of a divine reward (since the poor are, of course, unable to repay) gives concrete expression to one’s trust in God, such that the works themselves specifically become an idiom of faith.210 So it was understood by figures such as Ephrem, who attests to the critical Semitic conceptual-linguistic perspective.211 The act of bestowing charity, moreover, was recognized not only as a claim on a divine promise, but as a response to the Lord’s own gracious gift in the Jubilee release. With such considerations, Anderson provides an important theological grid against which the practice of almsgiving becomes a prime ex-



205 See Charity, 116–8; cf. 5–6. See George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1980). 206 See Sin, 139–51. 207 “Protestants should pay special attention to Anderson’s demonstration that the corollary notions of sin as debt and merit as a form of satisfaction did not arise in postbiblical Judaism or in the Roman Catholic Church. Rather, both notions are rooted in Scripture and grew in both Judaism and the early church,” Raymond Van Leeuwen, “Toward a Biblical Account of Sin?” Journal of Theological Interpretation 5 (2011) 135. 208 See Charity, 35–52. 209 On this text in both its MT and LXX forms, see Downs, Alms, 49. 210 See Sin, 152–63. Anderson cites two important articles on the ecumenical, systematic questions: Michael Root, “Aquinas, Merit, and Reformation Theology after the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification,” Modern Theology 20 (2004) 5–22; and Joseph Wawrykow, “John Calvin and Condign Merit,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 83 (1992) 73–90. Both authors argue for the compatibility (or even near identity) of Thomistic and Reformed visions of the relationship between divine grace and human merit. See further, Charles Raith II, “Calvin’s Critique of Merit, and Why Aquinas (Mostly) Agrees,” Pro Ecclesia 20 (2011) 135–66; idem., “Aquinas and Calvin on Merit, Part II: Condignity and Participation,” Pro Ecclesia 21 (2012) 195–209. 211 See Sin, 154–7.

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pression of the unobjectionable Gottvertrauen informing biblical wealth teaching (including that of Luke).212 (3) “Sacramental.” A final, quite important insight that Anderson offers is that almsgiving was conceived of as a cultic act (‫)עבודה‬.213 Indeed, “by the close of the biblical period, service to the poor had become the privileged way to serve God.”214 This cultic force is quite evident in charity’s redemptive power and function in atoning for sin (e.g. Sir 3:30); but it appears also in the primitive (and long persisting) association of Christian almsgiving and the Eucharistic celebration.215 The link of charity and the Church’s ritual life likely borrows on a Jewish Passover custom (cf. Justin, Apol. 67.1–7; see below Chapter Three §3.3.3). In any event, the link hints at giving to the poor as a privileged manner of communion with God: something far distant from the disenchanted view of our age, which tends to envision charity in the impersonal terms of programs and projects. Anderson considers the imaginative power of texts such as Matthew 25 and draws a key conclusion: One could meet God in the face of the poor. Charity was, to put it briefly, a sacramental act. That is, an act that established a contact point between the believer and God…It is in the concrete act of assisting a poor person that one meets Christ.216

This “deeply sacramental understanding of the poor person as a mediator of the Godhead” derives from an interpretation of actions done to the poor as done to God himself: “Those who mock the poor insult their Maker, but those who are kind to the needy honor him (Prov 14:31; cf. Prov 17:5; 19:17; see also Exod 22:20–26; 1 Sam 2:8; Isa 11:4; Ps 113).217 Though originally this Schöpfungstheologie meant that God’s honor is “inseparably connected with his workmanship,”218 the special association of the Lord with the poor naturally charged the works of mercy with a special theological force and shape, tolerating a stronger claim of identification, and making possible a unique

212

On this theme in Luke, see, e.g. Thomas E. Schmidt, Hostility to Wealth in the Synoptic Gospels (JSNTS 15; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1987) 136, 161. 213 See Charity, 15–34. 214 Ibid., 18. 215 See Charity, 8. 216 Ibid., 7, 9. 217 Stefan Seiler (“Die theologische Dimension von Armut und Reichtum im Horizont alttestamentlicher Prophetie und Weisheit,” ZAW 123 [2011] 593) remarks: “Mit solchen Ausagen erreicht die theologische Reflexion der Spruchweisheit über Armut und Reichtum einen Höhepunkt: Das Verhalten dem Bedürftigen gegenüber wird unmittelbar mit dem Verhalten Gott gegenüber in Verbindung gebracht!” See also, e.g., Gregory, “Poor in Israel,” 319–20. 218 So, e.g., Bruce Waltke, The Book of Proverbs: Chapters 1–15 (NICOT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004) 607.

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Christological “mutation” within the broader Second Temple almsgiving paradigm.219 1.3.1.2 Nathan Eubank The contribution of Nathan Eubank is less decisive than that of Anderson. Nevertheless, Eubank’s recent dissertation represents an important step in the application of Anderson’s new estimate of almsgiving to New Testament studies. 220 By tracing the use of redemptive alms as the backdrop to Matthew’s economic imagery, Eubank has successfully shown how powerfully this mode of thinking configures the synoptic tradition. In concentrating particularly on the motif of reward, Eubank has focused his attention principally on the material outlined in Anderson’s earlier work, Sin. Moreover, Eubank’s stated purpose is simply to situate the Matthean text in a Second Temple context. He does not take special pains to track specifically Christian developments in the deployment of charity discourse. The sacramental dimension of charity, accordingly, goes largely unnoticed. This certainly owes something to the peculiar texture of Matthean theology, which in many ways underplays this aspect, at least in comparison with Luke (as the present thesis will suggest at several points). The all-important text of Matt 25:31–46, however, presents an unmistakable instance of almsgiving Christology. The explosive significance of this text calls for greater attention. What Eubank has implicitly uncovered, however, is a very significant Christological adjustment in the imitatio motif. Whereas imitatio Dei played a key role in Jewish almsgiving discourse (see §1.1.2.1 [2] above), Matthew develops a paradigm in which Jesus himself has become the model of generosity and reward. While reward certainly featured within Jewish “treasure in heaven” thinking, the earlier imitatio motif had not assimilated this idea. God in heaven simply gave his good gifts, and people on earth were urged to do likewise; but God the archetypal giver was never characterized as himself looking for a return. The place of this reward dynamic in Matthew’s imitatio Christi motif thus testifies implicitly to the potential of Jesus’ resurrection to restructure the common fund of Jewish charity tropes. 1.3.2 Approaching the Poor “Sacramentally” Anderson’s work on charity has been celebrated for its ecumenical importance and its significance for Jewish-Christian relations. It is perhaps

219

The language of a Christological “mutation” deliberately alludes to Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003). See §1.4 below. 220 Eubank, Wages of Debt-Bearing; and “Storing Up Treasure with God in the Heavens: Celestial Investments in Matthew 6:1–21,” CBQ 76 (2014) 77–92.

1.3 Theological Redirection

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strange, then, to find “sacrament” as his chosen paradigm for charity’s religious value.221 The language of “sacrament” is troubled from multiple directions. On the one hand, it is deeply bound up with a very particular branch of Christian theology, and has thus been generally avoided by historians of religion in their analysis of ritual behavior.222 On the other hand, Protestant theologians have often found “sacrament” to imply magical superstition: the opposite of real, inner “religion.”223 The latter of these complaints must be dismissed as either ignorant or inattentive to basic distinctions in the classical doctrine of the sacraments (e.g. obex, opera operantis vs. operata, etc.).224 As to the whole dogmatic complex associated with the sacramental concept, it is well known that the primitive usage of both sacramentum and µυστήριον was not nearly so systematized as the medieval septenary concept.225 To this extent, historians of religion need not in principle be shy to engage a genuine first-century idea simply because it has enjoyed a particularly sophisticated technical afterlife. An effort must simply be made to apprehend its more primitive significance to avoid anarchronism. To this end, the notion of encountering the divinity in and through some personal encounter (e.g. with the poor) corresponds well to the “mystery/sacrament” idea, which in the earliest Christian usage is closely linked with the notion of revelation (ἀποκάλυψις) and the divine manifestation/epiphany of God both in Old Testament events and in the life of Jesus.226 The fact of the matter is, a “sacramental” mindset helpfully characterizes certain important shared patterns in ancient Jewish and Christian thought. This has been recognized even by Jewish scholars. Martin Jaffee, for instance, in a recent article, writes:

221

Although the doctrine of the sacraments became a major point of controversy during the Reformation, sacraments and sacramental theology per se are, of course, by no means unique to Catholicism. See, e.g., Eberhard Jüngel and Karl Rahner, Was ist ein Sakrament? Vorstöße zur Verständigung (Kleine ökumenische Schriften; Freiburg: Herder, 1971); and Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s, 1973). 222 Theodore Jennings, “Sacrament: An Overview,” in Mircea Eliade, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion, Volume 12 (New York: Macmillan, 1987) 500–4. 223 See, e.g., the essay of former Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, Alexander Nairne, “Semitic Sacramental Rites,” The Modern Churchman 16 (1926) 296–309. 224 On this point, see the succinct remarks of Gerard Sloyan, “Jewish Ritual of the First Century CE and Early Christian Sacramental Behavior,” Biblical Theology Bulletin 15 (1985) 99–100. 225 See Robert Hotz, Sakramente – im Wechselspiel zwischen Ost und West (Zürich: Benziger, 1979) 22–47. Günther Bornkamm (“µυστήριον,” TDNT IV, 827) confirms of the early period that “the meaning of sacramentum is wholly coextensive with that of the Gk. word [µυστήριον].” 226 See Bornkamm, “µυστήριον,” TDNT IV, 802–27, esp. 817–27.

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It would seem that to speak of any aspect of rabbinic Judaism in terms of sacramentalism is to confuse the boundaries between rabbinic/Judaic piety and the rather distinct ritual piety of what ultimately became orthodox Christianity. Yet that is precisely my plan. More than a few scholars in recent years have argued that the clean line distinguishing rabbinic Judaism from the early patristic traditions of Christianity is rather more the making of modern scholarship than it is a fact of life “on the ground,” in late antiquity.227

If the boundary line is blurred well into the classical period of formative Judaism, the sacramental principle belongs all the more to the Judaism of an earlier period. The idea of Jewish sacramentalism has, nonetheless, faced resistance in New Testament studies. The Religionsgeschichtliche Schule, in particular, notably Bousset and Bultmann, were specifically opposed to the idea, firmly tracing all Christian sacramental thought to the mystery cults of the Hellenistic world. 228 This position is rooted in a series of unacceptable premises, however; and the early response of Frank Gavin, if dated, remains important. 229 “Rudimental sacramentalism, or at any rate the essential and germinal factors in sacramentalism, not only existed but flourished as an essential part of Judaism.”230 Jaffee’s lead may thus be followed. His working definition is also helpful. In Jafee’s conception “sacramentalism” has two particular foci: mediation and incorporation. This may be a reduced notion, but it gives some helpful structure to the evocative gestures of Gavin (“divinely ordained acts involving material means”) and Anderson (“a contact point between the believer and God”). Both dimensions (mediation and incorporation) apply well to charity in the ancient Jewish and Christian context. In the Jewish setting, the principle of mediation is evident especially in the way almsgiving came to function as a redemptive surrogate for the Temple cult. Christian thought about alms moved in a closely related direction.231 The principle of

227

Martin Jaffee, “Oral Transmission of Knowledge as Rabbinic Sacrament: An Overlooked Aspect of Discipleship in Oral Torah,” in Study and Knowledge in Jewish Thought (Howard Kreisel, ed.; Beer Sheva: Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 2006) 65–79, here 65. 228 Wilhelm Boussett, Die Religion des Judentums im späthellenistischen Zeitalter (Handbuch zum Neuen Testament 21; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1926) 109. Rudolf Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament (New York: Scribner’s Sons, 1951) 133–52. Bultmann is succint: “In Hellenistic Christianity the Lord’s Supper, like baptism, is understood as a sacrament in the sense of the mystery religions” (148, italics original). 229 Frank Gavin, The Jewish Antecedents of the Christian Sacraments (New York: Ktav, 1969). See also Sloyan, “Jewish Ritual,” 98–103. 230 Gavin, Jewish Antecedents, vi. 231 This is not limited to proto-orthodox circles. April De Connick (“The True Mysteries: Sacramentalism in the Gospel of Philip,” VC 55 [2001] 225–61) notes an interesting trend toward sacramentalism as a response to loss of the Temple in the context of Gnostic Christianity.

1.3 Theological Redirection

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incorporation is likewise discernable. For both Jews and Christians, charity served as an explicit boundary marker (see Chapter Three §3.3). The general fittingness of this sacramental pardigm in application to almsgiving is only reinforced when one considers the special case of interpreting charity discourse in the Gospels. Both the Gospels themselves as liturgical texts and the concrete Christian praxis of charitable giving were linked together in a single, shared, sacramental Sitz im Leben: the Eucharist.232 This is quite important. Both John (John 13:1–20) and Paul (1 Cor 11:17–33) point to the conclusion that hospitable service to others was somehow central to the primitive understanding of the Church’s sacral meal. 233 It was only natural that when collections for the poor (e.g. 1 Cor 16:1–4) and lections thereon were experienced in this cultic setting an acute sacral, even numinous significance would surround charity. Luke’s own special attunement to the Eucharist mystery (e.g. Luke 24:28– 35) gives us every reason to underline the sacramental horizon of his charity passages.234 Indeed, the meal hospitality motif, which plays such an important role in the Third Gospel (e.g. Luke 7:36–50; 11:37–54; 14:1–24), effectively binds the charity motif with the Christian Eucharist.235 Early Christians, including readers of Luke’s Gospel, encountered the reality of charity in an ambiance of ritual mystery. Ultimately, then, a “sacramental” approach to charity hopes simply to acknowledge this and secure distance from distorting anachronistic “excarnational” and impersonal perspectives: the widespread reduction of almsgiving to a carefully elaborated (coherent) ethical program. Special attention to the incorporating and mediating functions of almsgiving accordingly aids the re-construction of a “transcendent frame.” And here the personal and incarnational logic permits a distinctly Christological vision to emerge. This broad theological vision provides the proper interpretative grid for penetrating more deeply into Luke’s understanding of charity.

232

See Samuel Byrskog, “A Century with the Sitz im Leben: From Form-Critical to Gospel Community and Beyond,” ZNW 98 (2007) 1–27. Byrskog helpfully traces the shifting sense yet persistent utility of the idea of a Sitz im Leben. 233 See, e.g., Mary Coloe, “Welcome into the Household of God: The Foot Washing in John 13,” CBQ 66 (2004) 400–15, esp. 407–8. 234 See, e.g., Eugene Laverdiere, Dining in the Kingdom of God: The Origins of the Eucharist According to Luke (Chicago: Liturgy Training Publications, 1994). 235 See Brendan Byrne, The Hospitality of God: A Reading of Luke’s Gospel (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2000); and Bryan Joseph Esposito, Commensality: Jesus’ Meals with Pharisees and their Liturgical Roots (Lk 7:36–50; 11:37–54; 14:1–24) (AnB 209; Rome: Biblical Press, 2015).

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1.4 Recovering a Richer Reading of Lukan Charity 1.4 Recovering a Richer Reading

Having reviewed the state of scholarship, its deficiencies, and some promising new developments, it is now possible to chart the way forward. It is clear that a richer understanding of Luke’s theology of wealth is desirable – and within reach. What is needed in the first place is a deeper appreciation of the Third Gospel’s contact with the robust Jewish theology of charity: particularly its sacramental – incarnate and personal, mediating and incorporating – dimensions. At the same time, we wish to know how Luke’s distinctly Christian commitments come to expression through this specific Jewish “metaphysics of money” (Anderson). A helpful start in approaching this problem of continuity and difference is Larry Hurtado’s notion of “Christ-Devotion.” For Hurtado, this idea embraces not only the beliefs (“Christology”), but also the religious behaviors that testify to the exalted significance of Jesus in early Christianity.236 Charity, it seems, belongs within this scope of expressive behaviors. Like the phenomena identified by Hurtado, the distinctly Christian ways of engaging almsgiving, reconfigured around the person of Jesus, represent what can be styled as a “mutation” within an established Second Temple Jewish pattern of life and thought. The present study argues that Luke’s specific deployment of charity tropes should be recognized as just such a “mutation” within the apocalypticwisdom theology of Second Temple Judaism. More specifically, in the light of Jesus’ resurrection, Luke has conceived a practice of charity in which the redeeming action of Jesus invites a unique participation in the eschatological Jubilee of the kingdom, by which forgiveness (ἄφεσις) is made available on a massive scale. The model of the Lord’s death, likened in various ways to works of mercy, is of paramount importance in this vision; and if Luke has been criticized for a deficient theology of the cross, the subtlety of his charity soteriology helps reverse such an estimate. Some prefatory comments will clarify the manner of developing this thesis. 1.4.1 Methodology The drive to find ethical coherence, which has controlled so much scholarship in this domain, demands a particular method. Every expression of “wealth ethics” in the Gospel (and frequently Acts as well) must be accounted for and considered. Study after study thus presses through a survey of all the pre-



236 Larry Hurtado, “Christ-Devotion in the First Two Centuries: Reflections and a Proposal,” Toronto Journal of Theology 12 (1996) 17–33; and Lord Jesus Christ, 3–26. I accept Hurtado’s proposal, but will employ the less-cumbersome word “Christology” as implying this broader range of data.

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determined, “relevant” texts, severed from the narrative setting and often topically arranged.237 Narrative studies, for all their differences in perspective and procedure, follow a similar practice. One moves sequentially through the entire Gospel, noting (now in context) every pertinent passage and tracking the cumulative effect. The problem of adequately defining the field of relevant data points poses a difficulty for such studies; and, as noted above, some key texts have slipped through the net. Part of the challenge has been naming “charity.” The Jewish and early Christian view of ἐλεηµοσύνη was much more expansive than the rather shrunken English idea of “almsgiving,” including a diverse range of (mostly) corporal works of mercy (“Oberbegriff für Werke der Barmherzigkeit”).238 At the same time, as Anderson has shown, the notion of charity operated within an expansive religio-economic metaphor, which cannot be strictly limited to a word or Wortfeld, however linguistically rooted that metaphor was. Clearly, then, many modern analyses have suffered from far too narrow a conception of almsgiving in its ancient parameters. 239 This is reflected in hardened oppositions, such as that commonly made between Almosen and Besitzverzicht, which are not so sharply separated in the texts, but find a solid point of contact in appeals to a “treasure in heaven” (e.g. Luke 12:33; 18:22). The project of comprehensively treating all the pericopae in the Gospel with a bearing on charity is not the project proposed here. Rather, following Moxnes and Ayuch’s example, the procedure of this thesis will be to take a small number of texts (Schlüsselrede) and make deeper exegetical probes, using the full range of established exegetical tactics (e.g. source, form, redaction, narrative criticism, etc.), not privileging any one method or following any favorite theoretician. Three (to some degree self-standing) passages will be thus studied: Luke 7:36–50, 10:25–37, and 16:1–31. The choice of the first two texts is clearly a response to identified holes in the literature. A deliberate effort to broaden the discussion and perception of Luke’s theology of charity is thus implied. (The designation “charity” itself, preferred in the rhetoric of the present thesis, also intends to conjure a more abstract and theological resonance than inheres in the word “almsgiving.”)240 The “rele-

237

See, e.g., the critique of Cassidy, Seccombe, Pilgrim in Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 12. 238 See Roman Heiligenthal, “Werke der Barmherzigkeit oder Almosen? Zur Bedeutung von ἐλεηµοσύνη,” NovT 25 (1983) 289–301. See further Leo the Great, Sermo 6 Quadragesima, 1–2 (PL 54, 287) and Chapter Three §3.3.1 below. 239 The question was already raised in the thirteenth century, whether eleemosyna should be considered caritas, see ST II-II, 32. See Stephen J. Pope, “Aquinas on Almsgiving, Justice, and Charity,” HeyJ 32 (1991) 167–91. 240 Since this study is neither a restricted study of Luke’s use of ἐλεηµοσύνη or some related Wortfeld, the question of what exactly “belongs” is not so acute, and the words

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vance” of the third text – Luke 16 – is hardly in doubt among scholars. Nonetheless, seen through the light cast by the earlier chapters, new theological dimensions of this important pairing of wealth parables will become accessible. In view of the larger aims of this project, the integrated use of historicalcritical tools in the three exegetical probes will follow a general pattern. Each chapter will first seek to contextualize Luke’s material with appropriate Second Temple Jewish texts, whether from Scripture, Qumran, or the Apocrypha. Luke will then be directly addressed in relation to this specific background. The Gospel of Matthew will provide another steady point of reference, principally to gain perspective on the genuine distinctiveness of Luke’s vision, even within the Christian context – though the choice of three passages from the so-called L material will obviously limit the possibility of direct comparison (but see the discussion of Luke 11:4 || Matt 6:12 and Luke 12:57– 59 || Matt 5:25–26 in Chapter Two below).241 In addition to these more proximate Jewish and Christian texts, attention will be given, where appropriate, to patristic and rabbinic material, on the presumption that these rich bodies of literature have also preserved precious hints of an often quite conservative theological worldview. The theology informing the Gospels did not simply terminate at the moment they were composed, after all – despite the impression one might gain from much New Testament scholarship. Without proposing an explicit exercise in Wirkungsgeschichte, then, this study will give attention to specific theological “trajectories” that can help plot Lukan thought in the dynamics of a developing charity tradition (see, e.g., Chapter Two, Excursus).242 1.4.2 Apocalyptic and Allegory Although much has been said about Luke’s skill as a teller of parables, the study of Lukan charity texts has taken surprisingly little notice of the fact that a large percentage of the relevant wealth material appears in these celebrated

“alms” and “almsgiving” (along with “works of mercy” etc.) will be used for variety. The range of associations attached to “charity” is closer in many ways to the ancient use of ἐλεηµοσύνη (“mercy”) and ‫“( צדקה‬righteousness”), which carry an abstract and paradigmatic sense lost in the concrete idea of “almsgiving.” It is significant that ἀγάπη came to designate alms; cf. Ign. Rom. preface. 241 This selection of texts also frees the study from excessive reliance on any particular solution to the Synoptic Problem. Markan priority will, however, be assumed at several junctures. 242 The deep and problematic (Bultmannian) commitments of James Robinson and Helmut Koester should not obscure the essential value of the diachronic model they propose in Trajectories through Early Christianity (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971).

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stories.243 Metzger has called attention to the issue and helps point in the right direction; but his “reader-oriented enterprise” rests, in the end, upon a troubling hermeneutical foundation. 244 An innovative aspect of this thesis will therefore be its special handling of the parable material. Two special features will characterize the reading proposed here. Together they represent a very different perspective than Metzger’s. (1) First, the apocalyptic accent of the parables will be engaged. This does not mean that the primary analogue of Luke’s material is parable traditions in the apocalyptic literature.245 It means only that the L parables under review have a distinctly apocalyptic horizon: the eschatological Jubilee in connection with the Two Debtors (Luke 7:36–50), judgment and the return of Christ in the Good Samaritan (10:25–37), and resurrection in the case of 16:1–30.246 In describing these points of reference as “apocalyptic” a distinction is intended with respect to Metzger’s outlook. His study adopts the Nazareth Sermon in Luke 4 as a special key to the parables (rather than the Parable of the Sower). This is acceptable enough (one tires of hearing of the “programmatic” nature of the text). The problem is that Metzger reads this encapsulation of the Kingdom message in a distinctly immanent key: Jesus announces liberation for the economically poor. The transcendent, apocalyptic character of the sermon – indeed, the cosmic dualism in which Jesus liberates sinners from debt-bondage to the devil – goes unnoticed.247 Accordingly, Jesus’ preaching of the parables has largely been reduced to an inner-worldly message. Recognition of an apocalyptic backdrop to this material affirms the valuable insight of Ayuch, Nickelsburg, and Hogeterp, only recently coming to light. Thus, while wisdom motifs have already been heavily stressed in connection with wealth parables, such as the Rich Fool (Luke 12:12–21),248 the unique blending of wisdom and apocalyptic motifs in Luke’s vision is criti-



243 See Philip Sellew, “Interior Monologue as a Narrative Device in the Parables of Luke,” JBL 111 (1992) 239–53. 244 For Metzger (Consumption and Wealth, 15, 183) the parables “overflow with hermeneutical possibility and often elude, frustrate, and tease. Full of gaps and ellipses, replete with moments of undecidability, hopelessly polyvalent, they are scriptible narratives that must be written, not merely read.” 245 This may, by contrast, be the case with Mark, for example. See Priscilla Patten, “The Form and Function of Parable in Select Apocalyptic Literature and Their Significance for Parables in the Gospel of Mark,” NTS 29 (1983) 246–58. 246 On this wider sense of “apocalyptic” as a “primarily eschatological…pattern of thought” rather than simply a genre, see Michael Stone, “Apocalyptic Literature” in Jewish Writings of the Second Temple Period (Michael Stone, ed.; CRINT 2; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984) 394. 247 See the Excursus at the end of Chapter Two. 248 See, e.g., Matthew Rindge, Jesus’ Parable o f the Rich Fool: Luke 12:13–34 among Ancient Conversations on Death and Possessions (SBL Early Christianity and Its Literature 6; Atlanta: SBL, 2011).

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cally important to underscore. Divorced from apocalyptic commitments, wisdom motifs easily become trapped within an immanent ethical frame. They become moral tropes forgetful of Israel’s transcendent God who intervenes and personally acts within history. The interpretation of the L parables – not to say the reading of Lukan wealth texts – has been greatly compromised by precisely this forgetfulness: a theologically numb and moralistic reductionism. To the extent that a de-eschatologized, moralizing outlook has often been imputed to Luke, the notion of Beispielerzählungen has been a red herring in Lukan scholarship.249 As Jeffrey Tucker rightly argues, this designation has no convincing warrant; and it is simply wrong to align Luke’s parables with an Aristotelian rhetorical tradition (παράδειγµα) at the expense of the Jewish apocalyptic background, pace Cullivier, et al. 250 Investigations into Lukan theology, including the study of wealth and poverty in the Gospel, have been greatly misled by this entire tradition of scholarship stemming from Adolph Jülicher, whose attempt to rationalize and sanitize Gospel discourse is overburdened with a wide range of problematic assumptions.251 (2) A second characteristic feature of this thesis follows. In place of a rationalistic/moralistic reading of the parables, an allegorical interpretation will

249

Jeffrey Tucker, Example Stories: Perspectives on Four Parables in the Gospel of Luke (JSNTSup 162; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1992). Tucker examines the work of Adolf Jülicher and others who have promoted this desigination and stresses the need to place the parables in the Lukan context. See also Ernst Baasland, “Zum Beispiel der Beispielerzählungen: Zur Formenlehre der Glichnisse und zur methodik der Gleichnisauslegung,” NovT 28 [1986] 193–219; Dan Via, “Parable and Example Story: A Literary Structuralist Approach,” Sem [1974] 105–33; and Klyne Snodgrass, Stories with Intent: A Comprehensive Guide to the Parables of Jesus [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008]13–15, 351–3). 250 See Élian Cullivier, “Parabole dans la Tradition Synoptique,” ETR 66 (1991) 42–44. For further discussion on the function of παραβολή in the rhetorical tradition, see Burton Mack and Vernon Robbins, Patterns of Persuasion in the Gospels (Sonoma, CA: Polebridge Press, 1989) 146–8; Madeleine I. Boucher, The Parables (New Testament Message 7; Wilmington, DE; Michael Glazier, 1981) 34–9; Jean Zumstein, “Jésus et les Paraboles,” in Les Paraboles Évangéliques: Perspectives Nouvelles (Lectio Divina 135; Paris: Cerf, 1989) 94–97. This line of argument reaches back directly to Adolf Jülicher. See Stefan Alkier, “Die ‘Gleichnisreden Jesu’ as ‘Meisterwerke volkstümlicher Beredsamkeit’: Beobachtungen zur Aristotelesrezeption Adolf Jülichers,” in Die Gleichnisreden Jesu 1899–1999: Beiträge zum Dialog mit Adolf Jülicher (Ulrich Mell, ed.; BZNW 103; Berlin/New York: de Gruyter, 1999) 39–74. Tucker (Example Stories, 275–395) engages the Aristotle and the Greek rhetorical tradition at length and determines that it has been wrongly applied to New Testament parables. 251 Jülicher’s parable scholarship should not be isolated from his larger vision. He was deeply committed to the nineteenth century project of liberal Protestantism and was a major architect of the influential school of theology at Marburg. See J.-C. Kaiser, “Adolf Jülicher als Zeitgenosse: eine biographische Skizze,” in Dialog mit Adolf Jülicher, 257–86.

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be entertained. This may appear to be a rather brazen repudiation of Jülicher. The reality is more nuanced, however, and a simple return to fanciful, ahistorical interpretation is not intended. The controverted issue of locating allegory in the Gospel parables has been frequently reviewed.252 At the outset, one may simply observe that the narrow opposition of Jülicher, Jeremias, and Dodd no longer dominates scholarship.253 On the contrary, a good number of scholars are now content to describe Jesus’ parables as allegories. 254 The very important article of Ryan Schellenberg deserves mention here.255 Adopting the narratological terminology of Gérard Genette, Schellenberg demonstrates convincingly that “Luke habitually blurs the boundary between the metadiegetic world of Jesus’ stories with his own story of Jesus.”256 In a process called metalepsis, characters and motifs from the outer frame – Luke’s narrative about the man from Nazareth – thus regularly penetrate the embedded world of the parables (e.g. Luke 12:41–45; 14:15–24). In this way, the interaction of different narrative levels in the Gospel (which are not hermetically sealed spaces) becomes constitutive of meaning, and “what interpreters have long treated – or denigrated – as allegory may instead be a function of this narrative trope.”257 As Schellenberg reveals, interest in the complexity of the narrative world is now regnant. Metzger’s work confirms this, but also raises concerns. His postmodern stress on the “hopelessly polyvalent” nature of the parables –



252 See, e.g., Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 15–17; and John Meier, A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus: Volume V, Probing the Authenticity of the Parables (AYBRL; New Haven: Yale University, 2016) 82–8. 253 The disrepute of Allegory has been traced to the reaction of German Romanticism against French neo-classicism. See, e.g., Mary Ford, “Towards the Restoration of Allegory: Christology: Epistemology and Narrative Structure,” St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly (1990) 161–96; Robert L. Wilken, “In Defense of Allegory,” Modern Theology 14 (1998) 197–212; and Graham Keith, “Can Anything Good Come out of Allegory? The Cases of Origen and Augustine” EvQ 70 (1998) 23–49. 254 See, e.g., Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 16; Craig Blomberg, Interpreting the Parables (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1990) 29–69; Boucher, Parables; and John Dominic Crossan, Cliffs of Fall (New York: Seabury, 1980) 96–7; “Parable, Allegory, and Paradox,” Semiology and the Parables (Daniel Patter, ed.; Pittsburgh: Pickwick, 1976) 271–8. 255 Ryan Schellenberg, “Which Master? Whose Steward? Metalepsis and Lordship in the Parable of the Prudent Steward (Luke 16.1–13),” JSNT 30 (2008) 263–88. 256 Schellenberg, 269. According to Genette, the first narrative level – Luke’s story about Jesus – is called the diegetic or intradiegetic level; the second level – on which the embedded stories of the parables are found – is called the metadiegetic; and the third narrative level – that of the narrator, Luke himself – is the extradiegetic level. See Gérard Genette, Narrative Discourse: An Essay in Method (J. E. Lewin, trans.; Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, 1980) 228–34; and Narrative Discourse Revisited (J. E. Lewin, trans.; Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, 1988) 92–4. 257 Schellenberg, “Metalepsis,” 272.

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born of powerful currents in contemporary philosophy and criticism – could not be more welcoming to layered meanings, or more contrary to Jülicher’s single precise Vergleichspunkt. 258 Jülicher, of course, was alarmed at the eisegesis he saw in interpretations that coopted the parables for private theological interests. Metzger’s extreme perspective (“scriptable narratives”) represents, perhaps, the revenge of eisegesis: an overzealous assertion that alongside authors, readers are also contextualized contributors to the construction of the meaning of a text. Some middle ground between these exegetical extremes is desirable: controllable with Jülicher, yet polyvalent with Metzger. The hermeneutical discussion here is complex – in many ways unnecessarily so.259 Helpful clarifications, such as Schellenberg’s narrative analysis of metalepsis, which is not a reader response theory, and Klauck’s important distinction between allegory (i.e. a symbolic mode of thought, rather than a Gattung) and allegorizing (i.e. the assignment of unintended, hidden meanings to a text) are simple enough and help ward off obtuse objections. 260 But the frequent “extreme modern reaction to extreme patristic distortions,” on the one hand, and mystifying post-modern appeals to the parables’ “seething flux that threatens to unsettle interpretative repose,” on the other, accomplish little.261 As often, it is more productive to be concrete – and here Luke’s relation to the attested phenomenon of Gospel allegory is of interest. In contrast to the inclination of Mark and Matthew, the transparency of Luke’s parables has been a dogma for many scholars. It is no accident that Luke was central to Jülicher’s program. John Drury, for instance, in this same line of scholarship writes: “The L parables tell themselves. We need no key; there is no code to break. People act so intelligibly that a modest knowledge of human character is all we need to grasp them.”262 Frank Stagg’s study of



258 Adolf Jülicher, Die Gleichnisrede Jesu (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1969). 259 See, e.g., Paul Ricoeur, Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning (Fort Worth, TX: Texas Christian University, 1976) 52–6; Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (Toronto: University of Toronto, 2006); and Gerhard Kurz, Metapher, Allegorie, und Symbol (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988). 260 See Hans-Josef Klauck, Allegorie und Allegorese in synoptischen Gleichnistexten (NTA 14; Münster: Aschendorff, 1986). Charles E. Carlston (“Parable and Allegory Revisited: An Interpretative Review,” CBQ 43 [1981) 242) calls Klauck’s work “surely the most learned study of the parables in any language since Jülicher.” See also Kurt Erlemann, “Allegory, Allegorese, Allegorisierung,” in Hermeneutik der Gleichnisse Jesu: Methodische Neuansätze zum Verstehen urchristlicher Parabeltexte (Ruben Zimmermann and Gabi Kern, eds.; WUNT 231; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 482–93. 261 Meier, Probing the Authenticity of the Parables, 85; and Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 23–4. 262 John Drury, The Parables in the Gospels: History and Allegory (New York: Crossroads, 1985) 116, cf. 111.

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Luke’s theology of parables presents a similar view. He speaks easily of “the point” of this or that parable and observes how, in comparison with the Markan and Matthean forms of the Parable of the Sower, Luke appears uncomfortable with the idea of encoded, esoteric parables (cf. Luke 8:9–15).263 A reply to this scholarship is in order, but Metzger’s attempt to claim Luke as a calculated riddler is unlikely and misses the crucial point, which concerns Luke’s broader project of parable telling.264 In the first place, Luke’s adjustment of Mark 4:12 should not be misread (as Stagg has done). Luke’s discomfort appears to be less with “hidden” meanings and more with the apparent idea in Mark 4:12c that repentance and forgiveness are somehow precluded by Jesus’ use of the parables. This, after all, would undermine a major preoccupation of the Gospel. Luke 8:10 consequently drops only µήποτε ἐπιστρέψωσιν καὶ ἀφεθῇ αὐτοῖς from Mark’s citation of Isa 6:9–10, preserving βλέποντες µὴ βλέπωσιν, καὶ ἀκούοντες µὴ συνιῶσιν.265 Such sensitivity to repentance exposes the key point. Luke regularly depicts Jesus using parables, not simply to teach his disciples, but to urge his opponents to change their minds and their lives. It is striking, in fact, just how many of the L parables are addressed to outsiders, often Pharisees and lawyers (Luke 7:41–43; 10:29–35; 12:16–20; 13:6–9, 24– 25; 14:7–10, 28–32; 15:8–9; 15:11–32; 16: 19–31; 18: 9–14).266 The distance Luke keeps from esotericism in the parables is thus subordinated to a very specific narrative dynamic: Jesus is actively working to persuade and threaten and cajole a group of outsiders, i.e. the elite in Israel. Seen from this vantage, the narrative world depicting Jesus’ efforts at turning the Pharisees flows into these porous parables in widely recognized ways. The elder brother in the Prodigal Son (15:11–32), for instance, calls the grumbling Pharisees to account by portraying their behavior in narrative form.267 In the parable of the Great Banquet (14:15–24) “a mirror is held up before the lawyers and Phari-

263

See Frank Stagg, “Luke’s Theological Use of Parables,” Review and Expositor 94 (1997) 215–29. See also Charles Hendrick, The Parables as Poetic Fiction: The Creative Voice of Jesus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994) 20; and Luke Timothy Johnson, Gospel of Luke (Sacra Pagina 3; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1991) 132. 264 Greg Forbes’ (The God of Old: The Role of the Lukan Parables in the Purpose of Luke’s Gospel [Library of New Testament Studies: Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2000) effort to see in Luke’s Parables a special message about God calculated for Gentile Godfearers goes well beyond the evidence. It is better to stay within the level of the narrative. 265 Luke cites the Isaiah text in full at the end of Acts (28:26–27). This has an ominous significance and reveals a narrative movement from the Gospel to Acts. 266 See J. Stanley Glen, The Parables of Conflict in Luke (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962). 267 See, e.g., Boucher, Mysterious Parable, 20–1; and Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 133–4. On the application of the parable, Snodgrass observes that “those who reject Luke’s context do not offer any convincing alternative, or they still find the parable applied to the Pharisees.”

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sees” in which they can perceive themselves and the risk they run by continuing to reject Jesus’ preaching.268 The Lukan parable of the Minas (19:11–27), with its peculiar subplot of the rejected king, “verwandelt die Geschichte in eine auf das Schicksal Jesu hin transparente Allegorie.”269 Luke quite plainly plays with “coded” meanings in his parables. In this way, an allegorical approach is not really so venturesome.270 One may even, from this perspective, agree that Lukan parables are indeed “transparent.”271 This transparency is not ordered to abstract universal ethical lessons, however. It is designed, rather, as an open challenge to those resistant characters that are drawn up into Jesus’ story in the story. The allegorical dynamic at work in the parables opens up a symbolic space of relations quite beyond any impersonal moral message. This dimension of meaning does not invite promiscuous eisegesis, however. The polyvalence of the parables can be controlled through an acknowledgement of the narrative as a privileged interpretative context. This is a key methodological point. The (excessive) contemporary stress on the elusive character of the parables recalls Dodd’s early notion of “sufficient doubt.”272 Thus, the perspective that the parables are unresolvable riddles, common especially in authors like John Dominic Crossan, derives in large part from Dodd’s original policy of prying the texts loose from their narrative homes and placing them in the Sitz im Leben Jesu. This project may be interesting and worthwhile, but it



268 See Fitzmyer (Luke, 1050–4, here 1054) who discusses the relationship between Luke 14:15–24 and the parallel in the Gospel of Thomas §64, highlighting Luke’s “allegorization of the original parable.” See also Joachim Jeremias, Die Gleichnisse Jesu (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1952) 34. 269 François Bovon, Das Evangelium nach Lukas, Bd. 3 (EKK 3; Zürich: Benziger, 2001) 289. The possibility (or likelihood) of a preexisting allegory in this parable (cf. Jeremias, Gleichnisse Jesu, 68) cannot count against Luke’s narrative endorsement of the perspective. 270 See the very helpful discussion of C. Kavin Rowe, Early Narrative Christology: The Lord in the Gospel of Luke (BZNW 139; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2006) 151–7. Rowe demonstrates that the title “Lord” which appears in various Lukan parables points to Jesus. 271 While it is important to avoid hypostatizing “L” as a theologically or literarily homogeneous written document, it is helpful to ask what common features bind these traditions unique to Luke. One important feature that should be registered is Luke’s tendency to interpret these parables. Whereas most of the parables he shares with Matthew or Mark are presented without concluding comment or application, L parables very frequently append some logion which draws out the intended meaning (e.g. 7:44–47; 10:36–37; 11:9– 10; 12:21; 14:11; 14:33–35; 15:10; 16:9–13; 17:10; 18:8b, 14b). Metzger has not accounted for this phenomenon. 272 “At its simplest a parable is a metaphor or simile drawn from nature or common life, arresting the hearer by its vividness or strangeness, and leaving the mind in sufficient doubt about its precise application to tease it into active thought,” C. H. Dodd, Parables of the Kingdom (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1961) 5.

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fails to accredit the interpretative clues that the evangelists have provided. These clues may remain underdetermined in various ways; but it is simply false to imagine that the parables are not elaborately contextualized. The most important context is Luke’s story about Jesus, who announces the Jubilee of forgiveness, dies on the cross, and comes back risen from the dead. This broad host narrative interacts with the embedded narratives of the parables in objective, if often only suggestive ways. The result must be an exegetical approach that allows room for a distinct Christological resonance in reckoning with these texts. Ultimately, a much richer narrative theology informs Luke’s vision than Jülicher allowed. Yet this richness is canonically configured, so that objective parameters still govern the evocative quality of the parables. This narrative space presents the key for unlocking the richness of Luke’s charity parables. 1.4.3 Narrative Theology New Testament scholars, including interpreters of Luke’s Gospel, are increasingly resorting to the category of “narrative theology.”273 This move is at once appropriate and helpful, and yet freighted with problematic overtones. On the one hand, it simply acknowledges διήγησις as the specific modality of Lukan theology. To this extent, narrative theology merely strives to be genre sensitive in culling doctrine from the Gospel. On the other hand, the associations of the label as it has been used by systematic theologicans such as Hans Frei, George Lindbeck and Robert Jensen, carry a real danger of abandoning a necessary commitment to objectivity and must be carefully avoided.274 A similar flight from ontology is detectable is the work of certain influential exegetes, Richard Bauckham, for instance, who builds directly upon Frei (among others). 275 No bracketing or reduction of history and metaphysics to a kind of self-contained story world is here intended. On the contrary, the precise conviction driving the present project is that a profound historical truth claim about Jesus’ resurrection has actively



273 See, e.g., C. Kavin Rowe, Early Narrative Christology; also, e.g., Joshua Leim, Matthew’s Theological Grammar: The Father and the Son (WUNT II/402; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015); Thomas Söding, “‘Als sie sahen, was geschehen war…’ (Luke 23:49): Zur narrativen Soteriologie des lukanischen Kreuzigungberichts,” ZTK 104 (2007) 381–403; Dennis Hamm, “What the Samaritan Leper Sees: The Narrative Christology of Luke 17:11–19,” CBQ 56 (1992) 273−87; and idem., “The Freeing of the Bent Woman and the Restoration of Israel,” JSNT 31 (1987) 23–44. 274 See especially the critique of Francesca Aran Murphy, God Is Not a Story: Realism Revisited (New York: Oxford University, 2007). 275 For a full discussion of this issue, including the Christological perspectives Bauckham inherits from Jürgen Moltmann, see Anthony Giambrone, “Neo-Arians, Richard Bauckham, and the Revenge of Alexandrian Exegesis: In Search of an Ecclesial Hermeneutic,” Angelicum, forthcoming.

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Chapter 1: Reading Luke on Charity

reshaped an important type of Second Temple Jewish discourse about salvation. Luke’s own firm belief in the “certainty” (ἀσφάλεια) of the things reported about Jesus was a commitment of such revolutionary and gripping power that it became the organizing center of all his thought. Accordingly, his literary representation of this claim, dressed (at times) in inherited charity tropes and inscribed within fictive parables, functions as a mode of historical witness to his new vision of reality. One finds here something similar to what Erich Auerbach famously detected: another way that the rhetoric of the Gospels attests a new conception of the world through an upsetting of the conventions of literary mimesis.276 Luke’s charity parables function as stories within a story, and the interaction of these nested narratives with the outer story world is both deliberate and diverse. No argument is mounted here that a single tightly conceived Christology controls all the parables, not even all the parables studied here.277 Quite the opposite. Jesus appears variously in the role of a creditor, an agent of mercy (and debtor), and (fleetingly) in the face of the poor. By thus telling the charity story in different ways, the parables resemble a polyphonic chorus, commenting on the (“polyvalent”) main drama and exposing the polymorphous nature of Jesus’ action. Behind these various deployments, however, is a kind of master narrative – at least relatively speaking. 278 The Gospel itself is also a story within a story: in this case, framed by the grand tale of Israel’s release (Exodus) from debt-bondage. This all-important tale embeds Luke’s parables at another canonical level, within the world of the Old Testament narrative. Without pretending to exhaust the contextualization of the parables, then, the following chapter will begin to sketch something of this debt-bondage storyline and the way Luke has rewritten it around Jesus.

276

See Erich Auerbach, Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature (Princeton: Princeton University 2003); and especially Justin Taylor, The Treatment of Reality in the Gospels: Five Studies (Cahiers de la Revue biblique 78; Paris: Gabalda, 2011). 277 For this reason, the narrative approach undertaken here is not pursued as a cumulative study. 278 N. T. Wright (Jesus and the Victory of God [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996] 126–31, 179) has advanced the view that all the parables tell Israel’s story in miniature. This has merit, if the idea can also be pressed too far. See Klyne Snodgrass, “Reading and Overreading the Parables in Jesus and the Victory of God,” in Jesus and the Restoration of Israel: A Critical Assessment of N. T. Wright’s “Jesus and the Victory of God” (Carey Newman, ed.; Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1999) 61–76.



Chapter 2

“A Certain Creditor”: Sin as Debt in Lukan Theology 2.1 Introduction 2.1 Introduction

Specialized studies on the use of wealth in Luke’s Gospel have not properly sounded the foundations of Luke’s preoccupation with economic themes. In a particular way, the metaphor of sin as a debt, which to a substantial degree stands behind the high estimate of almsgiving in early Jewish and Christian contexts, has not been systematically considered as a Lukan conception. The idea, however, was massively productive in the Second Temple period and deeply informs the theology of sources very close to Luke’s Gospel: particularly, Second Isaiah, 11QMelchizedek, and the Gospel of Matthew. It is surprising, then, how frequently scholars have, on the thin basis of Luke 11:4, casually repeated the view that Luke distances himself from this “debt” theology. The failure to trace Luke’s own appropriation of the sin as debt metaphor has led to the neglect of several key Gospel passages in the repertoire of Lukan wealth texts. The story of the sinful woman, with its parable of the two debtors (Luke 7:36–50), and the saying about reconciling with one’s opponent (12:57–59) are of particular interest here. Each exposes a peculiarly Lukan Christology in which Jesus plays the role of Israel’s creditor. At the same time, these texts also expose how the “debt release” (ἄφεσις) offered by God through Jesus is bound to the “debtor” producing “fruits worthy of repentance” through charitable deeds. This precise conjunction of God’s forgiveness of sins by Jesus and a corresponding economic mercy on the part of sinners is uniquely Lukan. It structures his distinctive shaping of the Our Father and distinguishes his vision in an important way from Matthean theology. Indeed, Luke’s distance here from Matthew might be considered a just gauge of the typical Lukan perspective on charity and his theological use of economic imagery. The purpose of this chapter will be to expose the roots of Luke’s interest in charity by exploring his engagement with the sin as debt metaphor. The chapter will progress in several stages. First, the pervasive presence of the metaphor in Second Temple Judaism will be registered, with special attention to the sources closest to Luke (§2.2.1), particularly Matthew’s Gospel (§2.2.2). Next, it will be shown that Luke’s version of the Our Father (Luke 11:4) does

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not reveal a Hellenistic discomfort with the idea of sin as debt (§2.3.1), but rather articulates a particular relation between divine and human mercy (§2.3.2). After this will come a treatment of the story of the sinful woman (Luke 7:36–50). This will indicate how the interrelated divine and human expressions of mercy respectively correspond to a particular “Creditor Christology” (§2.4.1) and a construction of repentance as redemptive charity (§2.4.2). A contextual analysis of Luke 12:57–59, within the larger discourse of Luke 12:13–13:9, will follow (§2.5). Here the same Christology and emphasis on almsdeeds as “fruits worthy of repentance” will be exposed, even while the stress on judgment is intensified. The chapter will end with an excursus on debt slavery in the famous Nazareth Sermon (Luke 4:16–30). This final section will explore explicit contacts with the comparative material surveyed in §2.2, i.e. Deutero-Isaiah and 11QMelchizedek, in connection with the notion of a Jubilee release and the “Devil’s Ransom” soteriology.

2.2 Sins as Debts in the Lukan Context 2.2 Sins as Debts

2.2.1 Sins as Debts in Second Temple Judaism Scholars have long recognized the Aramaic use of ‫“( חובא‬debt”) to designate sin.1 Only recently, however, has the deep significance of this lexical datum come to light. Gary Anderson, in particular, has exposed the immense productivity of the implicit economic metaphor in both Jewish and Christian thought. 2 As Anderson explains, before the influence of Aramaic had been felt in the Hebrew language,3 sin was conceived of as a weight to be borne

1

See, e.g., Gustav Dalman, Die Worte Jesu (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs’sche, 1930) 335–8; Hauck, “ὀφείλω,” TDNT V, 561–3; and Paul Joüon, “La pécheresse de Galilée et la parabole des deux débiteurs (Luc, 7, 36–50),” Recherches de science religieuse 25 (1939) 615–9. The Aramaic datum is absent from most early Lukan commentaries (e.g. Hahn, Godet, Schlatter, Schanz, Lagrange, Easton, Creed) and only enters the commentary tradition after Dalman and Joüon. 2 Anderson, Sin. See also, “From Israel’s Burden to Israel’s Debt,” 1–30. Anderson’s work has been very favorably received. See Sommer, “Hedgehog and Fox,” 373–82. The coupling of debt language with other economic imagery establishes the real power of the Aramaic metaphor for sin. James Keenan (“Sin: A History,” TS 72 [2011] 922) rightly observes: “The singular concept of debt is…less important a finding than the exhaustive financial vocabulary (qua metaphors!) of debt, borrower, credit, loan, redemption, etc.” But see also the careful criticisms of Joseph Lam, “Sin: A History,” RBL 09/2010; and idem., The Metaphorical Patterning of the Sin-Concept in Biblical Hebrew (Ph.D. Dissertation: University of Chicago, 2012). 3 The growing influence of Aramaic on Hebrew in the Second Temple period is “in der hebraistischen Forschung unstrittig” – though the extent of this influence is a matter of debate. See, e.g., Michael Pietsch, “Ein Aramaismus im spätbiblischen Hebräisch? Be-

2.2 Sins as Debts

69

(‫)נשא עון‬, while sin’s removal was enacted through such mechanisms as the scapegoat.4 Through the great cultural and lexical shifts of post-exilic society, however, this earlier construction was displaced by the idea of sin as debt.5 This language erected new metaphoric scaffolding on which transgression and its removal were reconceived. Sin and salvation came to be imagined as a financial transaction. The adoption of such restructured soteriology was profound and, according to Anderson, represents “one of the most striking developments in biblical religion.”6 The pervasive influence of the debt metaphor during the New Testament period must be appreciated more than it has been to this point. It does not represent the kind of isolated linguistic detail that explains only a stray Gospel expression here or there, as it has normally been treated in New Testament studies.7 Rather, debt imagery – with all the correlative concepts this

obachtungen zum biblisch-hebräischen Verbalsystem in der erzählenden Literatur des Zweiten Temples,” in “Sieben Augen auf Einem Stein” (Sach 3,9): Studien zur Literatur des Zweiten Tempels (Friedhelm Hartenstein and Michael Pietsch, eds.; Germany: Neukirchner, 2007) 287–307. 4 See Anderson, Sin, 22–3; and Lam, Sin-Concept, 144–277. On the history and significance of the scapegoat ritual, see Calum Carmichael, “The Origin of the Scapegoat Ritual,” VT 50 (2000) 167–82; and Eric Gilchrest, “For the Wages of Sin Is…Banishment: An Unexplored Substitutionary Motif in Lev 16 and the Ritual of the Scapegoat,” EQ 85 (2013) 36–51. 5 See Lam, Sin-Concept, 280–378. An aspect of the “history of sin” that Anderson’s focus on burden and debt underestimates is sin understood as defilement (also illness, which is closely related). This admittedly controversial conception has roots in the priestly legislation and is especially important at Qumran. See Jonathan Klawans, Impurity and Sin in Ancient Judaism (New York: Oxford University, 2000). See also, e.g., Lam, Sin-Concept, 403–37; Mila Ginskurskaya, “The Idea of Sin-Impurity: The Dead Sea Scrolls in the Light of Leviticus,” TynB 60 (2009) 309–12; Martha Himmelfarb, “Impurity and Sin in 4QD, 1QS, and 4Q512,” DSD 8 (2001) 9–37; and Loren Stuckenbruck, “Wisdom and Holiness at Qumran: Strategies for Dealing with Sin in the Community Rule,” in Where Shall Wisdom Be Found? Wisdom in the Bible, the Church, and the Contemporary World (Stephen Barton, ed.; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1999) 47–60. The coexistence of the various metaphors for sin (weight, debt, defilement) at Qumran challenges too simplistic a view of the pattern of development. On the weight metaphor at Qumran, see Gary Anderson, “Two Notes on Measuring Character and Sin at Qumran,” in Things Revealed: Studies in Early Judaism and Christian Literature in Honor of Michael E. Stone (Esther Chazon, David Satran, and Ruth Clements, eds.; JSJSup 89; Leiden: Brill, 2004) 141–7. For a very canonical approach focusing on divine discipline, human response in the form of a cry to God, and divine grace as the ultimate remedy for sin, see Mark J. Boda, A Severe Mercy: Sin and Its Remedy in the Old Testament (Siphrut 1; Winona Lake, IN: Einsenbrauns, 2009). 6 Anderson, Sin, 9. 7 This is an important, general methodological point for the use of Aramaic in Gospel studies. See above all the critique of previous scholarship (Torrey, Burney, Black, et. al.) and the revised statement of method proposed by Maurice Casey, Aramaic Sources of Mark’s Gospel (SNTSMS 102; Cambridge: Cambridge, 1998) 1–63. Casey insists upon the

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entails, e.g., credit, loans, repayment, etc. – represents a fundamental idiom of Second Temple theological thought and must be approached as a kind of religious worldview. A consideration of several texts will indicate how this metaphoric paradigm directly shaped the theological context in which Luke worked. 2.2.1.1 Deutero-Isaiah The final chapters of the book of Isaiah (40–66) are recognized as a major influence on Lukan theology (cf. Luke 2:30–32; 3:4–6; 4:18–19; 7:22; 19:46; 22:37; Acts 7:49–50; 13:34, 47).8 To this extent, it is significant that the language of redemption from slavery “becomes the central term of Second Isaiah’s vocabulary describing Israel’s deliverance from sin.”9 While the experience of the Exodus ultimately lies behind this terminology (Isa 43:14–21; 48:21; 52:3–6; 63:7–14; cf. Exod 6:6; 15:13), economic debt imagery also shapes the prophet’s vision.10 Thus, “frequently in Isaiah 40–66 one encounters the metaphor of Israel as a debt-slave, the Exile as the period of servi-

need for thick socio-lexical reconstructions of the Aramaic world behind relevant Gospel texts. The highly fragmentary DSS texts in which the Aramaic expression “sin/debt” is found have perhaps inhibited such robust cultural reconstructions, cf. 4QMess ar 2:17; 11QtgJob 34:4, 38:2–3; 4Q504 2.15; 11QPsa 19.9–10. In addition to Casey, see the comments of Lincoln Hurst (“The Neglected Role of Semantics in the Search for the Aramaic Words of Jesus,” JSNT 28 [1986] 63–80), who stresses the need to expand the contextual fields in which Aramaic terms are analyzed and understood. 8 “Second” (or “Trito-”) Isaiah would, of course, have been a perfectly alien concept for Luke, and scholars must avoid anachronism. The diachronic designation will be used here only to help trace the chronological emergence and development of sin as debt language. On the influence of Isaiah on Luke, see, e.g., Peter Mallen, Reading and Transformation of Isaiah in Luke-Acts (Library of New Testament Studies 367; London: T & T Clark, 2008); David Pao, Acts and the Isaianic New Exodus (WUNT II/130; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000); Robert O’Toole, “How Does Luke Portray Jesus as Servant of YHWH,” Bib 81 (2000) 328–46; Thomas Moore, “‘To the End of the Earth’: The Geographical and Ethnic Universalism of Acts 1:8 in Light of Isaianic Influence on Luke,” JETS 40 (1997) 389–99; Jack T. Sanders, “The Prophetic Use of the Scriptures in Luke-Acts,” in Early Jewish and Christian Exegesis: Studies in Memory of William Hugh Brownlee (Craig Evans and W. F. Stinespring, eds.; Atlanta: Scholars, 1987) 191–8; and James A. Sanders, “Isaiah in Luke,” Int 36 (1982) 144–55; and David Seccombe, “Luke and Isaiah,” NTS 27 (1981) 252–9. See also Joseph Blenkinsopp, Opening the Sealed Book: Interpretations of the Book of Isaiah in Late Antiquity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006) esp. 129–68. 9 Anderson, Sin, 46; cf. 44–54. See also John Sietze Bergsma, The Jubilee from Leviticus to Qumran: A History of Interpretation (VTSup 115; Leiden; Brill, 2007) 191–3. The word ‫ גאל‬occurs twenty-two times in the book in its nominal and verbal forms. 10 See Klaus Baltzer, “Liberation from Debt Slavery after the Exile in Second Isaiah and Nehemiah,” in Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross (Patrick D. Miller, Jr., ed.; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987) 477–84.

2.2 Sins as Debts

71

tude, and the Lord, of course, as the ‫גאל‬, the redeemer.”11 The Lord, for instance, asks directly: Which of my creditors (‫ )מנושי‬was it to whom I sold you off? You were only sold off for your sins (‫…)בעונתיכם נמכרתם‬ Is my hand really too short to redeem (‫( ”?)מפדות‬Isa 50:1–2)12

God did not hand over his people to the gods of the nations as though he were forced to surrender them, like a debtor when his creditors come calling. 13 Rather, Israel’s own transgressions have them in arrears, and they must now work off their debt in cruel servitude – while the Lord retains the resources to pay the ransom (cf. 43:24).14 Isaiah’s explicit likening of sin to debt is clear and confirmed by the phrase ‫בעונתיכם נמכרתם‬. As Jan Koole observes, ‫ עון‬here “not only implies the idea of ‘sin’ but also of ‘debt,’” and the beth pretii can be recognized by the use of the verb ‫מכר‬.15 The text is thus a perfect illustration of the metaphorical transformation of “sin” described by Anderson. Whereas Ezekiel still speaks of “bearing sin” (‫נשא עון‬, e.g. Ezek 4:4–6), Deutero-Isaiah – while also retain-

11

Bergsma, Jubilee, 192. Cf. Isa 49:7–9; Neh 5:8; Ps 44:13; Deut 32:30. The use of ‫ פדות‬in Isa 50:2 is significant. As Baltzer (“Liberation from Debt Slavery,” 481) indicates, it represents “a terminus technicus for freeing in the context of the institution of debt slavery…. Second Isaiah normally employs the verb ga’al, which has a broader meaning, in the sense of the restoration of a previous status. The word ga’al is primarily oriented towards legal relations in the clan; pādâ belongs to the realm of commercial relations. Both are used to describe release from debt slavery.” Language similar to Isaiah’s appears in Ps 130:8 (‫והוא יפדה את ישראל‬ ‫)מכל עונתיו‬. On this verse, Frank-Lother Hossfeld and Erich Zenger (Psalmen 101–150 [HThKAT; Freiberg: Herder, 2008] 589) note two possibilities: “Zum einen meint ‫פדה‬ ‘freikaufen’ den Freikauf aus der Sklaverei (vgl. Ex 21, 8; übertragen auf Israels Befreiung aus Ägypten: Dtn 7,8; 9, 26; 13, 6; 15, 15; 21, 8; 24, 18; 2 Sam 7, 23; Mi 6, 4; Ps 78, 42; 111, 9; Neh 1, 10), zum anderen kann damit die Zahlung eines ‘Sühnegeldes’ bzw. einer ‘Abfindungssumme’ an Stelle der zu erwartenden Todesstrafe (vgl. Z.B. Ex 21, 28–30; Ps 49, 9.16) bezeichnet werden.” 13 John Oswalt (The Book of Isaiah [NICOT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998] 318) comments: “He calls them to show any creditor who could have forced him to sell them against his will. No, it is their fault (for your sins) that they have been put away and sold, not God’s.” See also, Jan Koole, Isaiah III: Volume 2 / Isaiah 49–55 (Historical Commentary on the Old Testament; Leuven: Peeters, 1998) 86, 90. 14 Baltzer (“Liberation from Debt Slavery,” 479) observes the Lord’s gratuitous, substitutionary action in redeeming: “Yahweh as master has property rights over his servant, whom he made and chose…. [S]hould the servant fail to serve, he can be admonished and punished; in extreme cases, this means the slave’s sale, abrogating his legal relationship to the master. If the master buys the slave back, at his request – redeems him – he far exceeds the limits of his obligation. In this instance, it is the master who pays the price for the servant’s redemption. Jacob/Israel does not bear the cost.” 15 Koole, Isaiah III, 91. 12

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ing this language (e.g. Isa 53:11; 1:4) – begins to construe ‫ עון‬in economic terms. The idea of Isa 50:1 that sinful Israel has been “sold” (‫ )מכר‬on account of its sins is ultimately a deuteronomic expression for the nation’s self-surrender into the hands of evil (Deut 28:68; 32:30; Judg 2:14; 3:8; 4:2; 10:7; 1 Sam 12:9; cf. Ps 44:13; Judg 4:9; 1 Kgs 21:20, 25; 1 Macc 1:15; Rom 7:14; 4Q504 2.15; 11QPsa 19.9–10; also Joel 4:4–8).16 To that extent, the emergent economic model of sin and expiation, operative in Deutero-Isaiah, has important pre-exilic roots, which Anderson has left unexplored.17 The interesting feature here is that even in the prospect of being “sold off” as debt-slaves to the nations, the hope of redemption is yet inscribed in these writings. Canonically, the foundational text is the final curse in the great listing of covenant curses in Deuteronomy 28. And I will return you to Egypt in ships, by the way I told you that you would not see again. And you will try to sell yourselves there to your enemies as male and female slaves (‫ – )והתמכרתם… לעבדים ולשפחות‬but there will be no buyer (Deut 28:68).18

Deuteronomy pictures Israel’s sin as an epic reversal of the Exodus event, and from here the “selling” of the people comes to depict the pattern of national sin. Yet, in the midst of this self-imposed destitution – indeed, as the very expression of it – they will be unable to alienate themselves entirely: “There will be no buyer” (‫)ואין קנה‬. The point is important because in the semantics of ‫ – מכר‬which should not in all cases be translated as “sell” – there is often a “transfer of rights and claims for a predetermined period without actually transferring ownership.”19 The “sale” of Israel is never final, in other words. In theological principle at least, Israelites could not be permanently enslaved (Lev 25:25; cf. Jer 34:8–22).20 Like the Land, they are and remain



16 Marc Philonenko (“Sur l’expression ‘vendu au péché’ dans l’épître aux Romains,” Revue de l’ Histoire des Religions 203 [1986] 41–52) sees the importance of Isa 50:1 on later formulations at Qumran and in Rom 7:14, but he gives no attention to the earlier use of this expression. 17 Anderson (Sin, 205 fn. 2) acknowledges the limits of his focus: “Suffice it to say…the image of sin as a debt that become so prominent in the Second Temple period did have a few examples from the First Temple period that it could build on.” 18 On this text, see Donald G. Schley, “Yahweh Will Cause You to Return to Egypt in Ships,” VT 35 (1985) 369–72; and D. J. Reimer, “Concerning Return to Egypt: Deuteronomy xvii 16 and xxviii 68 Reconsidered,” in Studies in the Pentateuch (J. A. Emerton, ed.; VTSup 61; Leiden: Brill, 1990) 217–29. Schley is concerned mainly with the phrase “in boats,” while Reimer sees Deut 28:68 as an early stage of anti-Egyptian polemic built upon Exod 14:13. No special attention has been given to the place of this text in relation to the deuteronomistic motif of being “sold” by sin. 19 Linpinski, TDOT VIII, 292 (emphasis added). Cf. b. B. Meṣ. 79a–b. 20 It is significant that the biblical model of Israel’s bondage is debt- rather than chattelslavery. On this significant distinction, Gregory Chirichigno (Debt-Slavery in Israel and

2.2 Sins as Debts

73

the “possession” (‫ )סגלה‬of God and will always, at some point, revert to him. Thus, “When Yahweh ‘sells’ his people to the enemies in Judg. 3:8; 4:2; 10:7f., this is only for a number of years, and the exiles, too, can count on the end of the exile.”21 Accordingly, the deuteronomist’s economic language of exile (‫)מכר‬, cast in the idiom of debt-slavery, was already implicitly ordered to the expectation of one of two possible eventualities outlined in the Torah. Like a “Hebrew” man caught in his debts, the nation could be caught by its sins and “sold” (Deut 15:12) – but only until either (i) the sins were paid for, by the one enslaved or by another, or until (ii) relief came by the year of release (cf. Lev 25:25–28, 39–40). Deeply inscribed in the earliest “sin as debt” soteriology is thus the hope and anticipation that Israel’s period of indentured service in exile will, in one way or another, have its inevitable end. The promise of freedom from debt-slavery implicit in the deuteronomic language is fulfilled in Isaiah’s vision. In fact, both potential outcomes of the slave metaphor – repayment and remission – find expression in the book. In Isa 40:2, Israel manages to come up with the payment: 1

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to the heart of Jerusalem, And declare to her that her term of service (‫ )צבאה‬is over, That her iniquity has been satisfied (‫;)נרצה‬ For she has received double (‫ )כפלים‬for all her sins (Isa 40:1–2).22

2

Anderson’s discussion of this passage exposes the thoroughgoing financial imagery, particularly in the interpretation of ‫רצה‬.23 This word carries a con-

the Ancient Near East [JSOT 141; Sheffield: JSOT, 1991] 143) observes: “In the ancient Near East debt-slaves were not identified with foreign chattel-slaves…[and] citizens who became debt-slaves were not to be regarded as the property of their creditors…While certain rights pertaining to debt-slaves were also in special cases extended to chattel-slaves (e.g., LH §119), the latter were always regarded as the property of their owners.” Chirichigno (185) further determines: “While it is possible that some of the biblical slave laws refer to both chattel- and debt-slaves, the term ‫ עברי‬was most likely employed in order to differentiate between the two classes of slaves…when the term ‫ עבד‬is qualified by the designation ‫עברי‬, as in Exod. 21.2 and Deut 15.12, the resultant expression ‫ עבד עברי‬refers specifically to debt slaves.” 21 Koole, Isaiah, 90. As Koole and others note, the translation “sell” is not quite accurate in these contexts. 22 On the tremendous importance of this text in Luke’s vision, see Pao, Acts and the Isaianic New Exodus, 37–69. 23 Anderson (Sin, 50–3) notes that Isaiah’s expression for satisfaction (‫ )רצה‬is “highly unusual,” but he rejects the notion of two roots and traces the etymology of this word to a single idea: “A verb (nirṣah) that once described an individual as quit of his obligation to pay a vow naturally comes to mean someone who is quit of his obligation to repay a debt that has accrued through sin” (italics original). On this root, see Anderson, “From Israel’s Burden to Israel’s Debt,” 19–29. The “term of service” invoked here with the word ‫צבה‬

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tractual sense of providing the full payment of what is promised or owed. The logic of Isaiah’s image is therefore simple and works on a principle of just recompense. Israel’s Exile is presented as a set time of service that is now at last discharged. To this end, it is important to see that (pace Koole and Anderson) the double repayment is not mere hyperbole (cf. Isa 61:7–8).24 It is rather a reference to Jer 16:18 – “I will first exact double their iniquity and their sins (‫)ושלמתי ראשונה משנה עונם וחטאתם‬.”25 The Lord, who, like a harsh creditor, demanded back a double price for Israel’s sins, has now been repaid in full – both principal and interest.26 The passage in Isaiah 40 thus illustrates how “for the author of Second Isaiah, Israel’s sins at the close of the First Temple period had put her over her head in debt. Decades of penal service in Babylon would be required to satisfy its terms.” 27 The double measure of Israel’s comfort is very real, but it corresponds to a stern principle of justice in repayment. Trito-Isaiah preserves another image for the end of Israel’s servitude: debt release. The key text is Isa 61:1–2. This passage, which touches the very heart of Lukan theology, reimagines the debt-slavery metaphor as ending through a Jubilee.28 It seems likely that as the fresh hope of the early postExilic period, which found expression in Isa 40:1–2, soon faded, Israel came to see more clearly that it somehow still remained mired in the debt of its

recalls the Neo-Babylonian ṣābu, the compulsory work required of prisoners of war (like the Judeans). See Marius Terblanch, “The Theme of the Babylonian Exile as Imprisonment in Isaiah 42:22 and other Texts in Is 40–55,” Old Testament Essays 21 (2008) 482. The word conjures the notion of a day laborer (cf. Job 7:1–2; 14:14), a kind of indentured servant, who like a debt-slave is obligated to fulfill a time of service, after which his debts will be considered repaid and his slavery will come to an end. 24 See Koole, Isaiah, 55; and Anderson, Sin, 47. 25 On this reference in Isa 40:2, see Bradley Gregory, “The Post-Exilic Exile in Third Isaiah: Isa 61:1–3 in Light of Second Temple Hermeneutics,” JBL 126 (2007) 485. On Jer 16:18, Robert Carroll (Jeremiah [OTL; London: SCM, 1986] 345) cross-references Isa 40:2 and suggests that ‫( ראשונה‬missing in the LXX) “may be an explanatory gloss in MT noting that double punishment must precede the promise of return in vv. 14–15.” 26 Exorbitant rates of interest, as high as 100% per annum, were well known to the ancient world. See Michael Hudson and Marc Van de Mieroop, eds., Debt and Economic Renewal in the Ancient Near East (Bethesda, MD: CDL, 2002); and Richard Sylla and Sidney Homer, A History of Interest Rates (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, 2004). “If wealth is placed where it bears interest, it comes back to you redoubled,” The Instruction of Any (21st–22nd dynasty), in Miriam Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature: A Book of Readings: Volume 2: The New Kingdom (Berkeley: University of California, 1976) 138. 27 Anderson, Sin, 54. 28 See especially James Sanders, “From Isaiah 61 to Luke 4,” in Christianity, Judaism, and Other Greco-Roman Cults: Part I: New Testament (Jacob Neusner, ed.; Leiden: Brill, 1975) 75–106; and Gregory, ‘Post-Exilic Exile in Third Isaiah,” 475–96.

2.2 Sins as Debts

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sins. The more merciful mode of redemption by remission accordingly came into view. The passage, Isaiah’s archetypal proclamation of the “good news” of deliverance (‫לבשר‬, εὐαγγελίσασθαι; cf. 40:9; 41:27; 52:7), is impressively drafted as a proclamation of remittance: 1

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me Because the Lord has anointed me He has sent me to preach good news to the poor (‫)לבשר ענוים שלחני‬ To bind up the wounded of heart, 2 To proclaim release to captives (‫)לקרא לשבוים דרור‬ Freedom to the imprisoned; To proclaim a year of the Lord’s favor (‫)לקרא שנת רצון ליהוה‬ And a day of vindication by our God; To comfort all who mourn (Isa 61:1–2).

Many puzzles obscure the text, but the background in the Torah at least is clear. As Joseph Blenkinsopp explains, “the expression liqrō’ dĕror (‘proclaim freedom’) is a technical term for the solemn proclamation of the šemiṭṭâ (Jer 34:17), the seventh year ‘release,’ when fellow-Israelites who had been sold into indentured service were to be set free and their outstanding debts forgiven (Exod 21:2; Deut 15:1–11; Jer 34:8–22).”29 The “captives” in view here are thus best understood as indentured debt-slaves, rather than political prisoners or the spiritually blind. 30 While a message of economic

29

Joseph Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 50–66 (AB 19B; New York: Doubleday, 2003) 225. Blenkinsopp adds: “‘The Year of YHVH’s good pleasure’ (šĕnat rāṣôn laYHVH) probably refers to the same social institution.” See also the classic statement of Walther Zimmerli, “Das ‘Gnadenjahr des Herrn,” in Archäologie und Altes Testament: Festschrift für Kurt Galling zum 8. Jan. 1970 (Arnulf Kuschke and Ernst Kutsch, eds.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1970) 321–2. The Jubilee background is contested by John J. Collins, “A Herald of Good Tidings: Isa 61:1–3 and Its Actualization in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in The Quest for Context and Meaning: Studies in Biblical Intertextuality in Honor of James A. Sanders (Craig Evans and Shemaryahu Talmon, eds.; Biblical Interpretation Series; Leiden: Brill, 1997) 228; but see the response of Gregory, “Postexilic Exile in Third Isaiah,” 484–5. 30 See Claus Westermann Isaiah 40–66 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1969) 337, 366–7; and Willem A. M. Beuken, “Servant and Herald of Good Tidings: Isaiah 61 as an Interpretation of Isaiah 40–55,” in The Book of Isaiah: Le livre d’Isaïe (Jacques Vermeylen, ed.; BETL 81; Leuven: Leuven University, 1989) 418–19. Some scholars see in the opening for the ‫ אסורים‬a reference to the blind/deaf whose eyes/ears are shut up. On this issue, see Blenkinsopp, Isaiah, 219; Daniel L. Smith-Christopher, “Reassessing the Historical and Sociological Impact of the Babylonian Exile (597/587–539 BCE),” in Exile: Old Testament, Jewish, and Christian Conceptions (James Scott, ed.; JSJSup 56; Leiden: Brill, 1997) 28–31; and Shalom M. Paul, “Deutero-Isaiah and Cuneiform Royal Inscriptions,” in Essays in Memory of E. A. Speiser (William Hallo, ed.; New Haven: American Oriental Society, 1968) 182.

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liberation thus resonates through the text, 31 Bradley Gregory points out that “scholars are increasingly drawing attention to the fact that even if there are certain socio-political circumstances underlying these descriptions, that these circumstances are portrayed in language drawn from earlier traditions calls for an explanation.” 32 In other words, the Torah’s Jubilee legislation was invoked for a self-conscious reason. Specifically, in conformity to a broader trend of post-exilic reinterpretation – anticipated tentatively already in the deuteronomistic notion of ‫ מכר‬and perhaps explicit already in the “year of release” (‫ )שנת הדרור‬in Ezek 46:17 (cf. 40:1) 33 – “what was prescribed for individual Israelites in Leviticus 25 has been developed typologically in reference to the entire community.”34 In this way, the Jubilee release of debts in Isa 61:1–2 has become a promise of national restoration, based on the unstated premise that Israel has been ruinously indebted by her sins and the belief that the Lord, through his Servant, can graciously clear the account. 2.2.1.2 11QMelchizedek The economic metaphor for sin established in the post-exilic era continued to develop and exert its force around the turn of the era. This can be seen in the Dead Sea Scrolls (e.g. 4QMess ar 2:17; 11QtgJob 34:4; 38:2–3; 4Q504 2.15;

31

On the reference to the “poor,” see F. Festorazzi, “L’évangile des pauvres, Is 61, 1– 2a, 10–11,” AS 2/7 (1969) 28–33. 32 Gregory, “Postexilic Exile in Third Isaiah,” 482–3. 33 See Daniel Block, Ezekiel (NICOT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) 512, 679–81; and Walther Zimmerli, Ezekiel II: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel Chapters 25–48. (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1983) 346–7. See also John Bergsma (“The Restored Temple as ‘Built Jubilee’ in Ezekiel 40–48,” Proceedings EGL & MWBS 24 [2004] 75–86), who considers Zimmerli’s suggestion that the symbolic dimensions of the eschatological Temple refer to the Jubilee. The dating formula in Ezek 40:1 mentions the 25th year, half a Jubilee, and Bergsma (76) remarks: “Ezekiel finds himself in “mid-time” [i.e. an attested apocalyptic concept]: halfway between the time of judgment (for him, 597 B.C.E.) and the expected restoration. He would have construed the Exile has a jubilee period: just as the indebted Israelite had to serve up to fifty years before returning to home and family, so the nation as a corporate individual must ‘serve among the nations’ (Jer 25:11 LXX) until the coming of the jubilee.” On the likelihood of an historical Jubilee reference in Ezek 40:1, see Rodger Young, “The Talmud’s Two Jubilees and Their Relevance to the Date of the Exodus,” WTJ 68 (2006) 71–83. 34 Gregory, “Postexilic Exile in Third Isaiah,” 485. “By employing a typological relationship between the individual Israelite of Leviticus 25 and the entire postexilic community, Third Isaiah has moved the concept of the jubilee from a legal prescription to a prophetic-theological concept whereby the jubilee is indicative of eschatological deliverance, the same kind of hermeneutical move found in other Second Temple texts” (488).

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11QPsa 19.9–10).35 One of the most important places where the sin as debt idea emerges in the scrolls is in 11QMelchizedek (11Q13), a text deeply informed by Isa 61:1–2 and its sources in the Torah, and much discussed in Lukan studies (cf. Luke 4:16–30).36 2

And as for what he said, “in [this] year of Jubilee [each of you shall return to his property,” (Lev 24:13) concerning it, he said, “Now th]is is 3 [the manner of the remission:] every creditor shall remit what he has lent [his neighbor. He shall not press his neighbor or his brother it has been proclaimed] a remission 4 of Go[d.’ (Deut 15:2) Its interpretation] for the final days concerns the captives (Isa 61:1) who […] and whose 5 teachers have been hidden and kept secret, and from the inheritance of Melchizedek, fo[r…] and they are the inheritance of Melchizedek, who 6 will make them return (cf. Lev 25:13). And liberty (Lev 25:10) shall be proclaimed to them, to free (‫ )לעזוב‬them from [the debt of] all their iniquities (‫)עווניתיהמה‬. And this will happen 7 in the first week of the jubilee (‫( )היובל‬that occurs) after [the ni[ne] jubilees. And the day of Atonement is the end of the tenth Jubilee, (cf. Dan 9:24) 8 in which atonement shall be made for all the sons of [light and for] the men [of] the lot of Mel[chi]zedek […] over [th]em [ ] accor[ding to] a[ll] their [doing]s, for 9 it is the time for the ‘year of grace’ (Isa 61:2) of Melchizedek and [his] arm[ies, the nati]on [of] the holy ones of God.

The scenario here recalls the texts seen in Isaiah. Israel is suffering a term of punishment for nine long Jubilees, before Melchizedek appears in the tenth Jubilee to announce that the nation’s debts are now rescinded: a message quite like the prophet’s good news in Isa 61:1–2. There are a couple things to observe in this text. First, the use of ‫ לעזוב‬with ‫ עון‬is “bizarre,” for “in the Bible the verb la-‘azôb means ‘to leave, abandon,’ or even ‘to forsake’…. It never means ‘to free one from sins’ or ‘to forgive.’”37 The only way to understand the use here is by recognizing a calque on the Aramaic ‫שבק‬, which shares the semantic range of ‫עזב‬, but includes as well the meaning “to forgive a sin/debt.” 38 The author’s awkward Hebrew

35

In the Dead Sea Scrolls, the use of the debt metaphor for sin is widely muted by the scribal artifice of imitating an archaic biblical style. Its appearance in several places is thus all the more interesting. See Anderson, Sin, 33–9. 36 For the text and translation, see Florentino G. Martínez, The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader: Volume 1: Texts Concerned with Religious Law, Exegetical Texts and Parabiblical Texts (Donald Perry and Emmanuel Tov, eds.; Leiden: Brill, 2014) 391–7. See also Marinus de Jonge and A. S. van der Woude, “11Q Melchizedek and the New Testament,” NTS 12 (1965–66) 301–26; Josef Milik, “Milki-sedeq et Milki-resha’ dans les anciens écrits juifs et chrétiens,” JJS 23 (1972) 95–144; Paul Kobelski, Melchizedek and Melchiresha‘ (CBQMS 10; Washington: CBA, 1981); and Émile Puech, “Notes sur le manuscrit de 11QMelkisedeq,” RevQ 12 (1987) 483–514. 37 Anderson, Sin, 37. 38 Ibid.

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hence betrays his underlying Aramaic frame of reference in imaging sin as a debt-like thing. Second, more impressively, in line with this perspective, Lev 25:8–17 and Deut 15:2 have both been reinterpreted as texts about the forgiveness of sin instead of monetary debt, which was their original application.39 The allusion to Dan 9:24 in lines 7–8 confirms that the “expiation of guilt” (‫ )כפר עון‬is in view.40 For the author of 11Q13, the Torah’s promise of debt release has become the promise of a messianic amnesty forgiving Israel’s sins. 41 By means of Isa 61:1–3, James Sanders explains, “11QMelch eschatologizes the Jubilee year proclamation of Lev 25 and Deut 15.”42 Another element is also present here, already provisionally glimpsed in Isa 61:1–2: the growth of Israel’s national debt. The tenfold Jubilee paradigm envisioned in 11Q13 belongs to a growing sense in the Second Temple period for the staggering extent of Israel’s sin.43 Earlier texts like Jeremiah 25, Isaiah 40, and 2 Chronicles 36 were rather sanguine about Israel’s ability to pay off its debt in a generation. But when it appeared to many that the Exile was still in force generations later, a more sober accounting read the numbers in a different light.44 Jeremiah’s prophecy that Israel’s servitude would be spent in seventy years (Jer 25:11) played an important role in this recalculation. Specifically, when Daniel 9 extends the original seventy-year period by another “seventy weeks of years,” a ten-fold Jubilee (70 x 7 = 10 x 49) is put in

39

Ibid., 36–7. “Although it was clear that Deuteronomy 15 and Leviticus 25 had nothing to do with sin when they were composed, it was altogether natural for a biblical interpreter to understand them in this way.” On the interpretation of the Jubilee at Qumran, see Bergsma, Jubilee, 251–94. 40 The priestly identity of Melchizedek (cf. Ps 110) also points towards the atoning function of the Jubilee he proclaims. See Rick van de Water, “Michael or YWHW? Towards Identifying Melchizedek in 11Q13” JSP 16 (2006) 80. 41 See Anderson, “From Israel’s Burden to Israel’s Debt,” 14–18. This understanding does no violence to Isaiah’s literal sense, which was already a post-exilic re-reading of the Jubilee texts. See Gregory, “Postexilic Exile in Third Isaiah,” 475–96. 42 Sanders, “From Isaiah 61 to Luke 4,” 91. See Merrill Miller, “Function of Isaiah 61:1–2 in 11Q Melchizedek,” JBL 88 (1969) 467–9. Miller demonstrates that though Isa 61:1–3 is never quoted at length, it “stands behind our document and appears in the form of Stichwörter at crucial points.” The text’s key quotations of Lev 25:13, Isa 52:7, and Ps 82:1–2 (Torah, Nebiim, Ketubim) are all interpreted through Isa 61:1–2. 43 August Strobel (“Die Ausrufung des Jubeljahrs in der Nazarethpredigt Jesu: Zur apokalyptischen Tradition Lc 4,16–30,” in Jesus in Nazareth [W. Eltester, ed.; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972] 39–50) actually argues that Luke may have calculated the beginning of Jesus’ ministry using an apocalyptic calendar that would date the Nazareth sermon to the tenth and final Jubilee from Ezra’s return. 44 N. T. Wright has popularized the thesis that Israel in the Second Temple period still understood itself as being in Exile. This perspective has been critiqued and confirmed in a more nuanced way by Brant Pitre, Jesus, the Tribulation, and the End of the Exile (WUNT II/204; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005).

2.2 Sins as Debts

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place. 45 This “lengthening the term of the debt” is not, however, simply a reworking of the math in Jeremiah, as though he had originally intended another multiple of seven.46 Rather, “The sevenfold extension of Jeremiah’s ‘seventy years’ to ‘seventy weeks of years’ seems based on the principle that failure to repent in the face of God’s discipline results in sevenfold greater discipline, as articulated in Lev 26:18, 21, 24, 28.” 47 Since Israel went on with its disastrous deficit spending, even as fiscal austerities were imposed to set things right, the hole into which they had dug themselves had grown by a magnitude of seven. Like an indentured man who racks up an astronomical new debt, while ostensibly working off his earlier liabilities, Israel compounded its miserable servitude by failing to repent. 2.2.2 Sins as Debts in Matthew The sin as debt metaphor clearly contoured the soteriological imagination of traditions close to Luke. The synoptic tradition deserves special mention in this connection, for Matthew – whose proximity to Luke is of a special order – makes ample use of the debt motif. Indeed, put bluntly, “for Matthew sin is debt.”48 The parade examples are the Our Father (Matt 6:9–13) and the parable of the Two Debtors (Matt 18:23–35).49 These by no means exhaust Matthew’s engagement with this brand of soteriology, however. Nathan Eubank’s recent study of the theme demonstrates just how robust and pervasive the sin as debt framework is in Matthew’s vision. Nevertheless, these two related texts bring to special clarity Matthew’s appropriation. Prominently embedded in the Matthean Our Father is the language of debt remission: “Remit us our debts (ἄφες ἡµῖν τὰ ὀφειλήµατα ἡµῶν) as we have remitted those indebted to us (ἀφήκαµεν τοῖς ὀφειλέταις ἡµῶν)” (Matt



45 On the rethinking of Lev 25:1–55 in Dan 9:24–37, see Michael Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel (Oxford: Oxford University, 1985) 482–3. 46 Pace Anderson, Sin, 84. Anderson does not so much take the view that Daniel has simply fixed the numbers, as that he has seen the greater extent of Israel’s pre-exilic sin. The suggestion here is that post-exilic sin has entered the equation. This view accords better with the vision of 2 Chron 36:20–22 (cf. Lev 26:34–35, 43), which understands Jeremiah’s original prophecy to have been fulfilled at the rise of Cyrus (cf. Jer 25:11–14; 29:10). In support of this reckoning, see Michael Segal, “The Chronological Conception of the Persian Period in Daniel 9,” Journal of Ancient Judaism 2 (2011) 282–303. Segal interprets the prayer in Dan 9 to express the necessary turning to God required after the seventy years (cf. Jer 29:12–14), while the counting of the 70 weeks of years begins from the fall of Babylon, not the destruction of Jerusalem. 47 Bergsma, Jubilee, 226. Cf. Luke 11:24–26. 48 Eubank, Debt of Sin, 67. 49 As Eubank (Debt of Sin, 53) remarks, “The most famous example of debt language in the New Testament may be the Matthean version of the Lord’s Prayer.” See Anderson, Sin, 31–3.

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6:12).50 While debt release language of this sort has affinities with Hellenistic royal propaganda,51 such resonance can be explained as part of a larger cultural pattern, reaching back to ANE amnesty texts and ultimately aligned with the distinct biblical idea of the Jubilee.52 Lexical analysis of Matthew’s Greek reinforces the biblical connection. As Raymond Brown observed, “The idea of remitting (aphiemi) debts which appears in our petition is more Semitic than Greek, for ‘remission’ has a religious sense only in the Greek of the LXX, which is under Hebrew influence.”53 Brown here averts to the use of ἄφεσις to translate a particular range of religiously charged terms, including ‫“( יובל‬Jubilee,” Lev 25:13; 27:17), ‫“( דרור‬release,” Lev 25:10; Isa 61:1; Jer 34:8 MT/41:8 LXX), and ‫“( שמטה‬release/remission,” Exod 23:11; Deut 15:1). 54 Whereas in Greek usage the meaning of ἄφεσις as “release” from an office, marriage, obligation, debt, or punishment was a strictly legal locution, in the Semitic context, in conjunction with the idea of sin as debt, a distinct set of jubilary associations emerged.55

50

See Samuel Tobias Lachs, “On Matthew 6:12,” NovT 17 (1975) 6–8. On Matthew’s use of the perfect tense here, see Jean Carmignac, Recherches sur le ‘Notre Père’ (Paris: Éd. Letouzey et Ané, 1969) 230; and Joachim Jeremias, The Prayers of Jesus (London: SCM, 1967) 94, 103. 51 See Giovanni Battista Bazzana, “Basileia and Debt Relief: The Forgiveness of Debts in the Lord’s Prayer in the Light of Documentary Papyri,” CBQ 73 (2011) 511–25. Bazzana highlights the linguistic links between the Lord’s Prayer and Ptolemaic amnesty texts, but also shows the “significant inversion” by which the Gospel’s divine figure follows the standard set by the members of the community (rather than vice versa). Bazzana (517) acknowledges that “forgiveness of debts is part and parcel of an ideology present and effective not only in the Ptolemaic kingdom but in other areas of the eastern Mediterranean and in the land of Israel as well.” 52 See, e.g., Niels Peter Lemche, “The Manumission of Slaves – The Fallow Year – The Sabbatical Year – The Jobel Year,” VT 26 (1976) 38–59; Julius Lewy, “The Biblical Institution of Deror in the Light of Akkadian Documents,” Eretz Israel 5 (1958) 21–31; J. J. Finkelstein, “Some New Misharum Material and its Implications,” Assyriological Studies 16 (1965) 233–46; and Moshe Weinfeld, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and the Ancient Near East (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995). See also Anderson, Sin, 36. 53 Raymond Brown, “The Pater Noster as an Eschatological Prayer,” TS 22 (1961) 175– 208. Brown’s comment could be improved. It is the notion of remitting “sins” not “debts” which is distinctly Semitic – though, of course, the prayer has the former idea in mind. The collocation of οφειλ- and ἀφίηµι appears in a number of Ptolemaic papyri. See Bazzana, “Debt Relief,” 514–7. See also Rudolf Bultmann, “ἀφίηµι” TDNT I, 510. 54 See TDNT I, 509–12. 55 The Jubilee connotation should not be overstated, since ἄφεσις continued to function also in its normal Hellenistic sense. See Sharon Ringe, Jesus, Liberation, and the Biblical Jubilee: Images for Ethics and Christology (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985) 34, 65. Nevertheless, the associations with Jubilee texts and the new meaning of “forgiveness” (Lev 16:26; Exod 32:32) – a calque on the polyvalent Aramaic ‫ – שבק‬were decisive

2.2 Sins as Debts

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On the basis of this peculiar linguistic usage, Ernst Lohmeyer, followed by others, argued that “hier [i.e. Matt 6:12] ist es [i.e. ἀφιέναι] fast ein fester Terminus des alttestamentlichen Sabbatjahres geworden, über dem die Bestimmung steht (Dt 15,2): Du sollst erlassen jegliches eigne Darlehen, welches dir der Nächste schuldet.” 56 Norbert Lohfink prefers to see a link to Exod 34:9 (‫ ;וסלחת לעוננו לחטאתנו‬ἀφελεῖς σὺ τὰς ἁµαρτίας ἡµῶν καὶ τὰς ἀνοµίας ἡµῶν), but as Dieter Böhler points out, this text, though it mentions forgiveness, does not explain the striking debt language of Jesus’ prayer.57 Lohmeyer thus appears to be correct in linking Matthew’s petition to the

developments. See Jesús Luzarraga, El Padrenuestro desde el Arameo (AnB 171; Rome: PIB, 2008) 130–7. 56 Ernst Lohmeyer, Das Vater-Unser (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1946) 113. See also James William Thirtle, The Lord’s Prayer: An Interpretation Critical and Expository (London: Morgan and Scott, 1915) 136–9, 256–61; Lachs, “On Matthew 6:12,” 7; F. Charles Fensham, “The Legal Background of Mt vi. 12,” NovT 4 (1960) 1–2; and Robert Bryan Sloan, The Favorable Year of the Lord: A Study of Jubilary Theology in the Gospel of Luke (Austin, TX: Scholars, 1977) 140. Lachs sees in the Matthean petition an appeal to Deut 15:2 as contrasted with the (less generous) institution of the prōzbūl. Fensham highlights the unusually merciful character of Deut 15:2 in its ANE context – where the rights of debtors were negligible – and indicates lexical and thematic connections with Matt 6:12. Fensham appears unaware of the metaphoric reinterpretation of Deut 15:2 in the Second Temple period, but his conclusion is on the right track: “The background of this [i.e. the allusion to Deut 15:2 and debt-slavery in Matt 6:12] is the hard facts of life, but Jesus brought these facts in connexion with spiritual needs.” 57 Norbert Lohfink (“Das Vaterunser intertextuell gedeutet,” in Bibel und Liturgie [G. Braulik and Norbert Lohfink, eds.; ÖBS 28; Frankfurt: Lang, 2005] 350) locates the Our Father’s threefold bread, forgiveness, and testing petitions within an Exodus framework – linking forgiveness with Exod 32–34, especially 32:32 and 34:9. Dieter Böhler (“Mose und das Vaterunser: Die Bitte um Shuldenerlass in der Tora,” BZ 58 [2014] 71–5) perceives the problem of Lohfink’s thesis and attempts to solve it. Appealing to Onkelos and Neofiti, he suggests that an Aramaic rendering of Exod 34:9 must have been “im Ohr” – since the Hebrew vocabulary of sin and forgiveness used in this text cannot explain the debt language. “Die Bitte καὶ ἄφες ἡµῖν τὰ ὀφειλήµατα ἡµῶν ruft den Textkomplex Ex 32–34 auf und ist (bis auf das fehlende ‫ = לנא‬ἡµῖν) geradezu ein wörtliches Zitat aus dem aramäischen Text von Ex 34,9.” The evocation of a Targum would at least nominally supply the missing notion of ‫חובא‬, though this proposal appears naïve when faced with the massive calquing back and forth between Hebrew and Aramaic in the period. More significant is the fact that the Exodus text gives no support to acts of “release” on the part of the human party, focusing solely on the Lord’s mercy. On the other hand, the Jubilee (cf. Deut 15:2), as it was reinterpreted in the Second Temple period, held together thoughts of both divine and human mercy. Carmignac (Recherches, 223) dislikes the allusion to Deut 15:2 because, on his (unlikely) theory of an original Hebrew version of the prayer, the text suggests the verb ‫ שמט‬rather than ‫ סלח‬and ‫נשא‬, which he prefers for the play on words he reconstructs.

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same text in Deuteronomy that served the author of the Melchizedek scroll in his theology of eschatological redemption from sin.58 Ultimately, Matthew’s transparent application of the debt petition to pardoning one another’s offenses confirms that the pervasive sin as debt metaphor, seen in the material surveyed above, also controls his usage.59 If you forgive (ἀφῆτε) people their transgressions (παραπτώµατα), your Heavenly Father will also forgive (ἀφήσει) you. But if you do not forgive people, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions (Matt 6:14–15).

Marius Nel has underscored the decisive importance of these verses in determining the spiritual application of the debt language in Matthew’s fifth petition and coupled this contextual argument with an estimate of Matthew’s general laissez faire approach to debt.60

58

Within the Second Temple context provided by 11Q13, Lohmeyer’s interpretation has the advantage of reinforcing the eschatological content of the prayer. On the act of forgiveness as an eschatological act, see Walter Grundmann, Das Evangelium nach Lukas (ThHKNT 3; Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1961) 233; Joachim Jeremias, The Lord’s Prayer (FBBS 8; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1964) 29–32; and Brown, “Eschatological Prayer,” 175–209. 59 So, e.g., Dalman, Worte Jesu, 337. The meaning of the petition in the original preMatthean form of the prayer is another question, but in view of the Second Temple evidence there is no compelling reason to assign the “spiritualization” of debtor language to Matthew himself. On the possible economic orientation of the primitive tradition, see David Fiensy, “Jesus and Debts: Did He Pray About Them?” Restoration Quarterly 44 (2002) 233–40; and Bazzana, “Debt Relief,” 514. See also Martin Goodman, “The First Jewish Revolt: Social Conflict and the Problem of Debt,” JJS 33 (1982) 414–27. Much scholarship on the economic dimensions of Jesus’ preaching must be reconsidered in light of Anderson’s work on this economic metaphor in biblical thought: e.g., John Dominic Crossan, The Greatest Prayer: Rediscovering the Revolutionary Message of the Lord’s Prayer (London: SPCK, 2011). 60 Marius J. Nel, “The Forgiveness of Debt in Matthew 6:12, 14–15,” Neotestamentica 47 (2013) 87–106. Nel asserts: “It is clear that the two parallelisms in 6:14–15 limit the semantic range of ὀφειλήµατα in 6:12 to its figurative meaning by replacing it with the overlapping synonymous nouns παραπτώµατα which has a narrower semantic range (“sin” or “transgression”) than ὀφειλήµατα, as it does not refer to monetary debt” (emphasis original). He determines, as well, that “Matthew depicts Jesus as cognizant of the reality of debt without explicitly condemning it, as he does not forbid loans…[or] demand the cancellation of all debt.” Nel allows that monetary debt was a substantial problem in the firstcentury Syrian context in which Matthew was likely written. On various grounds, however, he resists the argument of Ringe and Crosby that the expectation and stipulations of a messianic Jubilee provide the main interpretative context for Matt 6:12. He recognizes, however, that Matthew here must be contrasted with Luke, who “clearly has a focus on the remission of monetary debts that is not explicitly shared by Matthew.” See also, G. J. Volschenk and A. G. van Aarde, “A Social Scientific Study of the Significance of the Jubilee in the New Testament,” HTS 58 (2002) 811–37.

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The same spiritual lesson offered by the Our Father is dramatized again later in the Gospel in the familiar parable of the Two Debtors (Matt 18:23– 25), sometimes called the Ungrateful Servant.61 A king wanted to settle his accounts with his servants and began with a debtor (ὀφειλέτης) who owed him a huge amount (vv. 23–43). When the man could not repay the loan, the king determined to sell his wife and children and all his possessions to raise the sum (vv. 25). The man begged for mercy, and the king, moved, forgave the debt (τὸ δάνειον ἀφῆκεν ἀυτῷ, v. 27). The servant whose debt was remitted then promptly found a fellow servant who owed him a paltry sum, demanded it of him, and would not listen to his pleas for mercy, but threatened instead to have him thrown into prison until he should pay (vv. 29–30). The king, learning of this, grew angry and handed the first slave over to the torturers “until he should pay back all he owed” (οὗ ἀποδῷ πᾶν τὸ ὀφειλόµενον, v. 34). The lesson is severe: “Thus will my Heavenly Father do to you, unless each one forgives (ἀφῆτε) his brother from your hearts [sic]” (v. 35). As commentators see, the connection with the “debts” in the fifth petition of the Our Father is unmistakable. Another interesting theme also vividly emerges in this parable, however: the threat of debtor’s prison (Matt 18:25, 30, 34).62 The collapse of this institution in the nineteenth century has naturally distanced us from the assumptions associated with the place.63 It is essential to note two things, however. First, no distinction was made between malfeasance and misfortune. Default-

61

See Eubank, Debt of Sin, 55; and Anderson, Sin, 32–3. In the Greek context, one who defaulted on a loan was rendered ἀγώγιµος, liable to be led into to detention or sold-off. This practice of lending on security of the body (δανείζειν ἐπὶ τοῖς σώµασι) draws a blurry line between debt-slavery and debt prison, particularly since debt prisoners were commonly set to labor to remediate their debts. See Moses Finley, “La servitude pour dettes,” Revue historique de droit francais et étranger 43 (1965) 159–84. Finley’s influential judgment that under Solon “debt-bondage was abolished tout court” has been clarified by Edward Harris, “Did Solon Abolish Debt Bondage?” The Classical Quarterly 52 (2000) 415–30. The important distinction between “debtbondage” (which remained in force throughout Greek antiquity) and “enslavement for debt” (which Solon did abolish) is that the first was a temporary status, while the second was in principle for life. In Roman law, from at least 111 BCE, the liquidation of debts was also addressed by the seizure of one’s possessions (bonorum uenditio, cf. Matt 18:25), a protocol well attested in the Babatha archive. On the Greco-Roman context of debtors’ prisons, see Alberto Maffi, “Emprisonnement pour dettes dans le monde grec,” and Andrew Lintott, “La servitude pour dettes à Rome,” in Carcer: Prison et privation de liberté dans l’Antiquité classique (Cécile Bertrand-Dagenbach, Alain Chauvot, Michel Matter, and Jean-Marie Salamito, eds.; Paris: de Boccard, 1999) 7–25. 63 The use of debtor’s prisons was nearly universal until the sudden pan-national reforms of the 19th century. On this event, see the interesting account of Gustav Peebles, “Washing Away the Sins of Debt: The Nineteenth Century Eradication of the Debtor’s Prison,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 55 (2013) 701–24. 62

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ing on a loan was indiscriminately viewed under the rubric of criminality, as if insolvency itself were a sin.64 The idea of being locked away thus carried a strong connotation of guilt – reinforcing the sin as debt idea. Second and more importantly, debtor’s prison was envisioned as a temporary measure. “Incarceration was intended to compel debtors to produce any hidden funds they might have, and, should that fail, to incite friends or family to pay the ransom – that is, to pay the debt.”65 The image thus evoked “temporary holding cells” where debtors were detained until the delinquent funds could be gathered.66 Debtors’ prison was thus envisioned as a purgative instrument of moral reform, a place where one could “forgive the sin of unpaid debt, so long as the initiate was willing to undergo a period of punishment and repentance.”67 So understood, debt-slavery and debt-prison correspond rather closely. 68 The prison image, nevertheless, evokes a distinct connotation of eschatological judgment, not as evident in the slavery motif (cf. 1 Pet 3:19; Jude 6; 1 Enoch 10:4–6, 12–14; 13:1; 14:5; 18:14–16; 21:6, 10). It is thus fitting when Eubank suggests that the institution of debt-prison maps suggestively onto the proto-purgatorial vision of certain Jewish texts (t. San. 13:3; m. ‘Ed. 2:10; cf. 2 Macc 12; Test. Ab.) in which “Gehenna was sometimes thought of as a temporary place of chastisement.”69 Arguably, then, the expectation implicit in Matthew’s parable is that, despite the huge sum, the debtor is not destined for never-ending punishment, but might somehow manage to pay back πᾶν τὸ ὀφειλόµενον and be freed from his incarceration. This prospect of release is hinted at again in the text of Matt 5:21–26 – another evocation of the debtor’s prison.70

64

See Peebles, “Sins of Debt,” 706–10. Eubank, Debt of Sin, 59. 66 See John Bauschatz, “Ptolemaic Prisons Reconsidered,” The Classical Bulletin 83 (2007) 5. 67 Peebles, “Sins of Debt,” 704. 68 Debtor’s prison as a well-ordered, judicial institution does not appear with clarity in Isaiah. Nevertheless, it is not at all distant from the book’s debt-slavery paradigm. Terblanch (“Babylonian Exile as Imprisonment,” 482–97) argues that Second Isaiah depicts the Exile as an imprisonment in 42:22 in large part to stress its temporary nature, since those imprisoned and impressed into Babylonian labor gangs were not normally enslaved in perpetuo. 69 Eubank, Debt of Sin, 59–60. 70 On the scene Hans Dieter Betz (The Sermon on the Mount: A Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, including the Sermon on the Plain (Matthew 5:3–7:27 and Luke 6:20–49) [Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995] 226) says that though “we are not told the nature of this dispute,” it is nonetheless clear that “the case concerns the owing of debts.” The paying of the last cent suggests as much, but so does the very idea of prison. “Debt was the commonest reason for imprisonment in antiquity, including first-century 65

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Make friends quickly with your accuser, while you are with him along the way, lest your accuser hand you over to the judge, and he judge to the bailiff and you be thrown into prison. Amen, I say to you, you will not come out from there until you have paid the last penny (ἕως ἂν ἀποδῷς τὸν ἔσχατον κοδράντην, Matt 5:25–26).

In context, punishment in Gehenna is in view (Matt 5:22), and the “unresolved debts (i.e. sins) against another person are in fact sins against God, who will certainly collect what is his due.”71 In the final phrase, however, Eubank detects the possibility of paying one’s debts from the eschatological place of punishment. He does not wish to suggest “a well-developed understanding of purgatory, but only that [Matt] 5:25–26 and 18:23–35 may assume that it is possible to pays one’s debts after death.”72 If he is right, Matthew may well have some manner of post-mortem ransom in mind – perhaps produced by the charity of one’s friends (the normal means of ransom for those held in debtor’s prison).73 Whatever Matthew’s view of post-mortem redemption, the thought of canceling sin’s debt by charity is very important. A coordinate idea is evident here, as Anderson shows: “Almost as soon as the idea of sin as a debt appears on the scene, so does its financial counterpart, credit” (cf. Dan 4:24 MT).74 The logic is simple: as sins racks up debt, so good deeds accumulate credit. Accordingly, Matthew, like other Second Temple literature (e.g. Tob 4:5–11; Sir 29:9–13; Ps Sol. 9:5; 2 Baruch 14:12–13; 24:1–2) complements the debt metaphor with an interest in “heavenly treasure” (e.g. Matt 5:3–6:24; 10:1– 42; 16:13–28; 19:16–20; 25:14–46).75 While almsgiving is the classic good deed by which one gains credit against the day of judgment (cf. Matt 19:16– 20; 25:14–46), in both Matt 18:23–35 and 5:21–26 it is acts of forgiveness that earn one favor in heaven. This reciprocity ethic and mode of piety, though less celebrated than material charity, has a clear pedigree in Jewish thought: “Forgive (ἄφες) your neighbor the wrong he has done, and when you pray your sins will be absolved (λυθήσονται)” (Sir 28:2).76

Palestine,” Eubank, Debt of Sin, 59. See Ramon Sugranyes de Franch, Études sur le droit palestinien à l’époque évangelique (Fribourg: Libraire de l’Université, 1946) 60–3. 71 Eubank, Debt of Sin, 58. 72 Ibid., 60–1. 73 The early Christians, in fact, practiced such ransoms as a regular work of mercy, cf. Aristides, Apology, 15.6–7; Lucian, Peregrinus 13. 74 See especially Anderson, Sin, 135–51, here 135. 75 Eubank, Debt of Sin, 68–104; Anderson, Sin, 164–88; and Charity, 123–35. 76 On Sir 28:2–4 and the Jewish background to the fifth petition (cf. Wis 12:22; 1 Sam 26:23–24; m. Yoma 8:8), see Carmignac, Recherches, 226–7. See also George Foot Moore, Judaism in the First Centuries of the Christian Era: Volume 2 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1930) 153–5. On the wisdom background (Tun-ErgehenZusammenhang) of the heavenly treasure motif, see Koch, “Der Schatz im Himmel,” 47– 60.

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Eubank’s study ultimately intends simply “to articulate Matthew’s vision of the divine economy in its late first-century Jewish context.”77 His success in this effort is very helpful and is relied upon here, for it inevitably serves to secure a solid historical foundation for interpreting Luke’s Gospel as well. At the same time, the profile of Matthew’s own unique deployment of the sin as debt theology provides the most proximate context for a nuanced understanding of Luke’s interaction with this theme.

2.3 Debts in the Lukan Our Father 2.3 Debts in the Our Father

2.3.1 “Forgive Us Our Sins” (Luke 11:4): Erasing Debts? The prominence of sin as debt thinking is well established in traditions intimately associated with Luke’s Gospel: namely, Second-Isaiah, 11QMelchizedek, and Matthew. It is strange, then, that Luke’s engagement with the idea has been so widely neglected. Where it has been cursorily considered, moreover, it has often been implicitly downplayed – including in the work of Anderson and Eubank. The slender evidence brought forward for this problematic perspective is generally Luke’s version of the Our Father (Luke 11:2– 4), which differs on the matter of debt language (as on other points) from Matthew’s version (Matt 6:9–13). The argument is simple. The use of “debt” for sin is peculiar in Greek and would reputedly not have been apparent outside a Semitic context. Luke’s own version of the Our Father, then, which reads “forgive us our sins” (ἄφες ἡµῖν τὰς ἁµαρτίας ἡµῶν, Luke 11:4a) rather than “forgive us our debts” (ἄφες ἡµῖν τὰ ὀφειλήµατα ἡµῶν, Matt 6:12) as in Matthew, reflects Luke’s Hellenized setting, where the metaphor had no currency. In Matthew’s more Jewish Christian context, the reasoning goes, the debt language would have been recognized and intelligible, while for Luke’s Gentile audience more transparent language was required – and supplied. 78 In the process, Luke “nearly loses the idea of sin as debt.”79

77

Eubank, Debt of Sin, 209. Eubank (199) notes, “A sizable stream of Matthean scholarship has been at pains to show that, like a good Kantian, Jesus did not use the hope of heavenly treasure to motivate followers.” Nevertheless, he says “the central burden of this study…has not been to rectify previous misunderstandings but to articulate Matthew’s vision of the divine economy in its late first-century Jewish context and also to show that some of the Gospel’s central claims about Jesus emerge form this conceptual matrix and should be understood in light of it.” 78 It is difficult to exaggerate the influence of this position. Joseph Fitzmyer (The Gospel According to Luke X–XXIV [AB 28a; New York: Doubleday, 1985] 906) is representative: “Luke has changed opheilēmata, ‘debts,’ to hamartias, ‘sins,’ probably to make the petition more intelligible for Gentile Christian readers, since, though opheilēma is found in

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This widely endorsed explanation has some plausibility prima facie. On closer inspection, however, such a perspective proves unsatisfying – another case where Luke’s impressive Jewishness has been underestimated and the dubious Hellenistic-Jewish dichotomy has been overdrawn.80 A moderation of this outmoded framework is essential, and it must be matched with a more contextualized approach to the problem. Understanding Luke’s use of ἁµαρτίας in 11:4, in other words, must be analyzed with greater attention to his other many differences from Matthean theology. 81 Luke’s change of “debts” to “sins” here should not be isolated as if it were a well-controlled phenomenon detached from larger compositional patterns. Two basic objections, thus, confront the common opinion of Luke’s Hellenistic discomfort with the metaphor. The first is that Luke’s linguistic context is rendered too simplistically on this view. We may ask, for instance, whether in the diglossal eastern province where he likely wrote, the Semitic idiom would not already be recognizable, even in Greek dress.82 Even outside

classical and Hellenistic Greek in the sense of a ‘debt,’ the religious sense of it is unattested there.” Böhler (“Die Bitte um Shuldenerlass,” 73) agrees “dass sein [Luke’s] griechisches Publikum einen religiösen Sinn des ökonomischen ‘Schulden’-Begriffs gar nicht verstehen würde und verändert zunächst zu ‘Sünden.’” This basic interpretation controls almost all commentary on this verse, e.g., I. H. Marshall, The Gospel of Luke (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978) 460–1; Michael Wolter, Das Lukasevangelium (HNT 5; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 405; Bovon, Lukas 2, 134. See also, e.g., Ernst von Dobschütz, “The Lord’s Prayer,” HTR 7 (1914) 315; Brown, “Eschatological Prayer,” 178; Anderson, Sin, 31–2; Eubank, Debt of Sin, 51–2; Davies and Allison, The Gospel According to Matthew: Volume 1 (3 vols.; ICC; London: T & T Clark, 1988) 611; Luzarraga, El Padrenuestro, 133. 79 Marshall, Luke, 461. Dalman (Worte Jesu, 337–8) similarly contends that the notion of guilt itself has been displaced: “Bei Lukas tritt die ‘Sünde’ (ἁµαρτία) an die Stelle der Schuld. Das bedeutet Ersatz des Bildes der ‘Schuld’ durch die Abweichung von der Norm des göttlichen Willens.” 80 The case against sharply dividing the Jewish from the Hellenistic sphere was decisively made by Martin Hengel (Judaism and Hellenism). See also Hengel, “Judaism and Hellenism Revisited,” in Hellenism in the Land of Israel (John J. Collins, ed.; Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame, 2001) 6–37. For a short history of this debate, see Gerdmar, Judaism-Hellenism Dichotomy, 16–8. See §1.2.3 above. 81 On the larger divergences in the two forms of the prayer, see Allison and Davies, Matthew 1, 590–617; Ulrich Luz, Das Evangelium nach Matthäus (EKK I/1; Zürich: Benziger, 1985) 436–8; Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 370–86; and Carmignac, Recherches, 18–28. 82 Luzarraga (El Padreneustro, 269) rightly observes that “los Greco-arameos han entendido bien ‘deudas’ como ‘pecados’, y ‘deudores’ como ‘ofensores.’” The place where Luke composed his Gospel, of course, remains unknown; but in view of its normally accepted origin in one of the eastern provinces (perhaps even Ceasarea in Palestine, see Hans Klein, “Zur Frage nach dem Abfassungsort der Lukasschriften,” EvT 32 [1972] 467–77), and the probability of Luke’s own Antiochene origin, the phenomenon of bi-lingual inter-

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a Semitic cultural setting, however, the point of intelligibility must be pressed. Though Aramaic is uniquely positioned to play with the idea, the language has no monopoly on the idea of moral misdeeds as debts. Euripides, for instance, can speak of Orestes’ un-avenged crime of matricide as an unpaid “debt” (χρεῶν, Eum. 260);83 and Aeschines, one of the ten Attic orators, could speak comfortably of “remitting” sins (ἐγὼ γάρ, ὅσα µὲν παῖς ὢν εἰς τὸ σῶµα τὸ ἑαυτοῦ ἡµάρτηκεν, ἀφίηµι, 1.39). Such expressions – isolated acts of dramatic and professional diction – are hardly common; but the debt metaphor for misdeeds was evidently viable in the Hellenistic world. It is hard to insist, then, that Luke’s avoidance of ὀφειλήµατα was meant merely as a concession to Greek speakers. The use of ἀφίηµι with the object ἁµαρτίας, after all, which Luke does not spurn, is also a Semitic locution – a Septuagintalism as already seen. 84 Evidently, securing pure idiomatic Greek was not Luke’s primary concern in the matter of this metaphor. A second, quite forceful, indeed decisive internal difficulty in taking the use of “sins” in Luke 11:4 as merely explanatory in purpose is that, from a narrative perspective, Luke has already introduced and engaged the debt release metaphor in a substantial way.85 The point must be made here by way

ference deserves greater consideration in understanding Luke’s Greek. On the importance of this dimension of linguistics – and its wide neglect in New Testament study, see Stanley Porter, Diglossia and Other Topics in New Testament Linguistics (JSNTSup 193; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2000) esp. 18–34. See also, Albert Hogeterp, “New Testament Greek as Popular Speech: Deissman in Retrospect: A Case Study in Luke’s Greek,” ZNWKAK 102 (2011) 178–200. Hogeterp frames his conclusions on Luke’s Greek by the “greater knowledge of bi-lingual, including Graeco-Semitic language contacts and conceptualization of bi-lingualism which is nowadays available,” determining that, contrary to trends in scholarship which see Luke as “lessening the ‘local coloring’ of Jesus traditions,” the Third Gospel shows much semitic thinking and at times intensifies the semitic quality of the language, e.g. Luke 10:5b–7a vs. Matt 10:10–13. 83 There is a textual problem in the line, but Alan Sommerstein (Aeschylus II [LCL 146; Cambridge, MA. Harvard University, 2008] 388 fn. 69) recognizes the reading χρεῶν as an “ancient variant” – which is adequate for the purpose of demonstrating the usage. 84 If a thoroughly Greek audience were in view, one might have expected a verb like συγγιγνώσκω or even ἱλάσκοµαι (cf. ἱλάσθητί µοι τῷ ἁµαρτωλῷ, Luke 18:13; Heb 2:17; 8:12) in place of ἀφίηµι. Classical Greek employed several words to express forgiveness of ἁµαρτία. E.g., συγγνώσεταί σοι τήνδ᾽ ἁµαρτίαν πόσις (Eur. And. 837); σύγγνωθ᾽: ἁµαρτεῖν εἰκὸς ἀνθρώπους, τέκνον (Eur. Hip. 615; cf. Plato, Hip. Min. 372a; Diog. Laert. Vit. 4.7.56); and also µετίηµι (Herod. Hist. 8.140). The idea of an amnesty could be expressed by the phrase µὴ (ἀ)µνησικακέω (cf. Thucy. Hist. 4.74; Andocides, On the Mysteries 1.90; Nic. Dam. Vit. Caes. 29; Dio. Sic. 18.56). The word ἀµνηστία appears first in Plutarch and Valerius Maximus, possibly as a translation of Cicero’s oblivio. 85 Joel B. Green (The Gospel of Luke [NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997] 433) observes: “Because of the centrality of ‘release’ in Jesus’ missionary program…we should not be surprised to discover the central role of forgiveness of sins and debts in Jesus’

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of anticipation. The relevant passages – particularly, the famous Jubilee proclamation in Nazareth (Luke 4:16–30) and the story of the sinful woman (7:36–50) with its parable of the debtors (vv. 41–42) – are involved texts and will both be treated in more detail below. In view of such material, however, readers of the Gospel would thus recognize the idea of sin as debt well before Luke 11:4. This narrative datum concerns two significant and uniquely Lukan texts and poses a major challenge to simplistic views of the Third Gospel’s supposed hesitance about indulging the debt metaphor. Far from avoiding the notion, Luke appears (as we will see) to have crafted his own characteristic narrative expression of sin as debt theology. In the end, therefore, Luke must not be understood as indicating any special reserve about the Semitic metaphor – in the Our Father or elsewhere. A fuller explanation for his version of the forgiveness petition must be found. 2.3.2 “For We Forgive All Our Debtors” (Luke 11:4): Divine and Human Mercy The retention of the language of “debtors” (ὀφείλοντι) in 11:4b confirms clearly enough Luke’s readiness to engage the sin as debt framework: Καὶ ἄφες ἡµῖν τὰς ἁµαρτίας ἡµῶν Καὶ γὰρ αὐτοὶ ἀφίοµεν παντὶ ὀφείλοντι ἡµῖν (Luke 11:4).86

Unfortunately, it is not certain what precise form (or forms) of the prayer Luke inherited.87 Redaction criticism must, as a result, be used with caution.

model prayer. Forgiveness of sins, in fact, is a pervasive motif in the Lukan narrative, and its correlation to the reciprocity of creditors and debtors was noted already in 7:40–47.” 86 In Harnack’s influential reconstruction, the line καὶ γὰρ αὐτοὶ ἀφίοµεν παντὶ ὀφείλοντι ἡµῖν does not appear in Marcion’s text. On the great difficulty of using Marcion for text critical judgments, see Dieter Roth, “The Text of the Lord’s Prayer in Marcion’s Gospel,” Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der älteren Kirche 103 (2012) 47–64. See further, Robert Leaney, “The Lucan Text of the Lord’s Prayer (LK xi 2–4,” NovT 1 (1956) 103–11. 87 Because of the wide divergence in their respective versions, it is difficult to know whether Matthew and Luke shared a common source. Most commentators, nevertheless, accept that Luke knows the prayer in Greek (cf. ἐπιούσιας, Matt 6:11; Luke 11:3) from his double tradition source. So, e.g. Marshall, Luke, 455; Fitzmyer, Luke, 897; Bovon, Lukas 2, 120–2. But as Wolter (Lukasevangelium, 404) cautions: “Eine Rekonstruktion der Vorlage und damit die Identifikation der lk Redaktion wird im vorliegenden Fall [i.e. Luke’s use of Q] über die üblichen methodischen Probleme hinaus noch zusätzlich dadurch erschwert, dass beide Evangelisten den Text des Gebets nicht nur durch Q kennengelernt dürften. Es ist damit zu rechnen, dass er ihnen auch durch seinen Gebrauch in der gottesdienstlichen Liturgie vertraut gewesen ist.” Attempts to recover an original Aramaic (or Hebrew) version have been abundant (i.e. Torrey, Burney, Dalman, Kuhn, Jeremias, Díez Macho, Carmignac, Grelot, Fitzmyer, Subugal, Schwarz, Gese, De Moor, Luzarraga), but

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There are nevertheless indications that, as suggested, Luke’s hand has touched this verse and altered the original parallel still preserved in Matthew (ὀφειλήµατα/ὀφειλέταις). 88 If the theory of a Hellenistic clarification is insufficient to account for this, however, what explanation might be offered? On the one hand, Luke’s tendency to introduce synonyms for variation must be considered (e.g. Luke 18:38–39 || Mark 10:47–48; Luke 22:45–46 || Mark 14:37; Luke 23:46–47 || Mark 15:37–39). The case of Luke 13:2–4 is suggestive in this connection, for here Luke employs the same conceptual parallel: ἁµαρτωλοί and ὀφειλέται. This is Sondergut material, however, and redactional theories are even more precarious than in 11:4.89 It is, accordingly, hard to do more than note that each word serves a distinct narrative purpose in the passage. Thus, in the rhetorical context of 13:1–5 (ἐὰν µὴ µετανοῆτε…), ἁµαρτωλοί in 13:2 is simply Luke’s characteristic and expected description for those requiring repentance: “I did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance (ἁµαρτωλοὺς εἰς µετάνοιαν, 5:32; cf. 15:7, 10; 7:34; 15:1; 18:13).” At the same time, the use of ὀφειλέται in 13:4 functions for Luke as more than mere color. It forges an important link to the preceding unit on settling with one’s creditor (Luke 12:57–59; cf. ἐν αὐτῷ τῷ καιρῷ, 13:1), a key sin-as-debt tradition shared with Matthew, described above (Matt 5:25–26) and treated again below (§2.5). Luke thus appears to have more than mere stylistic intentions in 13:2–4, and we can suspect the

very difficult to establish. For a convenient collection of the reconstructions, see Luzarraga, El Padrenuestro, 341–53. On the hypothesis of Luzarraga, the Q hypothesis is far too simplistic to account for the evolution of the text. He argues that the original, short Aramaic form of the prayer taught by Jesus would have been written down in Aramaic, with slight variants in different contexts, and soon translated into Greek somewhere in Palestine, where it was sanctioned by bi-lingual Church authorities like Peter. This translation would have been known to Luke, who edited it for his own Gospel. Meanwhile, the short, written Aramaic form developed on its own trajectory into a longer Aramaic form, later translated in Greek form, known to and redacted by Matthew. See also Günter Schwarz, “Matthäus VI. 9–13/Lukas XI. 2–4: Emmendation und Rückübersetzung,” NTS 15 (1968– 69) 233–47. There is little to warrant the extravagant explanation of Michael Goulder (“The Composition of the Lord’s Prayer,” JTS 14 [1963] 32–45) that Matthew composed the prayer himself and Luke redacted it. 88 Joachim Jeremias (Die Sprache des Lukasevangeliums: Redaktion und Tradition im Nicht Markusstoff des dritten Evangeliums [KEK; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1980] 195–6) determines that the features of the language in Luke 11:2b–4 are consistently traditional and pre-Lukan (“vorlukanischer Sprachgebrauch”). Carmignac (Recherches, 222), however, points out that πᾶς is a typically Lukan addition (cf. Mark 3:5 || Luke 6:7; Mark 3:7 || Luke 6:17; Matt 5:42 || Luke 6:30; Matt 10:25 || Luke 6:40). 89 Bovon (Lukas 2, 378) analyzes Luke 13:2–4 in conscious parallel to 11:4 – ὀφειλέται comes from tradition, while ἁµαρτωλοί is a clarifying redactional change (contrary to Jeremias, Sprach des Lukasevangeliums, 226). This explanation is no more satisfying for being repeated.

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same in 11:4. Indeed, the authoritative, traditional, and liturgical character of the Lord’s Prayer warns against any purely cosmetic solution.90 The neat distinction in Luke 11:4 between what God forgives (ἁµαρτίας) and what we forgive (ὀφείλοντι) appears to provide the key. 91 The two distinct subjects of ἀφίηµι correspond to two different behaviors, and for Luke the object of God’s action (sin) is not precisely the object of our own (debts). The point is important. It maps onto a clear syntactic/semantic pattern observed by Rikard Roitto, whereby “divine forgiveness was somehow perceived as qualitatively different from human forgiveness.” 92 Robert Sloan has seen the interpretative signifance and argued that Luke’s petition implies that “as God forgives sins, so the disciples too, because of that fact are therewith to forgive their financial debtors.”93 Believers, in other words, are called to a kind of mimetic analog, mirroring a behavior proper to God (forgiving sins) in a way proper to creatures (forgiving debts). Sloan’s insight is not developed, but he appears to be right on several scores. First of all, his parsing of the problem allows the full scope of the debt metaphor to come explicitly into play. Money and morals are both involved – but in different ways. Whereas Matthew’s appended “spiritualization” (Matt 6:14–15) of the prayer colors his double use of “debt” language with a single, uniform signification (“sin”), Luke varies his terminology and affixes no coverall explanation. His version of the petition thus preserves a polysemous potential, exploiting the double meaning of ‫ חובא‬by aligning the mundane, economic sense of the word with a human activity, while linking the extended spiritual sense with a distinctly divine work. This coherent semantic distinction suits Luke’s theology in a double fashion. It enables him to

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The unlikely theory of Jean Irigoin (“La version lucanienne du Notre Pere,” RHPR 80 [2000] 211), who proposes that Luke used ἁµαρτίας in 11:4 for metrical reasons (i.e. number of syllables and shift in accent), comes under this judgment. 91 “Critical to our understanding of forgiveness in this co-text is, first, that we not capsize too quickly the distinction between ‘sins’ and ‘debts’ in its two members,” Green, Luke, 443. 92 Rikard Roitto, “The Polyvalence of ἀφίηµι and the Two Cognitive Frames in the Synoptic Gospels,” NovT 57 (2015) 136–58, here 142. Roitto holds that two distinct NT grammars of forgiveness can be discerned: one in which sin is a substance to be removed and God the exclusive agent; one in which sin is a debt and here humans can also enact forgiveness. 93 Sloan, Year of Favor, 144. On the problem of poverty and debt in Luke’s context, see e.g., Beate Kowalski, “Conversations about Poverty in the Lukan Community,” in Theology and Conversation: Towards a Relational Theology (J. Haers and P. de Mey, eds.; BETL 172; Leuven: Leuven University, 2003) 125–44; Esler, Community and gospel, 169–79; and Ivoni Richter Reimer, “The Forgiveness of Debts in Matthew and Luke,” in God’s Economy: Biblical Studies from Latin America (Ross Kinsler and Gloria Kinsler, eds.’ New York: Orbis, 2005) 152–68, esp. 162.

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reinforce his interest in wealth ethics, while reserving the forgiveness of sins uniquely to God. Luke’s overt attention to the idea of economic debt remission is a recognized theme in the Gospel (e.g. Luke 6:34–35; 16:5–8; 19:1–9).94 The developed motif of the “forgiveness of sins” (Luke 1:77; 3:3; 24:47; Acts 2:38; 5:31; 10:43; 26:18) is also critical to understand, however, though it has inexplicably been neglected in the interpretation of the debt language in this verse. 95 For Matthew, forgiveness is not beyond human reach. 96 Thus, for instance, Matthew’s story of the healing of the paralytic suppresses Mark’s leading question, τίς δύναται ἀφιέναι ἁµαρτίας εἰ µὴ εἷς ὁ θεός (Mark 2:7), and says instead οὗτος βλασφηµεῖ (Matt 9:3). Luke, by contrast, not only includes the rhetorical question, but repeats it again later in the Gospel (Luke 5:21; 7:49). Matthew’s formulation aims to leave room for the fraternal forgiveness of sins, since he repeatedly exhorts a reduplication of God’s moral forgiveness in the human sphere (e.g. Matt 6:14–15; 18:15–35). Luke, by contrast, reserves the forgiveness of sins to God – through Jesus – alone, and sees economic kindness, instead, as the created reflection of divine mercy.97

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See, e.g., Nel, “Forgiveness of Debt,” 97. “Forgiveness of sins” (ἄφεσις ἁµαρτιῶν) is one of the most characteristic ways Luke sums up the effect of the Christ-event. The expression occurs eleven times in the NT, of which eight are in Luke-Acts. It is closely associated with the notion of σωτηρία. See Fitzmyer, Luke, 221–4; Richard Gaffin, Jr., “Justification in Luke-Acts,” in Right With God: Justification in the Bible and the World (D. A. Carson, ed.; UK: Paternoster, 1992) 106–25; J. Massyngbaerde Ford, “Reconciliation and Forgiveness in Luke’s Gospel,” in Political Issues in Luke-Acts (Richard Cassidy and Philip Scharper, eds; New York: Orbis, 1983) 80–98; and Stanley Porter, “The Messiah in Luke and Acts: Forgiveness for the Captives,” in Messiah in the Old and New Testaments (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007) 144–64. See also Shelly Matthews, “Clemency as Cruelty: Forgiveness as Force in the Dying Prayers of Jesus and Stephen,” Biblical Interpretation 17 (2009) 118–46; and Nathan Eubank, “A Disconcerting Prayer: On the Originality of Luke 23:34a,” JBL 129 (2010) 521–36. 96 It is important to underline the point made by Roitto (“Two Cognitive Frames of Forgiveness,” 157) that it is only within the conceptual metaphor of sin as debt that the human remission of another’s moral failings comes to expression in early Christian literature. Linguistically, Matthew does not seem to envision that the community removes sin imagined as a substance, even if he takes the economic dimension of the debt image less literally than Luke. 97 Luke does recognize the duty to offer forgiveness to offending brethren (Luke 17:3– 4), but it is significant that this double tradition logion is located in one of the most miscellaneous segments of the entire Gospel (Luke 17:1–10), comprised of four isolated sayings, juxtaposed with little clear interrelation and very little apparent connection to the larger context (cf. Fitzmyer, Luke, 1136; Bovon, Lukas 3, 132). In other words, Luke preserved the logion on forgiving seven times, but found it difficult to assimilate fraternal forgiveness into his broader Gospel framework of forgiveness from God. Matthew, by contrast, embraces and expands this same tradition (now seventy seven times) with his elabo95

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Such a Lukan theology of forgiveness squares with Sloan’s posing of the prayer, and the implication is quite significant. The mercy by which we measure out mercy for ourselves is for Luke essentially economic mercy – ἐλεηµοσύνη – not mutual forgiveness as in the First Gospel. Indeed, charity in its various shapes forms the backbone of the distinctly Lukan vision of reciprocity: “Lend expecting nothing back.… Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.… Release (ἀπολύετε) and it will be released (ἀπολυθήσεσθε). Give (δίδοτε) and it will be given (δοθήσεται) to you… for the measure you measure out will be measured back to you” (Luke 6:35, 36, 37c–38a,c; cf. Matt 7:2).98 Of course, if Luke distinguishes himself here from Matthew, a long tradition stands behind the idea of economic mercy somehow petitioning God’s forgiveness; 99 and ultimately, Luke 11:4 represents an engagement with the framework of redemptive alms. 100 As already noted in treating

rate parable of the Two Debtors (Matt 18:15–30). It is interesting to note that Stephen’s forgiveness of his murderers, while modeled on Jesus’ forgiveness on the Cross, does not directly command ἄφες αὐτοῖς (Luke 23:34), but rather implores God in the subjunctive: κύριε, µὴ στήσῃς αὐτοῖς ταύτην τὴν ἁµαρτίαν (Acts 7:60). It is interesting, as well, that this use of ἵστηµι in the sense of “ascribe” is a LXX expression associated with financial sums. 98 It should be observed that, contrary to many modern translations (e.g. NAB, NRSV, EIN), Luke 6:37c does not say “forgive” (ἀφῆτε) but “release” (ἀπολύετε), as one releases a prisoner, cf. Luke 23:16–25 (also 22:68 A, D, W, etc.). The image of debt-bondage and echo of Jubilee legislation is important (cf. Deut 15:1–11). BDAG rightly understands an economic reference: “pardon (your debtors).” See also Green, Luke, 275. The Matthean parallel of Luke 6:35–42 (Matt 7:1–5) does not include either the injunction to “lend” or to “give,” which echoes Luke’s command to give alms several verses before: παντὶ αἰτοῦντί σε δίδου (Luke 6:30; cf. Matt 5:42). See Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 616. See also John Kloppenborg, “Agrarian Discourse and the Sayings of Jesus: ‘Measure for Measure’ in Gospel Traditions and Agricultural Practices,” in Engaging Economics: New Testament Scenarios and Early Christian Reception (Bruce Longenecker and Kelley Liebengood, eds.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009) 104–28; Alan Kirk, “‘Love Your Enemies,’ The Golden Rule, and Ancient Reciprocity (Luke 6:27–35),” JBL 122 (2003) 667–86; and Stephen Charles Mott, “The Power of Giving and Receiving: Reciprocity in Hellenistic Benevolence,” in Current Issues in Biblical and Patristic Interpretation: Studies in Honor of Merrill C. Tenney (Gerald Hawthorne, ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975) 60–72. 99 Already in Deuteronomy 15 the fulfillment of the charity precept was connected with a special blessing: “When you give, give generously and not with a stingy heart; for that, the LORD, your God, will bless you in all your works and undertakings” (Deut 15:10). 100 See Anderson, Charity; Garrison, Redemptive Almsgiving; Alyssa Gray, “Redemptive Almsgiving and the Rabbis of late Antiquity,” JSQ 18 (2011) 144–84; and David Downs, “Redemptive Almsgiving and Economic Stratification in 2 Clement,” Journal of Early Christian Studies 19 (2011) 493–517. Downs (Alms, 7) has moved away from the language of redemption and is now careful “to make a clear and consistent distinction between meritorious almsgiving and atoning almsgiving.”

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Matthew (§2.2.2), closely linked to debt theology is trust in the power of good deeds, particularly ἐλεηµοσύνη, to forgive sins. This is not the creation of later rabbinic and patristic authors, it bears saying. Rather, it appears clearly already in Second Temple texts. Thus, as Matthew followed the ethical tradition of Sir 28:2, stressing forgiveness of others as the key to forgiveness by God, so Luke embraced a different idea drawn from the same milieu: “Water quenches a flaming fire and almsgiving atones for sins” (ἐλεηµοσύνη ἐξιλάσεται ἁµαρτίας, Sir 3:30; cf. 29:1–13; Tob 12:9). Theological aversion to the type of morality implied here has colored interpretive judgments on the Our Father. On the one hand, scholars are generally glad to note that the present tense of Luke’s ἀφίοµεν and γάρ avoids the stronger claim on God implied in Matthew’s perfect ἀφήκαµεν and ὡς καί. 101 It remains hard, however, to avoid the do ut des logic of Luke’s version. François Bovon, accordingly, uneasy with this idea in Luke 11:4, is compelled to disregard the Second Temple evidence and erect an artificial wall between Luke’s supposed theology of grace and the later tradition (implicitly guilty of Selbsterlösung): “Er [Lukas] meint, daß Jesus, im Unterschied zu den Rabbinern, die über Mittel nachsinnen, die Frauen und Männern zur Verfügung stehen, um ihre Schulden gegenüber Gott zu begleichen, die Menschen als ‘zahlungsunfähig’ erkläre.” 102 The evidence will not support this. Luke – similar to Ben Sira before him and the rabbis after him – imagined himself within an ethical universe in which the debt of sin could somehow be canceled through an enactment of the Jubilee release in works of mercy.103 Luke’s version of the Our Father shows that he perceives a profound parallel between economic and moral mercy – as one should expect given his historical and cultural context. The bi-colon of Luke 11:4 articulates this parallel relation in an almost catechetical way. Lukan “wealth ethics,” his high interest in human charity, hangs in some sense like a pendant on his theology of divine ἄφεσις. The two must not be divorced. Unfortunately, this centrality of “forgiveness” in Luke’s vision has been a missing coordinate in studies of the coherence of Luke’s thought on the proper use of possessions.

101

See, e.g., Marshall, Luke, 461; and Carmignac, Recherches, 230. Green (Luke, 443) suggests that γάρ carries no causal force. Willy Rordorf (“The Lord’s Prayer in the Light of Its Liturgical Use in the Early Church,” Studia Liturgica 14 [1980–81] 12–14) offers a liturgical explanation. In the East, the sign of peace was exchanged before the Lord’s Prayer (“forgive us, as we have just done”), while in the West it was exchanged after (“forgive us as we are going to do”). The Matthean and Lukan tenses would correspond to this discrepancy in usage. 102 Bovon, Lukas 2, 134. 103 Sloan (Favorable Year, 140–2) argues that linguistically Luke’s evocation of Deut 15:2 is clearer than Matthew’s.

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2.4 Christology and Repentance in the Story of the Sinful Woman (Luke 7:36–50) 2.4 Story of the Sinful Woman

The Our Father is not a didactic text and its compact expression presupposes more than it can say. Measuring Luke’s deep interaction with sin as debt theology thus depends on other evidence. The two critical indices that Luke articulates in Luke 11:4 – God’s action in forgiving sins and the related human action in works of mercy – correspond, in fact, to two distinct points of emphasis in Luke’s debt discourse, as also in his theology of forgiveness: Christology and repentance. Christ, for Luke, is the agent who offers the divine debt release, while charity is the way his ἄφεσις is received. The story of the sinful woman (7:36–50) helps illustrate this double-sided and distinctly Lukan adaptation of debt theology. 2.4.1 “A Certain Creditor” (Luke 7:41): Lukan Creditor Christology The parable of the two forgiven debtors (Luke 7:41–42), embedded in the account of the sinful woman, offers the clearest confirmation that Luke has a vigorous interest in the debt metaphor. There were two debtors to a certain creditor (δύο χρεοφειλέται ἦσαν δανιστῇ τινι). The one owed five hundred denarii and the other fifty. Since they did not have the resources to repay (ἀποδοῦναι), he forgave (ἐχαρίσατο) both. Which of them will love (ἀγαπήσει) him more? (Luke 7:41–42)

The parable is brief, but richly contextualized.104 Little argumentation is necessary to see the Semitic background. Within the narrative (Luke 7:36–50), the identification of the large forgiven debt of the parable with the forgiveness of the “many sins” of the woman who anoints Jesus is all but explicit and secured by the catchword “love”: ἀφέωνται αἱ ἁµαρτίαι αὐτῆς αἱ πολλαί, ὅτι ἠγάπησεν πολύ (7:47). The language in the parable describing the creditor’s action (ἐχαρίσατο) also already points towards an understanding of debt remission as forgiveness.105 The result of this interaction of the parable with the surrounding narrative context is that the parable “allegorizes the narrative.”106 The obvious affinity of Luke’s two debtors with Matthew’s parable of the unforgiving servant is revealing (Matt 18:23–35).107 No genetic relation be-



104 On this passage, see especially the thorough treatment of Joël Delobel, “L’onction par la pécheresse: La composition littéraire de Lc. VII, 36–50,” ETL 42 (1966) 415–75. 105 The expression ἀµφοτέροις ἐχαρίσατο (Luke 7:42) technically means, “he gave both a favor/forgave both” (cf. Col 2:13). The verb could also be used for the literal canceling of debts, however, e.g. Josephus, A.J. 6.7.4 §144. 106 Fitzmyer, Luke, 687. See also Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 87. 107 On these two related parables, see ibid., 61–92.

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tween the two seems to exist. Nonetheless, “like Matt 18:23–35 this parable [i.e. Luke 7:41–43] assumes that forgiveness is a gracious release from indebtedness to God.”108 This shared theological framework, a common inheritance from Second Temple sources, including the teaching of Jesus, helps expose an interesting contrast in the two evangelists’ perspectives on divine forgiveness. Matthew’s creditor is a “king” figure (Matt 18:23), a conventional Jewish cipher for God.109 The nimshal even identifies the king of the parable with Jesus’ heavenly Father (οὕτως καὶ ὁ πατήρ µου ὁ οὐράνιος ποιήσει ὑµῖν... 18:35). Christological implications are, of course, inescapable. 110 Nevertheless, as Klyne Snodgrass acknowledges, “at best…the christological thinking is implicit and is not the focus of the parable.”111 The Lukan pericope (Luke 7:36–50), by contrast, functions as the Third Gospel’s key controversy story over Jesus’ authority to receive repentant sinners and “remit” their sins (τίς οὗτός ἐστιν ὅς καὶ ἁµαρτίας ἀφίησιν; Luke 7:49). 112 This pronounced Christology of the Lukan scene thus markedly separates Luke’s appropriation of the debt theology from Matthew’s usage. Specifically, Luke has reconfigured the debtor-creditor relation along Christological lines, for “the parable’s danistēs must have its correlevant in reality”; and as the one to whom the sinful woman’s love is directed and who pronounces the forgiveness of her sins, “it seems best to identify Jesus as the danistēs.” 113 Jesus in Luke thus takes for himself the role of the merciful

108

Ibid., 80. See Exod 15:18; 1 Sam 8:7; 12:12; Pss 93:1–4; 96:10; 103:19; Isa 6:1, 5; 24:23; Obad 21; Jdt 9:12; Tob 13:6; 1 En. 25:3, 5; 91:13; Philo, Op. 1.88; Cher. 1.29, 99; Plant. 1.51, etc. Rabbinic parables very frequently compare God to a king. See David Stern, Parables in Midrash: Narrative and Exegesis in Rabbinic Literature (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1991) 19–34. 110 See, e.g., Hans Weder, Die Gleichnisse Jesu als Metaphern: Traditions- und redaktionsgeschichtliche Analysen und Interpretationen (FRLANT 120; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1978) 216. 111 Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 75. 112 The healing of the paralytic (Luke 5:17–26; cf. Matt 9:1–8; Mark 2:1–12) is also a controversy story about forgiveness. The story in Luke 7:36–50 is Sondergut material, however, and more overtly expressive of Lukan themes (e.g. table fellowship, repentance, etc.; cf. 5:27–30; 15:1–30; 19:1–10). On the connection between these two accounts, see Robert Maddox, The Purpose of Luke-Acts (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1982) 144. 113 See John Kilgallen, “A Proposal for Interpreting Luke 7,36–50,” Bib (1991) 321–9, here 322, 323. Kilgallen elsewhere (“Forgiveness of Sins (Luke 7:36–50),” NovT 40 [1998] 112) remarks again: “It is, in principle, more reasonable than not that the creditor too be an element of allegorization, and so, allegorized, the creditor is Jesus.” 109

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creditor – a role conventionally belonging, as in Matthew, to God. “Jesus is broker of God’s gracious forgiveness,” to put it in patron-client terms.114 In view of this, the failure of Simon the Pharisee to perceive who truly stands before him carries a serious charge. In neglecting to anoint Jesus’ head, Simon has failed to recognize and love God in his agent, the anointed prophet, who is sent to proclaim ἄφεσις (Luke 4:18–19; cf. Isa 61:1–2).115 Just as in the previous unit Jesus had clarified his identity to the messengers from John by recalling the text of his Nazareth sermon, claiming for himself a range of liberating acts (Luke 7:21; cf. Isa 61:1) understood as acts of God (cf. 4Q521),116 so here Jesus continues to insert himself into the same Jubilee framework, completing the job description cut short in 7:18–35 by proclaiming “release” to sinners. 117 Against this background, the repentant woman’s behavior signals that she embraces “the plan of God” (τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θεοῦ) by submitting herself to God acting now in Jesus: a thing the lawyers and Pharisees, like Simon, fail to do (cf. 7:29–30).118

114

Evelyn Thibeaux, “‘Known to Be a Sinner’: The Narrative Rhetoric of Luke 7:36– 50,” Biblical Theology Bulletin 23 (1993) 153. 115 Simon’s misperception of Jesus’ status is a major focus of the pericope: οὗτος εἰ ἦν [ὁ] προφήτης... (Luke 7:39). In Luke’s messianism, Jesus is depicted as “the anointed prophet.” See Porter, “Forgiveness for the Captives,” 144–64. According to D. A. S. Ravens (“Setting of Luke’s Account of the Anointing: Luke 7.2–8.3,” NTS 34 [1988] 283), Luke’s use of the verb ἀλείφω rather than χρίω in 7:36–54 “would seem to rule out the possibility that Luke understood the event as aving a messianic significance.” Ravens undercuts his own argument, however, by stressing how Jesus’ prophetic role is accentuated in the text (284), since this prophetic identity has messianic significance for Luke. See Rowe, Early Narrative Christology, 80. Green (Luke, 80) rightly rules that, “The debate over whether Jesus’ anointing is that of a prophet or messiah…is of little consequence. In light of 1:32–35; 2:11; 3:21–22; 4:24–27, neither can be ruled out.” 116 On the debate over whether or not God employs a messianic (Elijah-esque) mediating agent in 4Q521 and related traditions, see Benjamin Wold, “Agency and Raising the Dead in 4QPseudo-Ezekiel and 4Q521 2 ii,” ZNWKAK 103 (2012) 1–19. 117 The citation of Isaiah 61 in Luke 7:22 naturally recalls Luke 4:16–30. The theme of ἄφεσις – repeated twice in Luke 4:18–19 (cf. Isa 61:1; 58:6) – is flagrantly missing from this latter citation of the text, however. In light of Luke’s editorial tactic of using adjacent pericopae to illustrate connected themes (e.g. Luke 10:25–42), one wonders whether the theme of forgiveness which immediately follows (Luke 7:36–50) might not be placed here in view of the scripture from Isaiah. “It is impossible to know whether Luke deliberately presented the material in chapter 7 to echo 4:16–44, but the way the sources appear to have been interwoven suggests that the similarity is not coincidental,” Ringe, Biblical Jubilee, 48. 118 Charles Talbert (Reading Luke, A Literary and Theological Commentary on the Third Gospel [New York: Crossroad, 1984] 84–5) sees the story of the anointing as an illustration of the entire preceding scene, with Simon representing the Pharisees who reject Jesus and the sinful woman standing as an example of the repentant sinners who accept

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The creditor Christology that Luke crafts in this passage is not an isolated phenomenon in the Gospel (cf. 4:16–30; 12:57–59; 16:1–8), as we shall see – nor is it isolated within the context of early Christianity (e.g. Col 2:13–15). It recalls, moreover, the “Christology of divine identity” propounded by Richard Bauckham, however problematic his narrative theology may be. 119 The character of Jesus here stands at the intersection between God’s action and Israel’s history. In the release of “debts” offered to the sinful woman, Luke thus reveals, through the character of the creditor, what Kavin Rowe similarly calls “the binding of θεός and Ἰησοῦς.”120 In the parable of the two debtors, Luke retells a basic story of debt-release familiar already from Israel’s scriptures. He weaves a new soteriological narrative, however, in which two major reconfigurations are observable. First, in a way very similar to 11Q13, which introduces Melchizedek into the Jubilee framework of Deutero-Isaiah, Luke inserts Jesus into the middle of Israel’s debt dealings with the Lord as the divinely authorized agent who proclaims the good news of their release. 121 As noted, this distinguishes Luke’s use of the debt motif from Matthew’s. Second, in contrast to the metaphor as it appears in Isaiah and 11Q13, Luke, like Matthew, gives significant narrative attention to the behavior of the forgiven debtor. Indeed, the introduction of a second debtor into the narrative in each Gospel serves precisely to concentrate the divine debt-release parables on this theme of the “Israel” character, by giving it new depth. Examining the response on the part of the debtor leads from the creditor Christology to the second of the two characteristic indices of Luke’s debt theology: repentance through acts of charity.

God’s just judgment. So already Bede: “The evangelist builds up in deed what he had proposed in word,” In Lucam, ad loc. (PL 92, 423). 119 Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008). Bauckham seeks to transcend the “fundamentally misleading contrast of ‘functional’ and ‘ontic’ Christology as categories for reading New Testament texts.” In the perspective of classical metaphysics, agere sequitur esse; Jesus’ function in forgiving sin and his divine being are thus not so easily dismissed or superceded – as the Gospel controversy texts themselves would suggest. On certain deeply troubling elements of Bauckham’s “divine identity” proposal, see Giambrone, “Neo-Arians.” 120 Rowe, Early Narrative Christology, 202 (cf. 21–3, 199–202). Although Luke’s depiction of Jesus as the merciful creditor (δανιστής) in Luke 7:36–50 is not articulated through the use of the κύριος title, there is an important contact of the “release” motif with this core, titular language of Luke’s “narrative theology” in Luke 4:16–30 and 16:9). See the Excursus at the end of this chapter and Chapter Four below. 121 In terms evocative of Bauckham’s Christology, Van de Water (“Michael or YWHW?” 75–86) argues that Melchizedek in 11Q13 is not a created angelic intermediary, as often proposed, but a figure comparable to Philo’s λόγος.

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2.4.2 “Because She Loved Much” (Luke 7:47) The Gospels’ attention to the behavior of the debtor(s) in the metaphor of debt release, though clearly raised to a new importance, is not an entirely new idea. The early post-exilic period already understood that a correspondence, even a formal congruence must obtain between the Lord’s mercy and the mercy shown in turn by Israel. The conclusion of Klaus Baltzer’s study of debt release in Deutero-Isaiah and Nehemiah best captures the link that exists here between the early post-exilic outlook and the vision of the New Testament: The transformation of the exile is and remains a divine wonder. It demands a human response. They [i.e. the returned exiles] must proclaim the release of debt; they must make possible the return of those who have been sold into slavery…An epitome of this aspect of Second Isaiah’s theology is found in the parable of ‘the generous king and the unforgiving servant’ in Matt 18:21–35. The point of the tale is this: If you have enjoyed release from debt, how much more should you, too, make like allowance for others.122

Both Matthew and Luke have in their Gospels, in differing ways, “epitomized” this theology of Second Isaiah. The divine proclamation of forgiveness demands a proportionate human response. Matthew locates this coordinate human response in acts of mutual forgiveness. For Luke it is expressed through charitable works – an idea, in fact, closer than Matthew’s to the actual social and economic perspective of Deutero-Isaiah and Nehemiah 5. The role of charity in Luke 7:36–50 is, admittedly, not immediately evident and has therefore been overlooked in secondary literature on almsgiving in Luke. Nevertheless, sufficient evidence exists to connect the text with Lukan wealth ethics. The passage, in fact, represents one of Luke’s more suggestive evocations of the notion of redemptive charity – an idea intimately tied up with the sin as debt theology so central to the passage. The logic of this redemptive view of alms, in which charity might even anticipate and procure forgiveness, is seemingly formulated in 7:47 – “Her many sins are forgiven, because she loved much” (ἀφέωνται αἱ ἁµαρτία αὐτῆς αἱ πολλαί, ὅτι ἠγάπησεν πολύ). Ancient readers saw the implicit redemptive alms motif. Ephrem is perhaps the most impressive witness to an understanding of the sinful woman’s “purchase” of forgiveness through the payment of a debt.123 He cleverly exposes, first, the implicit debt relation contracted in the framework of hospital-

122

Baltzer, “Liberation from Debt Slavery,” 482. On this influential homily, which perhaps belongs to an “‘Ephremic” strand within the wider Syrian tradition, rather than specifically deriving from Ephrem himself,” see Hannah Hunt, Joy-Bearing Grief: Tears of Contrition in the Writings of the Early Syrian and Byzantine Fathers (Leiden: Brill, 2004) 107–26. 123

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ity: “Thou gavest me no water for my feet. Behold the withholding of that which was due! But she moistened them with her tears. Behold the payment of what was due!”124 As Ephrem sees, by neglecting the expectations of charity a kind of “debt” is incurred, a deficit that demands to be paid. The woman’s show of love accordingly supplies the Pharisee’s lack, not her own. Our Lord showed that the Pharisee owed him all those things and withheld them; but that the sinful woman had come in and rendered all those things which he had withheld. Because she then paid the debts of him who wrongfully withheld them, the Just One forgave her her own debt, even her sins.125

In this way, the woman, in ministering to Jesus, performs an act of charity, a merciful debt release for Simon. The woman’s charity in supplying for Simon’s lack, nevertheless, at the same time, serves also to pay off her own debts from her sinful life. The sorrowing kisses testified that they sought to win over the creditor to tear up the debtbonds. The goodly ointment of the sinful woman proclaimed that it was a bribe of penitence…by her pure kisses she was atoning for her transgressions…. The sinful woman by the flood of her tears, in full assurance was rewarded with the remission of sins.126

It is important to see that the economic aspect of the woman’s loving show of hospitality was not simply a metaphor about sin-release for Ephrem. He was sensitive to the real price in dollars and cents she paid to pay off her “debt.” Thus, in another homily on the same text, the repentant prostitute (as she is vividly styled) holds up the gold she has earned from her sins and cries out, “This, O Lord, that I have gained from iniquity, with it will I purchase for myself redemption (bh ’qn’ ly pwrqn’).”127 She then uses the funds to purchase the perfume with which she will anoint the Lord and “buy” her redemption (l. 69–133). Ephrem’s reading is imaginative, but not at all outrageous. In the following three sections, the background of redemptive almsgiving in Luke 7:36–50 will be explored. First, the problematic “resultative” reading of ὅτι 7:47 will be contested. Next, Luke’s special use of ἀγαπᾶν in the sense of charity will be examined. Finally, the paradigm of hospitality as a saving work will be explored.



124 For the original text, see CSCO 311; Scriptores Syri 134. Translation is taken from Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series 2, Volume 13: Gregory the Great (II), Ephraim Syrus, Aphrahat (Philip Schaf and Henry Wace, eds.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2012) 312 (On Our Lord §20). 125 Ibid., 313. 126 Ibid., 324, 325, 327. 127 Ibid., 327. Purqān, purqānā (n.m.) means literally the “price of redemption” (CAL).

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2.4.2.1 The Causal ὅτι Luke 7:36–50 reveals a tension between divine and human initiative. Indeed, the text’s uncertain portrayal of how the woman’s show of love relates to God’s forgiveness seems to affirm two different perspectives: one in the parable and its interpretation (Luke 7:41–43), where love evidently follows forgiveness; another in the narrative (7:47) where the woman’s love seems to cause her forgiveness.128 In earlier times, a doctrinal controversy over these two perspectives actually split exegetes, along confessional lines, over the value of good works. 129 Protestants, stressing 7:41–43, understood the Pauline principle of justification sola fide as being at stake (i.e. 7:50), 130 while Catholics, focusing on 7:47, defended the doctrine of contritio cartitate perfecta. 131 Early on, however, the difficulty of integrating Luke’s two different perspectives into a single consistent vision was recognized as a real crux. Père Lagrange, therefore, recognizing fathers on both sides, could (without conceding the Protestant reading of Pauline justification) leave the dispute unresolved: “La cause réelle du pardon, et donc le point théologique, demeure dans l’ombre.”132 More recently, two Jesuit scholars, Joseph Fitzmyer and John Kilgallen, have attempted to settle the matter more univocally, lobbying strongly for the priority of the parable, the woman’s forgiveness prior to her act of love, and a reading of Luke 7:47 in a “resultative” sense.133 In language reminiscent of

128

On the basis of his syntactic analysis, Roitto (“Two Cognitive Frames of Forgiveness,” 156) points to the interesting fact that in this passage “the idea that love causes forgiveness is consistently paired with the substance-frame of forgiveness, but the idea that forgiveness causes love is consistently paired with the debt-frame of forgiveness…when Luke attempts dialectic integration of two understandings of the relation between love and forgiveness, he also intertwines two different linguistic constructions for forgiveness.” 129 The confessional division should not be overplayed. Denis Buzy (Les Paraboles [Verbum Salutis VI; Paris: Beauchsne, 1932] 259) remarks that it would be “une mauvaise plaisanterie et une injustice” to paint one position as the Catholic position and the other as the Protestant. Elsewhere Buzy (“Enseignements Paraboliques,” RB 26 [1917] 185) notes, for instance, that the “Protestant” position was proposed first by Catholics like Tolet and Salmeron; while among non-Catholic scholars holding the causal reading, he cites no less influential an interpreter than Adolf Jülicher (Gleichnisreden Jesu, 298). 130 See, e.g., Alfred Plummer, The Gospel According to S. Luke (ICC; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1910) 213–4; and Georg Ludwig Hahn, Das Evangelium des Lucas (Breslau: E. Morgenstern, 1892) 507–8. 131 See, e.g., Paul Schanz, Commentar über das Evangelium des heiligen Lucas (Tübingen: Franz Fues, 1882) 248–50. On this doctrine, see the helpful article of P. de Letter, “Perfect Contrition and Perfect Charity,” TS 7 (1946) 507–24. 132 M.-J. Lagrange, Évangile selon Saint Luc (Paris: Gabalda, 1921) 231. 133 See Fitzmyer, Luke, 683–94; John Kilgallen, “John the Baptist, the Sinful Woman, and the Pharisees,” JBL 104 (1985) 675–9; idem., “Forgiveness of Sins: Luke 7:36–50,”

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earlier Protestant scholars, Kilgallen thus contends that faith, not love, is the operative principle in the woman’s rehabilitation, the “most essential element,” indeed “the essential characteristic” in the Lukan mechanics of forgiveness.134 While this view can appeal to 7:50, it is a dubious characterization of Luke’s theology of ἄφεσις. As an interpretation of 7:47 it entirely fails to convince. Kilgallen first argues that the perfect tense of the verb ἀφέωνται in Luke 7:47 suggests that the woman has already been forgiven. This assertion, of course, carries some force in the abstract. Within the narrative, however, such an event can, Kilgallen admits, only be presumed since “there is no indication of any sins being forgiven during the early or middle stages of the story.”135 Grammatically, however, it remains a possibility that might be harmonized with a special reading of the ὅτι clause. Specifically, he claims, “the ὅτι is understood in the special causal sense which gives the reason not why the fact is so, but whereby it is known to be so.”136 The woman’s love, in this case, manifests rather than triggers her pardon. Thus: “Her sins, her many sins, have been forgiven her, and this can be known from the fact that she has loved (me) much.”137 Two basic difficulties complicate this analysis. (i) The same perfect passive verb, ἀφέωνται, appears in Jesus’ performative speech act in the very next verse: “He said to her, Ἀφέωνταί σου αἱ ἁµαρτίαι” (Luke 7:48). This expression parallels exactly the act of absolution Jesus offers in the story of the paralytic: ἀφέωνταί σοι αἱ ἁµαρτίαι σου...ἀφέωνταί σοι αἱ ἁµαρτίαι σου (5:20, 23); and in each pericope Jesus’ pronouncement generates a response among the hearers who understand him to be conferring forgiveness directly (5:21; 7:49). Consequently, as even Fitzmyer sees, the verb carries a present sense in 7:48.138 It is accordingly difficult to insist upon a different sense in the immediately preceding verse. (ii) The logical or resultative use of ὅτι, which would make the subordinate (ὅτι) clause express the effect rather than the cause, is unusual

NovT 40 (1998) 105–16; idem., “Proposal,” 305–30; idem., “What Does It Mean to Say That There Are Additions in Luke 7,36–50?” Bib (2005) 529–35. 134 Kilgallen, “Proposal,” 325. 135 Kilgallen, “The Sinful Woman,” 675. 136 See Maximillian Zerwick, Biblical Greek (Rome: PIB, 1990) 144 (§422). See also Buzy, Paraboles, 252–3. 137 Kilgallen, “The Sinful Woman,” 675. 138 Fitzmyer, Luke, 692. Buzy (Paraboles, 251) comments on the sense: “Pardonnés en ce moment, car il serait gratuit de supposer une absolution antérieur. En ce moment, ce qui ne marque pas néanmoins la minute precise où le pardon est octroyé. Un parfait de ce genre doit se prendre avec une certaine latitude; il signifie l’état de pardon plus encore que l’acte de pardoner.”

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and “difficile de justifier en grec.” 139 An Aramaic substratum has at times been invoked to explain the situation.140 The line would have originally run: “I say to you ‫ די‬many sins are forgiven her, ‫ די‬she loves much.” The first ‫די‬ dropped out because it was mistakenly taken as a ὅτι recitativum, then the main and subordinate clauses got flip-flopped. Zerwick was certainly right that this possibility does not enjoy a “high degree of probability.” As Maurice Casey warns, the mistranslated ‫ די‬card is greatly overplayed.141 Even where the argument is accepted, however, Luke’s meaning (being ultimately grounded on an error) remains just as problematic for the resultative view. It seems as if Luke intended us to understand, in spite of the logic of the parable, the words in the sense ‘because she loved much’, in order to enable him to go on to portray Christ granting the woman absolution (v. 48): because of this demonstration of gratitude (Luke intends us to understand) the woman’s sins are being (or going to be) forgiven now. The alternative (and undoubtedly original) meaning places the absolution or forgiveness of the woman in the past – her demonstration of affection is a consequence of her having been forgiven. There is no doubt how the original Aramaic was construed.142

On the level of Luke’s canonical text, then, it remains no less difficult, even on the theory of a garbled Aramaic tradition, to defend the resultative reading. There is, in fact, no obvious Lukan precedent for such a usage of the conjunction ὅτι as Kilgallen and Fitzmyer wish to find. Most of the suggested instances are cleft interrogatives or independent exclamations (Luke 4:36; 8:25; 11:18). 143 The case of Luke 7:39b is intriguing and syntactically complex. Οὗτος εἰ ἦν προφήτης, ἐγίνωσκεν ἂν τίς καὶ ποταπὴ ἡ γυνὴ ἥτις ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ, ὅτι ἁµαρτωλός ἐστιν.

139

Albert Valensin and Joseph Huby, Évangile selon Saint Luc (Verbum Salutis 3; Paris: Gabriel Beauchesne, 1927) 149. See also Anneli Aejmelaeus, “OTI causale in Septuagint Greek,” in La Septuaginta en la investigación contemporanea (V Congreso de la IOSCS) (Natalio Fernández Marcos, ed.; Madrid: Ediciones Textos y Estudios Cardenal Cisneros, 1985) 115–32. 140 Zerwick (§427) suggests that possibly ‫ די‬was used twice in an Aramaic original, then misunderstood in the Greek. “In the Greek version the first ‫ די‬was taken as introducing the direct speech which follows, and so was not rendered into Greek at all, while the second ‫די‬ was rendered ὅτι, presumably understood as causal.” The idea can be traced to C. C. Torrey. Matthew Black (An Aramaic Approach to the Gospels and Acts [Oxford: Clarendon, 1967] 181–3) fully endorses the proposal. 141 Casey, Aramaic Sources, 21–2. 142 Black, Aramaic Approach, 183. 143 See BDF §476. On possible Lukan instances of a resultative use of ὅτι, see R. Crespo, “Le fueron perdonados sus muchos pecados, porque amó mucho” (Exégesis de Lc 7, 47),” La Ciencia tomista 20 (1919) 289–300.

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It is not a precedent, however. 144 Within the apodosis of the present contrafactual conditional, ὅτι functions within a prolepsis – explaining why the ordering of clauses by the conjunction might look reversed. The semantics of the verb γινώσκω further conspire towards the idea of a logical usage (expressing how a thing is known).145 In fact, though, the subject of the subordinate ὅτι clause (i.e. implied ἡ γυνή, in a predicate nominative construction with ἁµαρτωλός) is simply anticipated as the object of the main clause – a compound interrogative in this case (ἐγίνωσκεν...τίς καὶ ποταπὴ ἡ γυνή) – such that ὅτι ultimately serves as a simple complement to ἐγίνωσκεν (“he would know...that she is a sinner”). The point in all this is only that the causal reading of ὅτι in Luke 7:47 is much to be preferred and rejected only if compelled. Indeed, the possibility of a “logical/resultative” use gains all its force from its ability to tolerate an otherwise established claim that the woman has already been forgiven. Rather than straining the syntax of 7:47, a better way to approach the interpretative crux of the whole unit is thus to examine the language of ἀγαπᾶν, for this language is ultimatelly what binds the parable (7:42) to the narrative frame (7:47).146 Such an examination, however, points directly to the notion of good works. 2.4.2.2 Love as Charity in Luke The understanding of ἀγαπᾶν in Luke 7:36–50 as meaning “be grateful” has become popular and seemingly fits 7:42 quite nicely. The gloss is theoretically based upon the observation that both Hebrew and Aramaic lack a proper word for thanks.147 Some evidence purportedly exists, additionally, for a meaning of ἀγαπᾶν as give thanks in the Greek of the period.148 Unfortunately, the three examples brought forward for this unusual Greek usage are all instances of translation Greek (i.e. Ps 114:1 LXX; Josephus, B.J. 1.10.2 §198, 5.10.3 §438, cf. 1.3) – a fact that considerably qualifies the evidence. Moreover, in the only case where the Semitic Vorlage is available, the meaning of ‫( אהבתי‬LXX, ἠγάπησα) is by overwhelming consensus reckoned

144

Pace Buzy (Paraboles, 252–3), who proposes this verse as “l’analogie la plus caractéristique,” of special interest since it belongs to the same passage. 145 The appeal to 1 John 3:14 as an analogy is also semantically misleading because of the use of οἴδαµεν, which semantically governs a double ὅτι. In contrast to these verses, a verb of knowing must be gratuitously supplied in Luke 7:47. 146 “La noeud de la question reside dans l’ecart entre le récit et la parabole des vv. 41– 43,” G. Bouwman, “La Pécheresse hospitaliere (Lc., vii, 36–50),” ETL 45 (1969) 171. 147 See Jeremias (Gleichnisse, 105); and Valensin and Huby (Saint Luc) 148. 148 H. G. Wood, “The use of ἀγαπάω in Luke viii. 42, 47 [sic],” ExpT 66 (1955) 319−20.

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to be “I love” and not “I thank.”149 Moreover, Greek itself has a perfectly good word for “give thanks,” so the appeal to a Semitic origin behind Luke’s locution has, in any case, a very uncertain bearing on Luke’s own Greek text. At what level are we to imagine the Semitic influence? 150 Most damaging to the thesis, however, is the fact that Aramaic had (naturally) found a way to express thanks; but it was not with a word for “love” (‫חבב‬, ‫רחם‬, ‫חשק‬, ‫)שנג‬, but rather with the word for “praise” (‫)ידה‬. 151 This, it is very important to observe, is an expression that Luke seemingly does know and use in the sense of thanks in the story of the Ten Lepers (οὐχ εὑρέθησαν ὑποστρέψαντες δοῦναι δόξαν τῷ θεῷ εἰ µὴ ὁ ἀλλογενὴς οὗτος, Luke 17:18; cf. 2:38; 22:17). It is hard, then, to maintain that in Luke 7:42 and 7:47 a semantic hole in the Semitic languages was simply plugged with the arbitrary Greek idea of “love.” Rather, Fitzmyer appears to be correct in suggesting that “perhaps the more literal sense of agapan, ‘love’ should...be retained.”152 Fitzmyer’s conclusion may be strengthened by highlighting what Luke’s own use of love language signifies – for it nowhere else has the purported sense of thanks.153 A probe here is actually quite revealing. Indeed, the striking appearance of “love” in this passage has not been adequately registered or explained. Nowhere else in the synoptic Gospels is Jesus the object of human love (ἀγαπᾶν). Much has been made of the supposedly erotic overtones of the pericope, but this is the wrong direction to look. Reinhard von Bendemann instead indicates where the language leads: “Was sie [die Sünderin] an Jesus tut, wird als ἀγαπᾶν qualifiziert (7,47). Dies ergibt einen semantischen Rückbezug auf Lk 6,27–36, denjenigen paränetischen Zusammenhang, der zuvor die lukani-



149 See Hossfeld and Zenger, Psalmen 101–150, 269. The translation of the Vul, Luther, RSV, NAB, JB, EÜ, and CEI all read ‫ אהבתי‬as “I love.” 150 Most scholars appeal to a Sitz im Leben Jesu. Joüon (“La parabole des deux débiteurs,” 616), for example, reasons, “Notre Seigneur a certainement parlé, en cette circonstance, en araméen, car la femme, la plupart des convives et les plus grand number des disciples ne comprenaient que cette langue.” See also Valesin and Huby, Saint Luc, 147. Matthew Black (Aramaic Approach, 181–2), who offers his own reconstruction of Luke 7:41–42, appears to envision a pre-Lukan origin sometime after the preaching of Jesus. 151 See Fitzmyer, Luke, 690. None of the standard lexicons (i.e. Jastrow, Sokolow, CAL) give any indication that the range of Aramaic words for love (‫חבב‬, ‫רחם‬, ‫חשק‬, ‫)שנג‬ ever mean “give thanks.” 152 Ibid., 690. 153 The verb ἀγαπάω appears in ten verses in the Gospel and never in Acts (Luke 3:22; 6:27, 32, 35; 7:5, 42, 47; 10:25; 11:43; 16:13). Most of these uses derive from Luke’s sources (Luke 3:22 || Matt 3:17; Mark 1:11; Luke 6:27, 32, 35 || Matt 5:44, 46; Luke 10:25 || Mark 12:30; Matt 22:37; Luke 11:43 || Matt 23:6; Luke 16:13 || Matt 6:24).

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sche Erzählung vom heidnischen Centurio in Lk 7,1–10 mit beeinflußt (vgl. 7,5).”154 The programmatic exposition of love in Luke’s Sermon on the Plain, the first use of ἀγαπᾶν in the Gospel, provides an indispensable context and reference point for understanding Luke’s conception.155 27

Love your enemies (ἀγαπᾶτε), do good (καλῶς ποιεῖτε) to those who hate you. 28Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. 29To the one who strikes you on the cheek, offer also the other; and from the one who takes your cloak, do not withhold your tunic. 30Give to all who beg from you (παντὶ αἰτουντί σε δίδου), and from the one who takes what is yours do not beg for it back. 31As you wish men would do to you, do to them likewise. 32If you love those who love you (ἀγαπᾶτε τοὺς ἀγαπῶντας), what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. 33And if you do good (ἀγαθοποιῆτε τοὺς ἀγαθοποιοῦντας) to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. 34And if you lend (δανίσητε) to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners in order to receive back the same things. 35 But love your enemies and do good and lend (ἀγαθοποιεῖτε καὶ δανίζετε), expecting nothing; and your wage (ὁ µισθός) will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind (χρηστός) with the unkind (ἀχαρίστους) and the evil. 36Be merciful (οἰκτίρµονες) as your Father is merciful (Luke 6:27–36; cf. Matt 5:38–48).156

The language of ἀγαπᾶν here is developed in close association with two illuminating lexical parallels, ἀγαθοποιεῖν and δανίζειν, neither of which appears in the Matthean Sermon. The verb ἀγαθοποιεῖν carries a strong connotation of charitable works: bene-faction, not just benevolence. 157 In Test. Benj. 5:2, for instance, the word specifically describes one who has “respect for good works” (φόβος ἀγαθῶν ἔργων, 5:3); while Tobit 12:13 (BA) more concretely uses ἀγαθοποιῶν to denote Tobit’s work of mercy in burying the dead (e.g. Tobit 2:2–8).158 Polycarp (Phil. 10:2) explicitly interprets the equivalent expression

154

Reinhard von Bendemann, “Liebe und Sündenvergebung: Eine narrativetraditionsgeschichtliche Analyse von Lk 7,36–50,” BZ 44 (2000) 162. 155 The use of ἀγαπητός in Luke 3:22 comes from Mark 1:11. It is not analyzed as a verbal form of ἀγαπάω, but was fixed as an adjective. See BDAG, s.v.; BDF §65.3. 156 The italicized text approximates the Lukan divergence from the Matthean parallel. On this passage, see Willem van Unnik, “Die Motivierung der Feindesliebe in Lukas vi 32–35,” NovT 8 (1966) 284–300. Van Unnik rightly concentrates on the theme of “Wohltätigkeit.” See also Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 590–616. 157 The idea is very similar to ἀγαθοεργέω and the locution ἐργαζόµαι τὸ ἀγαθόν, a near technical expression in the ancient world for conferring material benefits on others (cf. Gal 6:10; 1 Tim 6:18). See Bruce Winter, Seek the Welfare of the City: Christians as Benefactors and Citizens (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994) 11–40. Comounds with ποιέω were very common. See BDF §119.1. 158 In a philosophical context, the notion could express a characteristic attribute of the divine essence: παρὸ καὶ ὁ Πλάτων συνιστάς, ὅτι φύσει ἀγαθόν ἐστιν ὁ θεός, ἀπὸ τῶν ὁµοίων ἐπικεχείρηκεν. ὡς γὰρ θερµοῦ, φησίν, ἴδιόν ἐστι τὸ θερµαίνειν καὶ ψυχροῦ ἴδιόν

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εὖ ποιεῖν through a citation of Tobit 12:9 (cf. Prov 10:2; 11:4), one of the most celebrated proof texts for the redemptive power of almsgiving: ἐλεηµοσύνη ἐκ θανάτου ῥύεται (see Chapter Four). As for δανίζειν, the associations are no less clear. 159 In the language of lending, Luke embraces a concept entirely native to the Jewish idea of almsgiving and doing good.160 Some contact with the Greco-Roman system of benefaction may be allowed. 161 But Jesus’ claim that the behavior he inculcates will set his hearers apart from the (pagan?) ἁµαρτωλοί should be taken seriously, for the social justice legislation in Deut 15:1–11 ultimately stands behind this idea of loaning as an act of charity.162 By the Tannaitic period, the generous loans prescribed in the Torah had acquired a paradigmatic significance in Jewish charity discourse, as the following chapter (§3.4.1) will show in detail. In the light of Luke’s two glosses on ἀγαπᾶν (i.e. ἀγαθοποιεῖν, δανίζειν), Lukan loving is thus distinctly weighted towards charitable expressions of aid.163 This understanding of love in Luke is further confirmed in the story of the healing of the centurian’s servant (Luke 7:1–10). The text appears

ἐστι τὸ ψύχειν, οὕτω καὶ ἀγαθοῦ ἴδιόν ἐστι τὸ ἀγαθοποιεῖν· τἀγαθὸν δέ γε ὁ θεός· ἴδιον ἄρα ἐστὶ θεοῦ τὸ ἀγαθοποιεῖν (Sext. Emp., Math. 11.70–71). Cf. ἀγαθουργῶν, Acts 14:17. The imitatio Dei motif common in much charity discourse is interesting in this connection, cf. Luke 6:37 (Matt 5:43–48); 3 John 11. Cf. Letter to Diognetus 10:6; Gregory of Nazianzen, Oratio 14, De pauperum amore, 23–25 (PG 35, 887–890). On this motif, see Bradley, Everlasting Signet Ring, 254–90; and Kloppenborg, “Agrarian Discourse,” 123. 159 Betz (Sermon on the Mount, 602) wonders “why...the issue of moneylending [is] brought in at this point [i.e. Luke 6:34–35].” His best answer is that it serves as a convenient foil. “The implication is that in the lending of money, one does nothing to another person that one can ethically call ‘love’ or ‘doing good.’” It is true that do ut des reasoning is especially evident in the case of lending money. But Betz twists the logic of the passage in opposing every notion of reciprocity to what we may “ethically call ‘love.’” See Kirk, “Love Your Enemies,” 667. 160 “Money-lending as an act of mercy is to be distinguished from almsgiving” (Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 606 fn. 133, 608–9). It is clear that Betz has too sharply located Luke’s loaning language in “the Hellenistic debates on benevolence” at the complete expense of almsgiving, the “Jewish equivalent,” which he recognizes in Matthew’s Sermon. 161 Seneca in De Beneficiis considers an act of beneficence (χάρις) to be a gift only when there is no hope of return, and he contrasts such behavior repeatedly with lending. See Troels Engberg-Pedersen, “Giving and Doing: The Philosophical Coherence of the Sermon on the Plain,” in Jenseits von Indikativ und Imperativ (Friedrich Wilhelm Horn and Ruben Zimmermann, eds.; WUNT 238; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009) 277. 162 See Weinfeld, Social Justice, 162–74. 163 The final imitatio Dei injunction which closes Luke’s unit on love clinches this background: γίνεσθε οἰκτίρµονες καθὼς ὁ πατὴρ ὑµῶν οἰκτίρµων ἐστίν (Luke 6:36). The line was understood by Justin under the rubric “Sharing with Those in Need” (τὸ κοινωνεῖν τοῖς δεοµένοις, Apol. 15:10, 13).

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immediately after the Sermon on the Plain and just shortly before the account of the sinful woman. Luke includes the unique and hardly incidental addition that the centurion “loves (ἀγαπᾷ τὸ ἔθνος ἡµῶν) our nation and he built the synagoguge for us” (7:5). The act of loving here is demonstrated in a concrete (and extravagant) benefaction. If such a gift resonates with the ethos of Hellenistic euergetism, in Luke’s two-volume work, it is directly coordinated with the pious almsgiving of Luke’s other Centurion, Cornelius, who likewise practices almsgiving toward Israel (ποιῶν ἐλεηµοσύνας πολλὰς τῷ λαῷ, Acts 10:2). 164 It is perhaps even more significant that the generous love of the centurion from Capernaum makes him ἀξιός (Luke 7:4) of a miracle that would save his servant from death (ἤµελλεν τελευτᾶν): precisely the promise attached to ἐλεηµοσύνη in the scriptures (Prov 10:2; 11:4; Tob 12:9) – a promise widely celebrated in Jewish and Christian circles and an idea of redemptive almsgiving that Luke elsewhere explicitly plays upon (see Chapter Four §4.2). Apart from the story of the Sinful Woman, three other uses of ἀγαπᾶν appear in Luke. Two belong to double tradition material and do not reveal a great deal (Luke 16:13 || Matt 6:24; Luke 11:43 || Matt 23:6). The other is the triple tradition citation of Deut 6:5/Lev 19:18 (ἀγαπήσεις κύριον τὸν θεόν σου...καὶ τὸν πλησίον σου ὡς σεαυτόν). Luke has substantially reconfigured this tradition in his Good Samaritan pericope (Luke 10:25–37); and as the following chapter will show, following a tradition attested at Qumran, he understands the love commandment as a commandment to give alms. The appearance in Luke 11:42 of the nominal phrase ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ θεοῦ as that which the Pharisees have neglected, along with “justice” (κρίσις), has as its immediate context Jesus’ call to give alms: δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην (11:41). Hays sees the closest textual parallel to this pair, justice and love, in the double love commandment in Luke 10:27;165 and Downs concludes, “It is appropriate to envision ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ θεοῦ as a practice that the Pharisees ought to have embraced...loving their neighbors through the merciful practice of almsgiving.”166 To the extent that the two commandments of love of God and love of neighbor are inseparable for Luke, this appears to be justified. While Luke never provides so bold an identification of the two commandments as James 1:27, for instance, the example of Luke 16:13, the only other passage in the Gospel where the love of God is invoked, considers such love to be incompatible with love of money.167 In other words, for Luke, loving God

164

The two closely-related godfearers nicely illustrate the false dichotomy that might be drawn between Jewish and Greco-Roman perspectives on benefaction, e.g. Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 606–9. 165 Hays, Wealth Ethics, 122–3. 166 Downs, Alms, 128. 167 Ibid.

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and serving him as one’s exclusive master, is not a purely spiritual matter; it means concretely detaching oneself from wealth by charitably giving alms. A characteristic Lukan understanding of ἀγαπᾶν might thus be affirmed. Love, for Luke, is closely bound to charitable, material demonstrations of mercy – actions which make one ἀξιός and gain the χάρις of a great µισθός. This understanding provides the appropriate background for approaching the love invoked in Luke 7:36–50. 2.4.2.3 Hospitality as a Redemptive Work of Charity The subjective reception of ἄφεσις through repentance is a distinct aspect of Luke’s soteriology,168 and, for Luke, the proper use of wealth is integral to the idea of repentance.169 Luke Timothy Johnson has especially stressed this role of possessions in the Gospel as an index of one’s response to God through Jesus.170 The story of the woman in Luke 7:36–50 – a major Lukan repentance text – belongs to this wider literary pattern, though the passage has been broadly ignored in studies of almsgiving and the use of possessions in the Gospel.171 The love of the women, nonetheless, helps expose how Luke envisions the paying off of sin’s debt by works of charity. The unresolved tradition history of Luke 7:36–50 is notoriously complex (cf. John 12:1–8; Mark 14:3–9; also Matt 26:6–13) and repeated “with almost boring repetitiveness.” 172 Fitzmyer’s position that the passage blends material



168 Bovon (Luke the Theologian, 307) says, “I distinguish salvation from its reception, an objective soteriology from a subjective one…I think Luke himself draws a distinction between the kerygma and acceptance of the Word, between the salvation effected by Christ and the movement of humans towards this salvation.” On repentance in Luke, see especially Guy Nave, Jr., The Role and Function of Repentance in Luke-Acts (Academia Biblica 4; Atlanta: SBL, 2002). The study of Jon Nelson Bailey (Repentance in Luke-Acts [Ph.D. Dissertation; University of Notre Dame, 1993) is too narrowly focused on the words µετανοέω/µετάνοια and fails to explore the full meaning of the phenomenon of repentance in Luke. 169 See Nave, Repentance in Luke-Acts, 152–9, 174–89. 170 Johnson, Literary Function, 144–58. 171 Johnson (Luke, 129; cf. idem., Literary Function, 102) appreciates that the “language of possessions used to symbolize human relationships” is one of the “distinctive points of Lukan thematic interest” in 7:36–50. He does not explore the motif in any detail, however; nor have other studies on Lukan wealth ethics. 172 Bovon, Lukas 1, 385 (“mit einer geradezu langweiligen Ausdauer”). See the helpful summary of Raymond Brown, The Gospel according to John I-XII (AB 29; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1966) 449–52; and the analysis of Robert Holst, “The One Anointing of Jesus: Another Application of the Form-critical Method,” JBL 95 (1976) 435–46. On the wider history of the tradition and some textual issues, see Matti Myllykoski, “The Sinful Woman in the Gospel of Peter: Reconstructing the Other Side of P.Oxy. 4009,” NTS 55 (2009) 104–15. J. F. Coakley (“The Anointing at Bethany and the Priority of John,” JBL 107 [1988] 241–56) argues that John’s version preserves the earliest stratum of the

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from Mark 14:3–9 and a special source is quite reasonable, however.173 It is significant, then, that in the Markan parallel the woman’s gesture is conspicuously interpreted as a “good work” (καλὸν ἔργον): the ‫ מת מצוה‬of preparing a body (i.e. that of Jesus) for burial (cf. Tob 1:17–19; 2:3–9; 12:12–13; Josephus, C. Ap. 2.211; Philo, Hypoth. 7.7).174 It is, in fact, just this interpretation of her deed as one of the archetypal works of mercy for the poor (‫טובים‬ ‫מעשים‬, ‫ )גמילות חסדים‬that vindicates the woman from the criticism of the onlookers, who suggest that she should have rather given alms: “This myrrh might have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor” (Mark 14:5). In Mark’s text, Jesus’ quotation of Deut 15:11 – “the poor you always have with you” – turns a classic charity proof text in a bold Christological direction. “Jesus is the poor man par excellence.”175 This construal does not undermine the emphasis on alms, nor is the Christological ethic an idiosyncratic conceit (cf. Matt 25:31–46). 176 The formulation, nevertheless, is uncongenial to Luke’s designs. James Sanders thus imagines that at some point in the process of transmission “reference to Deut 15.11 would be dropped, since its appearance in Mark, and perhaps his sources, was seen [by Luke] as impertinent and abusive of the jubilee legislation.”177 This is too strong, but the fact remains that Luke cites precisely the opposite idea in Acts 4:24, quoting from the same Jubilee passage in Deuteronomy 15 – “There shall be no

tradition, which was known to Luke in some form. Whatever the ultimate historical origin (one anointing or two) and relative priority of the variant traditions, a redacted conflation of two circulating accounts appears to be the best explanation of Luke’s material. See the good treatment of J. Patrick Mullen, Dining with Pharisees (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2004) 84–99. See also Greg Carey, “Moving Things Ahead: A Lukan Redactional Technique and Its Implications for Gospel Origins,” Biblical Interpretation 21 (2013) 309–12. 173 See Fitzmyer, Luke, 693–4. Pace Schürmann, Lukasevangelium. See André Legault, “An Application of the Form-Critique Method to the Anointings in Galilee (Lk 7,36–50) and Bethany (Mt 26:6–13; Mk 14:3–9; Jn 12:1–8),” CBQ 16 (1954) 131–45. The omission of the story in Mark 14 from its corresponding place in Luke’s Gospel strongly indicates that Luke saw a connection with the material he had already recounted (Luke 7:36–50). 174 The same is true in John 12:1–8, which tradition likely also inform Luke’s story. See John Nolland, Luke 1–9:20 (WBC 35a; Waco, TX: Word Books, 1989) 352. Luz (Mattäus 4, 61) says “dieser Ausdruck [καλὸν ἔργον] entspricht dem rabbinischen ‫מעשה‬ ‫טוב‬, einem allgemeinen Ausdruck, der sowohl Wohltätigkeit als auch Liebeswerke umfaßt. Es ist also kaum anzunehmen, daß Jesus im folgenden zwei verschiedene Arten von ‘guten Werken’ nämlich Almosen und Liebeswerke, einander gegenüberstellen will.” 175 William Lane, The Gospel According to Mark (NICNT; Grand Rapids, 1974) 494. 176 Matthew’s Christological ethic of almsgiving is much more developed than Mark’s (cf. Matt 25:31–46). Interestingly, Matthew 26:6–13 follows Mark 14:3–9 rather closely, but omits the phrase ὅταν θἐλητε δύνασθε αὐτοις [i.e. πτωχοῖς] εὖ ποιῆσαι (Mark 14:7). 177 James Sanders, “Sins, Debts, and Jubilee Release,” in Text as Pretext: Essays in Honour of Robert Davidson (Robert P. Carroll, ed.; JSOTSup 138; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1992) 276.

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poor among you” (Deut 15:4).178 Greg Carey is therefore right to say, “While we cannot walk inside the author’s mind, we can easily imagine the author’s discomfort with the line, ‘For you always have the poor with you…’ (Mark 14:7).”179 In the end, then, one can agree with Sanders that “Luke knew an early account similar to Mark’s, and was encouraged by the paraphrase of Deut. 15.11 to pursue his jubilee interpretation of events reported and transmitted about Jesus, giving this episode its distinctive jubilee cast.” 180 By “jubilee cast” Sanders has particularly in mind Luke’s insertion of the parable (Luke 7:41–42) into the scene, with its overt focus on debt release. In the Lukan narrative, of course, the scene has been moved forward so that shadow of Jesus’ impending death and burial no longer looms. The interpretation of the deed as an anticipatory ‫ מת מצוה‬accordingly no longer makes sense. In its place, however, Luke has reconstructed the woman’s deed as a work of hospitality, which fits better with the meal scene where it is found and corresponds to a major Lukan charity motif.181 This re-conception is clear when, point-by-point, the woman’s behavior is coordinated with and interpreted by the ritual signs of welcome lacking on the part of Simon: the washing of feet, a kiss of greeting, and an anointing (Luke 7:44–46).182 The woman’s generous show of service not only reflects poorly on Simon; it paints her in a particularly meritorious light.183 The re-conception is somewhat strained, and it reveals how Luke is working to re-forge his sources. The intention, nonetheless, is clear.

178

The difficulties of the seemingly contradictory text of Deuteronomy 15:1–11 have long been recognized. On the coherence of the unit as expressing two possible scenarios, a blessing and a curse, see André Kabasele Mukenge, “‘Toutefois, il n’y aura pas de nécessiteux chez toi’: La stratégie argumentative de Deut. 15:1–11,” VT 60 (2010) 69–86. 179 Carey, “Moving Things Ahead,” 312. See also Mel Shoemaker, “Good News to the Poor in Luke’s Gospel,” Wesleyan Theological Journal 27 (1992) 198–9; and Klauck, “Die Armut der Jünger,” 161–2. 180 Sanders, “Sins, Debts, and Jubilee Release,” 274. Sanders looks to connect Luke’s language in the parable with the language “charizomai is a beautiful synonym for aphiemi.” 181 See Byrne, Hospitality of God, 73–7; and Andrew Arterbury, Entertaining Angels: Early Christian Hospitality in Its Mediterranean Setting (New Testament Monographs 8; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2005) 135–9. 182 Arterbury (Entertaining Angels, 138) shows against Tannehill and Schürmann that footbathing, kissing, and anointing of the head were customary (if not required) signs of hospitality. See, e.g., Homer, Od. 1.309–10; Heliodorus, Aeth. 2.22; Gen 18:4; 19:2; 24:32; 43:24; Judg 19:21; 1 Sam 25:41; 2 Sam 11:18; Tob 7:9; Test. Ab. 1:3; 3:7–9; Jos. Asen. 7:1; 20:2–4; Sifre Deut. 355. 183 As Arterbury (Entertaining Angels, 138) remarks, “Her actions are consistent with the developing Jewish expectation that an exceptionally meritorious host would make sure the guest’s feet have been washed.”

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It is important to stress here that hospitality, no less than the ‫מת מצוה‬, was held in very high regard in the Second Temple period as a charitable good work – which carried redemptive power. 184 In later rabbinic Judaism, haknasat ha-orhim (“welcoming guests”) was explicitly recognized as a form of zedekah, a mitzvah included in the Siddur read every morning. The example of Abraham in Genesis 18 was taken as a paradigmatic illustration of the precept; and his charitable service to a divine guest was not overlooked. The example of the harlot Rahab, styled as an innkeeper by Josephus (A.J. 5.7–8) and the targums, is also of very special significance in this connection.185 The harlot was celebrated in both early Christian and rabbinic traditions as a sinful woman whose great sins were remitted for her act of hospitable welcome (cf. Josh 6:25; 2:12).186 “Was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works (ἐξ ἔργων ἐδικαιώθη) when she welcomed the messengers (ὑποδεξαµένη τοὺς ἀγγέλους) and sent them out by a different route?” (James 2:25).187 A tannaitic tradition has Rahab pray, “May I be forgiven on account of three things: the cord, the window, and the flax” (Mekilta de Rabbi Ishmael Exod 18:1; cf. b. Zebaḥ. 116b; also Beha ‘aloteka 78; Ruth Rabbah 2:1). Sifre Zuta Num 10:29 formulates the principle of her salvation succinctly: “God gave to her by love, because she acted by love.” Rahab’s salvific work of welcome was linked to a great act of repentance, for she was understood to have become a proselyte, converted to the God of Israel (cf. Josh 2:11; Mekilta de Rabbi Ishmael Exod 18:11; Pesiqta Rabbati 40:3–4). 188 Accordingly, the harlot’s redemptive act of hospitality was also understood on the principle of faith. In view of this, it is of considerable importance that Rahab is paired with the figure Abraham in James 2:25, as one of the two scriptural proofs that “man is justified from works and not from faith alone” (ἐξ ἔργων δικαιοῦται ἄνθρωπος καὶ οὐκ ἐκ πίστεως µόνον, Jas 2:24). One might gather from this that some discussion, similar to that con-

184

See ibid., 55–134. Targum Jonathan reads ‫“( פנדקיתא‬innkeeper, hostess”) for ‫ זונה‬in Josh 2:1. Both Rashi and David ben Kimchi note the sexual connotations of this Aramaic term, however. Other traditions of character rehabilitation were more direct. Several MSS of 1 Clement (CLSCo) read ἡ ἐπιλεγοµένη πόρνη (12:1). 186 See Anthony Hanson, “Rahab the Harlot in Early Christian Tradition,” JSNT 1 (1978) 53–60; and William Lyons, “Rahab in Rehab: Christian Interpretation of the Madame from Jericho,” in Women in the Biblical World: A Survey of Old and New Testament Perspectives (Elizabeth McCabe, ed.; Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2009) 31–42. 187 On the text in James, see Ronald Charles, “Rahab: A Righteous Whore in James,” Neotestamentica 45 (2011) 206–20. 188 “Rabbinic tradition magnified Rahab’s profligacy, but this was only in order to bring out the wonder of her repentance.” Hanson, “Rahab the Harlot,” 54. On Rahab’s deficient “monotheism,” see Berel Dov Lerner, “Rahab the Harlot and other Philosophers of Religion,” JBQ 28 (2000) 52–5. 185

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cerning Abraham in Gen 15:6, also surrounded Rahab’s salvation (e.g. Gen. Rab. 56.1).189 Indeed, the “Pauline” side of such a debate is directly attested: “By faith (πίστει) Rahab the harlot did not perish with those who were disobedient, having given a gracious welcome (δεξαµένη...µετ᾽εἰρήνης) to the spies” (Heb 11:31). James 2:25 turns the accent in the other direction. 1 Clement adopts a mediating position, less insistent than James: “By faith and hospitality (διὰ πίστιν καὶ φιλοξενίαν) Rahab the harlot was saved” (1 Clem 12:1).190 Against the background of such traditions, Luke’s depiction of the sinful woman is most interesting. In an important and neglected article, Frédéric Manns has put the question directly: “Luc [7:36–50] a-t-il repris les traditions sur Rahab?” 191 Driving the question is not only Luke’s presentation of the sinful woman’s hospitality, but her implicit coloring as a repentant prostitute. Understanding the connection between the woman’s forgiveness and her behavior is ultimately at stake in Manns’ suggestion. The formulation of Luke 7:47 – οὗ χάριν λέγω σοι ἀφέωνται αἱ ἁµαρτίαι αὐτῆς αἱ πολλαί, ὅτι ἠγάπησεν πολύ – reminiscent of Sifre Zuta Num 10:29, suggests the same rabbinic lesson of redemptive charity. Luke’s addition at the end of the story – ἡ πίστις σου σέσωκέν σε (7:50) – moreover, links the passage with the early Christian Rahab faith and works discourse. Undoubtedly, a connection with these various traditions would be very productive. As Manns observes, Si la tradition rabbinique de Rahab est sous-jacente au récit de Luc, ou de sa source, on s’explique certaines incohérences du récit. Les thèmes de l’amour et de la foi de la pécheresse ne s’opposent plus. Le motif ternaire du pardon est repris dans la version de Luc qui souligne trois actions de la pecheresse [i.e. the footwashing, the kiss of greeting, and the anointing]. Enfin si cette tradition est reprise par Luc, il semble qu’il faille préferer la lecture causale du oti au verset 47. Luc, comme la tradition rabbinique, établit un lien de causalité entre l’action de la pécheresse et l’amour de Dieu.192

Manns underestimates the high relevance of the early Christian Rahab traditions and concentrates too exclusively on the rabbinic material. The suggestion is, thus, even stronger than he supposes. One difficulty for Manns’ thesis, which he himself advances, is the lack of any citation of the Book of Joshua in Luke; but this is an exaggerated problem. The Gospel is steeped in the scriptures and replete with allusions to the

189

See Roy Bowen Ward, “The Works of Abraham, James 2:14–26,” HTR 61 (1968) 285. 190 The author of 1 Clement “probably aims to reconcile the view of both of his Christian predecessors, the author of Hebrews and the author of James.” Hanson, “Rahab the Harlot,” 58–9. 191 Frederic Manns, “Luc 7,47 et les traditions juives sur rahab,” Revue des sciences religieuses 61 (1987) 1–16, here 15. 192 Manns, “Luc 7,47 et les Traditions juives,” 16.

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deuteronomistic history. In Timothy Crawford’s view, moreover, Acts makes “pervasive allusions” to “nearly every major section of Joshua.”193 The figure of Rahab was certainly within the Lukan repertoire.194 The more serious objection is that the woman of Luke 7:36–50 is never explicitly called a prostitute (πόρνη). The tradition has undoubtedly been over-imaginative in painting her life in lurid (and conflated) terms.195 Nonetheless, the prospect that Luke imagines her as a harlot appears most probable.196 The meal setting, her perfumes, and her suggestive behaviors all point straight in this direction.197 The phrase ἐν τῇ πόλει, moreover, hints at the public, urban nature of her sin – not, as some imagine, to a “subjective judgment” on the part of the local community. 198 The immediately preceding

193

Timothy Crawford, “Taking the Promised Land, Leaving the Promised Land: Luke’s Use of Joshua for a Christian Foundation Story,” Review & Expositor 95 (1998) 251–62. Crawford is too zealous in finding connections with Joshua, but Luke’s typological interaction with the book appears clear. 194 Luke demonstrates a subtle, but impressive pattern of interpreting women in the Gospel through Old Testament prototypes, e.g., the casting of Mary as Hannah in the Magnificat; or his use of the Old Testament “household rivals type-scene” (Sarai and Hagar, Leah and Rachel, Hannah and Peninnah, Bathsheba and Abishag, Noami and Ruth) in depicting Martha and Mary. See F. Scott Spencer, Salty Wives, Spirited Mothers, and Savvy Widows: Capable Women of Purpose and Persistence in Luke’s Gospel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012) 145–90. 195 Feminist critics have given special attention to this excess in the tradition. See, e.g., Barbara Reid, “Do You See This Woman? Luke 7:36–50 as a Paradigm for Feminist Hermeneutics,” Biblical Research 40 (1995) 42–7; and Luise Schotroff, “Through German and Feminist Eyes: A Liberationist Reading of Luke 7:36–50,” in A Feminist Companion to the Hebrew Bible and New Testament (Athalya Brenner, ed.; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1996) 332–41; Ingrid Kitzberger, “Love and Footwashing: John 13:1–20 and Luke 7:36– 50 read Intertextually,” Biblical Interpretation 2 (1994) 190–206; and Jennifer English, “Which Woman? Reimagining the Woman Who Anoints Jesus in Luke 7:36–50,” Currents in Theology and Mission 39 (2012) 435–41. See also Hannah Hunt, “Sexuality and Penitence in Syriac Commentaries in Luke’s Sinful Woman,” Studia Patristica XLIV (Louvain: Peeters, 2010) 189–94. 196 “The dramatic impact of the woman’s actions appears most strikingly if ‘sinner’ is understood as a euphemism for ‘prostitute’ or ‘courtesan,’” Nolland, Luke 1, 353. See Jeremias, Gleichnisse, 104; also, e.g., Marshall, Luke, 308; and Wolter, Lukasevangelium, 291–2. 197 See especially Kathleen E. Corley, “Were the Women Around Jesus Really Prostitutes? Women in the Context of Greco-Roman Meals,” SBL Seminar Papers 28 (1989) 487–521; and also Sarah Pomeroy, Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity (New York: Dorset, 1975) 88–92. 198 “Die Dirnen waren vornehmlich eine städtische Erscheinung,” von Bendemann, “Liebe und Sündenvergebung,” 168. Harlots were city figures, called “public women” (γύναι πάγνοινε, κοινή, cf. Anth. Graec. 5.175; 7.403.), who stereotypically took their positions leaning against the walls and archways of public buildings (cf. Martial, Epigr. 1.34.6; 12.32.22). Kilgallen (“Forgiveness of Sins,” 106) does not recognize this connec-

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115

passage, accusing Jesus of being a drunkard and glutton who mixed with tax collectors and sinners, implicitly including prostitutes (Luke 7:34; cf. Matt 21:31–32), points directly to the following scene with the sinful woman and thus helps secure the suggestion.199 Taking the woman in this way to be a prostitute does not imply that Luke’s intention was to eroticize the scene.200 Luke has, rather, constructed a poignant story of repentance, which the woman’s archetypically sinful profession gives special depth. It is not by accident that Luke’s account became a model for the later legends of repentant harlots.201 Early readers rightly understood the thrust of the text. The lexical status of adultery/harlotry as “the sin” in rabbinic Hebrew – in parallel to the notion of charity as “the commandment”

tion and makes a dubious claim: “By postponing the phrase ‘in the city’ as he does, Luke means to say, not that the woman was a sinner, but that the women was considered by the city to be a sinner.” See also e.g., Kilgallen, “Sinful Woman,” 675–6; Fitzmyer, Luke, 688–9; Reid, “Do You See This Woman?” 37–49; and Thibeaux, “‘Known to Be a Sinner,’” 151–60; Wolter, Lukasevangelium, 292. See also James Resseguie, “Luke 7:36–50: Making the Familiar Seem Strange,” Int 46 (1992) 285–90. Grammatically, Kilgallen’s claim is unconvincing. Luke’s hyperbaton is not so contorted: “a woman who was in the city, a sinner.” The apposition of ἁµαρτωλός seems even to emphasize what Kilgallen disputes. See Mullen, Dining with Pharisees, 110–16; and von Bendemann, “Liebe und Sündenvergebung,” 167–71. The MSS tradition placing the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1–11) immediately after this pericope indicates how natural the assumption of sexual sin was even to early readers. It does not “say something about us” to be impressed with the possibility (pace Mullen). 199 The explicit phrase “tax collectors and prostitutes” never appears in Luke or his Markan source, but only in Matt 21:31–32. Nevertheless, “There are several reasons to include prostitutes in the image these accusations [i.e. Luke 7:34] are meant to evoke. Given the matrix of ideas surrounding the literary setting of a banquet in Greco-Roman literature, the image created by such a phrase [i.e. “tax collectors and sinners”] would probably still include prostitutes of various sorts. Moreover, tax collectors, as stereotypical despicable people, were indeed connected in Greco-Roman rhetoric to those who trafficked in prostitution, particularly to brothel keepers. Finally, the paradigmatic “sin” in much of Greco-Roman literature usually involved sexual immorality, particularly on the part of women,” Corley, “Really Prostitutes?” 519. 200 The erotic overtones of the woman’s behavior have at times been greatly overstated, e.g. Green, Luke, 310. See the helpful research of Charles Cosgrove, “A Woman’s Unbound Hair in the Greco-Roman World, with Special Reference to the Story of the Sinful Woman in Luke 7:36–50,” JBL 124 (2005) 675–92. Cosgrove demonstrates from comparative material that no inevitable sexual connotations must be imagined. On the contrary, her behavior indicates that she is “grieving, supplicating, and grateful” (692). See also F. Scott Spencer, Dancing Girls, Loose Ladies, and Women of the Cloth: The Women in Jesus’ Life (London: Continuum, 2004) 115–20. Spencer explores the wisdom motifs evoked by the erotic (but not pornographic) behavior of the woman. 201 The converted prostitute, Pelagia, for instance, cast herself down at the feet of Bishop Nonnus and washes them with her tears and dries them with her hair (Life of St. Pelagia the Harlot 8).

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– suggests the paradigmatic power of Luke’s particular composition.202 Luke gives here an implicit, but forceful indication of charity’s surpassing redemptive power, which is stronger even than the strongest sin. Behind this Lukan depiction of “La Pécheresse hospitaliere,” Bouwman ultimately detected an ecclesial Sitz im Leben concerned with the scandal of accepting support from ill-gotten goods (i.e. the funds of converted prostitutes and tax collectors).203 As most scholars agree, this scenario is doubtful.204 Bouwman, nevertheless, rightly perceives the central place of possessions in the passage and draws an important connection to Luke 8:1–3. The example of the reformed women’s generosity in this text simply points in a different direction than Bouwman imagines: not towards an imagined early Church controversy, but towards a widespread interest in almsgiving in early Judaism and Christianity. The women of Luke 8:1–3 express their new life by ministering to the community of disciples (διηκόνουν αὐτοῖς, 8:3). 205 Much debate has surrounded the special role of διακονία assigned to these female figures.206 Carla Ricci’s monograph moves in the right direction, however, when she argues



202 One should not assume that Luke knew the rabbinic expression for harlotry as “the sin,” but only that he knew the idea which gave rise to the later linguistic peculiarity. On charity as “the commandment,” see Anthony Giambrone, “‘According to the Commandment’ (Did. 1.5): Lexical Reflections on Almsgiving as ‘The Commandment,’” NTS 60 (2014) 448–65. 203 See Bouwman, “La Pécheresse hospitaliere,” 172–9. Bouwman thinks Rahab may have specifically been an example for the early Church of “une femme dont le passé n’était pas sans reproche,” but whose assistance was nonetheless accepted. 204 Marshall (Luke, 305) judges correctly that Bouwmann’s theory “narrows down the significance of the story very considerably and is purely imaginative.” Arterbury (Entertaining Angels, 139) makes a more interesting suggestion of the Sitz im Leben when he points out that Simon the Pharisee’s determination that Jesus is a false prophet recalls “later Christian hosts [who] struggled with the task of determining whether the traveling missionaries who came to them were true or false prophets (Did. 11).” 205 For the reading αὐτῷ in Luke 8:3 (rather than αὐτοῖς), see Carla Ricci, Maria di Magdala e le molte altre: Donne sul cammino di Gesù (La dracma 2; Naples: D’Auria, 1991) 167–9. See also Robert Karris, “Women and Discipleship in Luke,” CBQ 56 (1994) 1–20; and Mary Rose D’Angelo, “Women in Luke-Acts: A Redactional View,” JBL 109 (1990) 441–61. 206 See Anni Hentschel, Diakonia im Neuen Testament (WUNT II/226; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007) 217–35. Fiorenza has interpreted this service in the sence of being a herald, while Collins perfers to see the role as an emmissary. See John N. Collins, Diakonia: Reinterpreting the Ancient Sources (New York: Oxford University, 1990). On this text, see the monograph of Ricci, Donne sul cammino di Gesù; Sabine Demel, “Jesu Umgang mit Frauen nach dem Lukasevangelium,” BN 57 (1991) 41–95; Ben Witherington III, “On the Road with Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna, and Other Disciples – Luke 8:1–3,” ZNW 70 (1979) 243–8; and David C. Sim, “The Women Followers of Jesus: The Implications of Luke 8:1–3,” HeyJ 30 (1989) 51–62.

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that the service allotted to Luke’s penitent women must be understood in a sense similar to διακονεῖν in Matt 25:44 – attending to the hungry, the thirsty, the strangers, the naked, the sick, and the imprisoned. The women are characterized, in other words, as performing those works of mercy which are the “fruits worthy of repentance” required by John’s preaching: clothing the naked and feeding the hungry (Luke 3:10–11). Effectively, this is the same charitable διακονία seen again in the characteristic table service of the young Christian community in Acts 6:1–7 (cf. Luke 10:38–42). 207 The women’s performing such service ἐκ τῶν ὑπαρχόντων (Luke 8:3), moreover, fits perfectly with Luke’s strong emphasis that discipleship comes at the cost of one’s possessions in a generous act of alms: πωλήσατε τὰ ὑπάρχοντα ὑµῶν καὶ δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην (12:33; cf. 12:15; 14:33; 19:8).208 The sinful woman of Luke 7:36–50 is cast as a prototype of the women described in the summary unit in 8:1–3 – “women who by any standard would have to be included among the ἁµαρτωλοί.”209 As a commentary on the preceding passage, the example of the women in Luke 8:1–3 thus helps to confirm the presence of an almsgiving paradigm in the case of the sinful woman. In narrative sequence, the two related units suggest first the beginning, then the continuation of a new life characterized from its inception by the “fruits worthy of repentance.” While the woman who anoints Jesus arguably “buys” her forgiveness – at least on the basis of Luke 7:47 and informed by the background of the Rahab material – Luke nevertheless resists too rude an interpretation of the ordering of good works and divine forgiveness (cf. Luke 11:4b). Indeed, both the parable in 7:41–42 and the example of the reformed women in 8:1–3 moderate an overly transactional perspective and give attention to divine initiative, so that in the end Luke preserves an important, even essential theological tension.210 And it is, indeed, a tension. Lagrange was entirely right that “le point

207

See David Pao, “Waiters or Preachers: Acts 6:1–7 and the Lukan Table Fellowship,” JBL 130 (2011) 127–44. On the long-noted parallels between Acts 6:1–7 and Luke 10:38– 42, with their shared contrast of λόγος and διακονέω, see Veronica Koperski, “Luke 10,38–42 and Acts 6:1–7: Women and Discipleship in the Literary Context of LukeActs,” in The Unity of Luke-Acts (J. Verheyden, ed.; BETL 142; Leuven: Leuven University, 1999) 517–44. 208 Wolter (Lukasevangelium, 301) observes, “Das partitive ἐκ (τῶν ὑµαρχόντων) mit dem Dat. commodi αὐταῖς und die sprachlichen Parallelen lassen vielmehr deutlich erkennen, dass Lukas lediglich an so etwas wie Spenden denkt; vgl. z. B. Tob 4,7AB (ἐκ τῶν ὑπαρχόντων σοι ποίει ἐλεηµοσύνην ‘aus deinen finanziellen Mitteln tue Barmherzigkeit.” Cf. Ap. Cont. 5.1 (ἐκ τῶν ὑπαρχόντων ὑµῶν...διακονήσατε τοῖς ἁγίοις). 209 Johnson, Literary Function, 102. 210 The First Gospel preserves the same tension in another fashion. Matthew’s version of the Our Father (ὡς καὶ ἡµεῖς ἀφήκαµεν) and its attached interpretation (ἐὰν γάρ ἀφῆτε... Matt 6:14) strongly suggest that fraternal forgiveness is the simple condition for divine forgiveness. His parable of the two debtors, however, subtly corrects this view. In that

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théologique, demeure dans l’ombre.” Fitzmyer and Kilgallen, by contrast, are wrong to resolve the “la cause réelle du pardon” at the expense of good works. They, and others in Lukan scholarship, have missed the multiple points where 7:36–50 has contacts with redemptive almsgiving discourse. The interrelationship between the woman’s saving faith (Luke 7:50) and redemptive love (7:47) certainly deserves a full systematic, theological treatment. The point made here, however, is simply the assertion of a fundamental, but contested exegetical datum: for Luke, charity somehow secures this sinful woman’s justification.211 The formulation of Kilgallen might even be cautiously reversed: at least at the levels of grammatical analysis, lexicography, pre-Lukan sources, parallel traditions, and narrative context, the woman’s work of love is the “most essential element” in her forgiveness.

2.5 Christology and Repentance in the Logion Reconciliandum in Via 2.5 Reconciliandum in Via

2.5.1 “Settle with Your Opponent” (Luke 12:57–59) Luke’s characteristic appropriation of the sin as debt metaphor is seen in another interesting Gospel text: the double tradition logion of settling with one’s opponent (Luke 12:57–59 || Matt 5:25–26). The Matthean form of this text (linked to his debtor parable by the notion of paying the last penny) has already been mentioned (§2.2.2), and here again a comparison of Matthew and Luke is very illuminating. The unique conjunction of “Creditor Christology” and a call to repentance through charity once more distinguishes Luke’s perspective. The debt imagery of the unit is implicit, but clear. “We are not told the nature of this dispute,” Hans Dieter Betz observes, but there is little doubt that “the case concerns the owing of debts.” 212 Indeed, this is plain from the threat of debtors’ prison. 213 The legal background of Luke’s expression δὸς ἐργασίαν ἀπηλλάχθαι (“make an effort to settle”), moreover – much more stringent than Matthew’s “be well-minded” (ἴσθι εὐνοῶν) – intensifies the

parable, a gracious act of divine forgiveness precedes the (failed) test of the servant’s own mercy and the master’s subsequent decision to exact his due. One might, therefore, say that for Matthew mercy is somehow ultimately bound to a principle of strict reciprocity, even while an entirely gratuitous experience of debt release is affirmed. 211 On the fitting use of “justification” language in this context, see Gaffin, “Justification in Luke-Acts,” 106–25. 212 Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 226. 213 “Debt was the commonest reason for imprisonment in antiquity, including firstcentury Palestine,” Eubank, Debt of Sin, 59. See Sugranyes de Franch, le droit palestinien, 60–3; and Bauschatz, “Ptolemaic Prisons Reconsidered,” 3–47, esp. 4–5.

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economic coloring of the unit and the whole precarious plight of the debtor.214 Luke’s engagement with debt theology here is indeed, in various ways, deeper than Matthew’s. Both evangelists, nevertheless, contextualize and interpret this image of debtor’s prison with an application to the forgiveness of sins. Matthew situates the text in his Sermon on the Mount, in the antithesis on murder (Matt 5:21–26). In an effort to heal the root cause of this sin, the commandment not to kill is extended to embrace the duty to control one’s anger, and this includes the counsel of defusing situations of conflict through reconciliation.215 “If…you remember that your brother has anything against you (ὁ ἀδελφός σου ἔχει τι κατὰ σοῦ)…go first and be reconciled with your brother (διαλλάγηθι τῷ ἀδελφῷ σου, 5:23–24). Matthew introduces in this context the image of the debtor walking to the court with his accuser to reinforce the importance of this inter-personal reconciliation and forgiveness.216 This is perfectly consistent with what has already been observed of Matthean debt theology in several other places. Debts represent sins committed against one another, and the notion of settling with one’s creditor thus operates for Matthew in a paraenetic mode.217 Though God looms as the judge, the eschatological force of the scene is minimal. Luke shapes the material in a very different way.218 While perceiving the same theme of reconciliation (ἀπηλλάχθαι ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ, Luke 12:58), he fundamentally has in view not reconciliation with the brethren, but with God through Jesus. This reconciliation, moreover, is implicitly found through economic justice. The distinctive Lukan focus is evident from the highly intricate context in which Luke’s version of the text appears (12:1–13:9). 2.5.2 “Coercing Charity” in Luke 12:13 – 13:9 Christopher Hays has recently shown how, despite its apparently disjointed complexion, the material in Luke 12:13–13:9 represents a coherent discourse

214

On the phrase δίδωµι ἐργασίαν, see Josef Ernst, Das Evangelium nach Lukas (Regensburger Neues Testament; Regensburg: Friedrich Pustet, 1977) 417; and Adolf Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995) 116–7. See also Bovon, Lukas 2, 361. 215 Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 230. 216 Davies and Allison (Matthew 1, 519) take Matt 5:23–24 to “demand reconciliation between Christian brothers” but say that 5:25–26 “seems to demand irenic relations between Christians and those outside the church, including opponents or enemies (cf. 5.38– 48).” This may be accurate, though going to court with fellow believers would not be impossible and is known to have been a concern in the early Christian community (cf. 1 Cor 6:1–8). 217 “In Matthew, this eschatological urgency has obviously receded to some extent and homiletical or common sense paraenetic motives have come forward,” ibid., 519. 218 The reconstruction of an original Q tradition is elusive, cf. ibid.

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“especially concerned to stimulate the proper use of wealth.”219 The demonstration of this position depends largely on exposing how Luke 12:35–13:9, which is normally considered to be “eschatological” or “spiritual,” is in fact significantly focused on the same wealth motif widely recognized in 12:13– 34.220 The parable of the Rich Fool in 12:13–21 narrates a lesson about the difference between earthly and heavenly storehouses and leads to a discourse in 12:22–34 on anxiety over worldly cares, ending with the call to “sell your possessions and give alms” so to have an “unfailing treasure in heaven” (12:34). Likewise, Hays suggests, the section on the Watchful Servants (12:35–48) “follow[s] logically on the previous admonition to seek first the Kingdom” and is “a perfect counterpart for 12:13–21.” 221 Just as personal eschatology is used in the story of the Rich Fool to caution against πλεονεξία, so the corporate eschatology of the parable of the Faithful and Unfaithful Stewards (12:42–48) urges a similar ethical readiness in the matter of material goods. In fact, the failure of the rich man who wishes to eat, drink and be merry (12:19) is directly echoed in the wicked servant’s misbehavior in eating and getting drunk (12:45). The “neuralgic question” in Hays’ analysis thus concerns the type of behavior the stewards of 12:42–48 are meant to exemplify. The choice of οἰκονόµος rather than δοῦλος, he suggests, highlights the theme of responsibility for material goods, while the inter-textual links with other Lukan wealth texts are quite noteworthy (cf. φρόνιµος/φρονίµως 16:1–8; πᾶσιν ὑπάρχουσιν αὐτοῦ/πᾶσιν τοῖς ἑυατοῦ ὑπάρχουσιν, 14:33). The sum result is that “the imagery and language of the Parable of the Faithful and Unfaithful Stewards is typical of the the rhetoric of Lukan wealth ethics.”222 Hays’ treatment is very helpful, and it shows that there is a more sustained attention to wealth ethics in the extended discourse than previously thought. His analysis has less of substance to contribute to understanding the latter sections of Luke 12, unfortunately. He recognizes, indeed, the theme of debt

219

Hays, “Coercing Charity,” 41–60, here 41. On the rhetorical unity of the sermon, see Robert Tannehill, Narrative Unity: A Literary Interpretation of Luke-Acts: Volume 1: The Gospel According to Luke (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1986) 240–53; and Wilhelm Wuellner, “The Rhetorical Genre of Jesus’ Sermon in 12:1–13:9,” in Persuasive Artistry: Studies in New Testament Rhetoric in Honor of George A. Kennedy (JSNTSup 50; Duane Watson, ed.; Sheffield: JSOT, 1991) 93–115. 220 Abraham J. Malherbe (“The Christianization of a Topos (Luke 12:13–34),” NovT 38 [1996] 123–35) showed the major connections between 12:13–34 and Greco-Roman moral discourse περί πλεονεξίας. This moral content is reinforced by the form critical study of Thomas Stegman, “Reading Luke 12:13–34 as an Elaboration of a Chreia: How Hermogenes of Tarsus Sheds Light on Reading Luke’s Gospel,” NovT 49 (2007) 328–52. 221 Hays, “Coercing Charity,” 43. 222 Ibid., 52.

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forgiveness in 12:57–59, and rightly resists “forcing the referent of these verses exclusively into spiritual or financial categories.”223 He has bypassed the saying on Jesus as a cause of division (12:49–53), however, and missed a key insight that binds the whole sermon together. In particular, Luke has linked the motif of debtors’ prison (12:57–59) and the sudden death of “sinners/debtors” (ὀφειλέται, 13:1–5) with his earlier unit on the quarrelling brothers and the Rich Fool (12:13–21). It is this thematic inclusio that captures best the thematic coherence of 12:13–13:9 and exposes the distinct Lukan debt theology in 12:57–59. 2.5.3 Christ the ἀντίδικος (Luke 12:57–59) In narrative context, Luke’s logion of the two opponents comes just as Jesus turns to the crowds (Luke 12:54; cf. 12:22, 41), calling them “hypocrites” who are unable to read the signs of the times (12:56). This is a direct reference back to his warning against the “hypocrisy” of the unrepentant Pharisees, thematically announced at the beginning of the sermon (12:1).224 It is the first time Jesus addresses the crowds since he spoke the parable of the Rich Fool (12:16–21). In this way, the intervening material (12:22–53), spoken to the disciples, is sandwiched between two structurally related blocks of teaching, and a formal/narrative parallel binds the former unit to the latter. With his charge of hypocrisy, Jesus suggests that the crowds, like the Pharisees, still fail to understand that the fast-fading present moment (τὸν καιρὸν τοῦτον, 12:56) is “precisely the time for repentance and conversion.”225 Thus, when Jesus invites the crowd to “judge for yourselves what is just” (ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτῶν...κρίνετε τὸ δίκαιον, 12:57), he “encourages them to make their own decisions, abandoning the perspectives of the Pharisees and lawyers, whose justice was already indicted in 11:41–43 insofar as their fastidious tithing was not matched by generosity.” 226 This call to break with the hypocrisy (and greed) of the Pharisees and repent is no abstract admonition. The Pharisees themselves were given the concrete counsel to give alms (δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην, 11:43); and the same injunction was repeated and amplified as an instruction for the disciples in the hearing of the crowds (πωλήσατε τὰ ὑπάρχοντα ὑµῶν καὶ δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην, 12:33). 227 Jesus’ appeal to the

223

Ibid., 55; see also 56. These are the only two uses of this word in Luke. Jesus’ warning against the “the leaven, which is the hypocrisy, of the Pharisees” (12:1) is itself a reference back to the Weheruf just launched against them (11:37–52). 225 Fitzmyer, Luke, 999. 226 Hays, “Coercing Charity,” 55. 227 “Luke often portrays Jesus teaching one group in the hearing of another because of the general suitability of Jesus’ message,” Green, Luke, 486. See also Tannehill, Narrative Unity, 247. 224

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crowds in 12:57, likewise, “appears to be significantly bound up with the right use of money.” 228 A hint in this direction appears in the phrase τὸ δίκαιον, a strange way to allude to repentance that seems to carry a subtle economic overtone.229 “Determine for yourselves what is equitable and just: mere fastidious tithing or real generosity?” τί δὲ καὶ ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτῶν οὐ κρίνετε τὸ δίκαιον; ὡς γὰρ ὑπάγεις µετὰ τοῦ ἀντιδίκου σου ἐπ᾽ ἄρχοντα, ἐν τῇ ὁδῷ δὸς ἐργασίαν ἀπηλλάχθαι ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ, µήποτε κατασύρῃ σε πρὸς τὸν κριτήν καὶ ὁ κριτής σε παραδῶσει τῷ πράκτορι, καὶ ὁ πράκτωρ σε βαλεῖ εἰς φυλακήν. λέγω σοι, οὐ µὴ ἐξέλθῃς ἐκεῖθεν ἕως καὶ τὸ ἔσχατον λεπτὸν ἀποδῷς (Luke 12:57–59).

Jesus’ call to judge for onself what is just (ἀφ᾽ ἑαυτῶν...κρίνετε τὸ δίκαιον) most importantly recalls the two brothers quarreling over their inheritance earlier in the discourse: “Who set me as judge and divider over you?” (τίς µε κατέστησεν κριτὴν ἢ µεριτσὴν ἐφ᾽ ὑµᾶς, Luke 12:13–14).230 Jesus’ resistence to being set as κριτής over those two opponents (12:14) points directly to the legal dispute in 12:57–59 and Jesus’ advice to settle disputes without the need for a judge’s arbitration. Indeed, Jesus expresses his hope that these two fraternal adversaries will find the resources to avoid all “greed” (ὁρᾶτε καὶ φυλάσσεθε ἀπὸ πάσης πλεονεξίας, 12:15) and settle the matter amicably among themselves before they reach the judge (πρὸς τὸν κριτήν, 12:58) – meaning before they must face their ultimate judgment. By resisting the role of judge, Jesus thus mercifully delays what would not now be a pleasant verdict (cf. 13:6–9). Truly, in requesting a judge these brothers do not know what they ask. Read against the recognized allusion to Exod 2:14 (“Who made you a ruler and judge over us?”), Luke presents the brothers’ dispute over money as an archetypal image for Israel’s disease of fraternal strife, which makes them congenitally resistant to the prophets sent to save them (cf. Acts 7:27). 231 In Luke 12:14, Jesus therefore refuses to be an accomplice in the sinful “division” (διαµερισµός) caused by the brothers’ greed for material wealth (µερίσασθαι τὴν κληρονοµίαν, Luke 12:13; τίς µε κατέστησεν κριτὴν ἢ

228

Hays, “Coercing Charity,” 55. See ibid., 45. Cf. Matt 20:4; P. Tebt. I 11.13. 230 On the text critical problem here, see Bovon, Lukas 2, 278–9. 231 The reference in Luke 12:14 to Exod 2:14 contributes to Luke’s important New Exodus motif and also anticipates the idea of the rejection of the prophets (cf. Acts 7:27). On the New Exodus motif in Lukan scholarship, see Mallen, Reading and Transformation, 14–9; Pao, Acts and the Isaianic New Exodus; Kenneth Bailey, “The Song of Mary: Vision of a New Exodus (Luke 1:46–55),” Theological Review 2 (1979) 29–35; and Mark Strauss, The Davidic Messiah in Luke-Acts: The Promise and Its Fulfillment in Lukan Christology (JSNTSup 110; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1995) 285–305. Strauss sees the New Exodus as the major motif behind Luke’s Travel Narrative. 229

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µεριστὴν ἐφ᾽ ὑµᾶς; 12:14).232 This refusal to participate in the fraternal fissures of Israel reflects Jesus’ consistent command to practice charity: a practice that overcomes the “division” brought on by hoarding possessions (11:41; 12:33; cf. Acts 4:34). Jesus, in this way, implicitly presents himself, by his detachment from greed, as a unifier, not a divider – the one who reconciles brother with brother and both with the father (cf. Luke 15:11–32). In the next breath and in another sense, however, Jesus fully accepts the role of “judge” and “divider,” as he acknowledges plainly in Luke 12:49– 53.233 Because of him and the “baptism” he brings (Luke 12:50; cf. 3:9, 16) families will be “divided” three against two and two against three (διαµερισµόν, διεµεµερισµένοι, διαµερισθήσονατι, 12:51–53). Just as the house of Israel was divided by John’s baptism, with its strong message of economic mercy (3:7–14; 7:29–30; 20:1–8) – a message which was more than Israel’s elite could accept – so Jesus’ call for repentance through generosity, which is even stronger than John’s program of repentance, will set the “money-loving” (φιλάργυροι, 16:14) elder brother against the spendthrift younger – Pharisees and scribes against tax collectors and sinners – in an ugly fraternal strife over the inheritance of the Father (cf. 15:11–32). This divisive power of Jesus’ John-like call to repentance through charity hangs in the air as Jesus next speaks his lesson about reconciling with one’s opponent (Luke 12:57–59). In this manner, the patience Jesus showed the brothers in refraining from judging them on the spot already wears thin here at the end of the discourse. Jesus is the divider of households (12:52). Indeed, he is the one who will “cut in two” those servants who have not managed their master’s resources well (διχοτοµήσει ἀυτόν, 12:46) and who will split those deserving a severe beating from those who deserve only a light beating (12:47–48).234 The axe of judgment John announced is ready to swing; and



232 Stegman (“Elaboration of a Chreia,” 337–8, 346–7) resists taking µεριστήν as a “divider,” preferring to translate “apportioner” and applying the designation to the providence of God. Stegman has entirely missed Luke’s sophisticated contextualization of the “division” motif (cf. Luke 12:46, 51–53). 233 Stegman (“Elaboration of a Chreia,” 346) is right to see Jesus assigning the role of “judge” to God in Luke 12:20. This must not be taken as a simple refusal of the title for himself, however. Luke’s Christology is much subtler. Jesus shares in the divine role of judgment, and just as God calls the Rich Fool to account in 12:20, so Jesus calls Israel to account with the warning of sudden death in 13:1–5. Stegman’s idea that God is revealed as the true µεριστής in 12:24–28 is more dubious, since the proper sense of the word is not providential “apportioner.” The role of “divider” is better seen in the κύριος of the parable in 12:35–48, who “cuts in half” the wicked servant (12:46) and executes a variegated judgment, distinguishing between greater and lesser punishments (12:47–48). Immediately after the parable, Jesus then identifies himself as the eschatological “divider” of Israel (12:49–53). 234 Hays (“Coercing Charity,” 48–52) demonstrates the economic focus of the parable of the Faithful and Unfaithful Stewards (Luke 12:41–48), stressing the context provided by

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one must now hastily beg for another year’s patience to produce the wanting “fruits worthy of repentance” (13:6–9; cf. 3:8–10).235 In narrative context, it is this urgent threat of judgment – meant as plea for repentance – that heavily colors Jesus’ metaphor of the two men on the way to the judge. Just as he gives the crowds this vivid image of the creditor and his debtor heading to court, Jesus is interrupted with the report of the unfortunate Galileans whom Pilate killed during their sacrifices.236 Jesus himself adds to this the fate of those suddenly crushed by the tower at Siloam (13:1–5). The pattern Luke sets by recalling these events again looks back directly to the story of the quarrelling brothers (12:13–21). After telling the brothers to settle their dispute themselves without employing him as judge (12:13–15), Jesus offers them the parable of the Rich Fool, whose life is suddenly required without warning (12:16–21). Thus, in 12:57–13:5, similarly, Jesus’ word about reconciling before meeting the judge (12:57–59) is followed by the account of those whose lives are suddenly snatched from them (13:1–5). Read through this parallel and contextual lens, Jesus’ message in 12:57–59 reprises his previous instruction. Repentance means storing up an inheritance in heaven, rather than laboring after vain treasures on earth (cf. 12:21, 33– 34). The Rich Fool, who had earthly storehouses but did not invest his wealth in God (µὴ εἰς θεὸν πλουτῶν, 12:21), is thus, on this spiritual accounting, like the sinful “debtors” (ὀφειλέται) of Luke 13:4, whose lives were abruptly demanded of them.237 Their debts came due, they were caught in arrears and

Luke 12 and highlighting the inter-textual connections with 16:1–8 and 14:14. Lintott (“La servitude pour dettes à Rome,” 20) sees a connection between Luke’s gruesome image and the capital punishment and cutting into parts threatened against those who defaulted on loans. See also, e.g., Otto Betz, “The Dichotomized Servant and the End of Judas Iscariot (Light on the Dark Passages: Matthew 24, 51 and parallel; Acts 1, 18),” RevQ 5 (1964) 43– 58; and Timothy Friedrichsen, “A Note on καὶ διχοτοµήσει ἀυτόν (Luke 12:46 and the Parallel in Matthew 24:51),” CBQ 63 (2001) 258–64. Betz’ suggestion that the phrase means being “cut off” from the people (‫כרת מתוך‬, cf. 1QS 2:16–17) may have merit, but it fails to appreciate the contextual theme of “division” running through Luke 12. Friedrichsen’s connection to the covenant curse of Gen 15 is likewise interesting, but inattentive to Luke’s context. 235 The call for good works demonstrating repentance is a kind of basso continuo in Luke’s Gospel. “Just as the ‘salvation of God’ is a theme uniting the entire [Lukan] narrative and constituting its central meaning, so also the theme of bearing fruits/performing deeds worthy of repentance’ is a theme uniting the entire narrative and constituting its central meaning,” Nave, Role and Function of Repentance, 30. Nave identifies the theme as an inclusio embracing the whole two-volume work (cf. Luke 3:8 – Acts 26:18–20). 236 On the link of this announcement to what immediately precedes, see Franklin Young, “Luke 13:1–9,” Int 31 (1977) 61. 237 On the meaning of the expression µὴ εἰς θεὸν πλουτῶν, see Joshua Noble, “‘Rich toward God’: Making Sense of Luke 12:21,” CBQ 78 (2016) 302–20. On the basis of parallel Greek constructions, Noble argues that the locution in Luke 12:21 does not, as

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snatched away by the πράκτορες. In a clever retrospective interplay of texts, the rich man here comes off as a debtor, that is, a sinner before God. Yet he might have eternally bettered his fate by giving alms to build up his credit in heaven (Luke 12:33; cf. Tob 4:5–11; Sir 29:9–13; Ps Sol. 9:5; 2 Baruch 14:12–13; 24:1–2). In the same way, those walking on the way do not know how very close the judge might really be. All are thus equally enjoined to prudently transfer their earthly funds into a heavenly account by radical acts of charity. The logic of the metaphor in Luke 12:57–59 sets up God as the passage’s creditor (ἀντίδικος). It is God himself who comes calling and addresses the rich man dircetly in 12:20 (εἶπεν δὲ ἀυτῷ ὁ θεός, ἄφρων). For those wise enough to repent in timely fashion – i.e. straightaway – µετάνοια thus means settling accounts with the Lord (13:3; cf. 13:5) and paying off the debt by depositing alms in his treasury (12:33), rather than stockpiling one’s private graineries. In the polyvalence of the parable, however, God also sits in the scene as the looming, eschatological κριτής (such as he appears in Matthew). God is thus both the creditor and the judge; he both pronounces the sentence and offers escape from his own just judgment. This double-mapping ambiguity in the Lord’s role – at once an agent of reconciliation and of condemnation – indicates how the poetics of allegory remain more symbolically blurred than the strained univocity of allegorizing. It should be observed, however, that formally we are dealing here more with a logion than a parable, however problematic such distinctions become at the limit. The allegorical possibilities in the present (limit) case are evident, however, due to the presence of distinct characters and an implicit story-line. In narrative context, in any case, Luke is able to activate a distinct Christological dimension precisely through the ambiguity of this divine creditor-judge figure. Viewed through Luke’s “binding of θεός and Ἰησοῦς” (Rowe), this double role played by God corresponds precisely to Jesus’ ambiguous status as divider: the judge who mercifully forestalls his judgment. The pronounced contextual accent here is Jesus’ interest not yet to assume his role as κριτής (12:14; cf. 13:8–9). Contextualized by the Travel Narrative, then, Jesus himself appears in 12:57–59 as the divine creditor who walks along the way (ἐν τῇ ὁδῷ): a Christology entirely foreign to Matt 5:25–26. 238 It is Jesus, in

commonly assumed, signify “rich in God’s sight,” but rather (like the more common dative case) codes God as the beneficiary of an act and “has the more specific meaning of giving one’s wealth to God.” The verse is thus “the most explicit reference in the NT to the idea of almsgiving not just as a means of compiling a treasure in heaven but also as a loan or gift made directly to God.” 238 In the Matthean setting the obvious ἀντίδικος of 5:25 is the brother in the preceeding verses, who “has something against you” (ὁ ἀδελφός σου ἔχει τι κατὰ σοῦ, Matt 5:23).

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Luke’s presentation, with whom the opportunity for sinners to find God’s mercy is still on offer – at least for now. In this light, Brent Kinmen rightly reads the text: “Like the debtor and his opponent on the way to the judge, the nation has a limited time to be reconciled to God via his agent Jesus. Specifically, this opportunity lasts only so long as Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem.”239 As in Luke 7:36–50, Luke casts Jesus as the one who has the full authority to forgive. At this later point in the Gospel, however, time is slipping by and the urgency of repenting mounts. The need to have one’s debts cleared is every day more pressing. The merciful creditor starts to look ever sterner: ever more like an impatient opponent (ἀντίδικος). To settle with Jesus means to settle with God, and this settlement means digging out of sin’s debt by depositing funds in heaven’s treasury (12:33). One must act both generously and quickly to produce the fruits of true conversion, deeds of charity for the poor (cf. 13:6–9; 3:8–10).

2.6 Conclusion 2.6 Conclusion

Contrary to the claim of most scholars, Luke actively embraces the Second Temple notion of sin as debt. Indeed, the text of Luke 11:4, commonly used to prove the contrary, displays the special subtlety of Luke’s appropriation of the theme. Whereas Matthew univocally understands “debts” as sins, Luke preserves the double sense of the underlying Aramaic wordplay, embracing thereby both an economic and a moral meaning. With this semantic distinction, moreover, Luke erects an important pattern, aligning the “release” of sins with God alone and making material mercy the humanly proportioned counterpart. This correlation, in turn, plots the distinct agencies of Jesus and the disciples respectively in the unique Lukan mechanics of mercy. Jesus forgives; the disciples repent by works of charity. Among the key texts in which Luke expands this theology is Luke 7:36– 50. The sin metaphor in the short parable of the Two Debtors is traditional and transparent; and like Matthew, Luke focuses special attention on the behavior of the “Israel” character who receives debt release. In Luke this focus takes shape as a repentance motif, and in various ways the sinful woman is associated with works of mercy. Although the language of “love” points in this direction, and the trappings of hospitality – with hints at the figure of Rahab – strengthen the idea, it is important to acknowledge that Luke’s repentance vignettes are not woodenly bound to displays of almsgiving (e.g. 15:11–31; 18:9–14). It remains the case, however, that the “fruits worthy of

239

Brent Kinmen, “Debtor’s Prison and the Future of Israel,” JETS 42 (1999) 411–25, here 417.

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repentance” (3:9) are in some way inseparable from Luke’s construction of µετάνοια, and that at least 7:47 suggests the idea of meritorious redemptive alms (the other side of the coin of the sin as debt tradition) at the center of the pericope. What is perhaps most striking and innovative in Luke 7:36–50 is the allegorical identification of Christ as the creditor forgiving the debts/sins. This pattern contrasts suggestively with Matthew’s assignment of the role to God and recurs, with variations, in Luke 12:57–59. The significance of such Creditor Christology is underscored by Luke’s more emphatic redactional reservation of the forgiveness of sins (ἄφεσις) to the divinity. In Chapter Four below, this Christological motif will appear again, once more in collocation with the repentance motif and the imagery of sin as debt (i.e. 16:1–8). The radical importance of such thinking, as an undergiding element in the Lukan portrayal of Jesus, can be witnessed by its role in the all-important Nazareth Sermon. The complexity of this text warrants its treatment in a special excursus.

2.7 Excursus: Debt Release in the Nazareth Sermon (Luke 4:16–30) 2.7 Excursus: Nazareth Sermon

Jeffery Siker has remarked that, “In the light of all the secondary literature on Luke 4,16–30 it is surprising that certain elements of the narrative have received so little attention.”240 The debt metaphor is one of these elements.241 A full treatment of the passage unfortunately cannot be offered here, but in this excursus two foundational aspects of the debt slavery metaphor as it appears in this text will be briefly considered: (1) the Jubilee theology informing Luke 4:16–30; and (2) the proto- “Devil’s Ransom” narrative which Luke presupposes. The first links Luke directly to the debt theology of DeuteroIsaiah and the second to 11Q13.

240

Jeffrey Siker, “‘First to the Gentiles’: A Literary Analysis of Luke 4:16–30,” JBL 111 (1992) 76. For a survey of relevant literature, see C. J. Schreck, “The Nazareth Pericope: Luke 4:16–30 in Recent Study,” in L’Évangile de Luc – The Gospel of Luke (F. Neirynck, ed.; BETL 32; Leuven: Leuven University, 1989) 399–471. 241 The Nazareth Sermon is unmistakably important to Luke’s construction of the poor. Luke 4:16–30, nevertheless, often functions in the literature on Lukan possessions as little more than a passing proof-text. “Kein anderer Evangelist hat so großes Interesse am Thema ‚Armut und Reichtum’ bzw. ‚Arme und Reiche’ wie Lukas. Das wird z.B. daran deutlich, dass von den Evangelisten nur Lukas die öffentliche Verkündigung Jesu mit der Predigt in Nazareth (Lk 4,16–30; vgl. Mk 6,1–6a par) beginnt, die besagt, Jesus sei von Gott gesandt worden, um den Armen das Evangelium zu verkündigen (Lk 4,18; vgl. 7,22 par; Jes 61,1),” Mineshige, Besitzverzicht und Almosen, 1. The first sentence of Mineshige’s book begins with this impressive reference, but no analysis of the text of Luke 4:16–30 ever follows.

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(1) Jubilee Theology. Twice Jesus connects his messianic mission with the Isaianic offering of “release” (ἄφεσις), fusing together Isa 61:1–2 and 58:6 as a composite quotation (Luke 4:18–19). Πνεῦµα κυρίου ἐπ᾽ ἐµὲ οὗ εἵνεκεν ἔχρισέν µε εὐαγγελίσασθαι πτωχοῖς, ἀπέσταλκέν µε, κηρύξαι αἰχµαλώτοις ἄφεσιν καὶ τυφλοῖς ἀνάβλεψιν (cf. Isa 61:1), ἄποστεῖλαι τεθραυσµένους ἐν ἀφέσιν (cf. Isa 58:6), κηρύξαι ἐνιαυτὸν κυρίου δεκτόν (cf. Isa 61:2).242

The material surveyed in §2.2 above (i.e. Isa 40:1–2; 50:1–2; 61:1–2; 11Q13) is obviously relevant and highly suggestive here. Doubts about the significance of the Jubilee background have nonetheless been voiced.243 Philip Esler, for instance, objects that Third Isaiah is addressed to sixth or fifth century inhabitants of Palestine, while Luke is concerned with urban Christians of the first century CE.244 The message in each case must, therefore, be considerably different. Despite the acknowledged influence of the Torah’s Jubilee legislation on Isa 61:1–2, the presence of Jubilee themes in Luke 4:16–30 is, hence, for some “a possibility that has not yet been proved.”245



242 “This citation represents one of the most difficult and complex text forms of all the OT quotations in the NT,” Charles Kimball, Jesus’ Exposition of the Old Testament in Luke’s Gospel (JSNTSup 94; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1994) 99. See also Darrell Bock, Proclamation from Prophecy and Pattern: Lucan Old Testament Christology (Library of New Testament Studies; Sheffield: JSOT, 1987) 106–8; and R. T. France, Jesus and the Old Testament: His Application of Old Testament Passages to Himself and His Mission (London: Tyndale, 1971) 252–3. The text inserts Isa 58:6d between Isa 61:1a, b, d and Isa 61:2a; but Luke’s distance from the LXX wording suggests that he possibly knows another text form. He agrees once with the MT against the LXX and four times with the LXX against the MT. Bruce Chilton (“Announcement in Nazara: An Analysis of Luke 4:16–21,” in Gospel Perspectives, II: Studies in History and Tradition in the Four Gospels [R. T. France and David Wenham, eds.; Sheffield: JSOT, 1982] 147–72, esp. 164– 6) attempted to identify a traditional mixed text form based on the Old Syriac of the New Testament, but this has not gained acceptance. Generally, it seems that Luke reads Isaiah in its LXX form. See Mallen, Reading and Transformation, 204; and Luke Timothy Johnson, Septuagintal Midrash in the Speeches of Acts (Milwaukee: Marquette University, 2002) 13–18. 243 On the debate of Jubilee themes in Luke, see the helpful overview of Schreck, “Nazareth Pericope,” 450–4. 244 Esler, Community and gospel, 170. 245 So Tannehill, Narrative Unity, 68. He continues, “While it seems clear that Isa 61:1– 2 develops themes from the Jubilee year, it is not so clear that the author of Luke-Acts was aware of the connection between this passage and the law of Jubilee.” Schreck (“Nazareth Pericope,” 450) remarks that the issue is less about the formal presence of Jubilee material in Luke, than a “well-founded reserve as to its extent.”

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It is true, Isaiah 61 has been entirely re-contextualized in Luke (cf. Luke 7:22).246 The Jubilee theme, is nevertheless, actively reinforced. This is most evident from Luke’s redactional insertion of Isa 58:6 into the text of Isa 61:1– 2.247 The common vocabulary of ἄφεσις is obviously very important here.248 It does not exhaust the linguistic links binding Isaiah 58 and 61, however.249 Indeed, one is invited to consider the broader context, and from this perspective it is quite striking that, as Isa 61:2 speaks of the “Lord’s year of favor” (‫)שנת רצון ליהוה‬, so Isa 58:5 speaks of the “Lord’s day of favor” (‫)יום רצון ליהוה‬.250 The entire chapter of Isaiah 58, in fact, like Isaiah 61, is deeply resonant with Jubilee themes, as Thomas Hanks has shown – though this background has not been widely recognized.251 It is well worth observ-

246

The “acceptable year of the Lord” (ἐνιαυτὸν κυρίου δεκτόν), e.g – in Isaiah a plain reference to the Jubilee – now links with Luke’s redaction of the logion about a prophet not being “accepted”: οὐδεὶς προφήτης δεκτός ἐστιν ἐν τῇ πατρίδι αὐτοῦ (Luke 4:24. Cf. Mark 6:4). At the same time, Luke also points forward to Acts and the welcoming of the Gentiles: ἐν παντὶ ἔθνει ὁ φοβούµενος αὐτὸν καὶ ἐργαζόµενος δικαιοσύνην δεκτὸς αὐτῷ ἐστιν (Acts 10:35). See Tannehill, Narrative Unity, 71–2. These are Luke’s only uses of this adjective, and one can see a distinct reorientation of the original reference. In the Lukan context, Isaiah’s allusion to the Jubilee has become a prophetic word of rejection (by the Jews) and acceptance (of the gentiles). 247 Rainer Albertz, “Die ‘Antrittspredigt’ Jesu im Lukasevangelium auf ihrem alttestamentlichen Hintergrund,” ZNW 74 (1983) 182–206, esp. 191–8. See also Wolter, Lukasevangelium, 191–3. Albertz’ position requires rejecting the view of Christopher Tuckett (“Luke 4,16, Isaiah, and Q,” Logia: Les paroles de Jésus – The Words of Jesus [J. Delobel, ed.; BETL 59; Leuven: Leuven University, 1982] 343–54), whose solution to the source question leads him to see the insertion of Isa 58:6 as pre-Lukan and evidence for a special Lukan source. 248 See, e.g., Marshall, Luke, 184; and Robert O’Toole, “Does Luke Also Portray Jesus as the Christ in Luke 4,16–30?” Bib 76 (1995) 508. The Hebrew texts of these two passages do not employ the same word for “freedom/release” (‫חפשים‬, Isa 58:6; ‫דרור‬, Isa 61:1) – which suggests an engagement with the Greek text. Through the LXX text of Isaiah, Luke would have inherited a view of the Jubilee that bundled together the canceling of loans and the release of slaves. This upsets the unconvincing view of Daniel Carroll (“La Cita de Isaías 58,6 en Lucas 4,18: Une nuova propuesta,” Kairós 11 [1992] 72), who rejects the Jubilee association of Isa 58:6 in favor of an interest in Sabbath observance: “En contraste con otros, quienes han propuesto que Isaías 58:6 fue insertado por ser también una alusión al jubileo (o al añosabático), creo que es posible que Jesús esté enfatizando un aspecto cúltico, la celebración del sábado.” 249 There are several interesting points of linguistic convergence in the Hebrew texts of these two passages (‫רצון‬, 58:5; 61:2; ‫קרא‬, 58:1, 5, 9, 13; 61:1–3, 6; ‫בנו ממך חרבות עולם‬, 58:12; 61:4). See Carroll, “La Cita de Isaías,” 66. 250 See Bergsma, Jubilee, 192. Cf. Isa 49:8 (‫)עת רצון‬. The LXX of Isa 58:5 reads νηστείαν δεκτήν. 251 See Thomas Hanks, God So Loved the Third World (James Dekker, trans.; Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1983) 99–102; and Bergsma, Jubilee, 195–8. Given Luke’s broad knowledge of Isaiah, we should expect his sensitivity to the wider context of Isa 58:6.

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ing, in this connection, that later tradition read both Isa 57:15–58:14 and Isa 61:1–11 together as the haphtaroth at the beginning of a Jubilee year. 252 While such lectionary practice cannot be established in the first century, it remains highly suggestive for the precise collocation Luke provides. With respect to the specific verse Luke introduces, Rainer Albertz highlights the decisive echo in Isa 58:6 (‫ )ושלח רצוצים חפשים‬of the release of debtslaves legislated in Deut 15:12–13 (‫תשלחנו חפשי‬, cf. Jer 34:10).253 The echo is admittedly obscured in the Greek, since Deut 15:12–13 LXX (ἐξαποστελεῖς αὐτὸν ἐλεύθερον; cf. Jer 34:9,14,16 MT; 41:9,14,16 LXX) does not use ἄφεσις, as does Isa 58:6 LXX (ἀπόστελλε τεθραυσµένους ἐν ἀφέσει); but as Albertz appreciates, this only indicates that by the time of the LXX translation of Isaiah, the release of slaves in Deut 15:12–13, to which the prophet originally alluded, had been identified with the general release (‫דרור‬/ἄφεσις) of loans called for several verses earlier in Deut 15:1–3 (δι᾽ ἑπτὰ ἐτῶν ποιήσεις ἄφεσιν).254 This bundling of the loan remission and the manumission

Similar attention to the context informs exegesis at Qumran and much early Christian interpretation of scripture. Room for variation must be allowed, but the interpretative canons of the New Testament era must not be tacitly conflated with the much less contextually controlled methods of the later rabbinic period. See Daniel Instone-Brewer, Techniques and Assumptions in Jewish Exegesis before 70 C.E. (Texte und Studien zum Antiken Judentum 30; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992); Richard Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (New Haven: Yale University, 1989); and G. K. Beale, The Right Doctrine from the Wrong Texts? Essays on the Use of the Old Testament in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1994). 252 See Mariusz Rosik and Victor Onwukeme, “Function of Isa 61,1–2 and 58,6 in Luke’s Programmatic Passage (Lk 4,16–30),” Polish Journal of Biblical Research 2 (2002) 68. Julian Morgenstern (“Two Prophecies from the Fourth Century BC and the Evolution of Yom Kippur,” HUCA 24 [1952–53] 35–9) argues that the text was originally proclaimed on a Yom Kippur, but not of a Jubilee year. 253 “Gerade aus der Terminologie des von Lukas ausgewählten Satzstückes geht eindeutig hervor, was damit gemeint ist: ‫ שלח חפשי‬bezeichnet als terminus technicus das Entlassen von Schuldsklaven,” Albertz, “Die ‘Antrittspredigt’ Jesu,” 194. According to France (Jesus and the Old Testament, 134 fn. 209) Luke’s citation of Isa 58:6 “has not been satisfactorily explained.” The presence of the verse in Luke 4:18 has been attributed to Luke’s faulty memory; e.g. Adolf Schlatter, Das Evangelium des Lukas (Stuttgart: Calwer, 1975) 226–7; Plummer, Luke 120–22; Helmer Ringgren, “Luke’s Use of the Old Testament,” HTR 79 (1986) 229; an early Christian testimonia text; e.g. C. H. Dodd, According to the Scriptures (London: Nesbit, 1952), 52–53; and the desire for a chiasm; e.g., N. W. Lund, Chiasmus in the New Testament (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1942) 236–8. The solution of Albertz is best. 254 Albertz, “Die ‘Antrittspredigt’ Jesu,” 194 fn. 45. The use of ἀποστέλλω with ἄφεσις is a “Mischform aus dem Sprachgebrauch in den Sklavengesetzen und den Sabbat/Jubeljahrgesetzen,” suggesting the association of texts already in the mind of the translator of Isaiah 58. The normal LXX translation for ‫ חפשי‬is ἐλεύθερος. On the much-discussed interpretative character of the LXX translation of Isaiah, see the classic study of Isaac Leo

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of indentured slaves is perfectly natural as a reading of Deuteronomy and points to the underlying logic of debt.255 The conflation of loan and slavery laws attested in LXX Isaiah belongs to a broader exegetical pattern linking the jubilee laws from Deuteronomy and those from Leviticus. In 11QWords of Moses (1Q22; cf. 1QS 10.6–8; 4Q319), for instance, one finds an equation of the šĕmiṭṭâ (Deut 15:1) and sabbatical years (Lev 25:1–7). 256 More famously, 11Q13 2:2–4 harmonizes the return of alienated land in Lev 25:13 and the debt release of Deut 15:2 (cf. Josephus, A.J. 3.282).257 In application to Luke 4:18, the combination of Isa 58:6 and 61:1–2 represents a similar binding of the distinct Deuteronomy and Leviticus Jubilee traditions as is seen in 11Q13. In the case of Luke, however, these Torah traditions are mediated through Isaianic appropriations. In the Hebrew text of Isaiah 58, the charity provisions of Deuteronomy dominate the thought; while in Isaiah 61 Leviticus 25 is more prominent. Recognizing the common idea of release from debt slavery, the LXX translation, in a first stage of alignment, subtly linked the two chapters by using the common language of ἄφεσις to translate both ‫ יובל‬in Lev 25:13 and ‫ שמטה‬in Deut 15:2. It is Luke, however, who completed the identification, by intermingling the two Isaian texts. In the Gospel, then, the “release” (ἄφεσις) of debt-slaves called for in Isa 61:1 is integrated and reinforced with the addition of the “release” of loans recalled in Isa 58:6. The pattern of linking the release of loans and of slaves, while it depends upon a common framework of debt, nevertheless leaves unexplained the generative life setting in which the connection of Leviticus 25 and Deuteron-

Seeligmann, The Septuagint Version of Isaiah and Cognate Studies (FAT 40; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004); and more recently, Ronald Troxel, LXX-Isaiah as Translation and Interpretation (JSJSup 124; Leiden: Brill, 2008), esp. 1–35. Koole (Isaiah III, 137) mentions the possibility that ἐν ἀφέσει may go back to a phonetic correspondance with ‫חפשי‬. 255 “The law in 15:12–18 is a natural sequence to the laws on loans and poverty in vv. 1–11; for poverty is the underlying cause of indentured servitude,” Duane Christiansen, Deuteronomy 1:1–21:9 (WBC 6A; Colombia: Nelson Reference & Electronic: 2001) 319. 256 See Bergsma, Jubilee, 281, cf. 259–62. The same equation is made in Targumim Onqelos, Pseudo-Jonathan, and, Neofiti I. See Jeffrey Stackert, Rewriting the Torah: Literary Revision in Deuteronomy and the Holiness Legislation (FAT 52; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007) 126 fn. 36. The distinct agricultural and financial injunctions of Exod 23:11 and Deut 15:2 are analogously combined in Neh 10:32. See Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, 251. 257 See George Brooke, Exegesis at Qumran: 4Q Florilegium in Its Jewish Context (JSOTSup 29; Sheffield: JSOT 1985) 320–1. A. S. van der Woude (“Melchizedek als himmlische Erlösergestalt in den neugefundenen eschatologischen Midraschim aus Qumran Höhle XI,” OTS 14 [1965] 354–73, here 361) explains this conjunction of Torah laws in 11QMelch with reference to the use of the Greek ἄφεσις to translate both ‫ יובל‬in Lev 25:13 and ‫ שמטה‬in Deut 15:2.

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omy 15 was originally made. Michael Bartos and Bernard Levinson have suggested, however, that the association was triggered in part by a legal problem, later attested in Sipre Deuteronomy and Sipra Leviticus, about whether or not the Jubilee in Leviticus mandated debt remission (which it never mentions).258 However real such an academic debate may have been, it is important not to lose sight of why “debt” remission was so important a theme. In the view of Bartos and Levinson, the legal problem was inextricably bound (at least in the Second Temple period) to an eschatological rereading of Leviticus 25 and Deuteronomy 15 (cf. Isa 61:1; Dan 9:24–27). Thus, “In the Melchizedek scroll, the Jubilee is an eschatological category, so when its author resolves the legal exegetical problem of whether the Jubilee remits debts, the resolution also effectively posits debt remission as eschatological,” which is to say, a remission of Israel’s sins.259 This result, which corresponds to the evidence already reviewed, is critical, for it helps clarify who exactly is targeted for the release Jesus proclaims. Albertz, for instance, gathers from Luke’s citation of Isa 58:6 and its later importance as an almsgiving text for the rabbis, that the Gospel has only material debtors in mind: “Wir können damit festhalten: Im von Lukas aufgenommen Zitat aus Jes 58, 6 sind mit den τεθραυσµένοι weder die Sünder, noch die von Dämonen Besessenen, sondern eindeutig die wirtschaftlich Ruinierten gemeint.”260 Albertz is certainly right to detect Luke’s concern for the literal poor as a centerpiece in the Gospel’s appropriation of Jubilee traditions. Nevertheless, he has taken no account of the eschatological debtslavery metaphor, at work already in Isaiah and attested in Luke’s day in 11Q13. The proclamation of the Jubilee in Luke 4:18–19 must thus be approached from a broader angle – including all the categories of “debtor” which Albertz considers mutually exclusive: sinners, the possessed, and the poor.261 (2) Devil’s Ransom. The identification of sinners and the poor among those debtors envisioned in Jesus’ Nazareth sermon is clear enough from the

258

Michael Bartos and Bernard Levinson, “This Is the Manner of the Remission”: Implicit Legal Exegesis in 11QMelchizedek as a Response to the Formation of the Torah,” JBL 132 (2013) 351–71. 259 Ibid., 370. 260 Albertz, “Die ‘Antrittspredigt’ Jesu,” 197. 261 Bock (Proclamation and Prophecy, 109) observes that the good news of Isa 61:1–2 is left on the level of proclamation, while Isa 58:6 includes the actual commission to act: “This figure does not merely bring a message and healing, but effects salvation…The prophetic picture (Isa. 61) is joined to a liberation portrait (Isa. 58). The insertion points us to the messianic christology,” (emphasis original), cf. Luke 7:18–23. See also Rosik and Onwukeme, “Function of Isa 61,1–2 and 58,6,” 74, 79.

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semantics of ‫חובא‬. But why should those possessed by the devil be included among the debtors? The eschatological interpretation of 11Q13 holds the key. Gary Anderson has shown how, following the New Exodus motif of Second Isaiah, the eschatology of 11Q13 “is patterned on Israel’s primal category of salvation – the Exodus from Egypt.”262 In place of Pharaoh, however, a new tyrant appears in 11Q13 2.13, 25. It is Belial who holds the Israelites in debt slavery.263 As Anderson remarks, this “shows a striking correlation to a theme that would emerge in early Christianity, that is, that Satan justly holds a bond of indebtedness against humankind.”264 Patristic authors often understood Satan as the holder of the bond note, with Christ somehow intervening to cancel the debt. Perhaps the most explicit and influential evocation of the theme in the New Testament appears in Col 2:13–15, where Christ is described as “forgiving us all trespasses (χαρισάµενος...πάντα τὰ παραπτώµατα), erasing the bond of indebtedness (ἐξαλείψας τὸ...χειρόγραφον) that stood against us with its legal demands.” The χειρόγραφον erased by Christ in this passage refers to the promissory note written out in the hand of the debtor (cf. Tob 5:3; 9:5; Test. Job 11:11). 265 Whether this note has somehow come into the possession of the devil is not clear in Colossians, however. 266 The question has thus arisen, where exactly this idea – so widespread in the patristic tradition – ultimately has its roots (e.g. Iren. Adv. Haer. 3.23.1).267 How did Satan enter into the debt-slavery metaphor for salvation? Anderson’s observation about 11Q13 points directly at Luke, who in fact appears to be the transmitter of this idea from Second Temple Judaism to the early Church. Luke, indeed, provides the critical and unexplored bridge. A fragment from Origen, glossing Luke 4:18, reveals the Gospel’s explicit connection to the patristic topos.

262

Anderson, “From Israel’s Burden to Israel’s Debt,” 16. Ibid., 17. 264 Ibid., 17. See also Anderson, The Genesis of Perfection (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001) 158–61; and especially M. E. Stone, Adam’s Contract with Satan: The Legend of the Cheirograph of Adam (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University, 2002). 265 On the papyrological evidence of these receipts, see Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, 330–4. Deissmann suggests that perhaps the well-attested practice of annulling an I.O.U. with a large Chi may inform Colossians’ language of nailing the χειρόγραφον to the cross. 266 On this text and the related traditions, see Anderson, Sin, 114–32. See also Joram Luttenberger, “Der gekreuzigte Schuldschein: Ein Aspekt der Deutung des Todes Jesu im Kolosserbrief,” NTS 51 (2005) 80–95. 267 On this motif among patristic authors, see Gustaf Aulén, Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of the Atonement (London: SPCK, 1970) 16–61, esp. 47–56. Aulén sees the single dominant, soteriological motif found throughout patristic literature as grounded in the New Testament: “It did not suddenly spring into being in the early church, or arrive as an importation from some outside source.” 263

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What captives does he mean, except those whom the devil had just taken prisoner and put in chains? Christ came and overpowered the imposter and the rebellious tyrant, Satan, and liberated the captives. Luke says that these same people were blind and broken. For, Christ shined the intelligible light upon those whose minds had been darkened. He forgave “the broken ones” – or rather, he losed them from the bonds of sin, as he also loosed those broken in heart – that is crushed by the weight of sin or humbled in spirit. To them he proclaims “a year acceptable to the Lord” (Fragment on Luke 100.2).268

Origen’s reading here is not fanciful. Luke clearly already knows the idea of Satan enslaving the children of Abraham (ἣν ἔδησεν ὁ Σατανᾶς), with Jesus dramatically releasing them from bondage (ἔδει λυθῆναι ἀπὸ τοῦ δεσµοῦ τούτου, Luke 13:16).269 Indeed, the liberation of “all those oppressed by the devil” (πάντας τοὺς καταδυναστευοµένους ὑπὸ τοῦ διαβόλου, Acts 10:38) is essential to the good news preached about Jesus. 270 The Christian mission, moreover, remains an ongoing project of turning people from “the power of Satan...to receive forgiveness of sins” (τῆς ἐξουσίας τοῦ Σανατνᾶ...τοῦ λαβεῖν αὐτοὺς ἄφεσιν ἁµαρτιῶν, Acts 26:18). Glimpses of some broad narrative of redemption are evident here, but scholars have been slow to recognize the fact. Hans Conzelmann, in fact, contended that Satan has no significant role in Luke’s vision of the salvation Jesus brings.271 This idea must be rejected, however. Rather, as Susan Garrett

268

Translation from Joseph Lienhard, Origen: Homilies on Luke, Fragments on Luke (The Fathers of the Church 94; Washington, DC: Catholic University of America, 1996) 168. Original text in Max Rauer, Origenes Werke, vol. 9 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1959). 269 In harmony with other expressions of Pauline theology, Col 1:14 uses slaveredemption language to speak of forgiveness (τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν παραπτωµάτων; cf. Eph 1:7), but the metaphorical scenario is not developed (or disclosed) as it is in Luke 13:16–17. 270 See the helpful comments of Jaroslav Pelikan (Acts [Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible; Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2005] 133–5) on Acts 10:38 (cf. 13:8–11), under the rubric De servo arbitrio. Pelikan explores the Christus Victor theology in the Lukan context. See also Origen, Contra Celsum 8.54. 271 Conzelmann (Theology of St. Luke, 156) influentially understood Luke 4:13 (συντελέσας πάντα πειρασµὸν ὁ διάβολος ἀπέστη ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἄχρι καιροῦ) as though Satan’s active opposition to the mission of Jesus was suspended between the Temptation and Passion: “Satan does not enter as a factor in the saving events. In fact, the only part he plays is the negative one of being excluded from the period of his ministry.” This interpretation is problematic on at least two counts. First, it fails to note the literary motif of the devil temporarily leaving a righteous man, after having been defeated. The Testament of Job 27:2–6 provides a helpful parallel: “As he [Satan] stood, he wept, saying, ‘Look Job, I am weary and I withdraw from you…you conquered my wrestling tactics which I brought on you.’ Then Satan, ashamed, left me for three years.” Second, Conzelmann (188 fn. 4) fails to appreciate the ongoing narrative engagement with Satan and his power between the Temptation and the Passion (e.g. Luke 8:12; 10:18–19; 11:21–22; 13:16–17), reading the relevant texts in a strained manner as meant “primarily to be a comfort to the church of

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convincingly argues, “one can scarely overestimate Satan’s importance in the history of salvation as told by Luke.”272 In fact, the scenario of bondage to Satan is for Luke much more than a passing image (e.g. 1:74; 10:18–19; 11:21–22; 22:3, 31–32; cf. Acts 5:3; 13:4–12; 19:8–20). 273 Ultimately, it provides the proper context for understanding Luke’s crucial engament with the Exodus motif, which is explicitly invoked as the model of redemption effected through Jesus’ passion (Luke 9:31). 274 Several allusions secure the point. Most importantly, an exodus from Satan’s lordship explains the unique Lukan reference to Exod 8:19 in the Beelzebul controversy (εἰ δὲ ἐν δακτύλῳ θεοῦ ἐγὼ ἐκβάλλω τὰ δαιµόνια, ἄρα ἔφθασεν ἐφ᾽ ὑµᾶς ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ, Luke 11:20). The exorcisms which Jesus performs reveal the finger of God, just as Moses’ mighty deeds did the same. And just as Moses’ works soon surpassed the power of Pharoah’s magicians, finally compelling the strong man to face defeat, stripped of what he jealously held, so Jesus’ contest with Beelzebul will surpass the reach of other exorcists and end in the demon’s being plundered of all held in thralldom (11:21–22; cf. Acts 19:11–20; also Isa 53:12). Again, Pharaoh’s oppression of the Israelites in Exod 1:13 lies behind Luke’s expression καταδυναστευοµένους ὑπὸ τοῦ διαβόλου in Acts 10:38. Behind such allusions, sparse but unambiguous, is a clear storyline: “The Jews are in bondage to the devil as surely as the Israelites were once in bondage to Pharaoh.”275 The reference to Exod 2:14 in Luke 12:14 (see §2.5.3) further confirms the Exodus paradigm, with Jesus assigning himself the role of rejected liberator

Luke’s time, which knows that since the time of the Passion of Jesus it is again subject to the attacks of Satan.” 272 Susan Garrett, The Demise of the Devil: Magic and Demonic in Luke’s Writings (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989) 37. See also, Walter Kirchschläger, Jesu exorzistisches Wirken aus der Sicht des Lukas: Ein Beitrag zur lukanischen Redaktion (ÖBS 3; Klosterneuburg: Österreichisches Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1981); and Joseph Fitzmyer, Luke the Theologian: Aspects of His Teaching (New York: Paulist, 1989) 146–74. Luke uses the word δαιµόνιον 21x, equal to Matthew (10x) and Mark (11x) combined. 273 The important role Satan plays in Mark’s Gospel provides the platform on which Luke builds his own depiction. On the Markan construction, see James Robinson, The Problem of History in Mark (SBT 21; London: SCM, 1957). 274 See Susan Garrett, “Exodus from Bondage: Luke 9:31 and Acts 12:1–24,” CBQ 52 (1990) 656–80; and Hamm, “Freeing of the Bent Woman,” 23–44. On Luke 9:31, see Fitzmyer, Luke, 793. On the Jesus-Moses typology, see David Moessner, “Jesus and the ‘Wilderness Generation’: The Death of the Prophet like Moses according to Luke,” in SBL 1982 Seminar Papers (Kent H. Richards, ed.; Chico, CA: Scholars, 1982) 319–40; and idem., “Luke 9:1–50: Luke’s Preview of the Journey of the Prophet like Moses of Deuteronomy,” JBL 102 (1983) 575–605. On the New Exodus motif in Lukan scholarship, see note 231 above. 275 Garrett, Demise of the Devil, 101.

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sent by God. While Satan is not directly mentioned in this passage, there is an important connection in Luke’s mind. Bondage to Satan is wrapped up, for Luke, with a slavery to wealth and πλεονεξία (cf. Luke 12:15). 276 This is especially clear in Acts. The stealthy greed of Ananias and Saphira, for instance, is attributed directly to ὁ Σανατᾶς (Acts 5:3). Similarly, the pythoness, whose possession meant much “business” for her masters (ἐργασίαν πολλήν, Acts 16:16), and the riot of the idol makers in Ephesus, whose “prosperity” depended on false worship (ἐκ ταύτης τῆς ἐργασίας ἡ εὐπορία ἡµῖν ἐστιν, 19:25), illustrate the close binding of economic interests and service to the fallen powers.277 From this perspective, it is no incidental detail when Luke reckons up the enormous monetary value of the magic books burnt in Ephesus (ἀργυρίου µυριάδες πέντε, 19:19; cf. Luke 8:37). A significant expression of the hell-bound bondage to silver appears in the story of Simon the magician (Acts 8:22–23). Peter explicitly rejects his perverted notion that divine power is a matter of money: “Your money perish with you” (τὸ ἀργύριόν σου σὺν σοὶ εἴη εἰς ἀπώλειαν, 8:20). Peter then cites precisely Isa 58:6 to describe how Simon is in bondage.278 Repent (µετανόησον) therefore from this wickedness of yours and beg the Lord that he might forgive for you the thoughts of your heart, for I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity (χολὴν πικρίας καὶ σύνδεσµον ἀδικίας, Acts 8:22–23; cf. Isa 58:6).

We confront here a revealing but neglected insight into Luke’s understanding of the text he so importantly inserts in Isa 61:1–2. The “bond” (σύνδεσµον) from which Jesus brings “release” is a bondage to the economy of the devil. The need for Simon to repent to be freed of this yoke is significant. His own attitude to the power of money as well as the power of God must be entirely changed. In light of the huge importance Isaiah 58 had for the rabbinic doctrine of redemptive almsgiving (e.g. Lev. Rab. 34), it is easy to agree with Albertz that Luke has a similar interest in charity in view. In some manner, the mingling of Isa 61:1–2 and Isa 58:6 thus represents the same coordination of divine and human mercy seen in Luke 11:4 and elsewhere in the Gospel. Luke has detected a double agency in Isaiah’s language: the Lord’s anointed releases Israel from the bonds of their captivity (Isa 61:1–2); yet



276 According to Aaron Kuecker (“The Spirit and the ‘Other,’ Satan and the ‘Self’: Economic Ethics as a Consequence of Identity Transformation in Luke-Acts,” in Engaging Economics, 81–103), in Luke Satan is an active counterpoint to the Spirit’s work in moving believers to share their resources. 277 On the economically and culturally subversive significance of the Gospel in Acts, see C. Kavin Rowe, World Upside Down: Reading Acts in the Greco-Roman Age (New York: Oxford University, 2010). 278 See Sloan, Favorable Year, 119–20. On this passage in Acts, see “La conversion de Simon le magician (acts 8,4–25),” Bib (2010) 210

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Israel itself is also asked “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke (Isa 58:6) – specifically through works of mercy like feeding the hungry and clothing the naked (Isa 58:7). The people’s work is economic mercy, and the Lord’s work is of another order. The first thing Jesus does after his sermon in Nazareth is, accordingly, to perform an exorcism (Luke 4:31–37). As Robert Tannehill sees, “It is probably significant...that there is considerable emphasis on Jesus triumph over demons when he leaves Nazareth and goes to Capernaum [i.e. Luke 4:31–41].... Jesus’ healings and exorcisims are an important aspect of his mission of bringing ‘release.’”279 James Metzger is more direct. Highlighting the repeated mention in 4:43 of bringing the “good news” of the Kingdom to other villages (ἐυαγγελίσασθαί µε δεῖ), he detects an important structural device. “This inclusio confirms for readers that they have just witnessed what ‘bringing the good news to the poor’ (v. 18) will look like: it will involve teaching (ἐδίδασκεν; v. 15), and preaching (κηρύξαι; v. 18), to be sure, but also freeing people from demons and curing their illnesses (vv. 31–44).”280 If Luke attests the idea of a debt-bondage to Satan, however, the idea is not systematically developed or integrated. 281 The economic aspect of bondage to the devil is clear enough, as detailed above, but Luke’s exorcism traditions do not seem to have been reconfigured in the light of debt theology, nor do Luke’s debt texts appear coordinated with an explicit Devil’s Ransom theme. Thus, while the devil occupies a narrative role like Pharoah, the language of “redemption” does not, at the level of individual pericopae, generally mix with the idea of a rescue from debt. To be sure, Luke does have an idea of λύτρωσις (Luke 2:38; 21:28); and he is the only evangelist to use this language. The idea certainly reflects his unique dependence on DeuteroIsaiah. Nonetheless, the idea is not so important as ἄφεσις and given Israel’s two possible paths out of its debt predicament – satisfaction or the proclamation of a Jubilee – Luke much prefers the notion of release (cf. Isa 61:1–2) to repayment (cf. Isa 40:1–2). The central position of Isa 61:1–2 in the Gospel makes this perfectly clear (Luke 4:16–30). As seen, Luke 7:36–50 puts Jesus in the position of the lender, with full freedom to act mercifully – not in the role of a third party redeemer (gô’ēl) who ransoms sinners from prison by supplying the lender with his due (cf. Lev 25:47–49). The more complex narrative arrangement of Luke 12:57–59 widens the cast of characters to include a creditor, a debtor, and a judge (as

279

Tannehill, Narrative Unity, 65. See also Garrett, “Exodus from Bondage,” 662. Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 29. 281 It is clear that Jesus’ passion is envisioned as a confrontation with the Demon (cf. Luke 4:13). See Marc Rastoin, “Simon-Pierre entre Jésus et Satan: la théologie lucanienne a l’oeuvre en Lc 22,32–33,” Bib 89 (2008) 153–72. 280

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well as a πράκτωρ). 282 In the ambivalence of Jesus’ identity as κριτής, however, the creditor and judge figures coalesce, as seen above (a fact which undermines any charge of simplistic allegorizing). The same basic creditordebtor configuration, accordingly, controls the scene. No repayment of the devil is in view, as later appears. The implicit narrative is perhaps clearest in Luke 4:16–30, even if the creditor image has here been eclipsed. In some manner, Jesus’ regal announcement of a grand amnesty signals that, as the Son of David, he was exercising his royal perogative to remit the debts held by any of his subjects or else contracted in the age of the last régime. Conforming well to ancient expectations of a beneficent regent, the Lord thus enters upon his reign with a massive pardon. 283 In this sense, the devil’s claim on sinners is not compensated for in coinage paid by Jesus; it is simply overruled. Like Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II, who cleared the prisons of all those indicted with “errors, crimes, accusations, condemnations, and charges of all kinds” during the period of the previous dynasty,284 Christ arrives as Israel’s σωτήρ (Luke 2:11) and proclaims a general ἄφεσις. In the act of annoucing the advent of his Kingdom, he empties the gulags of all those held in debt-bondage under the tyranny of the devil (Luke 11:20–22) – the dynast who is likened not only to Pharoah, but also to the fallen king of Babylon (Luke 10:18; cf. Isa 14:12– 15), to whom all the glory and power of all kingdoms of the world had been delivered (Luke 4:6; cf. Dan 2:37–38). In Luke’s grand soteriological narrative, the release of debt-prisoners is thus accomplished in tandem with the unseating of the tyrant of Israel’s eschatological Exile, at the appearance of the Lord’s anointed who comes bearing the Kingdom (Isa 61:1–2; Luke 4:18; cf. Isa 45:1).

282

These “collection agents” functioned already in classical times. See Virgina Hunter, “Policing Public Debtors in Classical Athens,” Phoenix 54 (2000) 26–7; and H. I. Bell, “The Constitutio Antoniana and the Egyptian Poll-Tax,” Journal of Roman Studies 37 (1947) 21. As relatively poor, local tax farmers, the πράκτορες were contrasted with the senatorial ἐπιµεληταί, who collected more significant taxes. Given the allusion to Gehenna that Eubank finds in the Matthean parallel to Luke 12:57–59, a reference here to the devil should not be blithely ruled out. In view of Luke’s own notion of bondage to the devil (cf. Luke 13:16–17), the image of “prison” is suggestive. Even if the association were present, however, the devil would not be presented as the creditor who holds the cheirographon. He would serve only as the warden for the Lord. 283 See H. S. Smith, “A Note on Amnesty,” The Journal of Egyptian Archeology 54 (1968) 209–14. Ptolemaic amnesty declarations, e.g., “were proclaimed among a long list of royal boons granted…at the beginning of new reigns or when new dynastic arrangements held the promise of peaceful and beneficent rule succeeding internal strife.” 284 See Smith, “Note,” 210. On this famous decree of 118 BCE, see Marie-Thérèse Lenger, Corpus des ordonnances des Ptolémées: bilan des additions et corrections (1964– 1988), compléments à la bibliographie (Bruxelles Jubelpark 10; Fondation égyptologique Reine Élisabeth, 1990) 53.

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Luke’s perspective on escape from debt, in sum, lays the primary accent on mercy rather than justice: God’s decisive intervention in a great act of Jubilee release. This circumstance represents Luke’s special appropriation of Isaiah’s eschatological reading of Leviticus 25 in Isa 61:1–2. It also helps explain why Lukan soteriology is so commonly (and inaccurately) accused of lacking a (Pauline) theology of the cross.285 The cross for Luke is the place where forgiveness is announced (Πάτερ, ἄφες αὐτοῖς, Luke 23:34; cf. 23:43). Debts are canceled there by Jesus’ royal decree. The “wages of sin” exacted as a punishment are also in various ways suggested, above all perhaps in the “necessity” (δεῖ) of the Messiah’s suffering.286 Luke does indeed reckon with a strong notion of strict justice, but this belongs more to the “measure for measure” language that has its ground in human mercy and in the blessing/curse framework behind the charity prescribed in Deuteronomy 15 and Isaiah 58. Divine “justice” in Luke always takes a geneorously merciful form (cf. Luke 6:38 and Chapter Five §5.3).

285

See, e.g., F. F. Bruce, The Time is Fulfilled: Five Aspects of the Fulfillment of the Old Testament in the New (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978) 31 fn. 34; Henry Cadbury, Making of Luke-Acts, 280–1; Conzelmann, Theology of St. Luke, 201; and especially Ernst Käsemann, “Das Problem des historischen Jesus,” ZTK 51 (1954) 137. For additional references, see Richard Dillon, From Eye-Witnesses to Ministers of the Word: Tradition and Composition in Luke 24 (AnB 82; Rome: Biblical Institute, 1978) 29 fn. 84. Objections to the thesis have been raised, e.g. Richard Zehnle, “The Salvific Character of Jesus’ Death in Lucan Soteriology,” TS 30 (1969) 420–44; Richard Glöckner, Die Verkündigung des Heils beim Evangelisten Lukas (Mainz: Matthias Grünwald, 1975) 155–95; Jerome Neyrey, The Passion According to Luke: A Redaction Study of Luke’s Soteriology (New York: Paulist, 1985); Susan Garrett, “The Meaning of Jesus’ Death in Luke,” WW 12 (1992) 11–16; and Dennis D. Sylva, ed. Reimaging the Death of the Lukan Jesus (BBB 73; Frankfurt am Main; Anton Hain, 1990). For a good, short discussion of the whole issue, see Kevin Anderson, ‘But God Raised Him from the Dead’: The Theology of Jesus’ Resurrection in Luke-Acts (Paternoster Biblical Monographs; Paternoster, 2006) 37–41. 286 For a recent attempt to understand the necessity of the cross within the framework of a Christus Victor Theology, see Nicholas Lombardo, The Father’s Will: Christ’s Crucifixion and the Goodness of God (Oxford: Oxford University, 2013).



Chapter 3

“The One Who Showed Mercy”: Love of Neighbor and the Good Samaritan 3.1 Introduction 3.1 Introduction

One of the surprising but regular patterns of recent scholarship has been a neglect of the Good Samaritan percicope as a Lukan “wealth” text.1 Rather than recognizing the integral link of this text to the Gospel’s wider theme of almsgiving, interpreters have regularly viewed the parable from other perspectives and, consequently, failed to appreciate critical features both of Luke 10:25–37 and the broader wealth discourse in Luke-Acts. The pattern of oversight was set early on by the pioneer of Lukan wealth studies, Hans-Joachim Degenhardt, who omitted Luke 10:25–37 from his selection of relevant passages. Kyoshi Mineshige recognized the limits of Degenhardt’s survey and expanded the catalogue of texts rather extensively – yet still found no place for the Good Samaritan. The studies of Hans-Georg Gradl and James Metzger, while quite different, work sequentially through the narrative and are agreed in disregarding Luke 10:25–37. Admittedly, some specialists on Luke’s doctrine of wealth have attended to the passage, though only in a passing fashion. Kyoung-Jin Kim’s study of Stewardship and Almsgiving in Luke’s Theology recognizes that “by means of the benevolent conduct of the Samaritan Luke intends to show the way material possessions should be rightly used.”2 Vincenzo Petracca’s Gott oder das Geld also has a short treatment of the passage in which he affirms a similar lesson: “Angesichts von Not soll man sich nach Lk anrühren lassen und ohne finanzielle Rücksichtnahmen spontan helfen.”3 These treatments remain severely underdeveloped, however, marginal to the scholars’ broader constructions of Lukan almsgiving, and they ultimately fail to convince. Christopher Hays’ recent dissertation on Lukan Wealth Ethics is accordingly able to treat Luke 10:25–37 briefly, then declare in contradiction to Kim and

1

See Chapter One §1.1.2.3. Kim, Stewardship and Almsgiving, 179. Kim gives about two pages to the parable, but offers no sustained analysis or exegetical engagement. 3 Petracca, Gott oder das Geld, 92. 2

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Petracca that the parable does “not explicitly bear on the subject of wealth.”4 Its interest rather is in the “inclusive definition of neighbor.” 5 Such is the present opinion of research on Luke’s idea of charity and wealth. Parable scholarship – which has most certainly not overlooked the Good Samaritan – stands in substantial agreement with Hays. John Nolland makes the argument explicit: “the parable cannot be about attitudes to and the use of money or possessions.” 6 The preoccupations of the literature point in the same direction. Here the pattern of scholarship has been to follow a few key studies. A great deal of attention has been focused on the proper nomenclature of the passage (Gleichnis or Beispielerzälung?),7 for instance, and the halahkic particulars behind the priest and Levite’s behavior. 8 In general, though, even in these studies, the “inclusive definition of neighbor” is the center of the discussion. Nowhere, to my knowledge, in the substantial bibliography, does an article consider the parable in its specific connection to Luke’s interest in charity.9 Outside parable scholarship, Klaus Berger’s massive study on Jesus’ interpretation of the Law does include a helpful treatment of the Good Samaritan as an almsgiving text – though Berger, like most, is mainly concerned with the idea of the “neighbor.” 10 His interpretation of Luke 10:25–37, therefore, does not engage the complete Lukan pericope or the robust background of Jewish almsgiving; and his conclusion has been widely ignored and occasionally rejected.11 Friedrich Wilhelm Horn’s study of faith

4

Hays, Wealth Ethics, 199. Ibid. 6 See above all John Nolland, “The Role of Money and Possessions in the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11–32)” in Reading Luke: Interpretation, Reflection, Formation (Craig Bartholomew, Joel Green, and Anthony Thistelton, eds.; SHS 6; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005) 178–209, italics original. 7 See Tucker, Example Stories. 8 See Richard Bauckham, “The Scrupulous Priest and the Good Samaritan: Jesus’ Parabolic Interpretation of the Law of Moses,” NTS 44 (1998) 475–89. 9 For a basic bibliography, see Arland Hultgren, The Parables of Jesus: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000) 101–3. 10 Klaus Berger, Die Gesetzesauslegung Jesu: Ihr historischer Hintergrund im Judentum und im Alten Testament (WMANT 40; Netherlands: Neukirchner 1972) 232–9. In conformity to the purpose of his larger study, Berger’s interest is in the interpretation of Lev 19:18. Here he rightly perceives that “für Lk der ‘Sinn’ des Gebotes der Nächstenliebe in Armen- bzw. Elendenpflege besteht” (238). 11 Berger (Ibid., 238; cf. 233) recognizes an important textual feature in Luke’s narrative: “ein merkwürdiges Entsprechungsverhältnis zwischen dem Samaritergleichnis (Lk 10,29–37) und Lk 18,22–30: Das Samaritergleichnis verdeutlicht das Liebesgebot dahin, daß es in aufwendigem Erbarmen gegenüber Elenden konkretisiert wird; in Lk 18,22 wird ebenfalls zu dem Grundstock aus jüd.-hell. Ethik die Forderung nach Verzicht auf Reichtum zugunsten von Armen erhoben.” This insight is not adequately developed or buttressed, so that S. G. Wilson (Luke and the Law [SNTSMS 50; New York: 5

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and works in Luke’s theology wisely built upon Berger’s work; but, like Berger, Horn allows the idea of the πλήσιον to control the agenda (despite his specific interest in Wohltätigkeit).12 Hence, Horn fails to situate the ethic of charitable good works in Luke 10:25–37 within its full historical and exegetical context. It will be the burden of this chapter to emphasize, in contrast to this general trend in the literature, the great importance of Second Temple charity discourse in understanding the full text of Luke 10:25–37. If interpreters have struggled at times to know where amid the parable’s different accents the central stress should be placed – whether in the new definition of neighbor, a critique of the cult, the ethical exhortation,13 or (rarely) the traditional Christological allegory14 – this interpretative fragmentation (and instinct of mutual exegetical exclusion) reflects a basic failure to recognize the rhetoric of charity as Luke’s integrating idiom.15 Likewise, the common tendency to find in the pericope mild (or not so mild) anti-Jewish forms of universalism is checked by a proper contextualization in Jewish almsgiving thought and practice. The chapter will progress in three parts. (1) First, I will trace the reception history of Lev 19:18b as an injunction to give alms (§3.2.1). This will lead to a new appreciation for both the “spiritual sacrifice” substructure of Luke 10:25–37 and the way in which the love of enemies is enjoined (§3.2.2). (2) Next, I will explore the Second Temple understanding of almsgiving as works of mercy (§3.3.1). This will help position the pericope within its native boundary-marking framework (§3.3.2), wherein Luke’s new definition of “neighbor” is pursued (§3.3.3). (3) Finally, after considering the place of loaning laws in the Jewish almsgiving ethic (§3.4.1), I will treat the much

Cambridge University, 2005] 16) casually rejects the position that Luke 10:25:37 is primarily about almsgiving, objecting that “Berger appears to transfer notions from the admittedly similar passage in Lk. 18.18f.” 12 Horn, Glaube und Handeln, 107–14. Horn’s key result is to highlight the “paranetischen Duktus” of the passage, with its strong accent on ποιεῖν and the motivation of “Almosenforderung durch den endzeitlichen Lohn.” From this perspective he understands that to “become neighbor” is not determined by ethnicity, but by “dem karitativen Verhalten.” 13 See, e.g., Ruben Zimmermann, “The Etho-Poietic of the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Lk 10:25–37): The Ethics of Seeing in a Culture of Looking the Other Way,” Verbum et Ecclesia 29 (2008) 269–92. 14 Horn (ibid., 108) speaks for most when he says, “die christologische und allegorische Auslegung des Gleichnisses ist mit Recht in der kritischen Exegese aufgegeben worden.” Even Schellenberg (“Metalepsis,” 268), whose narratology enables him to perceive Luke’s regular pattern of allegory, remarks, “We would be surprised indeed if Jesus had a cameo role in the parable of the Good Samaritan.” 15 On the basic interpretative options exegetes have explored, see Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 347–8.

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neglected exchange between the Samaritan and the innkeeper (§3.4.2). The lens of charity legislation will here contribute new insight into the implicit Christology of the parable (§3.4.3).

3.2 “Love Your Neighbor”: Lukan Variations on an Almsgiving Theme 3.2 “Love Your Neighbor”

3.2.1 Lev 19:18b as a Charity Text 3.2.1.1 CD 6:20 The interpretation of Lev 19:18b as an explicit almsgiving text in early Christianity has not been adequately recognized, yet it develops a tradition attested at Qumran.16 In CD 6:20 (cf. 4QDa 3 iii 1; 4QDd 4 ii 2; 6QD 4 1), within a series of exhortations focused on proper behavior with respect to wealth, the verse from Leviticus is cited (CD 7:2; 9:2, 8), followed immediately by a revealing quotation of Ezek 16:49.17 6:14 6:15 6:16 6:17 6:18 6:19 6:20 6:21

‫אם לא ישמרו לעשות כפרוש התורה לקץ הרשע ולהבדל‬ ‫מבני השחת להנזר מהון הרשעה הטמא בנדר ובחרם‬ ‫בהוןו המקדש ולגזול את יעני עמו להיות אלמנות שללם‬ ‫ואת יתומים ירצחו ולהבדיל בין הטמא לטהור ולהודיע בין‬ ‫הקודש הולל ולשמור את יום השבת כפרושה ואת המועדות‬ ‫ואת יום התענית כמצאת באי הברית החדשה בארץ דמשק‬ ‫להרים את הקדשים כפירושיהם לאהוב איש אחיהו‬ ‫כמהו ולהחזיק ביד עני ואביון וגר ולדרוש איש את שלום‬

16

The Essene interpretation of Lev 19:18b in terms of material charity is widely overlooked. The allusion to Lev 19:18b in CD 6:20 is even missed in many translations of the DSS (Abegg, Vermes), though the language of the Holiness Code (Leviticus 17–25) deeply informs CD 6:11b–7:9a. See Jonathan Campell (The Use of Scripture in the Damascus Document 1–8, 19–20 [BZAW 228; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1995] 138–44). Berger’s important treatment of Lev 19:18 is essentially focused upon Universalismus and the interpretation of “neighbor” (‫רע‬, πλησίον), not the background of Jewish charity. He accordingly skims past CD 6:20 too quickly. See Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 80–135, esp. 118–20. 17 On this portion of the Damascus Document, see Philip Davies, The Damascus Document: An Interpretation of the “Damascus Document” (JSOTSup 25; Sheffield: JSOT, 1983) 161–4. See also the textual comments of David Hamidović, L’Écrit de Damas: Le manifeste essénien (Collection de la Revue des Études juives 51; Paris-Louvain: Peeters, 2011) 38–49. The relevant fragments from Caves 4 and 6 add little of interest, and it may be noted that the J. M. Baumgarten’s reconstruction of the key line in 4QDa as “to love each man his neighbor as himself” (‫ )ואהבת אישל את רעהו כמוהו‬in accord with MT Lev 19:18b is pure conjecture. It is not clear why the reading of CD (‫ )אחיהו‬is not preferred, as it is in the reconstructions of both 4QDd (Baumgarten and Stegemann) and 6QD (Wise, Abegg, Cook, and Gordon), or why the translation of 4QDa reads “brother.” Possibly the Hebrew transcription ‫ רעהו‬is an error.

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7:1

‫אחיהו ולא ימעל איש בשאר בשרו‬

6:14

They must take care to act in accordance with the exact interpretation of the Law 18 for the age of wickedness, to separate from the sons of the pit; to refrain from the impure wealth of wickedness (taken) from a vow or from a devoted thing or from the wealth of the sanctuary, and to (refrain from) robbing the poor of his people, making the widow their prey and murdering the orphans; and to distinguish between the impure and the pure; and to make known (the difference) between the holy and the profane; and to observe the Sabbath day according to the exact interpretation, and the fixed seasons and the day of the fast according to the commandments19 of those entering the New Covenant in the land of Damascus; to offer up the holy things according to their exact interpretations; to love each man his brother like himself;20 to support the hand of the poor,21 the needy, and the stranger;22 to seek each man the welfare/peace23 of his brother; and a man shall not defile his own flesh.24

6:15 6:16 6:17 6:18 6:19 6:20 6:21 7:1



18 The phrase ‫ פרוש התורה‬may be an alternative title for the Damascus Document, cf. 4QDa 1, 1. See Hamidović, L’Écrit de Damas, 39 fn. 18; also 27 fn. 16. 19 Following the emendation of Magen Broshi (The Damascus Document Reconsidered [Israel Exploration Society: Jerusalem, 1992] 21 fn. 11), I read “according to the commandments” (‫)כמצוות‬. Alternately, with Hamidović we might accept ‫ כמצאת‬and translate “as found (by).” The sense of the line is not in doubt. 20 The text of Lev 19:18b differs from the MT (and LXX) on two basic points: (1) the language has shifted from the second to the third person singular with the introduction of ‫ ;איש‬and (2) the object of ‫ אהב‬is ‫ אח‬rather than ‫רע‬. According to Campell (The Use of Scripture, 176) “there is no clear-cut dividing line between citation and allusion” in CD 1–8. The prospect of a non-MT text tradition can be noted, but the possibility will not be pursued here. See Eugene Ulrich, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Origins of the Bible (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999). On the use of ‫ אח‬and ‫ רע‬in Qumran’s citations of Leviticus 19 (cf. CD 6:20–21; 7:2; 8:5–6; 9:8; 19:18), see Berger, Die Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 117–20. 21 The phrase ‫ ולהחזיק ביד‬should be understood in the sense of “support, maintain” (rather than “sieze/take hold”). Note that the Akkadian cognate, ṣabātu qātam, means “help, assist a person” and the causative, šuṣbutu (= ‫)החזיק‬, can mean “provide somebody with income, food, etc.,” cf. CAD 16:31–32, 38. See the discussion of Lev 25:35 by Jacob Milgrom, Leviticus 23–27 (AB 3B; New Haven: Yale, 2001) 2206. 22 In Ezek 16:49, the prophet considers “the guilt of your Sister Sodom” to include not supporting the poor and needy – playing perhaps on the lack of ‫ צדקה‬found in the infamous and inhospitable city (cf. Gen 18:23–33). The “stranger” (‫ )גר‬is an addition to the biblical phrase, cf. Deut 24:14; Ezek 22:29. The sense of the word ‫ גר‬at Qumran was “proselyte”; see David Hamidović, “A la frontière de l’altérité, le statut de l’étranger-résident (‫ )גר‬dans milieu esséniens,” in L’étranger dans la Bible et sa culture (Lectio Divina 213; Paris: Cerf, 2007) 262–304. 23 In context, “welfare” is a good translation, but the link between “peace” and Lev 19:17–18 was an important theme in texts such as Jubilees (e.g. Jub. 37:23).

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The passage excerpted here belongs to the opening Admonition of the Damascus Document (§§1–8), in a legal section (4:12b–7:9) addressing the three snares of Belial (4:17–18; cf. T. Levi 14:5–8) – fornication (‫)הזנות‬, lucre (‫)וההון‬,25 and impurity of the sanctuary (‫ – )טמא המקדש‬amid an ethical collection of bulleted injunctions (6:11–7:10a) clustered around this thematic triad.26 While concerns of cult and purity (‫ )טמא המקדש‬are at issue in 6:17b–19, the command to offer up the “holy things” (‫ )להרים את הקדשים‬in 6:20 covers tithing regulations and thus signals a hinge, turning the discourse back to the earlier theme of wealth (cf. 6:15–17). Lines 6:20–7:1 thus reprise the theme of social responsibility for the vulnerable, but now in a positive fashion.27 The exhortation accordingly flows from (1) the impure use of wealth which robs from widows and orphans to (2) the observance of purity laws including the offering of “holy things” to (3) the righteous use of wealth on behalf of the needy. The free movement between the language of cult and charity is instructive – and not so loosely organized as it may appear. The insistance on observance of Sabbath and other holy days, first of all, prevents the accumulation of “wicked wealth” through illicit work.28 This idea is closely linked to wrongly gaining benefit through vowed or consecrated goods (‫)בנדר ובחרם‬, spoken of in 6:15 (cf. m. Ned.). Such abuse pollutes the gain, making it unfit for sacred use, in risk of contaminating the sanctuary and the nation (cf. CD 16:13–20; Matt 27:4–6). The thematic connection of 6:18–19 to the wider context is thus implicit, but follows a comprehensible inner logic. Behind all this is the deeper concern that wealth be held in purity so that it might be used to proper purpose in offering “holy things” (6:20) – including gifts to the poor. Indeed, the parallel the text sets up in 6:16–17 between unjustly profiting from wealth which belongs rightly to the sanctuary and

24

The notion of defrauding or defiling one’s flesh echoes both Leviticus (‫ )ימעל‬and Isa 58:7 (‫)ומבשרך לא תתעלם‬, cf. Deut 22:1–4. The latter verse had an important afterlife in rabbinic almsgiving haggadah, e.g. Lev. Rab. 34.14. The conjunction of priestly language, signaling the “defilement” of a devoted thing (cf. Lev 5:15; Ezek 18:24), with an expression for the one to whom a man’s charity is due (‫ )בשרו‬as object, evidently plays on the notion of poor kinsmen (and the whole people) as sacrosanct and holy. 25 This reading is a widely accepted emendation of ‫“( הין‬arrogance”). See Solomon Schechter, Documents of Jewish Sectaries, vol. 1, Fragments of a Zaddokite Work (NY: KTAV, 1970) 68. 26 See Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 36–40; and Davies, Damascus Document, 48–55. 27 A full negative rendition occurs in CD 8:5, describing those who flout the injunctions. 28 The prohibition of commercial activity is an expressed concern of the Damascus Document: “No one shall profane the Sabbath on account of wealth (‫( ”)הון‬11:15; cf. 10:18–19; 11:2, 12).

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“robbing” from widows and orphans is very important (cf. Sir 34:21–22).29 To withhold for oneself what, by vow (qorban) or Law, properly belongs to God, resembles withholding for one’s personal gain what properly belongs to the needy.30 At work here is a familiar Second Temple nexus of ideas which recognizes a sacral character and obligation in charitable giving.31 Giving to God and giving to the poor were seen as deeply intertwined, each making a claim on one’s produce and profit.32 Sirach, for example, repeatedly blends hieratic and charitable gifts.33 Fear God and honor the priest; Give him his portion as he commanded you: The first fruit (ἀπαρχήν) and sin offering, The gift of the arms and sacrifice of holiness, and first fruit of holy things (ἀπαρχὴν ἁγίων). To the poor also extend your hand, so that your blessing might be perfected (Sir 7:31–32).

The vision of Ben Sira draws on deep biblical roots, tapped directly in the reference to ‫ הקדשים‬in CD 6:20. The conflation of cult and charity, in particular, ultimately stems from the Pentateuch’s complicated tithing legislation, where a “third tithe” was set apart for the poor every third and sixth year. This offering for “the Levites, aliens, orphans, and widows,”



29 It is worth noting that the Temple treasury held funds both for the cult and for the poor, including deposits for widows and orphans (2 Macc 3:10; cf. 3:6). These latter deposits were considered sacrosanct, and the point of 2 Maccabees in relating the celestial rebuff of Heliodorus is “God’s protection of private deposits in His temple, not his protection of sacred funds or His exclusion of pagans from holy soil,” Jonathan Goldstein, II Maccabees (AB 41A; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1983) 205, emphasis original. 30 The rights of the poor to excess wealth are frequently invoked in patristic and rabbinic sources: “When giving to the poor man you are not giving him what is yours; rather you are paying back to him what is his,” Ambrose, De Nabuthae (PL 14, 765–792; CSEL 32.2.469–516). Cf. Jerome, Ep. 130.14 (PL 22, 1118–1119); Augustine, Serm. 61 (12) 12 (PL 38, 413); Gregory of Nazianzen, Oratio 14, De pauperum amore, 23–25 (PG 35, 887–890). The vulgate text of Luke 11:41 (quod superest, date eleemosynam) plays an important role in the development of this doctrine (quod necessario victui et vestimento superset, date pauperibus, Bede, In Lucae, PL 92, 483), which was later codified in the medieval idea of the superfluum (cf. ST II-II, q. 32, a. 5). On this theme in Leo, see Susan Wessel, Leo the Great and the Spiritual Rebuilding of a Universal Rome (Supplements to Vigilae Christianae: Leiden: Brill, 2008) 196–8. 31 On this theme, see Anderson, Charity; and also Bonnie Bowman Thurston, “The Widows as the ‘Altar of God,’” SBL Seminar Papers 24 (1985) 279–89. 32 Murphy (Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 141–53) has shown a similar connection in 1QS 9:3–9, where the donation of one’s assets to the common pool of the “Poor” was understood as making a gift to God. The idea was not confined to Palestinian Judaism: “If the poor or the cripple beg food of him he must give it as an offering of religion to God,” Philo, Hypoth. 7.7. 33 See Gregory, Everlasting Signet Ring, 222–53.

3.2 “Love Your Neighbor”

147

which was never brought to the priests in Jerusalem, was nevertheless described and treated in the Torah as a “sacred portion,” subject to precise purity laws (‫הקדש‬, τὰ ἅγια - Deut 26:12–15). As Gary Anderson explains, “Already in Deuteronomy we see the beginnings of the sacralization of gifts to the poor.” 34 This charity-as-cult-offering pattern of thought helpfully explains the movement of CD 6:14–7:1 and clarifies the proper focus of Lev 19:18b in this setting. It is not a random line in a random ethical miscellany, but stands in direct parallel to Ezek 16:49, concerned with the material responsibilities of social welfare.35 The citation of Ezekiel in CD 6:21, moreover, is important not only for its unmistakable reference to almsgiving, but because it links the present passage directly to the latter Laws portion of the document and the specification of how the exhortation to charity concretely functions in the community (14:12– 17; cf. 15:13–17).36 (12) This is the rule of the Many for all their needs (‫)חפציהם‬. The wages (13) of at least two days per month are to be handed over to the overseer. The judges shall give (14) from it for the benefit of orphans. And from it they shall support the hand of the poor and needy (‫)יחזיקו ביד עני ואביון‬, and the aged (15) who are dying (‫)ולזכן אשר יכרע‬, the persons captured by foreign peoples, and virgins who (16) have no redeemer, for all the works of the general community, and (17) the house of the community shall not be deprived of its means.37

As is evident, at least two days wages (i.e. two denarii, cf. Luke 10:35) were contributed on a monthly basis to support the community’s charitable enterprises. Whether or not wider Jewish society already practiced organized charity at this time (cf. m. Ket. 13.1–2. Pes. 10.1; Shek. 5.6),38 the apparatus of Essene almsgiving should not be underestimated.39 The reality of the practice can perhaps be judged in part by the language of vulnerable persons, which



34 Anderson, Charity, 28. See also Gregory, Everlasting Signet Ring, 245. Cf. Deut 14:22–27; 15:1–8; Sir 7:29–36; 35:6–26. 35 See Gordon M. Zerbe, “Economic Justice and Nonretaliation in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Implications for New Testament Interpretation,” in The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: Volume Three, The Scrolls and Christian Origins (James Charlesworth, ed.; Waco: Baylor University, 2006) 325. 36 On the complex topic of wealth in the Damascus Document, see Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 25–102 37 For perspective on this passage, see the fascinating proposal of Brian Capper, “Essene Community Houses and Jesus’ Early Community,” in Jesus and Archeology (James Charlesworth, ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006) 472–502, esp. 484–92. 38 Against the view of Joachim Jeremias (Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus [Philadelphia; Fortress, 1969] 126–34), David Seccombe (“Was There Organized Charity in Jerusalem before the Christians?” JTS 29 [1978] 140–3) argues the tamḥûy and qûppâ collections were not in place during the New Testament period. 39 Capper’s maximalist idea of numerous Essene poorhouses serving as centers of alms distribution throughout Judea poses an important challenge to the historical imagination.

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does not revert to the stereotypical biblical “widows and orphans” – though orphans hold pride of place40 – but focuses instead on curiously concrete and less familiar indigents like the suffering aged, those caught in human trafficking, and girls without dowries.41 The particular interest of the admonition in CD 6:20 thus corresponds to a robust lived concern for charitable activity in the community.42 Indeed, according to Josephus – who may exaggerate, but not without foundation43 – only two things were left to the individual discretion of the Essenes: ἐπικουρία καὶ ἔλεος, helping the deserving whenever they begged for alms (τοῖς ἀξίοις, ὁπόταν δέωνται) and handing food to the destitute (τροφὰς ἀπορουµένοις ὀρέγειν, B.J. 2.8.6. §134). Philo adds a similar witness (Prob. 79, 87–88). In a community where so much was strictly managed, liberal charity was apparently valued as the rule – and that rule found expression in Leviticus’ command that every man “love his brother as himself.” It must be observed, at this point, that understanding Lev 19:18b in reference to material charity is not an obvious way to interpret the text in its original setting.44 Granting that its immediate context at the heart of the heart of the Holiness Code fails to impose an incontrovertible meaning,45 the negative prohibitions in the surrounding verses tend to color the love commandment as



40 The Essene’s genuine attention to orphans may be confirmed in the practice of receiving young oblates, as described by Josephus (B.J. 2.8.2 §120). 41 Philo confirms the Essenes’ special care for the elderly, cf. Hypoth. 11.13; and Prob. 87. 42 For more on the culture of charity presupposed in the Damascus Document (e.g. CD 13:9–10), see Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 40–44. 43 The basic thesis of Todd Beall (Josephus’ Description of the Essenes Illustrated by the Dead Sea Scrolls [SNTSMS 58; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1988]) appears to be correct. Josephus is essentially trustworthy on the Essenes, though he tends to exaggerate and put things in a Hellenistic light. 44 See especially Hans-Peter Mathys, Liebe deinen Nächsten wie dich selbst: Untersuchungen zum alttestamentlichen Gebot der Nächstenliebe (Lev 19, 18) (OBO 71; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986); and, most recently, Adrian Schenker, “Das Gebot der Nächstenliebe in seinem Kontext (Lev 19,17–18): Lieben ohne Falschheit,” ZAW 124 (2012) 244–8. Schenker contends that, in context, the command to love in 19:18b (cf. 19:34) exhorts one to avoid deceitful vengeance and brute force: the two major themes of the passage, according to him, and two types of behavior impossible to inflict upon oneself. On this material, see also Baruch Schwartz, The Holiness Legislation: Studies in the Priestly Code (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1999) [Hebrew]. 45 “Die große Zahl der Kommentare sieht keinen inhaltlichen Bezug zwischen V. 11– 18a oder V. 17–18a und dem anschließenden Gebot von V. 18b,” Schenker, “Gebot der Nächstenliebe,” 244. Even the translation of the verse in isolation is a matter of debate. See Takamitsu Muraoka, “A Syntactic Problem in Lev xix. 18b,” JJS 23 (1978) 291–7; Mathys, Liebe deinen Nächsten, 6–10; and James Kugel, “On Hidden Hatred and Open Reproach: Early Exegesis of Lev 19:17,” HTR 80 (1987) 43–61.

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149

some variety of prohibition.46 Accordingly, even if the Torah’s locus classicus on charity, Deut 15:7–10, provides an appropriate canonical context, since like Lev 19:18b it seeks to legislate “die innere Einstellung,” this was not an inevitable inter-textual connection; for unlike Deuteronomy, the text from Leviticus does not at the same time include the positive injunction of “ein bestimmtes Handeln.” 47 It is no surprise, in view of this, that, apart from CD 6:20, the overt connection of Lev 19:18b to the practice of almsgiving does not appear in Second Temple Jewish works. 48 Jubilees, most notably, while putting great emphasis on the fulfillment of the command to love one’s fellow, never links this precept to material works of mercy (Jub. 7:20; 20:2; 35:20, 22, 24, 26; 36:4, 8, 9, 11; 37:4, 13, 18, 21, 24; 43:14; 46:1–2).49 Although a faint indication in the direction of charity might be sought in the vague giving of “help” (‫ )עזר‬in Jub. 46:1 (cf. 36:4),50 the wider context suggests instead the image of “fighting together against a common enemy” (cf. Jub. 20:2). 51 Peaceful brotherly co-existence is the author’s ideal (relations with outsiders is another matter);52 and, ultimately, for Jubilees the command to “love” one’s neighbor is colored largely as a negative injunction against separation, envy, hatred

46

Schenker’s thesis, for instance, ultimately reckons the command to love to be a summary of the prohibitions in the surrounding context. 47 So Mathys, Liebe deinen Nächsten, 144–5. James Kugel (“On Hidden Hatred,” 44) remarks that a “common thread” in Leviticus 19 is that “all of the things enjoined are difficult to enforce simply by legal fiat – they ultimately depend on the heart of each individual.” On the problem of legislating generosity, see the essay of Walter Houston, “‘You Shall Open your Hand to your Needy Brother’: Ideology and Moral Formation in Deut. 15.1–18,” in The Bible in Ethics: The Second Sheffield Colloquium (John Rogerson, Margaret Davies, and M. Daniel Carroll Rodas, eds.; JSOTSup 207; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1995) 296–314. 48 On the interpretative history of the text, see Reinhard Neudecker, “‘And You Shall Love Your Neighbor as Yourself – I Am the Lord’ (Lev 19,18) in Jewish Interpretation,” Bib 73 (1992) 496–517. Neudecker’s survey is much more limited than his title suggests, concentrating mainly on late rabbinic sources. See also Andreas Nissen, Gott und der Nächste im antiken Judentum: Untersuchungen zum Doppelgebot der Liebe (WUNT 15; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1974). Nissen likewise relies upon Talmudic era sources to argue the thesis that within a “Jewish” framework of thought no commandment can properly be considered the greatest. 49 On this theme, see Atar Livneh, “Love Your Fellow as Yourself”: The Interpretation of Lev 19:17–18 in the Book of Jubilees,” Dead Sea Discoveries 18 (2011) 173–99. Cf. Jub. 46:1–2; cf. 43:14; 50 “After the death of Jacob, the children of Israel became numerous in the land of Egypt. They became a populous nation and all of them were in harmony in their hearts so that each one loved the other and each one helped the other” Jub. 46:1 (OTP 2.137). 51 Livneh, “Love Your Fellow as Yourself,” 196; cf. 182. 52 On the “duty to hate outsiders” in this context, see James Kugel, Traditions of the Bible (Cambridge: Harvard, 1998) 757–8. Cf. 1QS 9:16–17, 21.

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and murder: an interpretation strongly contextualized both by the prohibitions of Lev 19:17–18a (e.g. “You shall not hate your neighbor in your heart”) and the multiple fraternal dysfunctions in the Genesis narrative (especially between Jacob and Esau, e.g. Gen 27:41; Jub. 35:1–38:14).53 The Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides is illustrative from another angle.54 This text, in contrast to Jubilees, gives great attention to works of mercy (19, 22–30, 83), while also repeatedly alluding to Leviticus 19: as ripe a conjunction for the exegesis of the Damascus Document as there might be.55 Interestingly enough, however, the apocryphal work never betrays a specific interest in Lev 19:18, which is not once alluded to or cited. The admonition to give to the poor is built instead on more explicit charity texts (e.g. Prov 3:27; Isa 58:7; Job 29:15; Deut 15:11–14). This revealing circumstance further confirms the limited circulation of the Essene exegesis within Second Temple Judaism, both in Palestine and in the diaspora. 3.2.1.2 Test. Iss. 5:1–3 The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs represent one possible exception to this pattern of limited circulation.56 In particular, a compact exegetical tradi-

53

Although Livneh (“Love Your Fellow as Yourself,” 176) is rightly concerned to show the “unique exegesis” of Lev 19:17–18 in Jubilees, she has not noted the larger distinction separating the charity interpretation of CD 6:20 and early Christian texts (see below) from the rest of Second Temple Jewish interpretations. Accordingly, for the present purpose, Jubilees fairly represents the dominant (narrative) interpretation of Lev 19:18b in Jewish texts from the period. With Cain and Abel, the Joseph story was important in propagating this exegesis (more than Jacob and Esau), cf. Zech 7:10; 8:17; 4Q538 1–2; Josephus, A.J. 2.6.10 (§226, 161); Philo, Jos. 220, 232–6; Test. Sim. 4:4–7; Test. Zeb. 8:4–5; Test. Gad 4:2–3. On Joseph’s fulfillment of Lev 19:17–20, see Kugel, Traditions of the Bible, 461. 54 The dating of Pseudo-Phocylides is difficult. Proposals range from the sixth century BCE to the fourth century CE. P. W. van der Horst (“Pseudo-Phocylides,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, Volume Two [James Charlesworth, ed; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2011] 567–8) prefers a range between 50 BCE and 100 CE, with “the most probable date…somewhere between 30. B.C. and A.D. 40.” The most likely place of origin is considered to be Alexandria. 55 See P. W. van der Horst, The Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides (SVTP 4; Leiden: Brill, 1978]) 66, 117–8, 124–6, 292. The more certain correspondences can be outlined as follows: Ps. Phoc 10 – Lev 19:15; Ps. Phoc. 16 – Lev 19:12; Ps. Phoc. 19 – Lev 19:13; Ps. Phoc. 21 – Lev 19:16; Ps. Phoc. 29 – Lev 19:33. 56 See Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 126–30. With respect to the question of origins, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs is, of course, one of the most vexing documents of the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, notriously difficult to situate. Proposed dates range from the middle of the second century BCE (e.g. Howard Clark Kee, “Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, Volume I [James Charlesworth, ed; Garden City: Doubleday, 1983] 777–8) to the late second or early third

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tion very similar to that found in the Damascus Document does appear in Test. Iss. 5:1–3. 1

Keep the Law of God, my children. Achieve generosity (ἁπλότητα);57 walk in innocence. Not meddling in your neighbor’s affairs. 2 Rather love the Lord and your neighbor (ἀγαπήσατε τὸν κύριον καὶ τὸν πλησίον). Be merciful towards poverty and weakness. (πένητα καὶ ἀσθενῆ ἐλεήσατε) 3 Bend your back in farming, and work in the tasks in every kind of farming, offering gifts to God with thanksgiving.58

Three things are worth noting here. First, as in CD 6:20–21, the love of neighbor (Lev 19:18b) is immediately glossed by an instruction on charity to the poor (cf. Test. Zeb. 7:1–4). Second, an implicit link is made between alms (Test. Iss. 5:2b) and sacrificial offerings (5:3c), similar to that observed in the Damascus Document. Finally, third, a crisp chiastic movement structures the thought in verses 2–3: (a) love the Lord; (b) love your neighbor; (b´) give alms; (a´) make offerings. Informing this rhythm, of course, is the double love command, familiar from the synoptic gospels (cf. Test. Ben. 3:3–5).59 The suspicion accordingly arises that we are confronted here with one of the Christian elements of the puzzling and hybrid Testament literature. 60 It is intriguing, in this connection, to observe the confused mixture of traditions

century CE (e.g. Marinus de Jonge, The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs: A Study of their Text, Composition, and Origin [Assen: Van Gorcum, 1975] 23–34). The extent of Christian influence/interpolation is still not settled. See, most recently, Joel Marcus, “The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs and the Didaskalia Apostolorum: A Common JewishChristian Milieu?” JTS 61 (2010) 596–626. Marcus returns to the 19th century hypothesis of a Jewish-Christian (rather than Jewish or Christian) origin, dating from the second or third century, somewhere in Syria. 57 The interpretation of ἁπλότης as “generosity, liberality” is contested (cf. BDAG s.v.), but, as in the Pauline contexts where it is proposed (Rom 12:8; 2 Cor 8:2; 9:11, 13), the rhetorical link to making gifts should not be missed here in Test. Iss. 58 The text continues: “Thus the Lord will bless you with the first fruits, as he has blessed all the saints from Abel to the present.” On the link between charity and first fruits see Giambrone, “‘According to the Commandment,’” 461–4. In coordination with Deut 6:5, the agricultural language of Test. Iss. 5:3 recalls the middle portion of the daily Shema (Deut 11:13–21). 59 The single ἀγαπήσατε recalls the Lukan formulation. 60 See, e.g., John Meier, A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus: Volume IV: Law and Love (AYBRL; New Haven: Yale, 2009) 507–9. On the general difficulty of disentangling Jewish and Christian elements of shared literature, see Robert Kraft, “Christian Transmission of Greek Jewish Scriptures: A Methodological Probe,” in Paganisme, Judaïsme, Christianisme: Influences et affrontements dans le monde antique (ed. A. Benoit, M. Philonenko, and C. Vogel; Paris: Éditions E. de Boccard, 1978) 207–26.

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on love of neighbor – “one of the highest virtues” in the Testaments – represented in other texts such as Test. Zeb. 8:3–4 and Test. Ben. 4:1–4.61 On the one hand, love of one’s neighbor signifies material concern for the poor (cf. Test. Zeb. 7:1–8:1), as in CD 6:20. On the other hand, this same love evidently means fraternal concord and lack of envy (cf. Test. Zeb. 8:6), as it does in Jubilees and the broader Second Temple perspective. A collision of interpretative traditions appears to be at work here – and the same conflation marks the early Christian exegesis (see below). However one chooses to handle the Testaments, the Doppelliebesgebot in Test. Iss. 5:2–3 points in two directions. While the close conjunction of charity for the poor and offerings to God is a well-attested Second Temple pairing, as already seen, the explicit fusion of Deut 6:5 with Lev 19:18b is a tradition that seems to originate with Jesus.62 This state of affairs suggests that perhaps Jesus’ collocation of these two Torah texts is not only a neat case of gězērâ šāwâ,63 but in fact draws upon a more developed tradition linking two types of commandments: precepts on the worship of God and precepts about charity toward the poor. 64 It is clear, in any case, that Jesus’ formally abstract teaching could be heard within this framework. The ultimate provenance of Test. Iss. 5:2–3 (Christian or Jewish) does not alter the exegetical pattern: the double love command was clearly comprehensible through the lens of two types of sacred offerings. To be noted here is the way the “love” of the Shema entailed observance of the whole commanded system of ritual worship, 65

61

According to Kee (“Twelve Patriarchs,” 779), “One of the highest virtues [in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs] is brotherly love (TSim 4:7; TIss 5:2; TDan 5:4).” On the ambiguities of this theme, see Matthias Konradt, “Menschen- oder Bruderliebe? Beobachtungen zum Liebesgebot in den Testamenten der Zwölf Patriarchen,” ZNWKAK 88 (1997) 296–310. 62 See Meier, Law and Love, 576. Meier’s position more concerns the expression than the idea of a double command. See Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 349. 63 See Walter Diezinger, “Zum Liebesgebot Mk XII, 28–34 und Parr,” NovT 20 (1978) 81–3; and Meier, Law and Love, 493–4. 64 See Jay Stern, “Jesus Citation of Deut 6:5 and Lev 19:18 in the Light of Jewish Tradition,” CBQ 28 (1966) 312–6. Stern wishes to see the normative division between ‫לחברו‬ ‫ מצוות שבין אדם‬and ‫ מצוות שבין אדם למקום‬behind Jesus’ two citations. An equivalent Greek division (ἐυσέβεια καὶ φιλανθρωπία) was also current. See Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 143–66. Cf. Jub. 36:4–5. We may go further than Stern and observe that these two types of commandments were already concretely linked in the charity-as-cult-offering rhetoric of the Second Temple period. 65 On the resonance of “love” language with covenant law, see William Moran, “The Ancient Near Eastern Background of the Love of God in Deuteronomy,” CBQ 25 (1963) 77–87. This sense was still understood in New Testament times (e.g. John 14:15).

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while ‫ ובכל מאדך‬was understood to mean loving God with all one’s mammon (‫בכל ממונך‬, m. Ber. 9:5; cf. Sifre Deut §§31–32).66 Ultimately, however, the parallel offerings binding the Shema and Lev 19:18b in the thought of Test. Iss. 5:2–3 represents an isolated stage in the exegetical tradition, for openly linking Deut 6:5 with sacrificial oblations appears to be an idea of limited circulation which eventually timed-out. 67 Hypotheses here are by nature precarious. Still it seems likely that at this point the Testament of Issachar preserves a Second Temple perspective already eroding in the earliest phases of the New Testament period. The decisive factor in establishing the primitive Christian vision was the filtering of the double commandment tradition through the topos of “spiritual sacrifice.”68 3.2.1.3 λογική λατρεία (1 John 3:16 and James 1:27) The theme of interior worship is ancient and widespread (e.g. Xen. Mem. 1.3.3; Plato, Leg. 4.716E; Iso. Or. 2.20; Dio. Chry. Or. 3.52–3; Sen. Ben. 1.6.3; 1 Sam 15:22; Prov 15:8; Ps 69:30–31; 69:3; Isa 1:10–17; Jer 6:20; 7:21–23; Hos 6:6; 8:13; Amos 5:20–5; Mal 1:10–14; Sir 34:23–35:5), yet it experienced new vigor in the first centuries of our era. 69 It occasions no great



66 On this meaning, see Birger Gerhardsson, The Shema in the New Testament (Lund: Novapress, 1996) 18. 67 The same idea may stand behind Sir 7:30f – “Love the one who made you with all your strength (ἐν ὅλῃ δυνάµει ἀγάπησον), and do not neglect his ministers.” In the rabbinic setting, however, the Shema was disassociated from sacrificial action: the priests are said to have retired to the Chamber of Hewn Stone, away from the altar, to recite it (m. Tamid 4.3). The mishnaic exegesis of ‫( מאדך‬m. Ber. 9:5; cf. Sifre Deut §32; Targum PseudoJonathan Deut 6:5; Targum Neofiti Deut 6:5; Targum Onkelos Deut 6:5) has a parallel at Qumran in the triad “knowledge, strength, and wealth,” pace Gerhardsson. See Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 120–5. Whether or not this understanding of the Shema was also accepted in primitive Christianity, as Gerhardsson (The Shema in the New Testament) has labored to show – the thought is intriguing (see Martin McNamara, Targum and Testament: Aramaic Paraphrases of the Hebrew Bible: A Light on the New Testament [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972] 124–7) – it does not seem that “love of God” generally carried the cultic associations seen in Test Iss. 5:2–3 and Sir 7:30. See Kim Haut Tan, “The Shema in Early Christianity,” TynB 59 (2008) 181–206. 68 Downs (Alms, 83–101) has refuted Garrison’s theory about the influence of prophetic cult critiques in the emergence of Christian atoning almsgiving. “Spiritual sacrifice” is not essentially a dismissal of the cult, however, but an appropriation of its symbolism and rhetoric, here understood in continuity with a ritual understanding of love of God in Deut 6:5. 69 See, e.g. Hans Wenschkewitz, Die Spiritualisierung der Kultusbegriffe Tempel, Priester und Opfer im Neuen Testament (Angelos Beiheft 4; Leipzig: Pfeiffer, 1932); Valentin Nikiprowezky, “La spiritualisation des sacrifices et le culte sacrificiel au temple de Jérusalem chez Philon d’Alexandrie,” Semitica 17 (1967) 97–116; and Everett Fergu-

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surprise, then, that as the notion of latreia logike advanced in Christian thinking, the paradigm of two parallel cults of sacrificial offering – priestly and charitable, i.e. love of God and love of neighbor – should collapse in a reconfiguring event of “creative destruction.” Christological factors play an important catalyzing role here (cf. Matt 25:31–46), but the essential result is congruent with developments in post-70 CE Judaism (cf. ’Abot R. Nat. 4:5; b. Sukk. 49b). 70 Love of God enacted through sacrifice was displaced by the service of charity, uniting both love of God and man. Expressions of this development take a variety of forms. In certain contexts, as in Mark 12:33, the Shema was conjoined with Lev 19:18b, but the exposition was focused on the preeminence of charity above sacrifice. Didache 1:2, in a similar line, presents the Doppelliebesgebot at the head of its “way of life” (ὁδὸς τῆς ζωῆ). Yet in elaborating the meaning of these commandments (τούτων δὲ τῶν λόγων ἡ διδαχή ἐστιν αὕτη), the text addresses only Lev 19:18b, love of neighbor – understanding the verse both as a precept against hatred (Did. 1:2–4) and as a call to give alms (Did. 1:5–6). This charity precept is understood by the Didachist in the language of Luke 6: “Give to all who ask of you, and do not demand it back… Blessed is the one who gives according to the command.”71 In another setting, the love of God might be discussed directly, but understood only through the lens of brotherly love. This is especially characteristic of the Johannine theological idiom (e.g. 1 John 4:20); and in this particular construction, the two great interpretative trajectories of Lev 19:18b again collide. Fraternal love – now merged with the love of God – is interpreted as both the opposite of Cain’s envious murder (1 John 3:11–15; cf. 2:9–11), in line with Jubilees, and as material aid for the poor: “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him” (1 John 3:16). Here again, but now much more forcefully, the fulfillment of Deut 6:5 is identified with brotherly love (cf. 1 John 4:21); and though Lev 19:18b is not directly invoked – unless perhaps through the new (but not new) commandment (1 John 2:7–8)72 – the verse

son, “Spiritual Sacrifice in Early Christianity and Its Environment,” ANRW II 23.2 (1980) 1151–89. 70 One must be careful here. See Jonathan Klawans, Purity, Sacrifice and the Temple: Symbolism and Supercessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism (New York: Oxford, 2006); and idem. “Josephus, the Rabbis, and Responses to Catastrophes Ancient and Modern,” JQR 100 (2010) 278–309. Klawans poses an important challenge to overstatements of the impact of the destruction of the Temple. 71 For a full discussion of this material, see Giambrone, “‘According to the Commandment,” 448–65. 72 See Oda Wischmeyer, “Das alte und neue Gebot: ein Beitrag zur Intertextualität der johanneischen Schriften,” in Studien zu Matthäus und Johannes (Andreas Dettwiler and Udo Poplutz, eds.; Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 2009) 207–20.

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clearly stands behind the now unified traditions prohibiting fratricide and commanding almsdeeds. John’s explicit alignment of love of the brethren (as both lack of hate and material mercy) with the love of God shows the extent to which charity might emerge as the full locus of true divine worship.73 Perhaps the most striking and direct expression of this perspective appears in the Letter of James: “Pure and spotless worship (θρησκεία καθαρὰ καὶ ἀµίαντος) before the God and Father is this: to visit (ἐπισκέπτεσθαι) orphans and widows in their affliction” (Jas 1:27; cf. Isa 1:13–17). The Letter of James is indeed a key witness in this discussion, for it represents the most subtle and sustained confrontation of the double commandment tradition with the topos of spiritual worship. In this regard, the simple love-of-God/love-of-neighbor juxtaposition of Test. Iss. 5:2–3 is displaced by a more complex mutual relation of ritual and mercy. Cult and charity, for James, are ultimately related like body and spirit (Jas 2:26). To see this one must appreciate that, in the language of faith and works, the letter rejects not so much “the ghosts of a pseudo-Pauline slogan” as the “deplorable propensity to consider piety [εὐσέβεια] and moral behavior [φιλανθπωπία] to be separate but equal virtues.”74 Indeed, this partitioning of duties to God and to man as separate but equal spheres of service is the mistaken view of the imagined interlocutor in Jas 2:18 – against whom the author’s “main counterpunch” is thrown: his withering ridicule of the Shema (alone) as an acceptable act of avodah (2:19): “You believe that God is One (εἷς ἐστιν ὁ θεός). You do well. Even the demons believe and shudder!”75 In classic prophetic style, the letter



73 The point should not be overstated. Obviously, in particular rhetorical contexts, things such as Torah study also played as visible a role as charity. In the particular (and pervasive) discourse of almsgiving, however, the loss of the Temple cult resulted in an amplified place for charity-as-offering language. The tradition in ’Abot R. Nat. 4:5 is worth quoting: “Rabbi Yohannan ben Zakkai said to Rabbi Yehoshua: “Be not grieved my son. There is another equally meritorious way of gaining ritual atonement, even though the Temple is destroyed. We can still gain ritual atonement through deeds of loving kindness. For it is written, “deeds of charity I desire not sacrifice” (cf. b. Ber. 55a). 74 Donald Verseput (“Reworking the Puzzle of Faith and Deeds in James 2.14–26,” NTS 43 [1997] 113; see also 109 and 115) plausibly contends that the controversy in James 2 is not one “where an opponent champions faith over against works in a struggle between two mutually exclusive soteriological principles…but one where ‘faith without works’ and ‘works’ are both perceived to be admissible alternatives.” 75 See the excellent study of Donald Verseput, “James 1:17 and the Jewish Morning Prayers,” NovT 39 (1997) 177–91. The letter’s interaction with Deut 6:4–5 is not immediately evident, but James, in fact, repeatedly engages the Shema throughout the intricately woven discourse of the first two chapters, beginning in 1:17 with a reference to the morning benedictions surrounding the daily recitation (Deut 6:4–9; 11:13–21; Num 15:37–41). A second, very important but difficult allusion comes in Jas 2:5. The give-away text, however, is the direct quotation in Jas 2:19.

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maps the community’s honored creed onto the trope of lip-service worship (εἴ τις δοκεῖ θρησκὸς εἶναι µὴ χαλιναγωγῶν γλῶσσαν αὐτοῦ...τούτου µάταιος ἡ θρησκεία, Jas 1:26),76 making this forceful critique the context for defining charity as “pure and spotless” worship (θρησκεία, 1:27). It is in this matrix of ideas, in conversation with the Shema, that James quotes the full text of Lev 19:18b in his memorable diatribe on the works of faith (Jam 2:1–26). Εἰ µέντοι νόµον τελεῖτε βασιλικὸν κατὰ τὴν γραφήν, Ἀγαπήσεις τὸν πλησίον σου ὡς σεαυτόν, καλῶς ποιεῖτε εἰ δὲ προσωποληµτεῖτε, ἁµαρτίαν ἐγάζεσθε ἐλεγχόµενοι ὑπὸ τοῦ νόµου ὡς παραβάται. If you indeed fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you do well. But if you are showing favoritism, you are committing a sin, indicted by the Law as transgressors (James 2:8–9).

A vigorous and vivid focus on charitable works informs the proximate context of this passage (2:1–6, 14–17),77 and the interpretation of Lev 19:18b as charity, albeit with a special accent on eliminating internal divisions, is not hard to see. The loaded language of “favoritism” (προσωποληµτέω), a direct echo of Lev 19:15, is the essential link to the poor: οὐ λήµψῃ πρόσωπον πτωχοῦ οὐδὲ θαυµάσεις πρόσωπον δυνάστου (Lev 19:15). 78 With the engagement of this theme of favoritism, read through an ungodly deference for the rich (Jas 2:1–5), James succeeds in anchoring the tradition of CD 6:20 within the original context of Leviticus 19, putting it on firmer exegetical ground alongside the interpretative tradition of Jubilees (cf. Lev 19:17–18a). 3.2.1.4 Matt 19:16–30 If the “royal law” in James enjoys a special prestige, both as a summary of the whole messianic Torah and an allusion to its defining precept in Lev 19:18b, we are not far from the Kingdom of God and the synoptic Great

76

James here “shows no hesitation in pointing to the fundamental tenet of Judaism recited daily in the shema‘ as his primary example of ‘faith,’” (Verseput, “Morning Prayers,” 187). 77 On the importance of the poor in the general social background to the letter, see David Hutchinson Edgar, Has Not God Chosen the Poor? The Social Setting of the Epistle of James (JSNTSup 206; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2001). 78 The phrase κατὰ τὴν γραφήν is not James’ normal scripture citation formula, suggesting that it functions adverbially in Jas 2:8 modifying τελεῖτε. Taken in this sense, one fulfills the “royal law” as scripture intends, i.e. rightly interpreted. This rendering is helpful in appreciating James’ effort to pronounce on the proper understanding of Lev 19:18b, which he does particularly through the idea of προσωπολήµπσις. See Luke Timothy Johnson, The Letter of James (AB 37A; New Haven: Yale, 1995) 230–1. At the same time, the use of τελεῖτε points straight ahead to the role of works in the conclusive theological formula of Jas 2:22 (ἐκ τῶν ἔγρων ἡ πίστις ἐτελειώθη). Cf. Sir 7:32.

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Commandment traditions. 79 As the following section will describe in more detail, Luke interacts directly with the Markan version of this tradition (Mark 12:28–34) in the Good Samaritan pericope (Luke 10:25–37), and the modifications he makes link that text directly with the story of the rich man who is invited to sell his possessions and give them to the poor (Mark 10:17–22). One final piece of evidence, therefore, sets the stage for the Lukan use of Lev 19:18b: Matthew’s account of the Rich Young Man, understood as a call to love one’s neighbor by a radical gift of alms (Matt 19:16–30). In response to the rich man’s question (“What shall I do to inherit eternal life?”), Matthew has Jesus cite the fourth through eighth commandments (in a slightly jumbled order).80 Then Jesus adds for good measure, what does not appear in Mark, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt 19:19b). Several factors converge in Matthew’s rendition. At a redactional level, Matthew may have been influenced (and/or baffled) by Mark’s peculiar precept, “Do not defraud/withhold” (Mark 10:19). However Mark’s expression was originally intended, µὴ ἀποστερήσῃς resonates directly with instructions on social justice for the poor, whose wages were his life and to whom loans were not to be grudgingly refused (cf. Sir 4:1; 29:6–7; 34:21–22; Jas 5:4).81 Matthew may have thus inserted the command to love one’s neighbor into the episode, in part, understanding it as a preferable alternative to an enigmatic (negative) Markan command to practice charity.82 At a narrative level, of course, Matthew understands Lev 19:18b as one of the two commandments upon which all the others hang (Matt 22:34–40). In this way, he presents Lev 19:18b in the story of the Rich Young Man as a summative expression of the second table of the Decalogue, an idea already attested in earlier Christian thought (Rom 13:8–10; cf. Gal 5:14; Jas 2:8–

79

See, e.g., Johnson, Letter of James, 231. The Decalogue was considered as a summary or heading of the whole Law. See Patrick Miller, The Ten Commandments (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2009). Several divergent versions of the Ten Commandments were in circulation by the New Testament period. See Alfred Jepsen, “Beiträge zur Auslegung und Geschichte des Dekalogs,” ZAW 79 (1967) 277–304. 81 Commentators at times perceive a restatement of the 8th and 9th commandments. See, e.g., Lane, Mark, 366. Joel Marcus (Mark 8–16 [AB 27A; New Haven: Yale University, 2009] 721–2) detects a Jewish interpretation of the 10th commandment, forbidding “not only craving for others’ possessions but also usurping them” (cf. Mekilta R. Šim. Yitro 17). Marcus recognizes the link of this language to “social oppression” and “similar types of exploitation…[which] characterized the landed aristocracy in first-century Palestine.” Accordingly, he concludes “our passage may wish to link the wealthy man in the narrative with this group and their practices.” 82 It would be quite understandable if Matthew simply replaced Mark’s untraceable citation with the more expressive and intelligible Lev 19:18b, which held status not only in the Torah, but also connected with a significant strain of primitive Christian tradition about the ten commandments, as well as with themes Matthew develops in his Gospel. 80

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11).83 Although elements of the Decalogue are discernible in the structure of Leviticus 19, the formulation of the commandments here clearly stems from Exod 20:13–16 or Deut 5:17–20, and Matthew’s addition of Lev 19:18b is best understood through the lens of Jesus’ own teaching (as an early Christian patrimony), rather than through its Old Testament context in the Torah. In this connection, the Sermon on the Mount is the critical text. The link Matthew forges between Matt 19:16–22 and the Sermon material is quite striking.84 Especially important is the way Matt 5:21–48, following the same progression of murder, adultery and false witness which appears in Matt 19:18–19, coordinates the climax of perfection (ἔσεσθε οὖν ὑµεῖς τέλειοι) with the true fulfillment of Lev 19:18b (Matt 5:43–48). Such language of perfection occurs only twice in the Gospel, and it connects directly with Jesus’ instruction to the rich man: “If you wish to be perfect (τέλειος), go sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come follow me” (Matt 19:21). In Matt 5:43–48, of course, Lev 19:18b is interpreted as the love of one’s enemies. “You have heard it said, Love your neighbor (πλησίον) and hate your enemy; but I say to you, love your enemies and pray for your persecutors” (Matt 5:43–44; cf. Luke 6:30–35). In view of the foregoing discussion, this unit looks very much like a response to the majority interpretation represented by Jubilees: do not hate your brother. Indeed, one should expect this tradition to be in view, if any substance at all is given to the trope, “You have heard it said.” 85 The replacement of “do not hate your brother” with “hate your enemy” is simply an ironic, rhetorical transposition. The prohibition (‫ )מצוה לא תעשה‬has been cashed out as a facetious injunction (‫– )מצוה עשה‬ albeit an injunction not ultimately so far from the worldview of Jubilees, where brotherly love in fact implies military alliance against a common foe.86 In effect, then, by forcing the positive precept in Lev 19:18b to be formulated in a positive manner, Jesus exposes the embarrassing limitations of the negative exegesis and offers an interpretation opposed to all murderous (not merely all fratricidal) hate (Matt 5:22–23; cf. 1 John 3:11–16; Wis 10:3). 87 His radicalizing of Lev 19:18 through an absolute prohibition of hatred has thus

83

On this general theme, see Lidija Novakovic, “The Decalogue in the New Testament,” PRSt 35 (2008) 373–86. 84 For a chart and discussion of the correspondence, see Davies and Allison, Matthew 1, 563; and Matthew 3, 62–3. 85 See Kugel, Traditions of the Bible, 757–8. 86 See Livneh, “Love Your Fellow as Yourself,” 196. Cf. 11QTemple 61:12–14. 87 On themes of fraternal envy and murder in the Sermon on the Mount, see Dale Allison, “Murder and Anger, Cain and Abel (Matt 5.21–25,” in Studies in Matthew: Interpretation Past and Present (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005) 65–79. Allison is led to pose the dependence of 1 John 3:11–17 on Matt 2:21–25 in part because he does not recognize the influence of Lev 19:18b and its tradition of interpretation on either author.

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recovered the unbounded positive form of the precept (ἀγαπᾶτε) by excluding the possibility of excluded groups and interpreting “neighbor” to include enemies. The Sermon’s expansion of πλησίον to include one’s enemy engages an interesting double hortatory logic. In the first place, Jesus’ exegesis invokes God’s own example, observing that he shines his sun on the good and the evil alike (Matt 5:45). At the same time, a framework of repayment structures the admonition: one loves one’s enemies, because loving one’s friends carries no special reward (τίνα µισθὸν ἔχετε; Matt 5:46; cf. 6:1–21). Recognizable here are the same two familiar modes of exhortation conventionally used to motivate charitable giving: imitatio Dei and treasure in heaven.88 The implication is that Lev 19:18b, as a text prohibiting fraternal hatred, has been rethought as a command to love one’s enemy in the light of the selfsame logic which moved Second Temple almsgiving. It is not impossible that Prov 25:21–22 has also exerted some influence here: “If the one who hates you is hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. For you will heap burning coals on his head and the Lord will repay you.” Leaving the much-debated burning coals to the side, one has in this text the clear counsel to show charity to an enemy in the hope of some divine recompense. In any event, the parallels to Matt 5:43–48 in both Luke 6:30–35 and Did. 1:2–6 confirm that in the Second Temple imagination a single tissue of thought indeed held together the sermonic command to love one’s enemies with the command to give alms. 89 It is hardly an accident, then, that Matthew’s very next unit treats the prototypical “righteousness” (‫ )צדקה‬of almsgiving (προσέχετε τὴν δικαιοσύνην ὑµῶν, Matt 6:1) – precisely in terms either of “drawing down one’s balance” by already receiving one’s reward or

88

On the imitatio Dei motif, see Bradley, Everlasting Signet Ring, 254–90. A striking expression of the theme appears in Letter to Diognetus 10:6. “Whoever takes up the burden of his neighbor (τὸ τοῦ πλησίον ἀναδέχεται βάρος), who wishes to do good (εὐεργετεῖν ἐθέλει) to the other who is worse off in that which he is better off, who providing (χορηγῶν) the things he has received from God to those in need (ἐπιδεοµένοις), becomes ‘God’ for the one receiving (θεὸς γίνεται τῶν λαµβανόντων). Such a one is an imitator of God (µιµητής ἐστι θεοῦ).” It is also interesting the way the Gospel of the Naassenes (apud Hippolytus, Refut. Omn. Haer. V.7.26) conflates Matt 5:45 with the scene of the rich young man (in its Markan form): τί µε λέγεις ἀγαθόν; ὁ πατήρ ὁ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς, ὅς ἀνατέλλει τὸν ἥλιον αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ δικαίους καὶ ἀδίκους καὶ βρέχει ἐπὶ ὁσίους καὶ ἁµαρτωλούς. 89 The importance of the conjunction of almsgiving and love of enemies finds interesting expression in the Syriac Book of Steps, where the eighth mēmrā (discourse) condemns the one who feeds the poor but “does not have in him that humble love that loves his murderers and washes the feet of his enemies” (8:2). On this fascinating document, see Robert Kitchen, “Zacchaeus’s Half: Ascetical Economy in the Syriac Book of Steps,” in Engaging Economics: New Testament Scenarios and early Christian reception (Bruce Longencker and Kelly Liebengood, eds.; Grand Rapids; Eerdmans, 2009) 281–303.

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seeking a treasure from the Father in heaven (6:1–4; cf. 6:19–21).90 The love of enemies, in a word, shares the same motivating metaphoric world with the call to give alms.91 Turning to Matthew’s use of Lev 19:18b in his story of the Rich Young Man, the reappearance of the treasure in heaven motif is a key into the passage (Matt 19:21). Accordingly, if the early reception history of the text is given any weight, almsgiving is certainly the point of the verse. The Gospel of the Nazarenes, specifically, in its remarkable version of the scene, could not be more explicit in understanding that Lev 19:18b is a matter of giving one’s substance to the poor.92 [Jesus] said to him: Go and sell all that you possess and distribute to the poor (divide pauperibus), and then come and follow me. But the rich man then began to scratch his head and it [the saying] pleased him not. And the Lord said: How can you say, I have fulfilled the law and the prophets? For it stands written in the law: Love thy neighbor as thyself, and behold many of your brethren, sons of Abraham are begrimed with dirt and die of hunger (amicti sunt stercore, morientes prae fame) – and your house is full of many good things and nothing at all comes forth from it to them!93

The Gospel of the Nazarenes is a secondary development of the Matthean tradition,94 and one major alteration is that here the love commandment has not been fulfilled (so also Clement Alex. Strom. 3.6.55), whereas in the Gospel the rich man insists he has observed all the commandments that Jesus lists (πάντα ταῦτα ἐφύλαξα, Matt 19:20). If the Gospel of the Nazarenes thus imagines that the man has not fulfilled Lev 19:18b (clearly understood in application to charity), the idea of such unfulfillment – ultimately perhaps because ‫ גמילות חסדים‬have no upper limit (cf. m. Peah 1:1) – may nevertheless be derived from Matthew’s more subtle depicition (τί ἔτι ὑστερῶ, Matt 19:20). Matthew operates within a paradigm of supererogation (cf. Did. 6:1). If the man wishes to be “perfect” (τέλειος), he must sell all he has and give to the poor, gaining a treasure in heaven; then he must follow after Jesus (Matt

90

On this theme in early Judaism, see Diamond, Holy Men and Hunger Artists, 68–71. On the Matthean text, see Eubank, “Storing Up Treasure,” 77–92. 91 It is interesting in this connection to consider Richard Horsely’s suggestion that “enemies” in this Q tradition might largely have in view neighbors unable to pay back debts. See Richard Horsely, “Ethics and Exegesis: ‘Love Your Enemies’ and the Doctrine of Non-Violence,” JAAR 54 (1986) 3–31. 92 On the transmission of this text, preserved in the Latin translation of Origen’s commentary on Matthew, see A. F. J. Klijn, “The Question of the Rich Young Man in a Jewish-Christian Gospel,” NovT 8(1966) 149–55. 93 Apud Origen, Comm. In Matth. XV.14. See Wilhelm Schneemelcher, ed., New Testament Apocrypha: Volume One: Gospels and Related Writings (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2003) 161; cf. 158. 94 Ibid., 154.

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19:21). In other words, the man’s Torah piety, however real, must be considered imperfect, lacking the fullness of eschatological rectitude.95 Within the narrative, the likelihood arises that the man observes the “righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees,” rather than the surpassing righteousness expounded in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. The bottom line is that Matthew’s narrative contextualizes the scene with the rich man as a call to fulfill the law perfectly by perfectly fulfilling Lev 19:18b – exchanging a radical gift of alms for a treasure in heaven (Matt 19:21). This, in any case, was how Matthew was understood in the early Christian circles that produced the Gospel of the Nazarenes. If the focus of Matt 5:43–44 is on an interpretation of love of neighbor as a radical command against hatred, the conjunction with Matt 19:16–22 fills out the picture. Like 1 John 3:11–16, Matthew preserves both Second Temple traditions of the interpretation of Lev 19:18b – the prohibition of hatred and the command to give alms. Although the Gospel has separated these two traditions in the course of the narrative, it nevertheless exposes the common framework binding them together: storing up a treasure in heaven. 3.2.2 “What is Written in the Law?” Luke’s Adaptation of Lev 19:18b 3.2.2.1 Thematic Conjunction In contrast to Matthew, who cites Lev 19:18b three times, Luke cites the verse only once (Luke 10:27). In this one single passage (Luke 10:25–37), however, Luke manages to draw together Feindesliebe (cf. Matt 5:43–44), almsgiving (cf. Matt 19:16–22), and the Great Commandment tradition (cf. Matt 22:34–40). At the same time, he gives expression to the conception of charity as a “spiritual sacrifice,” seen in texts like James. The historical and conceptual context for such a complex conjunction of themes should now be clear. As such, the Traditionsgeschichte outlined above (§3.2) must help shape interpretative judgments when Luke’s “narrative exegesis” leaves important points unspoken. 96 The words “love your enemy,” for instance, never appear;97 neither is an explicit critique of the cult

95

See Davies and Allison, Matthew 1, 485–7. On Luke’s “narrative exegesis” of Lev 19:18, see Green, Luke, 426, 429. The rabbinic use of parables as an exegesis of scriptural texts is very common. See Harvey MacArthur and Robert Johnston, They Also Taught in Parables: Rabbinic Parables from the First Centuries of the Christian Era (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990) 112–3. 97 Meier (Law and Love, 531) omits Luke 10:25–37 from consideration in his narrow investigation of “the arrestingly laconic command in Matt 5:44b || Luke 6:27b: ‘Love your enemies’ (agapate tous echtrous hymōn).” The presence of the theme of enemy-love in Luke 10:25–37 is widely accepted, though. See, e.g., John Donahue, “Who Is My Enemy? The Parable of the Good Samaritan and the Love of Enemies,” in The Love of Enemy and Nonretaliation in the New Testament (Willard Swartley, ed.; Louisville: Westminster John 96

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made; nor, for that matter, is a direct command given to share one’s resources with the needy. Such silence cannot be considered decisive, however. Form critically, Luke’s peculiar deployment of Lev 19:18b in a Streitgespräch parable must simply be appreciated for what it is – not expected to conform to other modes of expression, be they community rules, testament literature, epistolary diatribes, or logia.98 Of the various interpretative motifs at play in Luke 10:25–37, only a few comments can be made on the theme of spiritual sacrifice and the cult, since here more than elsewhere Luke’s “silence” makes it difficult to go too far beyond the material already discussed. The unflattering portrayal of the two clerical figures receives no comment (Luke 10:31–32), after all, and one must simply try to reconstruct a plausible historical context for the audience. At issue, of course, is the suggestion that the parable is an anticlerical attack on the Temple and the priesthood.99 If Bauckham and others have rightly worked to chasten this proposal, it may overreach to determine that the parable’s halakhic focus diffuses any polemic significance of the priest and Levite.100 As will be demonstrated, the halakhic questions at stake in Luke 10:25–37 belong specifically to the Torah’s charity legislation. The contextual evidence we have uncovered, then, suggests the real possibility that a distinct “worship by charity” perspective might inform the whole construction. This likelihood is increased if, as will be discussed momentarily, Luke has indeed appropriated a Markan source already pointing in this direction: “To love one’s neighbor as oneself is greater than all holocausts and sacrifices” (Mark

Knox, 1992) 137–56; Joel Green, The Gospel of Luke (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997) 432 fn. 130; Davies and Allison, Matthew 1, 550; and Warren Carter, “Love Your Enemies,” Word & World (2008) 14. 98 The source-critical division of the text (see below) corresponds to a formal division. The original Markan unit represents a scholastic dialogue (Schulgespräch), while the L material has the basic form of a parable – or “Example Story” if we prefer (cf. Luke 10:37; see Tucker, Example Stories; Baasland, “Zum Beispiel der Beispielerzählungen,” 193–219; Via, “Parable and Example Story,” 105–33; and Snodgrass, Stories with Intent,13–15, 351–3). In Luke’s reconfiguration of his sources, a single but complex formal unit has been forged: an extended controversy dialogue (Streitgespräch) structured by three key questions: Introductory Dialogue (10:25–28), Follow-up Exchange (10:29–35), and Concluding Dialogue and Sending (10:36–37). 99 See, e.g. Jeremias, Gleichnisse, 144; Eta Linnemann, Jesus of the Parables (New York: Harper & Row, 1967) 53; and Robert Funk, “The Good Samaritan as Metaphor,” Sem 2 (1974) 78. 100 See Bauckham, “Scrupulous Priest,” 478–80, esp. 479–80. “It is not opposing priests, but uses a priest to pose a legal issue” (488). See also, e.g., Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 354–5. A significant weakness of Bauckham’s reading is the inability to adequately account for the Levite on purely halakhic grounds.

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12:33; cf. Hos 6:6; 1 Sam 15:22; also b. Sukk. 49b).101 To the extent that this wide background is acknowledged, Luke’s stress on the verb ποιέω (Luke 10:25, 28, 37), 102 contrasted with the clerics’ flagrant negligence (ἀντιπαρῆλθεν) – whatever the motives – can be fruitfully compared with the polemic language of James (πίστις vs. ἔργα) and 1 John (λόγος/γλῶσσα vs. ἔργον/ἀλήθεια).103 Like these authors, Luke seems to envision concrete works of charity as God-pleasing avodah, a fulfillment of the double love command (one verb).104 3.2.2.2 Adjustments to Mark 12:28–34 If Luke’s use of Mark is helpful in addressing the parable’s prophetic perspective on the priestly cult, it is important to look more closely at how Luke reconfigures Mark’s Great Commandment episode (Mark 12:28–34). A number of narrative features will reveal Luke’s intention to recast the whole scene in the special light of almsgiving. The present section will accordingly focus on Luke’s introductory dialogue (Luke 10:25–28), while the final two sec-

101

See the Entrevernes Group, “‘Go and Do Likewise’: Narrative and Dialogue (Luke 10:25–37),” in Signs and Parables (Gary Phillips, trans.; Pittsburgh: Pickwick, 1978) 13–64, esp. 32; and Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 358. On the understanding of Hos 6:6 as almsgiving, see §3.3.1 below. Whatever Mark’s original meaning, Luke may have taken it in this sense of charity. The Bavli text is explicit on the idea: “R. Eliezer said: Greater is he who performs charity (‫ )העושה צדקה‬than [he who offers] all sacrifices (‫)הקרבנות‬, for it is said, ‘To do charity and justice is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.’” Cf. Str.-B. I 500. Luke’s absence of a direct citation of Hos 6:6 results from his elimination of the exchange of mutual congratulations between Jesus and the scribe (Mark 12:32–34). Some exegetes recognize the passage to stand behind the Lukan parable (Luke 10:30–35), however. See, e.g., J. D. M. Derrett, “Law in the New Testament: Fresh Light on the Parable of the Good Samaritan,” NTS 11 (1964–65) 22–37. If the Hosea text is in view, this is best explained through Mark. 102 “That the practice of God’s word is the central issue in this narrative unit is obvious from the repetition and placement of the verb ‘to do,’” Green, Luke, 425. 103 This polemical register better suits Lukan interests than an open attack on the Temple. Luke is committed to the proposition that moral action proves one’s religious integrity (e.g. Luke 3:8–14; 8:21), whereas his view of the Temple is generally positive and unlikely to be too directly critiqued. See, e.g., Chance, The Temple; and Fay, “Narrative Function of the Temple,” 255–70. 104 Luke’s formulation using the verb ἀγαπήσεις only once may be significant, if it intends to compress love of God and love of neighbor into a single commandment. Did 1:2 also uses a single verb, yet it still distinguishes: πρῶτον (Deut 6:5) and δεύτερον (Lev 19:18b). In 1 John 4:21, the two commandments have formally collapsed into one with a single conjugated verb, though the doubling of ἀγαπάω remains in the use of the participle: “This is the commandment (τὴν ἐντολήν) we have from him, that the one who loves (ὁ ἀγαπῶν) God should also love (ἀγαπᾷ) his brother.”

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tions of the chapter (§§3.3–4) will concentrate on issues in the parable proper (e.g. love of enemies). Redaction criticism is of limited use in application to Luke 10:25–37, it must be said. The text is rife with source critical riddles. 105 While certain questions are, by the nature of the case, all but impossible to settle, 106 the judgment that Mark 12:28–34 stands behind Luke 10:25–28, rather than a longer Q or L version, nevertheless appears to be the best hypothesis.107

105

Consideration of Luke’s sources in 10:25–37 immediately suggests a division of the text. While the introductory exchange in 10:25–28 corresponds to material in Mark 12:28– 34 (cf. Matt 22:34–40), the actual story of the Good Samaritan in 10:29–37 has no parallel. Two basic possibilties thus arise: (i) Luke relied upon a non-Markan source (whether Q or L) which included both the intro and the parable; see, e.g., Rudolf Bultmann, History of the Synoptic Tradition (John Marsh, trans.; New York: Harper & Row, 1963) 22–23; Fitzmyer, Luke, 2.877–8; and Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 348–9; or (ii) the conjunction of these two units is original to Luke. In the latter case, Luke could have either (a) sewn together the Markan perciope and a pre-existing parable tradition; see, e.g. Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 234; or (b) appended a parable of his own composition to the material from Mark; see Gerhard Sellin, “Lukas als Gleichniserzähler: Die Erzählung vom barmherzigen Samariter” ZNW 65 (1974) 166–89; 66 (1975) 19–60; and similarly Meier, Probing the Authenticity of the Parables, 199–209. 106 The search for sources behind Luke 10:29–37 is a much more speculative exercise than it is for 10:25–28. Classically, such material would be assigned (by definition) to L, and the affinities of this text with other elements of special Lukan material is suggestive. Most interesting is the rich number of parables and similtudes in L. As many as fifteen might be counted, including all four of the so-called Example Stories (7:41–43; 10:29–35; 11:5–8; 12:16–20; 13:6–9, 24–25; 14:7–10, 28–32; 15:8–9; 15:11–32; 16:1–8, 19–31; 17:7–9; 18:1–8, 9–14). Also worthy of note is the characteristic prominence given to Samaritans (9:51–56; 10:25–37; 17:11–19). To the extent that the parable represents larger patterns in the Lukan Sondergut, therefore, one must be prepared to extend a decision about this text to the larger body of material. Whatever such general patterns might indicate, though, the line between Lukan redaction of pre-existing Sondergut and outright Lukan compositon is very uncertain. Much depends on prior assumptions about Luke’s compositional technique. On any reckoning, then, the determination that Lukan theology and language characterizes the text of 10:29–37 is in itself insufficient to settle the question. Accordingly, as a kind of negative judgment, despite the long noted affinities with 2 Chron 28:5–15 (see, e.g. F. Scott Spencer, “2 Chronicles 28:5–15 and the Parable of the Good Samaritan,” WTJ 46 (1984) 317–49), I find it difficult to decide that no earlier parable tradition stands behind the story of the Good Samaritan. 107 The idea that Luke knew a non-Markan (L or Q) form of the complete unit depends in large part on a restricted view of the evangelist’s creativity. Otherwise, it is difficult for such a theory to find traction. The one whisper in the direction of Q – three minor agreements between Luke and Matthew (i.e. νοµικός, πειράζων, διδάσκαλε) – at most suggests a non-Markan source for Luke 10:25–28 || Matt 22:34–40. See note 110 below. (The form of Deut 6:5 used by the evangelists is inconclusive.) The later half of the unit (Luke 10:29–37) is not implicated, and nothing in the unique Lukan version of 10:25–28 commits the text to the subsequent verses. Indeed, the introductory section looks decidely self-contained, and after an apparent conclusion to the pericope in 10:28 a redactional

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The parallel of the Lukan scene with Mark’s report is admittedly very imperfect. Both texts share three fundamental features which make the correspondance secure, however. (1) A solitary figure learned in the Law interrogates Jesus. (2) The answer to the question entails a citation of Deut 6:5 and Lev 19:18b. (3) The correctness of this answer is affirmed. If no other pericope in the Gospels shares these precise points, the divergence from Mark’s version also remains impressive. First, Luke’s placement of the scene differs radically from Mark’s. 108 Where Mark situates the encounter in the final days of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry, Luke locates it near the beginning of his long Travel Narrative. This represents a rare break from Mark’s order in the final section of the Gospel. It has been observed, however, that the Markan pericope, with its expressions of mutual esteem between Jesus and the scribe, fits uncomfortably within the otherwise antagonistic controversy stories in Mark 12.109 If Matthew opts to address this dissonance by muting the mutual goodwill of Jesus and the scribe and adding a touch of hostility (i.e. Matt 22:34–40), another solution would be an editorial transposition. 110 Luke overcompensates and adopts both strategies.111

seam “restarts” the dialogue again in 10:29. The case for a single, non-Markan source solution is weak, therefore; and two general arguments confirm the likelihood that Luke himself is responsible for the conjunction of vv. 25–28 and vv. 29–37. (1) First, to the question of creativity, Luke demonstrates considerable freedom in his use of Mark elsewhere. He economizes, omits, transposes, and – importantly – mixes Mark with other sources. (2) Second, the Lukan text looks like an assemblage from the form critical perspective. It is broadly cast as a controversy story (Streitgespräch), but is awkwardly involved and shows formal remnants of its component pieces. A controversy unit of this extended complexity is unlikely to have circulated as such in the pre-Lukan logia tradition. On this issue, see Filip Noël, “The Double Commandment of Love in Lk 10,27: A Deuteronomic Pillar or Lukan Redaction of Mk 12,29–33,” in Scriptures in the Gospels (BETL 131; Leuven: Leuven University, 1997) 559–70. 108 On Luke’s pattern of moving and rewriting Markan materials, see Carey, “Moving Things Forward,” 302–19, esp. 312–15. 109 See, e.g., Meier, Law and Love, 484. 110 This redactional motive blunts the force of Matthew and Luke’s minor agreement in using πειράζων (Matt 22:35) and ἐκπειράζων (Luke 10:25) respectively. The use of νοµικός by both evangelists may be a case of scribal assimilation, since the word (which appears nowhere else in Matthew) is problematic in the Matthean text and graded only {C} in the UBS edition. See Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (New York: United Bible Societies, 1971) 50. 111 We must recognize here Luke’s desire not only to smooth out the Markan account of the Jerusalem ministry, but also to erect an important landmark at the start of the Travel Narrative. The movement of the Samaritan along the road to Jerusalem (ὁδεύων, 10:33) gives graphic expression to Jesus’ mission in this section of the Gospel, while the character of the lawyer develops an important theme of opposition, cf. Matera, “Conflict with Israel,” 57–77.

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Besides the change in order, three essential modifications characterize the Lukan form of the Markan scene. (1) First, as suggested, Luke depicts the lawyer (not scribe) in a more hostile light. (2) Next, Luke changes the initial question from “What is the greatest commandment?” to “What shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (3) Finally, Luke exchanges the roles of Jesus and the scribe figure, giving the lawyer the task of announcing the double love commandment. All three of these alterations can be explained on the hypothesis of Luke’s redaction of Mark. Together these narrative clues help uncover Luke’s understanding of Lev 19:18b as a charity text. (1) Luke’s decision to narrate the approach of a “lawyer” rather than a scribe (εἷς τῶν γραµµατέων, Mark 12:28) is telling, even if as a social group little separates νοµικοί from γραµµατεῖς in Lukan usage (cf. Luke 11:53).112 With the change, Luke signals a particular vision of the Law he aims to advance in this pericope: namely, its adequacy in teaching what one must do to have a share in eternal life.113 The hostility of Luke’s legal expert, in contrast to Mark’s friendlier figure, additionally develops an important subplot of opposition.114 Luke mentions lawyers four times in the Gospel, and each of the other three passages closely associates the profession with the Pharisees in very unfavorable ways (7:30; 11:45–52; 14:3; cf. 5:17).115 At this point in the narrative, the critical information is that both groups have “rejected God’s plan (τὴν βουλὴν τοῦ θεοῦ) for themselves” by not receiving John’s baptism (7:30). This specifically means that in contrast to the crowds, these elites never asked John the decisive repentance question: τί οὖν ποιήσωµεν (3:10, 12, 14; cf. Acts 2:37). They have, therefore, shown no fruits worthy of re-



112 In contrast to the more self-standing class of “scribes” in Mark (1:22; 2:6; 3:22; 9:11, 14; 12:28, 32, 35, 38), which is only incidentally linked to the Pharisee party (2:16), Luke’s “scribes” appear as an independent class only twice (Luke 20:39, 46), being in effect the attendants of either the Pharisees (5:21, 30; 6:7; 11:53; 15:2; cf. Acts 23:9) or, in connection to the Passion, the chief priests and elders (Luke 9:22; 19:47; 20:1, 19; 22:2, 66; 23:10; cf. Acts 4:5; 6:12). 113 This does not exclude a proper place for Jesus in Luke’s soteriology. See the helpful remarks of Hays, Wealth Ethics, 168 fn. 315; see also, 123–5. 114 Three things make the lawyer’s hostility clear from the outset: the unflattering profile of lawyers in the Gospel (cf. Luke 7:30; 11:45–52; 14:3), the critique of the “wise and learned” in the immediate context of this passage (10:21), and the circumstantial phrase ἐκπειράζων αύτόν (10:25). The address διδάσκαλε, which, though respectful, is never used by those close to Jesus in Luke’s Gospel also places the lawyer on the outside (cf. 18:8). The missing expressions of warm mutual esteem (Mark 12:32, 34) further confirm the impression of an adversarial relation. 115 For an important treatment of the stereotypical treatment of Pharisees in Luke’s Gospel, see Moxnes, Economy of the Kingdom.

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pentance and not yet begun the life of almsgiving John called for: sharing one’s food and clothing with those who have not (Luke 3:10).116 (2) The lawyer’s question to Jesus begins on a resonant note: τί ποιήσας. The question of doing, earlier put to John, is now being posed to Jesus.117 The lawyer’s purpose is not to submit himself to the authority of a charismatic prophet’s guidance, however, but only to probe where Jesus stands. It is significant, then, that the question of the lawyer does not simply reproduce the question of the crowds in Luke 3:10, but has instead been purposefully lifted from Mark’s story of the rich man. That figure, called to give away all his wealth as a gift of alms, had asked Jesus: τί ποιήσω ἵνα ζωὴν αἰώνιον κληρονοµήσω (Mark 10:17).118 In reduplicating this precise question and placing it in the mouth of the lawyer (τί ποιήσας ζωὴν αἰώνιον κληρονοµήσω), Luke, in an unmistakable way, twins the Good Samaritan pericope with his account of the Rich Ruler (Luke 18:18–30), who asks the same question word-for-word. 119 On one level, this narrative alignment directly links 10:25–37 with the issue of a rich man seeking salvation and Jesus instructing him to give alms. Where John had successfully instructed the crowds, tax collectors, and soldiers on the need to practice economic justice in ways appropriate to their state, Jesus’ mission leads him to confront the elite with a similar word. The economic status of the lawyer is never stated, of course. Nevertheless, the close associa-



116 There is good reason to suppose that behind the Baptist’s call for such charity stands the powerful idea of almsgiving as cleansing from sin. See Garrison, Redemptive Almsgiving. 117 Just as John demanded fruits worthy of repentance (Luke 3:8–14), Jesus authenticates a person’s hearing of the word (hence also reading of the Law, 10:26) by doing (cf. 6:46–49; 8:21; see Robert Wall, “Martha and Mary (Luke 10:38–42) in the Context of Christian Deuteronomy,” JSNT 35 [1989] 19–35). See Green, Luke, 425. The frequent anxiety over possible “works-righteousness” in this passage is a good index of the issue. See, e.g., J. Dwight Pentecost, The Parables of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1982) 71–5; and Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 356, 118 Although inheriting eternal life sounds characteristically Johannine, it is anchored in one passage in the synoptic (triple) tradition: Jesus’ encounter with the rich young man and his concluding exchange with Peter (Matt 19:16–30 || Mark 10:17–31 || Luke 18:18–30). The phrase actually forms an inclusio binding the whole unit together, from the question of the rich man (τἰ ποιήσω ἵνα ζωὴν αἰώνιον κληρονοµήσω, Mark, 10:17) to Jesus’ final answer to Peter (οὐδείς ἐστιν ὅς ἀφῆκεν οἰκίαν ἢ ἀδελφοὺς...ἐὰν µὴ λάβῃ ἑκατονταπλασίονα νῦν...καὶ ἐν τῷ αἰῶνι τῷ ἐρχοµένῳ ζωὴν αἰώνιον, Mark 10:29–30b). 119 On this narrative link, see Talbert, Reading Luke,111–12; and Kenneth Bailey, Through Peasant Eyes: More Lucan Parables: Their Culture and Style (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980) 159; and especially Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 233, 239. Wilson (Luke and the Law, 29) opines that, “If we follow Luke’s hint and attempt to interpret one in terms of the other we meet with little success.” Wilson rejects the decisive significance of almsgiving in Luke 10:25–37, however, which explains his perplexity.

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tion of the legal class with the Pharisees, who in Luke quite explicitly “love money” (16:14), suggests the man’s wealth convincingly enough (cf. 14:1– 6). 120 From the other direction, moreover, Luke’s decision in chapter 18 to speak specifically of an ἄρχων (18:18) strengthens the connection between these two figures, since “ruler” in Luke makes the man’s cultural capital clear and rings with more sinister overtones than the entirely nondescript Markan εἷς. Luke’s rich ἄρχων stands implicitly in connection with the lawyer-Pharisee alliance in its opposition to “the plan of God” (cf. Luke 14:1; 23:13, 35; 24:20; Acts 3:17; 13:27). Like two milemarkers at the beginning and end of the Travel Narrative, the diptych Luke creates with these two passages measures the invitation and final inability of Israel’s elite to respond to the challenge Jesus poses.121 The binding of these two texts enables Luke to propose the two stories as mutually interpreting replies to the same question: loving God and neighbor means selling all and giving to the poor.122 This narrative connection calls to mind the story of the rich man in the Gospel of the Nazarenes and its

120

See Moxnes, Economy of the Kingdom, 1–9, 17–21, 123. The last confrontation with the lawyers and Pharisees comes when the man with dropsy is healed on the Sabbath (Luke 14:1–6). The condition of dropsy was widely used as a metaphor for greed and wealth in the ancient world, since the condition can bring an unquenchable desire for drink, i.e. insatiable desire. It was also associated with the overindulgence of the rich in feasting. Jesus’ healing of the man suffering from this condition and the halahkic resistance of the Pharisees and lawyers (Luke 14:3) thus fits with the consistent confrontation between Jesus and these groups over matters of wealth. See Chad Hartsock, “The Healing of the Man with Dropsy and the Lukan Landscape,” Biblical Interpretation 21 (2013) 341–54. 121 The lawer’s story remains open when Jesus tells him what he must go and do (Luke 10:37). How does he respond? We are not told. The real conclusion only comes when Luke resumes the issue – and the rich ruler walks away sad (18:23). Jesus’ challenge ultimately proves too much for Israel’s elite. “How hard it is for those having possessions to enter the Kingdom of God” (18:24). The honestiores of the people will fail to follow Jesus, just as they failed to listen to John. 122 See Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 239. Robert Karris (“The Gospel According to Luke,” in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary [Raymond Brown, Joseph Fitzmyer, and Roland Murphy, eds.; Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990] 702 [§43:126]) understands Luke to have a “dual view” of the Law, necessitating two distinct answers to the repeated question: “In 18:18–30 Luke will provide a more specifically Christian answer to the same question about inheriting eternal life.” This view of the Law is developed by Wilson (Luke and the Law). Karris’ view fails, since the rich ἄρχων is certainly not represented as disciple. See also Craig Blomberg, “The Law in Luke-Acts,” JSNT 22 (1984) 53–80; and Gerald Downing, “Freedom from the Law in Luke-Acts,” JSNT 24 (1986) 49–52. Blomberg argues for a “slow dawning” of the implications of the New Covenant, while Downing counters that Greco-Roman reverence for traditional custom and the sophistication of Luke’s readers makes the presentation in Luke-Acts look like a voluntary, but non-superstitious (hence selective) embrace of the Law.

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understanding of Lev 19:18b. Moreover, the question itself, focused on securing eternal life, evokes a distinct motif common especially in rabbinic literature in which almsgiving specifically confers the promise of eternal life (see Chapter Four below; cf. Prov 10:2; 11:4; Tob 4:10; b. Roš. Haš. 4b; b. B. Bat. 10a–11a; Exod. Rab. 31.14; t. Pe’ah 1.2; b. Qidd. 39b; m. Pe’ah 1:1; y. Pe’ah 1:1; b. Qidd. 39b; b. Šabb. 127a–b).123 In this light, it looks very much as if the story Jesus tells about the Samaritan’s works of mercy (Luke 10:30– 35) presupposes a charity subtext in both the law from Leviticus and the lawyer’s question. The reformulation of the lawyer’s question in terms of eternal life naturally displaces the question as it originally appeared in the mouth of Mark’s scribe: Ποία ἐστὶν ἐντολὴ πρώτη πάντων (Mark 12:28). In view of the status of the phrase ἡ ἐντολή as a developing expression for almsgiving during this period, Luke’s revision deserves some explanation. 124 Two considerations might be mentioned. First, Luke’s desire to use a question focused on doing, at once linked to John’s instruction on almsgiving (Luke 3:10–14) and tied to the story of Mark’s rich young man, simply required the loss of ἐντολή as a price. Second, despite Luke’s deep interest in the Law (which gives special color to his version of this exchange), he is not interested in isolating particular mitzvoth.125 Rather, his vision is to see the scriptures as a uniform whole, saying a single thing (e.g. Luke 16:29; 24:27; Acts 3:18, 24; 10:43). Luke was thus of the mind of Tertullian: “This commandment of distributing to the poor is spread about everywhere in the law and the prophets” (Contra Marcionem 4:5).126 To that degree, isolating a single greatest commandment was not congenial to Luke’s purpose. (3) As a final major adjustment, Luke’s redaction of the Markan scene suprisingly reverses the roles and makes Jesus cede the punchline to the lawyer. Rather than answer the test and triumphantly announce the double love command (which is apparently not so innovative), Jesus instead throws the question right back. The point is plain. The lawyer already knows the answer, for the answer to the question of eternal life is clearly written in the Law he reads (Luke 10:26). 127 This notion of the manifest witness of the scriptures is very important to Luke – and not only in connection with the necessity of the Christ’s suffering (Luke 24:27). The same soteriological



123 Both worldly goods (including lengthened earthly life) and eternal life in the world to come were celebrated as the rewards for almsgiving. See Hays, Wealth Ethics, 44–5; and Anderson, Charity, 60–1. 124 On this topic, see Giambrone, “‘According to the Commandment,’” 457–65. 125 See Wilson, Luke and the Law, 14, 54–8. 126 A similar sentiment is attributed to Nachmanides. See Anderson, Charity, 16. 127 This answers the objection Snodgrass (Stories with Intent, 348) voices: “Luke, if he is dependent on Mark, would not likely take Jesus’ words and place them in the mouth of the lawyer.”

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interest found here – the sufficiency of the scriptures for finding one’s way to eternal life – appears explicitly at the end of the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus (16:31; cf. 16:17) – again in connection with active charity. If Luke thus underscores the transparent witness of the Law in answering the lawyer’s question, Mark’s scribe can be discerned behind the Lukan jurist. Specifically, Mark’s scribe already demonstrates a real understanding of what the scriptures teach, evidently recognizing the answer to his own question and approving of Jesus’ reply with a surpising tone of confidence (καλῶς, διδάσκαλε, ἐπ᾽ ἀληθείας εἶπες, Mark 12:32). Luke, then, only develops what Mark implicitly suggests: any good scribe knows the importance of loving God and neighbor. From this vatange point, the scribe’s nearness to the kingdom (οὐ µακρὰν εἶ ἀπὸ τῆς βασιλείας τοῦ θεοῦ, Mark 12:34) means, for Luke at least, that, as in the case of the rich man “one thing is still lacking” (Luke 18:22; cf. Mark 10:21): doing. This is no minor part of the equation, however. If James insists on both faith and works, Luke’s idiom replaces faith with knowledge. Hence, the indictment Jesus unleashes in the following chapter in his final curse: “Woe to you lawyers! You hold the key of knowledge (τὴν κλεῖδα τῆς γνώσεως), but you do not enter and you hinder those trying to enter” (Luke 11:52). The lawyer of 10:25–37 risks hearing this exact judgment, unless he – better than the Pharisees and lawyers under fire just one chapter on – heeds Jesus’ command to give alms (11:41). The significance of Jesus’ Weheruf (Luke 11:37–54) for understanding the hostility of the lawyer in 10:25–37 should not be missed. If a casuistic impulse (“And who is my neghbor?”) ultimately threatens to mislead this scholar of the Law in his pursuit of eternal life, it may be that, like those who tithe on mint and rue and every garden herb, but fail to give alms, he has neglected love of God and neighbor (τὴν κρίσιν καὶ τὴν ἀγάπην θεοῦ, 11:42– 44). 128 In this regard, the parable’s “scrupulous priest,” with his halakhic preoccupations and neglect of the poor victim at his feet, 129 may target

128

Green (Luke, 472) notes that the charge against the Pharisees in Luke 11:42–44 centers upon neglect of God and neighbor, and that “though the language is different, conceptually [it] is very close to the interaction recorded in 10:25–37.” The important phrase τὴν κρίσιν καὶ τὴν ἀγάπην θεοῦ (11:42) encapsulates this focus. The use of κρίσις has in view “non pas le jugement dernier…[mais] les devoirs envers le prochain” (cf. Deut 10:18 LXX). “Love of God” is a very rare expression, and the conjunction here is certainly “le premier commandement précédé du second (x, 27),” Lagrange, Luc, 344. 129 Bauckham (“Scrupulous Priest,” 476–80) argues that the priest is faced with the halahkic dilemma of weighing the command against his contracting corpse impurity (Lev 21:1–3) against the command of love (Lev 19:18b). This scenario presumes Lev 19:18b commands works of mercy. Philip Esler (“Jesus and the Reduction of Intergroup Conflict: The Parable of the Good Samaritan in the Light of Social Identity Theory,” Biblical Interpretation 8 [2000] 339–41) argues that Lev 21:1–4 applied only to the corpse of an Israelite. The uncertain ethnic identity of the naked victim is thus important for the

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precisely such figures as the lawyers and the Pharisees with their dangerous legal myopia. It would be a good sociological fit: many scribes/lawyers were also priests, and the Levites like the Pharisees inhabited a kind of quasipriestly penumbra (clerus minor).130 The implicit charge of the parable also fits this allegorized mapping. By failing to practice charity, the rich Pharisees and lawyers are guilty of “robbery” (ἁρπαγή, 11:39; cf. 18:11; 20:46–47) in just the sense seen in CD 6:16–17: withholding excess wealth that belongs by right to the poor. Israel’s elite are thus complicit in the plundering of innocent people, as in Jesus’ parable (10:30; cf. 19:46). They are blithely walking by “justice and the love of God” (παρέρχεσθε τὴν κρίσιν καὶ τὴν ἀγάπην θεοῦ, 11:42) – like the priest and Levite walking right by the poor man robbed on the road (ἀντιπαρῆλθεν, 10:31–32; cf. 16:19–31).

3.3 “Who Is My Neighbor?” Charity as a Boundary Marker 3.3 Charity as a Boundary Marker

3.3.1 Naming the Samaritan’s Behavior In evaluating the extended understanding of “neighbor” presented in Luke 10:25–37, it is important not to mistake the actions of the Good Samaritan. They belong in every way to the world of almsgiving, though the word ἐλεηµοσύνη does not appear. 131 This is a simple, but essential and widely neglected point. 132 Bauckham’s essay, for instance, helpfully identifies the relevance of the ‫ מת מצוה‬to the story (cf. Tob 1:17–19; 2:3–9; 12:12–13; Josephus, C. Ap. 2.211; Philo, Hypoth. 7.7), but fails to appreciate how this obligation to bury the dead unavoidably engages the whole ethos and legislation

dilemma as Esler sees it, just as his condition of being “half-dead” impinges on the case. “Jesus had raised a very difficult set of circumstances relating to whether the priest was obliged to help the injured man or not, but one yet capable of interpretation within existing halakhic discussion” (341). 130 Horn (Glaube und Handeln, 114; cf. Sellin, “Lukas als Gleichniserzähler, 41) discounts this possibility because he envisions an exaggerated anti-cult polemic. This is problematic for multiple reasons already suggested, and for the reason that Luke has a positive view towards the Temple (e.g. Luke 24:53). On the social classes of scribes and priests, see, e.g., Jeremias, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus, 147–270. Bauckham’s account suffers because it is unable to give any convincing place to the Levites. 131 See Berger, Gesetzesauslegung Jesu, 239. 132 Neither Mineshige’s study of Besitzversicht und Almosen bei Lukas nor Kim’s study of Stewardship and Almsgiving in Luke’s Theology addresses the passage. John Nolland’s attempt (“Role of Money and Possessions,” 189) to minimize the role of wealth imagery in the parable falls into this trap of separting monetary giving from merciful behavior more broadly considered, when he remarks that “the expenditure of money is but one of a string of actions on the part of the Samaritan that demonstrate his compassion.”

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of Jewish charity.133 Philip Esler goes so far as to say, “There is no sign at all in the text that the Samaritan’s response represented an embodiment of what Lev 19:18 requires.” He accordingly determines that Jesus presents “a major divergence from the Mosaic law, not just a novel way of interpreting it.”134 This is a greatly mistaken and unfortunate conclusion. An important article by Roman Heiligenthal is helpful here.135 Heiligenthal demonstrates that the idea of ἐλεηµοσύνη in the New Testament period comprehended both corporal works of mercy (‫ )גמילות חסדים‬and the use of money for the poor (‫מצוה‬/‫)צדקה‬. Thus, in its broadest usage the Greek word appears as an “Oberbegriff für Werke der Barmherzigkeit,” under which alms in the narrow, monetary sense might also be undertsood. Tobit, for instance, summarizes his comprehensive piety in action – his tithes distributed to the widow, orphan, and stranger, his giving clothes to the naked and food to the hungry, and his burying the dead – by simply stating: ἐλεηµοσύνας πολλὰς ἐποίησα (Tob 1:3, 16; cf. 4:5–18).136 The same usage is clear at least through the fourth century, as illustrated in the reception of Matthew 25.137 Closely related to this usage is the sense of ἐλεηµοσύναι as “good deeds” – an expansive description of virtuous actions, putting stress on the moral quality informing the works (cf. 12:1–7; Tobit 12:8–10; Acts 9:36).138 Against this wide reference to virtuous action on behalf of the needy, the more restricted application understands ἐλεηµοσύνη as “alms” in the modern sense. Heiligenthal considers this to be a relatively late and limited usage, though it appears already in both Tob 4:7–11 and Sir 29:10.139 Luke has clear knowledge of both basic meanings: works of mercy and monetary gifts.140 While the explicit language of ἐλεηµοσύνη in either sense

133

Bauckham, “Scrupulous Priest,” 475–89, esp. 482–4. Bauckham sees that the “concern is not the obligation to bury the dead, but the obligation to assist someone in great need.” This is correct. All that is missing is the step of concretizing this “obligation to assist someone in great need” in the context of the Second Temple commandment to practice charity. 134 Esler, “Reduction of Intergroup Conflict,” 343–4. 135 Heiligenthal, “Werke der Barmherzigkeit,” 289–301. 136 Heiligenthal (ibid., 291) remarks: “Tob 4:5–16 macht deutlich, dass ἐλεηµοσύνη nicht als Terminus Technicus für Almosen verwendet wurde, sondern, dass es als Terminus für barmherziges Werk, u.a. auch das Almosen bezeichnen konnte.” 137 Although the word never appears in the parable itself, early Christian authors collect the Matthean list of benefactions under the rubric ἐλεηµοσύνη, e.g. PsClemHom III 68, 1– 69, 1; Const. Ap. 3.4; Epistula Christi. 138 Heiligenthal, “Werke der Barmherzigkeit,” 293–6. 139 Ibid., 296. 140 The noun ἐλεηµοσύνη occurs ten times across his two volumes (Luke 11:41; 12:33; Acts 3:2, 3, 10; 9:36; 10:2, 4, 31; 24:17), and in at least six instances it envisions some monetary gift. In the Gospel, the word appears twice in conjunction with the verb δίδωµι (Luke 11:41; 12:33), with clear hints of its monetary reference. The street beggar scene in

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is absent from Luke 10:25–37, the closely related language of ἔλεος appears as the summary description of the Samaritan: ὁ ποιήσας τὸ ἔλεος (Luke 10:37).141 The syntagm ποιέω + ἔλεος, moreover, exactly replicates the normal idiom for “doing works of mercy”: ποιέω + ἐλεηµοσύνη (e.g. Tob 1:3, 17; Acts 10:2, 4). The Lukan phrase itself appears only a few times in the LXX, but the texts in question are highly suggestive and make the resonance with charitable behavior quite clear (cf. Sir 29:1; Ezek 18:16–19; Zech 7:9). In addition, as Jan Joosten has shown, the underlying Hebrew use of ‫ חסד‬had, in the Second Temple period, taken on the distinct sense of “charity.”142 In

Acts 3 explicitly has money in mind (Acts 3:5–6), and Paul’s mention of “offerings from my people” in his trial before Felix must be understood as a financial offering (Acts 24:17; cf. 24:26). Luke’s other uses, describing Tabitha and Cornelius, are more difficult to decide, though it seems most likely that the broad sense of charitable works is in view. 141 “Τὸ ἔλεος, ‘mercy,’ finds its expression here in something equivalent to ἐλεηµοσύνη, ‘alms,’ using a cognate instead of the actual word,” J. Ramsey Michaels, “Almsgiving and the Kingdom Within: Tertullian on Luke 17:21,” CBQ 60 (1998) 477. Luke’s use of the noun ἔλεος is unevenly distributed. The word appears five times in quick succession in the infancy narrative (Luke 1:50, 54, 58, 72, 78), then only once more in the two-volume work (10:37). Source-critically this pattern reinforces the notion of a distinct origin for the infancy material (or at least the hymns) and cautions against reading 10:37 through the lens of chapter one. A fundamental difference distinguishes the earlier instances from the later use. The ἔλεος of God is consistently in view in Luke 1, whereas in 10:37 ἔλεος is the object of a human action. Luke’s use of the verb ἐλεέω is more revealing. It occurs four times, always in the aorist imperative (ἐλέησον), always spoken by someone in need, and always connected with the performance of some concrete benefaction. (i) The rich man, suffering in the flames, calls out to “father Abraham” for a taste of water (16:24). (ii) The ten lepers beseech Jesus to do them some unspecified kindness (17:13). Green (Gospel of Luke, 623), considers whether the lepers’ request was for material aid or “some spiritual benefit,” and tries to keep both options open, deciding that they cry out “in the hope of receiving from [Jesus] some form of benefaction” which they believe “will have its source in God.” (iii-iv) Finally, the blind man in Jericho sits by the roadside begging (18:35) and twice cries out to Jesus: υἱὲ Δαυίδ ἐλέησόν µε (18:38–39). This text, with its distinct Christological coloring, is derived from Mark 10:47–48. It is the only instance of the form ἐλέησον in Mark, but Matthew’s extension of the word is instructive to consider. The request for mercy in Matthew is always a confessional act (υἱὲ Δαυίδ; κύριος Matt 9:27; 15:22; 17:14; 20:30–31). Luke, by contrast, is much more restrained, both in his use of the verb and its connection to titles. This is not to deny that Luke also has a forceful Christology in view. See, e.g. Hamm, “What the Samaritan Leper Sees,” 273–87. For Luke, however, ἐλέησον is at root an unadorned begging formula. Such usage is not common in Greek literature, but not unknown either. See, e.g., Testament of Job 23:5. After losing everything, Job’s wife goes begging for bread. The resistant shopkeeper (who happens to be Satan in disguise) asks her to pay the price: Παρασχοῦ τὸ τίµηµα καὶ λάβε ὅ θέλεις. She testily responds: Πόθεν µοι ἀργύριον...εἰ µὲν ἐλεεῖς ἐλέησον, ἐι δὲ µὴ σὺ ὄψει. Cf. Origen, Contra Celsum 6.67.32; Acts of Thomas 64.23. See also Rom 12:8. 142 Jan Joosten, “‫‘ חסד‬Bienveillance’ et ΕΛΕΟΣ ‘Pitié’: Réflexions sur une equivalence lexicale dans la Septante,” in “Car c’est l’amour qui me plait, non le sacrifice…”: Re-

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consequence, Hos 6:6, which may even help structure the parable (cf. Mark 12:33), had acquired a sense calling for charity (not just vague uprightness) rather than sacrifice (cf. ’Abot R. Nat. 4:5).143 Whether or not such a text gave shape to the parable in Luke, it demonstrates the context in which ὁ ποιήσας τὸ ἔλεος would have been understood. Perhaps as useful in this regard as Hos 6:6, is the phrasing of Jas 2:13 (τῷ ποιήσαντι ἔλεος), where the possibility of ἔλεος as mere sentiment is positively excluded, while the performance of material works of love for the poor, i.e. clothing and feeding them, is urgently stressed (2:1–18). This conforms well to the practical behavior of the Lukan parable’s protagonist, who unlike the priest and Levite would not be content to say, “Stay warm and well-fed” (cf. Luke 8:21). The concrete ἔλεος done by the Samaritan fits Heiligenthal’s analysis of ἐλεηµοσύνη perfectly, and the condition of the victim is paradigmatic in this regard. In the first place, his nakedness presents him as ripe for one of the most basic works of mercy: “Share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless into your house; when you see the naked, cover him, and hide not from your own flesh” (Isa 58:7; cf. Sir 29:20–21; Tob 1:17; 4:16; Ezek 18:7, 16; Matt 25:36; Lev Rab 34:14).144 The fact of being wounded compounds the “half-dead” (ἡµιθανῆ) man’s need for mercy and ultimately displaces the ‫מצוה‬ ‫מת‬. Although less archetypal than providing food and clothing or burying the dead, nursing was also recognized as an act of ἐλεηµοσύνη. Thus, Sirach includes visiting the sick alongside gifts to the poor (Sir 7:32–35), as Matthew will as well (Matt 25:36; cf. Jas 5:14–15); while 4 Ezra 2:20–23 includes caring for the “injured and weak” (confractum et debilem) among the works of mercy. The Essenes evidently even studied the treatment of diseases and medicinal roots for just this charitable purpose (Josephus, B.J. 2.8.6), offering service to both the sick and the aged (Philo, Prob. 79, 87–88; CD 14:14–15). Justin mentions “those who on account of illness or another cause are in want” (Apol. 67.7) as beneficiaries of the community dole, as does Tertullian (Apol. 39).

cherches sur Osée 6:6 et son interprétation juive et chrétienne (E. Bons, ed.; JSJSup 88; Leiden: Brill, 2004) 25–42. Matthew’s use of the verse in connection with the pe’ah controversy (and Levi’s open hospitality) deserves attention in this connection (Matt 12:7; cf. Matt 9:13). 143 On the place of Hos 6:6 in Luke 10:25–37, see, e.g., the maximalist position of Derrett, “Fresh Light on the Parable of the Good Samaritan,” 22–37; and the measured view of Hays, Wealth Ethics, 119. See also Joosten, “‫‘ חסד‬Bienveillance’ et ΕΛΕΟΣ ‘Pitié,’” 39−42. 144 In the ancient Jewish world nakedness could naturally bear different meanings and had to be contextually interpreted. See Michael Satlow, “Jewish Constructions of Nakedness in Late Antiquity,” JBL 166 (1997) 429–54.

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The Samaritan’s “mercy” is, therefore, squarely within the classical canon of ἐλεηµοσύνη, broadly understood.145 It is not limited to such material ‫חסדים‬ ‫גמילות‬, however. He also makes an act of ‫ צדקה‬with the donation of two denarii (and the pledge to give still more). This final act of monetary almsgiving is regularly overlooked – perhaps because of the complication of the innkeeper as a third party. Yet, as J. Ramsey Michaels rightly says of Luke 10:35: “Mercy comes down to a matter of giving, in actual dollars and cents.”146 In §3.4 this issue will be taken up directly. For the present, it suffices to affirm the direct relevance of Second Temple charity discourse, including the interpretation of Lev 19:18b, as the proper background to the encounter between the Samaritan and the wounded traveler. 3.3.2 Boundary Marking and the Limits of Charity 3.3.2.1 The Greco-Roman Border Charity towards the poor, whether in works of mercy or gifts of money (including free loans), functioned as an explicit mark of group identity among both Jews and Christians in the Greco-Roman world. As such, it served as a key boundary marker defining who was in and who was out. Charitable behavior, accordingly, was a prime context for articulating the proper definition of “neighbor” – both in praxis and in theory. 147 Luke 10:25–37 presupposes this situation. Bruce Longenecker’s study of charity in the Pauline churches provides a useful starting point.148 His analysis begins with a consideration of the “Poor in Their Ancient Places,” in which he exhaustively investigates the condition of and care for the economic underclasses in the Greco-Roman world. The key result is his conclusion that “there is a relatively solid basis” for the common view that “apart from Jewish traditions and practices, care for the poor was virtually absent in the ancient world prior to the rise of Christiani-



145 The prominence of tending to the injured man simply represents a narrative choice suited to the structure of the parable, just as the burial of the dead suits the purposes of Tobit’s narrative, which is built around a confrontation with the state, better than other (less politically objectionable) expressions of ἐλεηµοσύνη. 146 Michaels, “Almsgiving and the Kingdom Within,” 477. 147 Sellin (“Lukas als Gleichniserzähler,” 48) thus poses a false dichotomy when he claims: “In V. 29 klingt nicht mehr das ἀγαπᾶν von V. 27 mit. V. 29 lautet nicht ‘wen soll ich lieben?’, sondern ‘wer gehört dazu?’” 148 Longenecker, Remember the Poor. The reception of this provocative book has been favorable, but his major thesis will require time to test. See, e.g., the reviews of Christopher Hays, “Remember the Poor,” JTS 63 (2012) 284–7; and Lloyd Petersen, “Remember the Poor,” JSNT 34 (2012) 78–9.

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ty.”149 Longenecker does recognize some scattered contrary data,150 allowing that a certain movement toward chartable initiatives was perhaps beginning to assert itself in the pagan world during the New Testament period.151 Nevertheless, as he also sees, both the casual observers of Christianity and its fiercest opponents “seem to differentiate the practice of Christians from those of their non-Judeo-Christian contemporaries.”152 The pagan sources (as usual) are thin here, but the evidence bears out this last assertion.153 Lucian of Samosata, to take a striking example, whose “ignorance of Christians and Christian doctrine is really monumental,” nevertheless recognized and targeted the characteristic charity Christians showed to one another.154 Thus in De morte Peregrini he mocked the community’s gullible readiness to provide material assistance: “If any charlatan or trickster comes among them he quickly acquires sudden wealth by imposing on simple people” (Pereg. 13). 155 Lucian’s satire highlights a genuine (if uncomprehending) astonishment and pinpoints the critical context of fictive kinship.

149

Longenecker, Remember the Poor, 60–1. This judgment is broadly echoed: see, e.g., Gillian Clark, Christianity and Roman Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2004) 23–4, 106–11, 115; Gildas Hamel, Poverty and Charity in Roman Palestine, The First Three Centuries C.E. (Berkeley: University of California, 1990) 236; Paul Veyne, Bread and Circuses: Historical Sociology and Political Pluralism (London: Penguin, 1990) 31, 33; and Hendrik Bolkestein, Wohltätigkeit und Armenpflege im vorchristlichen Altertum: Ein Beitrag zum Problem ‘Moral und Gesellschaft (Utrecht: A. Oosthoek, 1939). 150 Among these charitable initiatives the imperial alimenta may be mentioned, Trajan’s endowment for the maintenance of poor boys (seemingly an expedient to extend the emperor’s personal patronage), and above all the grain dole for the residents of the city of Rome, originally conceived as a right for citizens (not the needy) in 58 BCE, though later understood as a welfare work. Moses Finley (The Ancient Economy [Sather Classic Lectures 34; Berkeley, CA: University of California, 1973] 201; cf. 40, 170–1) refers to the grain distribution as “the exception that proves the rule that, before the Christianization of the empire, not even the state cared much for the poor.” 151 Longenecker, Remember the Poor, 105. Longenecker’s view of the nascent stirrings of Greco-Roman charity agrees with the position of Gerhard Uhlhorn, Christian Charity in the Ancient Church (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons: 1883) 41. 152 Longenecker, Remember the Poor, 104. 153 See Robert Louis Wilken, The Christians as the Romans Saw Them (New Haven: Yale, 2003). 154 See Gilbert Bagnani, “Peregrinus Proteus and the Christians,” Historia: Zeitschrift für Geschichte 4 (1955) 107–112, esp. 111. 155 Lucian (c. 120–180 CE) satirized the life of the historical figure, Peregrinus, who immolated himself in a pyre at the Olympic Games in 165 CE. Eusebius knows of Peregrinus as a Cynic, but Lucian depicts him as a convert to the Christian faith who rose to be a leader in the community before being excommunicated and becoming a Cynic.

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The earnestness with which the people of this religion help one another in their need is incredible. They spare themselves nothing to this end. Apparently their first law-maker has put it into their heads that they all somehow ought to be regarded as brethren.156

Wider second-century Roman perceptions of the Christian superstitio fit well with Lucian’s remarks.157 From the Christian side, the Apologists were not slow to highlight this special mark of charity, which was so striking a phenomenon in the GrecoRoman world. Tertullian’s celebrated expression captures the Christian mood: Vide, inquiunt, ut invicem se diligent; ipsi enim invicem oderunt (Apol. 39; cf. Titus 3:3). We have our treasure chest…On the monthly day, if he likes, each puts in a small donation; but only if it be his pleasure, and only if he be able; for there is no compulsion; all is voluntary. These gifts are, as it were, piety’s deposit fund…to support and bury poor people, to supply the wants of boys and girls destitute of means and parents, and of old persons confined now to the house; such too as have suffered shipwreck…One in mind and

156

Lucian’s story of Peregrinus undergirds his editorial remarks: “People came even from the cities in Asia, sent by the Christians at their common expense, to succor and defend and encourage the hero. They show incredible speed whenever any such public action is taken; for in no time they lavish their all. So it was then in the case of Peregrinus; much money came to him from them by reason of his imprisonment, and he procured not a little revenue from it. The poor wretches have convinced themselves, first and foremost, that they are going to be immortal and live for all time, in consequence of which they despise death and even willingly give themselves into custody; most of them. Furthermore, their first lawgiver persuaded them that they are all brothers of one another after they have transgressed once for all by denying the Greek gods and by worshipping that crucified sophist himself and living under his laws. Therefore they despise all things indiscriminately and consider them common property, receiving such doctrines traditionally without any definite evidence. So if any charlatan and trickster, able to profit by occasions, comes among them, he quickly acquires sudden wealth by imposing upon simple folk” (Peregr. 13; A. M. Harmon, Lucian V [LCL; Cambridge: Harvard University, 1955] 15). 157 To Roman observers Christianity was in many ways a kind of social security program/burial society. See Wilken, As the Romans Saw Them, 31–47; and S. G. Wilson, “Voluntary Associations: An Overview,” in Voluntary Associations in the Greco-Roman World (John Kloppenborg and S. G. Wilson, eds.; New York: Routledge, 1996) 1–15. In this context, the oath to good behavior that Pliny mentions the Christians take includes what may be a reference to a system of internal, interest-free loaning (10.97): ne depositum appellati abnegarent. Of course, such a society of mutual benefaction might be seen under various aspects. Galen, who despite his supreme dislike of Christian doctrine could appreciate Christian virtue as a kind of popular philosophy, likely had the sharing of goods in view when he praised the Christians’ “keen pursuit of justice.” See Richard Walzer, Galen on Jews and Christians (London: Oxford University, 1949) 10–16.

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soul, we do not hesitate to share our earthly goods with one another. All things are common among us but our wives.158

Such proud appeals to the Christian’s remarkable charity were a consistent feature of the apologetic tradition and its claim to represent a καινὸν γένος ἤ ἐπιτήδευµα – a new people and way of life (Diog. 1). Already with Aristides, who “obviously regards his description of [Christian] morality as the most important part of his apology,” the novel social attitude of the tertium genus was laid out as an unprecedented marvel.159 They love one another (ἀλλήλους ἀγαπῶσιν); they do not overlook the widow (χήραν οὐκ ὑπερορῶσιν); they rescue the orphan (ὀρφανὸν διασώζουσιν). The one who has distributes liberally (ἀνεπιφθόνως ἐπιχορηγεῖ) to the one who has not. If they see a stranger (ξένον ἐὰν ἴδωσιν), they bring him under their own roof and rejoice over him as over a true brother (ὡς ἐπὶ ἀδελφῷ ἀληθινῷ): for they call themselves brothers, not according to the flesh, but after the spirit (οὐ κατὰ σάρκα ἀδελφοὺς ἑαυτοὺς καλοῦσιν, ἀλλὰ κατὰ ψυχήν); and when a poor person dies (τελευτήσαντα δὲ πένητα), and any of them see him, then he provides for his burial according to his ability; and if they hear that some are imprisoned or condemned for the name of Christ, they gather a collection and send them what they need (συµβαλλόµενοι πέµπσουσιν αὐτοῖς ἅ χρείαν ἔχουσιν), and if it is possible, they ransom him (ῥύονται). And if there is someone who is a slave or poor (δοῦλος...πένης), they fast two or three days and set aside what they would have taken for themselves and send it to them (15.5–7).160

This witness of this Athenian advocate of Christian life is truly impressive. It boasts of precisely what Lucian derided, and its full import has not been registered.161

158

Ante-Nicene Fathers: Volume 3: Latin Christianity: Its Founder Tertullian, I. Apologetic; II. Anti-Marcion; III. Ethical (Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, eds.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2012) 46. 159 On this apology, see Robert Grant, Greek Apologists of the Second Century (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1988) 36–9. On Aristides and the “third race” paradigm, see Peter Richardson, Israel in the Apostolic Church (SNTSMS 10; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1969) 22–5. The Greek text contrasts Gentiles, Jews, and Christians, but the four-part division of the Syriac is likely more original. 160 For the Greek text, see Carlotta Alpigiano, Aristide di Atene: Apologia (Biblioteca Patristica 11; Florence: Nardini, 1988). On the textual issues, see J. R. Harris, The Apology of Aristides (Texts and Studies I.1; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1892) 65–99. The fasting of Christians in support of charity appears first in the Didache, and may have grown by the time of Pope Cornelius to a massive organized operation, including perhaps 10,000 persons and a million yearly rations. See Michel Riquet, Christian Charity in Action (New York: Hawthorn, 1961) 55. 161 The appearance of such a self-conscious ethos of organized charity as early as 125 CE in as culturally Greek a context as that of Aristides argues for the early and impressive power of almsgiving as a force in the spread of the Christian way of life. “Christians gave alms and support, like the synagogue communities their forerunners. This ‘brotherly love’ has been minimized as a reason for turning to the Church, as if only those who were members could know of it. In fact it was widely recognized…Christian ‘love’ was public

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179

The practical result of the situation described here is that pagan converts to Christianity would have been initiated into a distinctively new praxis upon entering the community. For Jewish Christians, however, the situation would obviously have been much different. If the Christian community was indeed a καινὸν γένος, constituted as brothers κατὰ ψυχήν, their charitable ἐπιτήδευµα was nevertheless a common inheritance shared with the Jewish brotherhood κατὰ σάρκα (‫ולדרוש איש את שלום אחיהו ולא ימעל איש בשאר בשרו‬, CD 6:21–7:1; cf. Isa 58:7 LXX). The most remarkable pagan testimony to the Jews’ and Christians’ shared ethos of charity comes from the emperor Julian, who, in a significant letter outlining his religious restoration program, fumed: It is a scandal that there is not a single Jew who is a beggar, and that the godless Galileans feed not only their own (poor) but ours also; while everyone can see that our people lack aid from us.162

If the complete and longstanding failure of the pagan imperial complex to provide for the welfare of the poor had been exposed, this evidently owed something to the Christians’ distribution of aid to non-believers. Julian’s implicit distinction between the Jews and Christians on this score is significant, but must be approached cautiously as a description of the primitive period. Here, as elsewhere, the “parting of the ways” is a tangled business.163 3.3.2.2 Jewish In-Group Focus Contemporary outsiders noticed not only the noteworthy Jewish pattern of practicing charity, but also the way it was reserved to their own people. Tacitus (Histories 5.5.1), after censoriously denouncing the Jews’ accumulation of wealth through tribute and contributions (tributa et stipes), observes that, “The Jews are stubbornly loyal (fides obstinata) toward one another and always ready to show compassion (misericordia in promptu), but toward every other people they feel only hate and enmity.” Tacitus’ anti-Semitism (apparent enough here) is acknowledged – which makes his recognition of

knowledge and must have played its part in drawing outsiders to the faith,” Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (New York: Knopf, 1987) 324. 162 Ep. 84; Ep. 22, 430D. See the remarkable account of Sozomen (Hist. 5.16.5) detailing Julian’s effort to erect a pagan establishment modeled on the Church, including “hospitals for the relief of strangers and of the poor and for other philanthropic purposes,” in order to compete with Christianity for influence over society. See also Steven Muir, “Caring for the Weak’: Polytheist and Christian Charity in Sardis and Smyrna,” in Religious Rivalries and the Struggle for Success in Sardis and Smyrna (Richard Ascough, ed.; Wateroo: Wilfrid Laurier, 2005) 123–40. 163 For perspective on the complexities of this problem, see Adam H. Becker and Annette Yoshiko Reed, (eds.) The Ways that Never Parted: Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007).

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Jewish in-group compassion all the more convincing.164 Jewish sources were keen to note this ready misericordia as a distinguishing mark of the people of the covenant, and the rabbinic literature even suggested that many proselytes converted simply because they wanted to eat or be supported: a variation on “rice Christians” implying clearly enough the need to be an insider to partake of the community’s material benefactions (e.g. ’Aboth R. Nathan 7.1–2; Gen. Rab. 43.7; 48.8; 49.4, 9; Yalqut Shimoni, Emor 745).165 This charity was a point of Jewish pride. Josephus concludes his Contra Apionem telling how Gentiles everywhere admire the Jews’ distinctive customs: namely, Sabbath observance, the food laws, and “our mutual concord (ὁµόνοιαν) with one another and the distribution of our goods (τὴν τῶν ὄντων ἀνάδοσιν)” (C. Ap. 2.283). The apologetic nature of this claim of being universally admired is evident. The antipathy of Tacitus shows clearly enough that Jewish almsgiving could be seen to be as standoffish as the laws of kašrût. This only underscores the profound boundary marking significance of charity, however, which Josephus considered such a signal mark of his race (cf. Philo, Virt. 14.82–83). Showing concern for one’s “brother” in need was an essential aspect of Jewish identity – a defining mark of the true children of the covenant, as much as Sabbath and keeping kosher.166 “Whoever is merciful to his fellow men is certainly of the sons of our father Abraham, and whoever is not merciful to his fellow men is not of the sons of our father Abraham” (b. Beṣa 32b). The theological content of charity most thus not be missed in considering the social, community forming function also served.167 The charged question of who were (or were not) the true heirs of the covenant was, of course, a matter of lively controversy in the Second Temple period, so it should be no surprise that the limits of charity became expressive of the issue. Josephus includes the idea of the “deserving poor” (τοῖς ἀξίοις) in his description of the recipients of Essene almsgiving (B.J. 2.8.6. §134), and this might merely point to the authenticity of a beggar’s need – a perennial preoccupation, in the ancient world as today (e.g. 1 Tim 5:3; Did. 1:5–6; Clement Alex. Strom. 7.12; Lactantius, Inst. 6.11). On the other hand, the



164 See David Rokéaḥ, “Tacitus and Ancient Antisemitism,” Revue des études juives 154 (1995) 281–94. 165 See Louis Feldman, “Success of Early Jewish Proselytism,” in Jew and Gentile in the Ancient World: Attitudes and Interactions from Alexander to Justinian (Princeton: Princeton University, 1993) 336. 166 The trope “equal to all the commandments” (‫ )שקולה כנגד כל המצוות‬is a very revealing rhetorical tie shared by three distinct boundary markers: Sabbath observance, circumcision, and charity. See the discussion of charity and loaning laws in §3.4.1 below. 167 Francis Macatangay (“Acts of Charity as Acts of Remembance,” JSP 23 [2013] 69– 84) has made this point in connection with Tobit, stressing that the “social and humanitarian value…is derived from the fact that acts of mercy are acts of remembering God and are thus first of all a religious duty.”

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181

Book of Tobit, influential at Qumran, operates with the apparent assumption, not only that charity is confined to Jewish kinsmen (Paul Deselaers goes so far as to translate ἐλεηµοσύνη as solidarisches Handeln),168 but that it is to be conferred to those pious Jews “who remember [the Lord] with their whole heart” (Tob 2:2; cf. 1:3; 4:17).169 Ben Sira also counsels, “Give to the devout, but do not help the sinner. Do good to the humble, but do not give to the ungodly; hold back their bread, and do not give it to them” (Sir 12:4–5; cf. 12:7). In this connection, it is important to recall that the citation of Lev 19:18b as almsgiving in CD 6:20 reads ‫ אח‬rather than ‫רע‬. This shift has the ring of insider language and may give a clue to how such “love of brother” was rationed among the Essenes, 170 who, even more than the other Jewish “philosophies,” were “like brothers” (ὥσπερ ἀδελφοῖς) sharing all possessions in common (B.J. 2 §122; cf. CD 20:17–18; Philo, Prob. 79; φιλάλληλοι, B.J. 2.8.2 §120). 171 The expression “love your brother as yourself” in CD 6:20 might accordingly be a restricting interpretation, limiting charity to those who “remembered the Lord with their whole heart” (cf. 1QS 1:1–2), i.e. those whose religious observance was deemed to be proper in light of Essene halakha. Contrary to Brian Capper’s suggestion, then, there is some hint that the Essenes’ exemplary charity was perhaps confined to communal insiders (even if ‫ אח‬could work in a wider sense and was not always the language of communal/sectarian kinship).172 The Talmud, in this connection, interestingly



168 Paul Deselaers, Das Buch Tobit: Studien zu seiner Entstehung, Komposition und Theologie (OBO 43; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1982) 351–4. 169 The festal Passover context obviously constrains the possible candidates for Tobit’s invitation in Tob 2:2. The instruction “place your bread on the grave of the righteous, but give none to sinners” (Tob 4:17) is more apodictic in its limitation on charity. 170 The Essene community intentionally strove to live as an extended family unit (‫משפחה‬, 1QSa). The ‫ משפחה‬was a clan unit within the congregation (‫)עדה‬, between the tribe (‫שבט‬/‫ )מטה‬and the household (‫)בית אב‬. “The mišpahah was traditionally the association of families that supported each other; ideals of mutual support and liability may also lie behind the usage in 1QSa. Perhaps the mišpahah had some financial significance in the movement,” Jutta Jokiranta and Cecilia Wassen, “A Brotherhood at Qumran? Metaphorical Familial Language in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Northern Lights on the Dead Sea Scrolls (Anders Klostergaard Petersen, Torleif Elgvin, Cecilia Wassen, Hanne von Weissenberg, Mikael Winninge, Martin Ehrensvärd, eds.; Leiden: Brill, 2009) 173–203, here 180. 171 The type of community of goods practiced at Qumran was viewed as an expression of brotherly love on the model of Plutarch’s de Frat. Amor. Insiders at Qumran, nevertheless, generally preferred more hierarchical family metaphors (parent-child) to brother language. See Jokiranta and Wassen, “Brotherhood at Qumran,” 173, 194–8, 200–3. 172 Brian Capper (“John, Qumran, and Virtuoso Religion,” in John, Qumran, and the Dead Sea Scrolls: Sixty Years of Discovery and Debate [Mary Coloe and Tom Thatcher, eds.; Society of Biblical Literature Early Judaism and Its Literature 32; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2011] 105) argues that “the ‘needy (aporoumenois) to whom food was supplied at individual discretion cannot have been members of the community, who were

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criticizes the “Men of Jericho” (Essenes) for failing to observe pe’ah prescriptions, perhaps out of a reluctance to see food consumed by outsiders in a state of impurity (b. Pesaḥ. 55b-56a). 173 The School of Shammai evidently had a similar worry (m. Demai 3:1). On the other hand, it is noteworthy that the citation of Ezek 16:49 in CD 6:21 adds the category of the “stranger” (‫)גר‬ to the poor and needy who require assistance. Of course, the sense of the word in the Essene milieu was “proselyte,” so the stipulation simply affirms that, in regard to charity, such converts (to Judaism or the Yahad?) were to be reckoned as incorporated into the people.174 The question of the Essene community’s integration into wider Jewish national life obviously colors this whole discussion, but need not here be decided.175 Whatever the force of ‫אח‬ in in CD 6:20–21 – fellow Essenes or fellow Jews (cf. ‫בשרו‬, CD 7:1) – it is certainly an interpretation of the critical verse (Lev 19:18b). “Neighbor” (‫)רע‬ in Lev 19:18b was read as an insider term exclusive of socio-religious pariahs such as Samaritans (e.g. y. Ket. 3:1; Mek. “Nezikin” 12:11–12).176

allotted exact, appropriate portions.” Capper neglects to consider those Essenes not abiding at the Qumran compound, who were not so carefully allotted their portions. 173 See Constantin Daniel, “Les Esseniens et L’Arrière-fond Historique de la Parabole du Bon Samaritan,” NovT 11 (1969) 92. Kathleen Kenyon (Digging Up Jericho: The Results of Jericho Excavations 1952–1956 [New York: Praeger, 1957] 264) unearthed a large cemetery in Jericho that may attest Essene style burials, but this interpretation is questionable. See Joseph Zias, “The Cemeteries of Qumran and Celibacy: Confusions Laid to Rest?” Dead Sea Discoveries 7 (2000) 220–53. 174 Liminal figures such as the ger show the ambiguities of boundary maintenance. In other regards the ger was not fully incorporated into the community. See, e.g., J. Lübbe, “The Exclusion of the ger from the Future Temple,” in Mogilany 1993: Papers on the Dead Sea Scrolls Offered in Memory of Hans Burgmann (Qumranica Mogilanensia 13; Krakow: Enigma, 1996) 175–82; and especially Gary Porton, The Stranger within Your Gates: Converts and Conversion in Rabbinic Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1994). 175 While acknowledging stages in the community’s development, Brian Capper (“Virtuoso Religion”) argues that the sociological model of a religious “order” rather than a “sect” more adequately describes the integration of the Essenes into wider Jewish national life. 176 The condemnation of the Samaritans (“Cutheans”) is well documented. See Str.-B. I 538–60; II 525; III 313; IV 333, 1183; Jeremias, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus, 352–8; and TDNT VII, 88–94. The Samaritans, for their part, were hardly well disposed to the Judeans, famously defiling the Temple in the days of Coponius (6–9 CE) (Josephus, A.J. 18.29); harassing pilgrims and denying hospitality (Luke 9:51–56); and at times rejecting any blood relation to the “Jews” (Josephus, A.J. 11.341; 12.257).

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183

3.3.3 The Lukan Limits of Charity Exaggerated statements about Lukan universalism often appeal to the Good Samaritan.177 Set within its proper historical and narrative context, however, the text hardly commends an abstract and anachronistic Enlightenment vision of universal brotherhood.178 Rather, Luke presents charity as an ecclesiological phenomenon, whose sphere expands together with the Gospel. Such a view fits easily within the broader Christian perspective, and it is in this light that the boundary-breaking mercy of the Samaritan must be viewed. Early Christian charity generally exhibits an in-group focus, similar to that found in the Jewish context. Many argue, for instance, that fellow Christians are the proper referent of Matthew’s celebrated ἑνὶ τούτων τῶν ἀδελφῶν µου τῶν ἐλαχίστων (Matt 25:40, 45; cf. 10:11–15, 40, 42; 12:46–50; 18:5–6, 10, 14);179 and there can be no doubt about the Christian identity of the ἀδελφός in need in 1 John 3:17 (cf. διακονήσαντες τοῖς ἁγίοις, Heb 6:10).180 James likewise indicates that almsgiving is for the needy “brother or sister” (ἀδελφὸς ἢ ἀδελφή, Jas 2:15) and that the native place to show care for the poor is in the community assembly (εἰς συναγωγὴν ὑµῶν, 2:2). The normal context and collection point for early Christian almsgiving does indeed appear to have been within the initiates’ agape meal.181 Justin’s witness here



177 On the strong element of Jewish particularism preserved in Lukan universalism, see Daniel Marguerat and Emmanuelle Steffek, “Luc-Actes et la naissance du Dieu universel,” Études théologiques et religieuses 87 (2012) 35–55. 178 On the problem of anachronizing Christian universalism, see the provocative essay of Markus Bockmuehl, “The Trouble with the Inclusive Jesus,” Horizons in Biblical Theology 33 (2011) 9–23, esp. 21–3. See also Terrence Donaldson, Judaism and the Gentiles: Jewish Patterns of Universalism (To 135 C.E.) (Waco, TX: Baylor University, 2007). 179 The point is disputed, but increasingly held. See, e.g., R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew (NICNT; Grand Rapids, 2007) 957–9; Davies and Allison, Matthew 3, 428–9; and John Donahue, “The ‘Parable’ of the Sheep and the Goats’: A Challenge to Christian Ethics,” TS 47 (1986) 3–31. “Diese heute verbreitetste und fast Allgemeingut gewordene Interpretation von Mt 25,31–46, die ihren Kernpunkt in der Identifikation der ‘ganz geringen Brüder’ mit allen notleidenden Menschen hat, ist nicht alt. Sie ist erst im frühen 19. Jh. wichtig geworden,” Luz, Matthäus 4, 525; cf. 525–30. 180 See, e.g., Raymond E. Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple: the Life, Loves, and Hates of an Individual Church in New Testament Times (New York: Paulist, 1979) 132. Whatever the extravagances of Brown’s reconstruction, there is truth in the claim that “for the author of the Epistles ‘brethren’ were those members of the Johannine community who were in communion (koinōnia) with him and accepted his interpretation of the Johannine Gospel.” 181 While the celebration of the feast was separated from the Eucharist rather early on, the focus on material charity in the Christian meal remained. See Andrew McGowan, “Rethinking Agape and Eucharist in Early North African Christianity,’ Studia Liturgica 34 (2004) 165–76; and J. F. Keating, The Agapé and the Eucharist in the Early Church; Studies in the History of the Christian Love-Feasts (London: Methuen, 1901). Tertullian’s

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is impressive. His famous description of the community’s Sunday service begins with the remark that “Those who have come to the aid of all those who lack” (οἱ ἔχοντες τοῖς λειπονµένοις πᾶσιν ἐπικουροῦµεν, Apol. 67.1). After outlining the readings and prayers, he then describes the generous and voluntary nature of the giving and how the offerings are stored up in reserve under the administration of the presider (67.6). This presider it is who ensures material care for “the orphans and the widows, and those who on account of illness or another cause are in want, and those in need, and prisoners and strangers; in a word…all those in need” (67.7). 182 It would be difficult to prove, but it is likely enough that a Jewish Passover custom influenced this Eucharistic meal-based cult of charity (cf. Tob 2:2; Jn 13:29; m. Pesaḥ. 9.11; 10.1). If early Christian almsgiving thus preserved a strong in-group ethic, the Jewish and Christian patterns of charity would be distinguished more through the boundaries set by ethnic versus fictive kinship, than by internal versus

description in his Apology is as explicit as we could want in showing that the ἀγάπη meal was linked directly (and by name) to charitable giving: “Our feast shows its motive by its name. It is called by the Greek word for love (dilectio). Whatever is reckoned the cost, money spent in the name of piety is gain, since with that refreshment we benefit the needy” (39.16). The Apostolic Constitutions still stresses the invitation of widows to the meal; and in rural Egypt, even down to the 7th century, a direct link persists between almsgiving and the cultic “akape” meal, as seen in an interesting Coptic text. See Anthony Alcock, “The Agape,” VC 54 (2000) 209; and W. Belt, “Die Zauberostraka der Papyrus-Sammlung der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin,” Beiträge zur Orientwissenschaft 2 (1980) 70. Cf. Jude 12; 2 Pet 2:13; Did. 10.1; Ign. Smyrn. 8.2; Ep. Apost. 15; Acts Paul and Thecla 25; Clement Alex. Paed. 2.4.3–4; cf. 2.6.1–7.1; Strom. 3.2.10; Tertullian, De jejun. 17.2–3; Passio Perpet. 17.1; Municius Felix 31. 182 Justin here sheds light on another significant charity text. Ignatius’ reference to Rome “presiding in charity” (προκαθηµένη τῆς ἀγάπης) refers to the impressive alms given by that local church. Cf. Martin Hengel, Property and Riches in the Early Church: Aspects of a Social History of Early Christianity (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1974) 44. Dionysius of Corinth (fl. 171 CE) already speaks of the reputation and tradition of Roman giving: “This has been your custom from the beginning: to do good (εὐεργετεῖν) in divers ways to all the brethren, and to send supplies to many churches in every city: now relieving the poverty of the needy, now making provision (ἐπιχορηγοῦντας), by the supplies which you have been sending from the beginning for the brethren in the mines [i.e. suffering under forced labor], preserving the ancestral custom of the Romans, true Romans as you are. Your blessed bishop Soter has not only carried on this habit but has even increased it, by administering the bounty distributed to the saints” (apud Eusebius, H.E. 4.23.10). The “ancestral” Roman custom must be the grain dole. See note 150. In the light of Justin’s remarks, we can secure Ignatius’ specific liturgical allusion and reference to the bishop at the agape (cf. Rom 7:3; Smyrn. 8:2). Rome behaves in the whole congregation of the churches like the presider who gathers and distributes the community’s alms. This metaphor entails another (ecumenical) level of the circle of the brotherhood being defined with reference to the work of charity.

3.3 Charity as a Boundary Marker

185

external solicitude. Even on the matter of fictive kinship, however, one must acknowledge a difference of degree rather than kind. As already seen, the proselyte (‫ )גר‬might also be incorporated into the outreach of Jewish charity (e.g. CD 6:21; ’Abot R. Nathan 7.1–2; Gen. Rab. 43.7; 48.8; 49.4, 9).183 Nevertheless, in early Christian circles the in-group was more permeable and the universalist trend much stronger. It is no accident, then, that in Pauline Christianity almsgiving pushed in some way beyond the limits of the “household of the faith” (οἰκεῖος τῆς πίστεως, Gal 6:10; cf. Tertullian, Con. Marc. 4:16; Apol. 42).184 If a certain mission strategy was implicit in this aggressive extension of charity πρὸς πάντας, 185 Luke articulates a unique perspective on the joint work of charity and evangelization. The controversy over the “daily service” (ἡ διακονία ἡ καθηµερινή) is of special importance here (Acts 6:1–7). On the one hand, the deeply rooted Palestinian nature of this service of charity is evident. The initial concentration of the community’s poor ministry among “the Hebrews” points in this direction, and it is natural to note the Jewish parallel (if not antecedent) in the daily tamḥûy (m. Pe’ah 8:7; m. Pesaḥ. 10:1). 186 Important connections with the Essenes are also worthy of atten-



183 See, e.g., Michael Satlow, “‘Fruit and the Fruit of Fruit’: Charity and Piety among Jews in Late Antique Palestine,” JQR 100 (2010) 265. 184 Paul’s admonition ἐργαζώµεθα τὸ ἀγαθὸν τρὸς πάντας, µάλιστα δὲ πρὸς τοὺς οἰκείους τῆς πίστεως (Gal 6:10) sounds generic and plays a summative role in the foregoing paraenesis. Economic overtones are evident throughout 6:1–10, however, and it should be recalled that the locution ἐργαζώµεθα τὸ ἀγαθὸν was nearly a technical term in the ancient world for conferring material benefits on others. See Chapter Two §2.4.2.2. Winter, Seek the Welfare of the City, 11–40. Whatever the universal application of Paul’s directive (τρὸς πάντας), the plain in-group priority (µάλιστα) should not be lost. See Bernard Ukwuegbu, “Paraenesis, Identity-defining Norms, or Both? Galatians 5:13–6:10 in the Light of Social Identity Theory,” CBQ 70 (2008) 538–59. Tertullian gives evidence that the principle articulated in Gal 6:10 was followed (at least in places). The reputation of Tertullian as a close reader of Paul is explored in Todd Still and David Wilhite, eds., Tertullian and Paul (Pauline and Patristic Scholars in Debate 1; New York: Bloomsbury, 2013). 185 See Fox, Pagans and Christians, 324. 186 See Jeremias, Jerusalem, 172. Haenchen (Acts of the Apostles, 261–2) determines that “the Christians presumably had already introduced a system of poor-relief distinct from the Jewish. This could only have been necessary if they were no longer supported by the relief arrangements of the Jewish community. In other words, it presupposes a lengthy evolution and estrangement from the synagogue.” In the context of pre-rabbinic Judaism, this line of reasoning is misleading. The later (literary) consolidation of a distinct tamḥûy and qûppâ should not be rigidly reified as an object of comparison with Acts 6:1; nor should a monolithic and overly centralized “synagogue” be understood as the sole agent of local charity.

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tion. 187 Ultimately, however, it is most critical to observe the meal-based pattern of charity again at work.188 The language of διακονεῖν τραπέζαις (Acts 6:2) is decisive. 189 The conjunction of these terms is not common, but administering the community’s financial resources (i.e. banking tables), even if this implies care for the poor, should be rejected as the basic image.190 A parallel in Test. Job 12:1 is much more illuminating. If a man cheerful in heart (ἱλαρὸς τῇ καρδίᾳ)191 came saying, “I have nothing available to help the poor (ἐπικουρῆσαι τοῖς πένησιν). Yet, I wish at least to serve the poor at your table (διακονῆσαι τοῖς πτῶχοῖς ἐν τῇ σῇ τραπέζῃ).”192

The trope of opening one’s home to the poor stands behind Job’s open table of charity in this passage: “Let thy house be opened wide and let the needy be members of your household (‫( ”)בני ךבית‬PA 1:5; cf. Job 29:16). In the context of Acts, such open koinonia finds expression in the daily (καθηµερινή) table fellowship celebrated in the homes (κατ᾽ οἶκον) of the community.193 They were daily (καθ᾽ ἡµέραν), gathering together in the Temple, and breaking bread in their homes (κλῶντές τε κατ᾽ οἶκον ἄρτον), sharing food (µετελάµβανον τροφῆς) with glad and generous hearts (ἐν ἀγαλλιάσει καὶ ἀφελότητι καρδίας),194 praising God and enjoying favor with all the people (Acts 2:46–47; cf. 2:42).

187

Brian Capper, “The Palestinian Cultural Context of Earliest Christian Community of Goods,” in The Book of Acts in Its Palestinian Setting (Richard Bauckham, ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996) 351. 188 On the Jewish background to Luke’s presentation, see Brad Blue, “The Influence of Jewish Worship on Luke’s Presentation of the Early Church,” in Witness to the Gospel: The Theology of Acts (I. Howard Marshall and David Petersen, eds.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) 473–97. 189 On this whole issue, see the helpful study of Pao, “Waiters or Preachers,” 127–44. 190 See Kirsopp Lake and Henry J. Cadbury, English Translation and Commentary: Beginnings of Christianity IV, Part I: The Acts of the Apostles (London: Macmillan, 1933) 64; and Haenchen, Acts of the Apostles, 262 fn. 2. 191 R. B. Spittler (“Testament of Job,” in Old Testament Pseudepigraha, Volume 1, 844) notes, “The words are reminiscent of Paul’s ‘cheerful giver’ (hilaron…dotēn, 2 Cor 9:7).” 192 For the text, see Robert Kraft, The Testament of Job according to the SV Text (SBLTT 5; Pseudepigrapha Series; Missoula, MT: SBL and Scholars, 1974) 34–35. 193 Surprisingly, οἴκος is something of a Lukan word (Matt – 9x; Mark – 13x; Luke – 32x; Acts – 24x). See Bradley Blue, “Acts and the House Church,” in The Book of Acts in Its Greco-Roman Setting (David Gill and Conrad Gempf, eds; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994) 119–222; and Gregory Linton, “House Church Meetings in the New Testament Era,” Stone-Campbell Journal 8 (2005) 229–244. 194 As with the ἁπλότης, the sense of generosity should be entertained here. Cf. Test. Iss. 5.1. See note 57 above.

3.3 Charity as a Boundary Marker

187

Accordingly, David Pao is correct to say: “Rather than the imagery of the ‘soup kitchen,’ τῇ διακονίᾳ τῇ καθηµερινῇ is best understood to refer to the ‘common sacred meal.’”195 In this light, the neglect of the Hellenists is not altogether different from the divided gatherings described by Paul (ἐπι τὸ αὐτό, 1 Cor 11:20 cf. Acts 2:44), where some were left going away hungry at the breaking of the bread (1 Cor 11:21; cf. 1 Cor 10:16; Jas 2:1–5).196 Unlike Corinth, of course, the linguistic divisions of the primitive Jerusalem community likely created two distinct liturgical congregations, entailing logistical issues of a new order.197 More significantly, however, differing perspectives on the Law in its cultic and ritual aspects seem to have separated these two linguistic groups. 198 In any case, whatever social issues help explain the neglect of the Hellenist widows, some expression of communion in charity was clearly missing in the fractio of the expanding assembly.199 The deep symbolism of this affair with the Hellenist widows, with its suggestive sociological divide, was not lost on Luke. He intentionally presents the incident through his prism of table fellowship as a matter of “inclusion of the outcasts.” 200 As such, attending to the needs of the Hellenists directly recalls Jesus’ embrace of tax collectors and sinners. The catchword “grumbling” (γογγυσµός, Luke 5:29–31; 15:2; 19:7; Acts 6:1) helps makes the connection, as does the status of widows as lowly and vulnerable outcasts oppressed by the elite (Luke 4:25–26; 20:46–47; 21:2). As a reprise of Jesus’ ministry and proclamation of the kingdom, the embrace of the Greekspeaking widows also foreshadows the advancing progress of the Christian



195 Pao, Table Fellowship Motif, 137. The characterization of a “soup kitchen” comes from Luke Timothy Johnson, The Acts of the Apostles (SP 5; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1992) 106. 196 See Joseph Fitzmyer, First Corinthians (AB 32; New Haven: Yale, 2008) 427–8; and Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, St. Paul’s Corinth (Minneapolis: Liturgical, 2002) 166–9. Murphy-O’Connor suggests that wealthy Christians arrived early for the “Lord’s supper” and began banqueting well before the freedmen and slaves could participate – taking little heed to accommodate the poor or save them special portions. 197 Martin Hengel (History of Earliest Christianity, 71–6; Between Jesus and Paul: Studies in the Earliest History of Christianity [Philadelphia; Fortress, 1983] 54–8) detects a liturgical and theological division between the Hellenists and the Hebrews, observing, “difficulties in caring for the poor were an easily explainable consequence.” The church in Corinth may have had six or more distinct house churches (1 Cor 1:11, 16; 16:23; Acts 18:2–4, 7, 8; cf. Rom 16:1–2), but evidently they at times met all together in one place (1 Cor 14:23), possibly at the home of Gaius (Rom 16:23). 198 Ibid., 56–8. 199 For an interesting liturgical perspective on early Christians’ ritual sharing of food, see Barry Craig, Fractio Panis: A History of the Breaking of Bread in the Roman Rite (Studia Anselmiana 151; Rome: Pontificio Ateneo Sant’ Anselmo, 2011). 200 See Pao, “Waiters or Preachers,” 131–5.

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communion into unexplored new societies of outcasts: a movement that will climax in the table fellowship held with the gentile Cornelius and his household (Acts 10:1–11:18).201 Through the account of Acts 6:1–7 Luke has thus welded together the great missionary opening to the nations and the ministry of charity. It is no mistake in the narrative, then, that “men chosen to allow the Twelve to preach rather than serve at table appear later only as preachers and evangelists.”202 For Luke, the extension of charitable hospitality is the extension of the Gospel. In this way it is precisely their “status as ‘waiters’ that allows the Seven to continue the mission of Jesus in becoming ‘preachers’ to the outcasts and oppressed.”203 As recipients of mercy and inclusion, the Hellenists become agents of the same – propelling the Gospel of charity along its first fateful step outward toward the end of the world: from Jerusalem and Judea to Samaria (Acts 1:8). Indeed, “the beginnings of the mission among the hated Samaritans, who were worse than Gentiles in the eyes of Jews with a national consciousness…[was] the achievement of these Hellenists” (cf. Acts 8:4–25).204 The Hellenists are in-group outsiders, of course. 205 They are believers, even Jewish believers, though abandoned on the margins of the Church. The group’s ambivalent status is characteristic of Luke’s step-wise vision of the Christian mission, which should not be too one-sidedly cast as a “collision” – a wholly dichotomous confrontation between the Church and the world.206 All along the way into the pagan outer realm, transitional parties inhabit intermediate zones. After the Hellenists come the Samaritans, who are ethnically, geographically and theologically the archetypal example of this hybridity.



201 “In the light of the development of the narrative in the few chapters after Acts 6:1–7, the understanding of the Hellenists as those extending table fellowship to those beyond the traditional community should no longer be surprising,” ibid. 141. 202 Henry J. Cadbury, “The Hellenists,” in Additional Notes to the Commentary The Beginnings of Christianity, Volume V, Part I, The Acts of the Apostles (Kirsopp Lake and Henry J. Cadbury, eds.; London: Macmillan, 1933) 62. 203 Pao, “Waiters or Preachers,” 144. 204 Hengel, Between Jesus and Paul, 56. 205 It is interesting to note that the Pentateuchal slave laws (Exod 21:2–6; Deut 15:12– 18) address charity to a similar set of “in-group outsiders,” i.e. the ‫עברי‬. As Bergsma (Jubilee, 44) explains of this hypernym (not synonym) of “Israelite”: “It seems likely that when used in inner-Israelite communication – as in the Law codes – ‘Hebrew’ refers to those who share this [communal] identity but are not part of the ‘in-group’; this is, it refers to non-Israelite Hebrews.” 206 Rowe, World Upside Down, 50. Rowe’s engaging analysis conspicuously neglects the God-fearers as a category in the worldview of Acts. This is symptomatic of the profound Barthian vision of the book (e.g., 17!).

3.3 Charity as a Boundary Marker

189

The God-fearing Gentiles represent the outer reach of Luke’s extension of table fellowship.207 As a functional limit to the reach of charity and the Gospel, the interesting fact about these God-fearers is their almsgiving towards “the people” (ὁ λαός). The inside outsiders, in other words, already behave like members of the covenant should. They present themselves as “neighbors.” Cornelius, with his many gifts of alms (ποιῶν ἐλεηµοσύνας πολλὰς τῷ λαῷ, Acts 10:2), is paradigmatic in this regard. The equally generous centurion in the Gospel (ἀγαπᾷ γὰρ τὸ ἔθνος ἡµῶν καὶ τὴν συναγωγὴν αὐτὸς ῴκοδόµησεν, Luke 7:5) is an impressive anticipation of the same behavior. Within the schema Luke has set, such behavior – the “fruits worthy of repentance” not found among the insider elite in Israel (cf. Luke 3:8–14; 7:9; 20:9–19; Acts 11:18) – closely resembles the boundary-breaking charity of the Good Samaritan on the road.208 These outcast figures manifest exactly the good works neither John nor Jesus could elicit from the rich Pharisees and lawyers.209 The outward movement of mission, then, does not overwhelm the centripetal force of charity. Within Luke’s narrative, alms are directed from the margins by those who have been given the gift of life-giving repentance (Acts 11:18) to the people of God. Luke’s narrative portrayal of almsgiving, in fact, offers no clear example of charity bestowed on pagans.210 (The peculiar reversal of the “neighbor” appelation in Luke 10:36 must not obscure the fact that the Samaritan is the agent, not the recipient of mercy.) The wealth of the

207

For a review of research on God-fearers in general and in the Lukan context, see Bernd Wander, Gottesfürchtige und Sympathisanten: Studien zum heidnischen Umfeld von Diasporasynagogen (WUNT 104; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1998) 1–14 and 138–203, esp. 186–94. 208 Luke does not present the fate of Israel in the same precise terms as Matthew, who gives the vineyard to another nation that will produce the proper fruits (Matt 21:43). Understanding Israel’s ultimate fate in Luke is an ongoing matter of debate. See, e.g., Robert Tannehill, “Israel in Luke-Acts: A Tragic Story,” JBL 104 (1985) 69–85; and Jacob Jervell, “God’s Faithfulness to the Faithless People: Trends in Interpretation of LukeActs,” World & World 12 (1992) 29–36. 209 The figure of Zacchaeus might be added to the Samaritan and the centurions. His resolve to give alms helps contextualize the relation between salvation and works, which might be mischaracterized if only Luke 10 and Acts 10 were considered. See Dennis Hamm, “Luke 19:8 Once Again: Does Zacchaeus Defend or Resolve?” JBL 107 (1988) 431–7; and D. A. S. Ravens, “Zacchaeus: The Final Part of Lukan Triptych?” JSNT 41 (1991) 19–32. 210 Social science approaches to the Gospel have stressed that “the evangelist’s concern was limited to the needy of his own cicle” – even while insisting “the full implications remain to be worked out in our time in theologies of liberation and hope.” Mary Ann Beavis, “‘Expecting Nothing in Return’: Luke’s Picture of the Marginalized,” Int 48 (1994) 364–5. See also, Pilgrim, Good News, 171–2; and Esler, Community and gospel, 197–200.

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nations instead pours into Israel through alms (Acts 24:17). It is no accident that the immediate fruit of the Hellenists’ mission – which promptly spread beyond Samaria as far as the Greeks in Antioch (Acts 11:19–20) – was nothing other than a work of διακονία for the brethren back in Jerusalem (11:27– 30). If Luke thus opens a door of Gospel charity to outsiders, he does so in a way still centered on the community of faith. The seemingly unrestricted ethic παντὶ αἰτοῦντί σε δίδου in Luke 6:30 must accordingly be contextualized – and not only by sociological and missiological factors. At work in this counsel from the Lukan Sermon on the Plain is an overt imitatio Dei topos, as the unit’s conclusion makes plain: ἔσεσθε υἱοὶ ὑψίστου, ὅτι αὐτὸς χρηστός ἐστιν ἐπὶ τοὺς ἀχαρίστους καὶ πονηρούς. Γίνεσθε οἰκτίρµονες καθὼς ὁ πατὴρ ὑµῶν οἰκτίρµων ἐστίν (Luke 6:35–36).

Such thinking has strong echoes in authors like Philo, in his notion of an imitative philanthropia shown to the poor (e.g. Mut. 129; Spec. 1.221), as well as in less hellenizied Jewish sources. 211 The Double Tradition logion preserved in Matt 5:45 has also exercted its influence here, and it is easy to imagine that Luke 6:30 has been shaped to harmonize with an instruction on enemy love. It would accordingly be inaccurate to locate Luke’s text principally in the known debates about the worthy recipients of charity, however much it obviously exerts a pressure in this direction. 212 The early Church sensed this attenuated universalism and regularly qualified Luke’s too generous text with a more discerning logion, often identified as Sir 12:1 – “Let your alms sweat in your hand, until you know to whom you give” (Ἱδρωσάτω ἡ ἐλεηµοσύνη σου εἰς τὰς χειράς σου, µέχρις ἂν γνῷς τίνι δῷς).213 The primitive reception history would thus caution against too radical a reading of Luke 6:30 (e.g. Did. 1:5–6; Clement Alex. Quis div. 31; Tertullian, De. fug. 13). It is probably best to hold it close to Paul’s exhortation in Gal 6:10, structured by a communal ordo amoris. In the end, the Lukan instruction “Give to all who ask of you” finds its most helpful echo in Acts 3:1–10, when Peter gives the Gospel as alms to the beggar by the Beautiful Gate. Whatever Luke 6:30 may or may not indicate about active interaction with the “outside” world,214 this scene in Acts gives graphic, archetypal expression to the encounter with the poor as an essentially evangelical moment. In the act of almsgiving one is always poised at a

211

See Satlow, “‘Fruit and the Fruit of Fruit,’” 267–8. On this issue, Steven Bridge, “To Give or Not to Give? Deciphering the Saying of Didache 1.6,” Journal of Early Christian Studies 5 (1997) 555–68. 213 On the transmission of this logion, see idem., 556–9. 214 In order to reconcile Luke 6:30 and Sir 12:1 (?), Augustine (Exposition on Psalm 103) makes an interesting distinction between the poor who themselves seek us out and those poor we ourselves should actively seek out. 212

3.3 Charity as a Boundary Marker

191

threshold, on the frontier of the Church. If the (modern secular) thought of crusading against world poverty is thus, for Luke, inextricable from the progress of the Gospel, his vision is integrally expressed in the idea of koinonia. The cripple by the gate, having received Gospel mercy, “entered with them (σὺν αὐτοῖς) into the Temple, walking about and rejoicing and praising God” (Acts 3:8): an image of his entrance into the saving eschatological communion. In Luke’s theological vision, it is precisely in the expanding Christian communion that the covenant promise of Deut 15:4 is made real: “There shall be none in need among you” (cf. Acts 4:32).215 Though the Hellenistic features of this koinonia construct have been frequently noted, the importance of Deut 15:1–11 in Luke’s notion of the eschatological sharing of goods has not been sufficiently considered. The passage is critical for the whole Lukan perspective on charity. It contains the primitive Jubilee (šĕmiṭṭâ) legislation (cf. Lev 25:2; Luke 4:16–30) and is centered on the distinction between the “neighbor” (‫רע‬, πλησίον) and the “foreigner” (‫נכרי‬, ἀλλότριος). This key prophecy of Deut 15:4, which Luke understands to be fulfilled, carried the significant blessing that Israel, enjoying its vindication, will “lend to many nations” (‫והעבטת גוים רבים‬, Deut 15:6). What does such lending entail? The prospect of Israel’s holding a position of privileged prosperity is clearly in view, and though the original audience would have surely understood the text in terms of domination, the indebtedness of the nations need not be understood in too crude a sense (cf. Rom 15:27). Already in the context of Deuteronomy, loans serve as an act of intra-group charity within Israel, directed toward one’s impoverished brother (‫מאהיך האביון‬, Deut 15:7–8; cf. Exod 22:24). It was possible, then, to re-conceive the covenant blessing prophesied in Deuteronomy as the extension of fraternal charity to many nations – effectively making “neighbors” of the Gentiles, i.e. treating them as belonging to the covenant people. In this text, in other words, Luke would envision, not the growth of international banking by a millenaristically wealthy Israel, lawfully exacting interest from the Gentiles, but rather the worldwide expansion of Israel’s charitable in-group through the eschatological expansion of covenantal in-group-like relations.

215

Luke, whose anointing tradition is unique (Luke 7:36–50), significantly omits Jesus’ quotation of Deut 15:11 as recorded in Mark 14:7: “For you always have the poor with you.” The difficulties of the seemingly contradictory text of Deuteronomy 15:1–11 are recognized. On the coherence of the unit as expressing two possible scenarios, see Mukenge, “‘il n’y aura pas de nécessiteux chez toi,’” 69–86.

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3.4 “I Will Repay You”: Unraveling the Parable’s End 3.4 Unraveling the Parable’s End

3.4.1 Charity and Loans In order to approach the end of Luke’s parable properly, it is necessary to make a little excursus. In particular, it is necessary to see how vitally linked charity and loaning laws were. Only from this perspective can one appreciate the full background to the Samaritan’s interaction with the πανδοχεύς in Luke 10:34–35. Before the New Testament seized upon Lev 19:18b as an almsgiving verse, the most important Pentateuchal charity texts were the injunction to open one’s hand freely in Deut 15:7–11 and the poor tithe described in Deut 26:12–15. While the sacral nature of charity stems from the latter legislation, the essential boundary marking function belongs to the former. In this regard, the special significance of Deut 15:7–11 is that it blends the language of giving (‫ )נתון תתן‬and the language of loans (‫)והעבט תעביטנו‬. 216 As such, the reach of charity came under the control of lending prescriptions. The linking of loans and charity was natural, but the Torah’s authority ensured the lasting association of these two commands. Indeed, in ancient Israel, lending freely (i.e. without interest) was closely bound to works of mercy, for loans were not about venture capital, but helping those need.217 The plight of those forced into debt was recognized with pity as the struggle for survival (cf. Neh 5:1–8). From this perspective, Ezekiel seamlessly sandwiches merciful benefactions between the precepts on pledges and usury: He [the upright man] returns the pledge to the debtor and does not steal.

216

It may be, as Isaac Seligmann (“Darlehen, Bürgschaft und Zins in Recht und Gedankenwelt der Hebräischen Bibel,” in Gesammelte Studien zur Hebräischen Bibel (I. Seligmann, I. Leo, R. Smend, and E. Blum, eds.; FAT 41; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004) 319–48) argues, that “giving” (‫ )נתן‬language effectively operates here as “loaning” language. This only demonstrates how far the idea of charity was eclipsed, however. The charitable purpose of the loan laws is ultimately clear from the emphasis upon the “poor” (mentioned five times in Deut 15:7–11; cf. Exod 22:24; Lev 25:35). The conjoined prescription to return the debtor’s pledge each night demonstrates an abounding concern for the impoverished condition of one’s fellow in need of money (Exod 22:25–26; Deut 24:12–13). 217 Jerome captures this assumption with pointed irony: “Let the merciful usurer tell us whether he gave to someone who had possessions or to one who did not. If to someone who had possessions, he should not have given to him at all. But he gave as if to someone who did not have anything. Therefore why does he demand more back as if from someone who had something?” In Ez. 6.18 (PL 25, 176–77). On the context of loan-making and debt, see Robert Maloney, “Usury and Restrictions on Interest Taking in the Ancient Near East,” CBQ 36 (1974) 1–21; Goodman, “Social Conflict and the Problem of Debt,” 417– 27; Martin Hengel, Property and Riches, 19–21; and Jeremias, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus, 126–34.

3.4 Unraveling the Parable’s End

193

He gives his bread to the hungry and clothes the naked, He neither lends at interest nor takes increase (Ezek 18:7–8a; cf. 18:16–17).

In a later context giving loans and giving alms were developed along a single line of logic, so that for the wisdom tradition represented in Sirach “almsgiving is understood to be a special kind of loan”: a line of credit extended to God (Prov 19:17). 218 Philo translates the commandment on usury into the language of φιλανθρωπία (Spec. 2.71), but this is recognized specifically to mean “with open hands and willing minds to give cheerfully to those in need (χαρίζεσθαι τοῖς δεοµένοις)” (Virt. 1.83). It is no innovation, then, that in the discourse of the rabbis almsgiving and the prohibition on usury are often tightly bound together.219 In the Bavli, it is true, charity and loans are contrasted, to the favor of the latter: Rabbi Abba said in the name of Rabbi Simeon ben Lachish (A2): He who lends (‫ )המלוה‬is greater than he who performs charity (‫)העושה צדקה‬, and he who forms a business partnership (‫ )מטיל בכיס‬is greater than all (b. Šhabb. 63a).220

This opposition, like the distinction between ‫ צדקה‬and ‫גמילות חסדים‬, is a later development, however.221

218

Gregory, Everlasting Signet Ring, 221 (see the entire discussion, 81–221). Patristic authors made able use of this connection. Leo’s famous canon against usury (Nec hoc quoque) plays prettily on the notion of charity as a loan: “We ought to look toward and practice (exercere) only that usury (fenus) whereby what we bestow in mercy (misericorditer tribuimus) here we may recover from the Lord, who will restore many times over what will last forever (in perpetuum mensura)” (PL 54, 615–616). In the end, as in Leo’s edict, giving free loans and giving alms could fuse as a single commandment. 219 Rabbinic literature “did not pose the usury question in terms of justice; it saw it in terms of charity towards the poor, especially where the bond of brotherhood united the poor man with his brethren,” Robert Maloney, “Usury in Greek, Roman, and Rabbinic Thought,” Traditio 27 (1971) 79–109, here 109, emphasis added. 220 The ‫ כיס‬could refer to the purse of a collection fund (Jastrow s.v.), but the principle is that one seeks neither to embarrass nor enable the poor, hence the sense of a common financial undertaking (“business partnership”) is appropriate (cf. b. Ket. 10, 4) 221 See t. Peah 4.19. While ‫( גמילות חסדים‬e.g. visiting the sick, giving hospitality to strangers, equipping poor betrothed couples, comforting the bereaved, etc.) is implicitly superior to charity because it can be done for the living and the dead, the poor and the rich, and with or without money, the Tosefta text never actually draws this conclusion. It rather links the two together as “equal to all the commandments.” Rashi understood that ‫ צדקה‬is the act of giving, whereas ‫ גמילות חסדים‬is the noble intention behind the action. Maimonides saw a contrast between what is required in justice and what comes generously from the heart.

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In the rabbinic setting it was possible (at least for rhetorical purposes) to imagine the observance of single privileged work counting as complete observance of the Law. 222 Indeed, this very thought informs the Great Commandment tradition in the Gospels, especially in Matthew’s version (i.e. Matt 22:40). The idea thus arose that certain commandments, such as Sabbath observance, are “equal to all the commandments” (‫שקולה כנגד כל המצוות‬, Exod. Rab. 25.12 [3x]).223 One’s devotion to such precepts was thus the measure of one’s comprehensive devotion: “God said, ‘If you virtuously observe the Sabbath, I will regard you as observing all the commands of the Law, but if you profane it, I will regard it as if you had profaned all the commands’” (Exod. Rab. 25.12).224 If the commands like Sabbath rest and circumcision were preeminent acts of covenant observance – natural as representative commands – it is highly significant that the injunction against usury was likewise treated as a paradigmatic precept upon which everything might hang. “Anyone who lends on interest transgresses every prohibition in the Torah…. Scripture regards all who take interest as if they had committed all the evil deeds in the world…but he who lends without interest is regarded by God as if he had fulfilled all the commandments” (Exod. Rab. 31.14).225 This language, more-

222

The conceit may be related in some way to the Greco-Roman doctrine of the integrity of the virtues: ὁ µίαν ἔχων, καὶ πάσας ἔχει (Philo, Mos. 2.7; cf. Seneca De beneficiis 4.21.1; 5.15.1). See Str.-B. III 755; IV 22; Midr. Ps. 15.7 (60a). An exchange between Rabbi Gamliel and Rabbi Akiva turns on this very idea (b. Sanh. 81a; cf. Ezek 18:5). 223 On the still inconclusive dating of Exodus Rabbah, see H. L. Strack and Günter Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996) 308–9. While the final form of the text may be as late as the 10th or 11th century, the important collection of loan-related material in Exod. Rab. 31 belongs to the Tanḥuma-Yelamdenu portion of the text which relies on Tannaitic literature and the Yerushalmi, as well as the early Amoraic midrashim and Tanḥuma. The chapter has deep affinities with the Tannaitic traditions collected in this chapter. 224 Circumcision, interestingly, does not seem to have been the subject of so explicit a statement about fulfillment. Still, its peerless value was celebrated in such a way as clearly to imply it: “Great is circumcision, because it supplants the strict Sabbath precept” (b. Ned. 3, 11); “Great is circumcision, because it is equal to all commandments in the Torah” (‫שקולה כנגד כל המצוות שבתורה‬, b. Ned. 32a). Strack-Billerbeck (IV 38) comments on this: “Wie hier die Bundesschlieβung auf Grund der Worte oder Gebote der Tora erfolgt, so Gn 17,10 auf Grund der Beschneidung; daraus die Folgerung: die Beschneidung ist sämtlichen Geboten in der Tora gleichwertig.” See, especially b. Ned. 31b; Šabb. 133a; 137b; Midr. Ps. 6.1; cf. Str.-B. IV 24–5, 38–40. The phrase ‫ שקולה כנגד כל המצוות‬became a trope applied to the most esteemed commandments. For example, it is derived from Deut 11:31– 32 that “[The duty of] dwelling in the Land of Israel is equal to all the other commandments of the Torah put together” (‫שקולה כנגד כל המצוות‬, Sifre 80 [2x]). 225 The scriptural proof texts are Ezek 18:13 and Ps 15:5, respectively. Ezek 18:13 – “He lends at interest and exacts usury; shall he then live? He shall not live.” b. Tem. 6a–b

3.4 Unraveling the Parable’s End

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over, is bound directly to the commandment to give alms: “Anyone who has riches and gives charity to the poor and does not lend on interest is regarded as if he observed all the commandments” (Exod. Rab. 30.24). Indeed, in a Tannaitic formulation, “Acts of kindness and charity are equal to all the commandments” (t. Peah 4.19).226 One must not imagine this high estimation to be an isolated theme. Attention to the significance of the commandment on lending was a major preoccupation in early Judaism.227 The rare importance assigned to the precept is unmistakable. In one account, Israel’s Exile and loss of the Temple came from lending out on interest.228 Sifra made the lending law the very confession of the covenant: “I, the Lord Your God, brought you out of Egypt, on the condition that you keep the commandments on usury. Whoever professes them professes the Exodus from Egypt and vice versa.”229 In line with this, Rabbi Jose (T3) considered the breach of this mitzvah to be tantamount to denying God;230 and the Yerushalmi likewise considers it equal to the sin of idolatry (y. B. Meṣ. 5:10; b. Hor. 8a; cf. PA 5:9; b. Tem. 6b; b. Sukk. 29ab).231

also invoked Ezek 18:13. Rabbi Simon ben Eliezar (T4) praised the financial security of the man who lends without interest on the basis of Psalm 15:5 (b. B. Meṣ. 71a). The Mek. 22:24–29 (3.149) says that the one who lends on interest transgresses five commands, i.e. Lev 5:37, Lev 5:36, Exod 22:22 (2x), and Lev 19:14; cf. m. B. Meṣ. 5.12). 226 On the attribution of the Tosefta, see Strack and Stemberger, Introduction, 82, 151– 2. 227 See especially Maloney, “Usury in Greek, Roman, and Rabbinic Thought,” 79–109. See also Jacob Neusner, The Economics of the Mishnah (Atlanta: Scholars, 1998). Usury was not only a matter of concern in rabbinic Judaism. The Essenes also had special halakhic ordinances on the practice. See Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 44–7. Philo likewise gave the matter considerable attention (Virt. 82–7; Spec. 2.74–77). 228 “With Moses, too, did I make this condition concerning them, as it says, “If thou lend money to any of my people, even to the poor with thee, thou shalt not be to him as a creditor” (Exod 22:24); but if you transgress these commands, I will hand over two pledges [‫ – משכנים‬i.e. punning on the “Temple” and the “tents of Jacob” handed over to the Gentiles]” Exod. Rab. 31.10. 229 Sifra 25.38, 109c. Though the text has diverse origins, a leading role in the redaction of Sifra should perhaps be assigned to the school of Rabbi (T4) and especially R. Ḥiyya (T5). “A date in the second half of the third century seems justified for the basic core of Sifra,” Strack and Stemberger, Introduction, 82, 261–3. 230 “Come and see the blindness of those who lend at interest…get together witnesses, a notary, quill and ink, then write down and seal (a contract): so-and-so has denied the God of Israel” (b. B. Meṣ. 71a). The notion of the creditor’s blindness appears also in Philo (Spec. 2.77), where he remarks that the one lending on interest does not see “the time of repayment” – being the time of judgment. 231 Idolatry was (in some contexts) the capital sin, “equal in weight to the whole Torah” (b. Sanh. 74a). The rabbis also likened the crime of usury to murder or robbery (cf. CD 6:16–17; Jubilees; 1 John 3:11–15). Ezekiel already associated it with the archetypal sins of shedding blood, adultery, and idolatry (Ezek 18:10–13). The Deuteronomic Code

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The consistent view is very clear: judgment could be gauged on the fulfillment of this commandment. “God said: He who has lived on interest in this world will not live in the life to come” (Exod. Rab. 31.6). The precept, moreover, was not only a prohibition. According to Rabbi Ishmael (T2), the Jew was obliged to give (Mek. 3.147). On the verse in Exod 22:24 (“If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor…”), Ishmael said every “if” in the Torah refers to a voluntary act except this and two others (i.e., Lev 2:14 and Exod 20:22), arguing from Deut 15:8 (“You shall surely lend to him…”) that lending was obligatory on the principle binyan ab mi-shnê ketubim. 232 The fine line between giving loans and giving alms is evident at this point. A warning against all thought of stinginess was already sounded in the Torah (Deut 15:7–10),233 and the desire to have the right intention in granting generous loans became a real concern. Careful conditions were thus laid down to preserve the practice from every taint of interest – to the point that one could not even greet or inquire about one’s debtor or be moved to offer a loan on account of some earlier favor (Sifre 262–3; cf. b. B. Meṣ. 75b). The Mishnah greatly expanded the application of the prohibition on usury (e.g. m. B. Meṣ. 5), building a wide fence around the Torah. The trend is furthered in the Tosefta and Gemara. The evidence for the exalted value placed on generous lending/giving, hardly even hinted at here, is very impressive. A thorough study of this theme, especially in the Second Temple period, would be desirable. The Tannaitic fixation, after all, did not arise from nowhere. The point to underscore, however, is that though circumcision and Sabbath-keeping (and food laws) have been widely recognized as the boundary markers they surely were, free

located the prohibition on usury in a section (Deut 23:19–24:17) that expands the Decalogue’s commandment against stealing. See Georg Braulik, “Die Abfolge der Gesetze in Deuteronomium 12–26 und der Decalog,” in Das Deuteronomium: Entstehung, Gestalt und Botschaft (Norbert Lohfink, ed.; BETL 68; Leuven: Leven University, 1985) 252–72. The promises of reward for the fulfillment of the precept were also regularly celebrated (e.g. t. B. Meṣ. 6:18; b. B. Meṣ. 71a). 232 This understanding of R. Ishmael was influential and, with Maimonides, became canonical in later Judaism. 233 The call to generosity is clear in Deuteronomy and command forms appear with striking and emphatic density in the šĕmiṭṭâ law (Deut 15:1–11): do not harden your heart, do not close your hand (‫ לא‬+ imperfect); surely open your hand, surely lend (infinitive + imperfect); be careful lest you harbor a base thought and your eye begrudge and you do not give (imperfect + dependent clause); surely give (infinitive + imperfect); do not let your heart begrudge (‫ לא‬+ imperfect). See Jeffries Hamilton, Social Justice and Deuteronomy: The Case of Deuteronomy 15 (SBLDS 136; Atlanta: Scholars, 1992) 7–18. Hillel’s institution of the prōzbūl was a response to the deterrence that the law of the sabbatical year release created against generous lending (m. Šeb. 10.4; cf. m. Giṭ. 4.3; b. Giṭ. 36b; b. Yebam. 89b–90b). See Solomon Zeitlin, “Prosbul, Study in Tannaitic Judaism,” JQR 37 (1947) 347–8.

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lending, or more specifically, generosity towards one’s kinsmen, warrants the same recognition. The prohibition on interest was, of course, confined to loans made to Israelites. Sifre on Deuteronomy (§§113, 263) even made charging interest on foreigners a positive precept: ‫( זו מצות עשה‬see Deut 23:20–21; cf. 15:3).234 The Pentateuch uses different language in the various texts relevant to the command and ultimately stressed the identification of Israel and the “stranger” (Exod 22:20; Lev 25:23). Still, if this textual pressure was vindicated in Luke 10:25–37, it is not hard to see why a hard line was elsewhere drawn between covenant insiders and outsiders. 235 Exodus 22:25 addresses loans made to “my people, the poor among you”;236 Lev 25:35–37 concerns the case of “your brother” (‫ )אחיך‬when he becomes impoverished; 237 and Deut 15:6–11 speaks again of “a poor man from among your brothers” (‫)אחיך אביון מאחד‬.238 While the application of the usury laws was likely rather



234 The expression in Deut 23:21 (‫ )לנכרי תשיך‬tolerates a deontic sense, though modern translations are likely correct to take the imperfect as dynamic (RSV “you may lend”; NAB “you may demand interest”; JB “tu pourras prêter à intérêt”; EÜ “darfst du Zinsen nehmen”). On these categories, see Douglas Gropp, “The Function of the Finite verb in Classical Biblical Hebrew,” Hebrew Annual Review 13 (1991) 45–62. The schools of Ishmael and Akiba regularly debated the proper sense of imperfect verb forms, Akiba usually seeing an obligation and Ishmael a permission. See Martin McNamara, Targum Neofiti 1: Deuteronomy: Translated, with Apparatus and Notes (The Aramaic Bible 5a; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1997) 84 fn. 6. 235 Philo (Spec. 2.72–73) suggests that canceling all debts by making them benevolent gifts would be ideal, but unrealistic. Deut 15:1–3 thus presents a compromise, whereby interest can be taken from non-Jews (strangers) and the principal from Jews (brothers). 236 Exodus 22:20–24 seems contextually to envision “the poor” (‫ )העני‬as the stranger, the widow, and the orphan whom one must not oppress or afflict lest God’s wrath flare up. While the covenantal language of “my people” (‫ )עמי‬complicates the understanding of ‫גר‬, the text promotes solidarity, reminding the Israelites that they were once ‫ גרים‬in Egypt (v. 20). 237 The text envisions an unfortunate owner of the Land in stage two of a three stage downward spiral towards slavery (Lev 25:39–43). After being forced to sell his holding, then recouping it by redemption (25:25–28), he now suffers some further impoverishment, defaults, forfeits all his land and must become a “tenant farmer.” He is to be treated as a sojourner (‫ )גר‬under the authority of his creditor (v. 35), but is not to be exacted (v. 36– 37). His condition is thus exactly likened to that of all Israel, for “the land is mine; you are but ‫ גרים‬under my authority” (25:23). See Jacob Milgrom, Leviticus (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004) 299–303. 238 The double standard that obtains for the ‫ גר‬in the matter of loans is rather striking, especially in view of Deuteronomy’s normally strong regard for equal justice on behalf of the sojourner (Deut 1:16; 27:19), attention to his physical needs (10:18–19; 24:19–21), and concern to include him in the religious life of the people (14:29; 16:11, 14; 26:11–13). See Mark Biddle, “The Biblical Prohibition Against Usury,” Int 65 (2011) 122–5; and Christina van Houten, The Alien in Israelite Law (JSOTSup 107; Sheffield: Sheffield, 1991).

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uneven, it must have been common enough to charge Gentiles interest since, despite the fact that profit-making loans were nothing strange in the ancient world,239 the stereotype of the usurious Jew is a pagan (not Christian) creation. An Egyptian papyrus from 41 C.E., for instance, warns a young man named Serapion to watch out for creditors, especially Jews: βλέπε σάτον ἀπὸ τῶν Ἰουδαίων.240 Foreigners – like the Samaritan traveler – were thus put on guard. If they were not so rigorously avoided as the Gentiles (t. ‘Avodah Zarah 3.1–19), interest could still be charged on Samaritans because they were not considered Israelites at all (y. ‘Avodah Zarah 5.4). They were not neighbors when it came to charity laws. Approaching the parable of the Good Samaritan with this expanded perspective helps put several things into place. First, it situates Luke’s whole reconfigured “Great Commandment” tradition within a robust charity discourse (‫)שקולה כנגד כל המצוות‬, more substantial than the isolated parallel normally cited from Hillel (b. Šabb. 31a). Next, the place of charity as a moral boundary marker, on par with ritual behaviors like circumcision and Sabbath observance, helps contextualize the parable’s implicit critique of cultic εὐσέβεια to the exclusion of φιλανθρωπία.241 Finally, the significance of the Torah’s loaning laws sets the stage for the final curious details in the parable (Luke 10:34–35). 3.4.2 Innkeepers, Loans, and the Lawyer The Samaritan’s interaction with the innkeeper at the end of the parable is a “conspicuosly neglected” detail.242 The sheer excess of concern implied in the



239 See Maloney, “Usury in Greek, Roman, and Rabbinic Thought,” 79–109; and “Usury and Restriction on Interest Taking in the Ancient Near East,” 1–20. See also Finley, Ancient Economy, 53–7. 240 See U. Wilckens, Archiv für Papyrusforschung 4 (1907) 567. 241 This function of righteous works of mercy as a major communal boundary marker poses an important and unrecognized challenge to much New Perspective Pauline theology, which dismisses moral “works” as boundary markers in favor of circumcision, food laws, and Sabbath observance. A related disparity in the treatment of ritual and moral domains has troubled Old Testament exegesis. See, e.g., the remarks of Jonathan Klawans, “Ritual Purity, Moral Purity, and Sacrifice in Jacob Milgrom’s Leviticus,” Religious Studies Review 29 (2003) 19–28. 242 See Bruce Longenecker, “The Story of the Samaritan and the Innkeeper (Luke 10:30–35): A Study in Character Rehabilitation,” Biblical Interpretation 17 (2009) 422–47. Longenecker notes that “only one interpreter [i.e. John Donahue] puts any real interpretative weight on the figure of the innkeeper in a non-allegorical fashion…but he does so in a problematic fashion.” Where Donahue stresses the bad reputation of innkeepers in antiquity and the Samaritan’s role in protecting the wounded man, Longenecker lays emphasis on the cooperative exchange of trust between the Samaritan and the innkeeper (see esp. 436, 440). The Samaritan must believe that his money (and blank check) will be put to good use, while the innkeeper must trust the Samaritan to be good on his word.

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Samaritan’s eagerness to assume complete financial responsibility for the wounded man’s recovery is more than just an exclamation point. If the two denarii remind one of the monthly donation to charity required in the Damascus Document (CD 14:12–13), the remarkable offer to cover all expenses is not only an act of supererogation by the Samaritan. 243 It simultaneously invites an exchange of human trust. With a down payment on the one side and a line of credit on the other, the Samaritan and innkeeper would become cooperators in “doing mercy,” financially bound together in mutual good faith.244 As Anderson has nicely shown, being a creditor in just this sense is essential to the theological idiom of almsgiving.245 The situation with the innkeeper also poses a significant juridical wrinkle. From the perspective of one sensitive to Jewish legislation, the scene touches inescapably upon the laws of loaning – laws intimately related to the original question the lawyer posed.246 The legal circumstance is rarely observed, but Duncan Derrett has seen the implication: “This is ḳebbelanūt (principal indebtedness), and not ‘arevūt (suretyship).”247 In other words, the Samaritan stands to be a debtor; the poor victim of the robbers incurs no tab. This condition would presumably be understood in the present three-way exchange,248 for the Samaritan’s intention seems clearly enough to have been to assume liability as the principal borrower. That, indeed, is the critical issue. As the lender, by the Torah’s usury laws (Deut 23:19–20; cf. 15:1–11), the innkeeper would thus have the right to charge the Samaritan, a foreigner (ἀλλογενής, Luke 17:18), interest. If this prospect of profiteering at the expense of “the one who showed mercy” appears to us a bit obscene, it is difficult to know how it might have

243

The two denarii may have provided as much as three weeks of care for the wounded man. See Douglas Oakman, “The Buying Power of Two Denarii,” Forum 3 [1987] 33–8. 244 “If the Samaritan has to trust the innkeeper’s integrity in the use of the denarii that had been entrusted to him, so the innkeeper has to trust that the Samaritan’s integrity with regard to the assertion that he would return to compensate the innkeeper for the expenses that are not covered by the initial deposit of two denarii,” Longenecker, “Character Rehabilitation,” 440. 245 Anderson, Charity, 15–110. 246 It is misleading when Longenecker (“Character Rehabilitation,” 440) insists that the agreement is “not founded upon a financial contract, but a mutuality of trust.” It is wrong to oppose in this way the notion of trust and a contract. The latter always implies the former. (“Money is given only to those deemed worthy of credit,” Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 603). In any case, factually, an oral commitment such as the Samaritan made was contractually binding under Jewish law – though the parable, significantly, ends without the innkeeper’s response. 247 Derrett, “Parable of the Good Samaritan,” 29. 248 Technically, the Samaritan said neither “give him and I will repay” (ḳebbelanūt) nor “lend him…” (‘arevūt), but his intent is plain and the fomulas of the Babylonian R. Huna (b. B. Bat. 174a) are not ultimately determinative in the present case.

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affected the lawyer. The characters involved strongly invite the thought. Innkeepers in the ancient world had a reputation for extortion, and Samaritans were despised, so the possibility of opportunistically taking advantage was certainly there.249 In any event, repugnant or not, making loans in conformity to the Law inescapably required answering the lawyer’s very question: Who is my neighbor? The parable thus comes at the end squarely to the casuistic point. For, “the distinction who it is and who it is not licit to enter into usurious relations with turns out to be a paradigmatic instance of the friendenemy distinction.” 250 Accordingly, Jesus, like a good διδάσκαλος, subtly addresses the pertinent legal point, by ending with this implicit lingering question: What is the status of the Samaritan’s loan? The rhetorical poignancy of this pregnant ending should not be missed. If “the view from the ditch” opens new perspectives on the parable, this view from the reception desk might do the same.251 Indeed, the seemingly needless addendum of this complicated interaction at the inn contributes a curiosuly open ending to the parable. It leaves the Samaritan’s proposal hanging before the innkeeper – and before the lawyer. Ought the innkeeper become the neighbor of “the one who became the neighbor of him who fell among theives”? The lawyer’s answer to Jesus’ question (Luke 10:36) must decide this question as well. This twist at the parable’s end forces the listener, here the lawyer, to adopt at the end the perspective of the innkeeper. This would fit with Lukan practice, for it replicates the strategy at the end of the Prodigal Son.252 The

249

See, Longenecker, “Character Rehabilitation,” 430. Plato (Laws 918) speaks of innkeepers who will not let their guests go until they have paid “the most, unjust, abominable, and extortionate ransom.” Josephus (A.J. 3.276) lumps together those who earn their living by “cheating trades and keeping inns (τὰς ἐκ καπηλείας καὶ τοῦ πανδοκεύειν πεπορισµένας τὸν βίον).” The Mishnah considered gentile inns grave dens of iniquity (m. Avodah Zarah 2.1). A verse preserved at Pompeii curses the “swindling innkeeper” who so watered down the patron’s wine. See Lionel Casson, Travel in the Ancient World (Toronot: Hakkert, 1974) 214–5; and Ben-Zion Rosenfeld, “Innkeeping in Jewish Society in Roman Palestine,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 41 (1998) 133–58. 250 Luke Bretherton, “‘Love Your Enemies’: Usury, Citizenship, and the Friend-Enemy Distinction,” Modern Theology 27 (2011) 366. A similar principle was recognized in philosophical benevolence/friendship discourse: οὐδεις γὰρ παρακατατίθεται µὴ πιστεύων. οὗ δὲ τὸ χρέος, οὐ φίλος, οὐ γὰρ δανείζει, ἐὰν ᾖ φίλος, ἀλλὰ δίδωσιν (Aristotle, Problemata 29.2 950a 31–33). 251 See J. Ian H. McDonald, “The View from the Ditch – and Other Angles: Interpreting the Parable of the Good Samaritan,” SJT 49 (1996) 21–37; and Funk, “Good Samaritan as Metaphor,” 74–81. As Peter Rhea Jones (Studying the Parables of Jesus [Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 1999] 310–12) notes, Funk’s “view from the ditch” breaks down precisely at 10:35, where the innkeeper comes to the fore. 252 Nolland (“Role of Money and Possessions,” 206) highlights certain parallels between the parables of the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son and notes the shared use of

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elder son’s story awkardly extends the parable, yet never gets resolved, since it is meant to address the Pharisees’ unresolved situtation directly. The same controversy, moreover, might have elicited both parables, if indeed “it seems fair to think that Jesus’ association with the wrong people led to the lawyer’s question...about the boundaries of the word ‘neighbor.’” 253 Just as the Pharisees, grumbling about Jesus’ welcome of sinners, are meant to to find themselves in the circumstance of the elder brother, so the lawyer is here invited to resolve his own objections from the shoes of the hospitaler.254 The wider narrative helps secure this perspective.255 Jesus’ readiness to be welcomed by the (ultimately unwelcoming) Samaritans (Luke 9:52–56), specifically, should be recognized as a boundary-breaking scandal (in intention), precisely parallel to his readiness to dine in the house of sinners like Zachhaeus (19:7). 256 Accordingly, Jesus has already announced by his actions the principle that even Samaritans might “become neighbor” (πλησίον γεγονέναι, 10:36) through the act of charity.257 If this arouses concern, the

the word ἐσπλαγχνίσθη. “The father has compassion and the Good Samritan has compassion. What links these two figures? It is, I think, the elder son, who is challenged in the story to emulate the compassion of his father.” 253 Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 353. See also John J. Kilgallen, “The Plan of the ‘ΝΟΜΙΚΟΣ᾽ (Luke 10:25–37),” NTS 42 (1996) 615–19. 254 What John York (Last Shall be First, 162) says of the conclusion of the Prodigal Son can be applied equally to the Good Samaritan: “Human action is called upon to imitate the divine action of God.” The Samaritan holds a structural role as a divine placeholder similar to the merciful Father in Luke 15. See §3.4 below. 255 For an attempt to situate the parable within Luke’s narrative context, see Sylvia Keesmaat, “Strange Neighbors and Risky Care (matt 18:21–35; Luke 14:7–14; Luke 10:25–37),” in The Challenge of Jesus’ Parables (Richard Longenecker, ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000) 276–82. 256 David Ravens (Luke and the Restoration of Israel [JSNT 119; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1995] 82) comments: “The remarkable fact that this turning point [i.e. Luke 9:51] involves an intended mission to Samaritans, rather than Jews, has not been sufficiently emphasized by commentators who focus instead on the rejection.” 257 In 9:51b, when Jesus first set out upon “the exodus he was to accomplish in Jerusalem” (9:31), he promptly meets with the inhospitality of a Samaritan village (9:52–53). The description of the scene directly recalls the same inhospitality of Edom in Num 20:14– 21. Just as Jesus sent out messengers (ἀγγέλους) to prepare the way before him, so Moses sent messengers (‫ )מלאכים‬to Edom to ask permission to pass through their land. Both delegations were sent away empty. The Samaritan’s stout resistance to Jesus’ designs has an important almsgiving aspect that must not be missed. Like Edom, who would not provide impoverished Israel the mere kindness of a drink of water – not even for a price (!) – they reject Jesus in failing to perform an act of mercy. The allusion is supported by the strong Moses typology of the Travel Narrative identified by David Moessner, Lord of the Banquet: The Literary and Theological Significance of the Lukan Travel Narrative (Harrisburg, PA; Trinity International, 1989). See also John Meier, ‘The Historical Jesus and the Historical Samaritans; What Can Be Said?” Bib 81 (2000) 202–32; Yitzhak Magen, The

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charity of true hospitality remains the sign Jesus seeks in those who would share in eternal life. In a word, the Lord on the road to Jerusalem is looking for the hospitality of a true innkeeper (e.g. 9:52–53; 10:8–10; 10:38–42; 11:5–8, 37–53; 16:4–9, 19–31; 19:1–10; also 2:7; 9:12; Acts 16:14; 17:5–7; 18:2–3, 7; 19:9; 21:8; 21:16; 28:2–7).258 Contrary to virtually every non-allegorical reading, this interpretative stress on the host has the great advantage of accounting for the entire parable. 259 It also fits the pattern of Luke’s narrative and theology and calibrates Jesus’ response more directly to his questioner. Ultimately, on the reading proposed here, a missing perspective is also found to ease the longstanding problem of Luke’s backwards reply to the lawyer’s question.260 By identifying with the innkeeper, we at last meet a Jew compelled to treat a Samarιtan charitably as his brother. 3.4.3 The Samaritan’s Return: Christology and the “One Who Did Mercy” Once proper attention is paid to the final interaction with the innkeeper, the Samaritan’s promise to return and repay all excess expenditures takes on new significance. Luke’s hint has long been neglected, but as the interpretation of the parables recovers from a long allergy to allegory,261 the trope of repayment (ἀποδίδωµι) may be recognized for its familiar symbolism: divine reward (e.g. Matt 6:4, 6, 18). The idea, which functions as a major motif in Matthew’s Gospel, finds classic expression in a text like the parable of the vineyard (Luke 20:9–19; cf. Matt 21:33–46; Mk 12:1–12) and has deep roots

Samaritans and the Good Samaritan (JSP 7; Jerusalem: IAA, 2008); and the very full treatment of Martina Böhm, Samarien und die Samaritai bei Lukas. Eine Studie zum religionshistorischen und traditionsgeschichtlichen Hintergrund der lukanischen Samarientexte und zu deren topographischen Verhaftung (WUNT II/111; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999). 258 See especially Moessner, Lord of the Banquet, 132–75 (“Jesus the Journeying Guest Is Not Received”). The story of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1–10) plays an important role as the conclusion of the hospitality motif in the Travel Narrative. The motif extends throughout the Gospel, beginning already in the infancy narrative (2:7). See also Henry Cadbury, “Lexical Notes on Luke-Acts. III. Luke’s Interest in Lodging,” JBL 45 (1926) 305–22. 259 Mary Ann Tolbert (Perspectives on the Parables [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979] 96) makes this one of the central controls on proper parable interpretation: “Any critical understanding of the text must deal with the totality of the parable.” 260 On this commonly observed difficulty, see, e.g. Tolbert, Perspectives, 59–60. 261 See Chapter One §1.4.2. See also Klyne Snodgrass, “From Allegorizing to Allegorizing: A History of the Interpretation of the Parables of Jesus” in Challenge of Jesus’ Parables (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000) 3–29. The deficiencies of Jülicher’s perspective have long been recognized; see, e.g. Paul Fiebig, Altjüdische Gleichnisse und die Gleichnisse Jesu (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1904); Maxime Hermaniuk, La Parabole Évangélique (Louvain: Desclée de Brouwer, 1947); and Raymond Brown, “Parable and Allegory Reconsidered,” NovT 5 (1962) 36–45.

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in biblical thought (e.g. 2 Chr 15:7; Ruth 2:12; Prov 11:18; Sir 11:22; Barn. 19:11; m. ’Abot 2:16). In the Good Samaritan, of course, it is not a wage that is in view, but a loan.262 The loan metaphor, however, as already seen, was an established description of charity’s eternal reward: “He who is generous to the poor lends to the Lord; he will repay him in full” (Prov 19:17); and later authors did not overlook this highly suggestive verse (Clement Alex., Strom. 2.15; Cyprian, Laps. 35; Eleem. 2; Const. Ap. 2.35; 3.14; 7.12).263 Luke has adopted, yet reconfigured this charity-as-loan tradition.264 In the peculiar exchange of trust between the innkeeper and the Samaritan, both sides are mutually held accountable. Whatever resources the host personally invests in showing mercy to the robbers’ victim will be required of the Samaritan – if and when he ultimately returns. At the same time, however, the innkeeper will also have an account to give (cf. Luke 12:58; 16:2). Irenaeus recognized this latter aspect in connecting the Samaritan’s handing over of the denarii with the parable of the talents (Luke 19:11–26; cf. Matt 25:14−30). The Lord commends to the Holy Spirit his own man, who had fallen among robbers, whom he himself compassioned, and bound up his wounds, giving two royal denarii; so that we, receiving by the Spirit the image and inscription of the Father and Son, might cause the denarius entrusted to us to be fruitful, counting out the increase of it to the Lord (Ad. Haer. 3.17.3).

The identification of the Samaritan with Christ already controls this exegesis. Furthermore, Irenaeus envisions us (through the indwelling Spirit) in the position of the innkeeper (as proposed in the previous section). The parable thus brings the hearer to anticipate a moment of reckoning before the Lord (cf. Luke 12:47–48). The promise of Jesus’ return – with the reward and judgment that implies – is more explicitly identified with the Samaritan’s promise in the secondcentury exegesis of the presbyter. The man who was going down is Adam, Jerusalem is paradise, Jericho the world, the robbers are the hostile powers, the priest is the law, the Levite represents the prophets, the Samaritan is Christ, the wounds represent disobedience, the beast the Lord’s body, the inn should be interpreted as the Church, since it accepts all who wish to come in. Furthermore, the two denarii are to be understood as the father and the Son, the innkeeper as the



262 See Tzvi Novick, “Wages from God: The Dynamics of a Biblical Metaphor,” CBQ 73 (2011) 708–22. 263 “The notion that care for the poor constitutes a loan to God that the Creator will recompense features as a key component in early Jewish and Christian discourse about the meritorious value of almsgiving,” Downs, Alms, 49. 264 Noble (“Rich toward God,” 320) argues that Luke 12:21 contains “the most explicit reference in the NT to the idea of almsgiving...as a loan made directly to God.”

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chairman of the church, who is in charge of its supervision. The Samaritan’s promise to return points to the second coming of the savior.265

This remarkable, point-by-point allegorizing interpretation has been the parade example of uncontrolled eisegetical fancy; and, indeed, certain problems are not hard to see. Origen, for instance, drew out the implication that, as the priest and Levite have done no good, so the Law and the prophets cannot help this man who went down to Jericho. As shown above, however, Luke intends to make very much the opposite point in this pericope: everything necessary for eternal life is in the Law – if only one reads rightly and does it. Perceiving the promised return of the Samaritan as an idiom for the second coming of Christ does not require the allegorizing of every last detail, however, from the donkey to the denarii – or importing categories ultimately foreign to the Gospel. The action of God in Jesus’ own ministry repeatedly informs the pattern of Luke’s parables: the Lost Sheep (Luke 15:1–6), the Prodigal Son (15:11–31), the multiple kyrios parables. 266 It would not be strange, then, to find Jesus’ mission represented in Luke 10:30–35.267 Moreover, while Luke consistently uses ὑποστρέφω to mean “return” elsewhere in the Gospel (1:56; 2:20, 39, 45; 4:1, 14; 7:10; 8:37, 40, 55; 9:10, 42; 10:17;

265

Apud Origen Hom. In Lucam 34.3 (SC 87). On the history of interpretation of the parable, see Werner Monselewski, Der barmherzige Samariter: Eine auslegungsgeschichtliche Untersuchung zu Lukas 10, 25–37 (Beiträge zur Geschichte der biblischen Exegese 5; Tübingen; Mohr Siebeck, 1967); and Riemer Roukema, “The Good Samaritan in Ancient Christianity,” VC 58 (2004) 56–74. 266 See Forbes, God of Old. Forbes admits certain allegorical elements in Luke’s parables and argues that God appears as a character in each one. Nolland (“Role of Money and Possessions,” 178–209) is nuanced and categorizes the Lukan parables into five classes: (i) parables in which God plays no role; (ii) parables in which God’s action is presented figuratively; (iii) parables in which Jesus is presented figuratively as the one who acts in place of God; (iv) parables in which God/Jesus is present figuratively in connection with the mKingdom of God; and (v) parables in which God plays a direct role. Nolland’s classification has the oddity of lumping the Good Samaritan under the first rubic with “parables” (aphorisms really) like “Doctor, cure yourself! (Luke 4:23) and the speck and the log (6:41–42). Nolland himself senses the generic anomaly in this alignment: “With the notable exception of the parable of the Good Samaritan, parables in which God plays no role are all very brief parables, and there may be some question about whether they belong in the set of Lukan parables.” There is also reason to question whether the Good Samaritan, so clearly another literary species from these proverbs, belongs among the texts having no expression of divine agency, for Nolland himself further admits: “God almost always turns up (except in some of the very brief parables) in a significant role in the Lukan parables, the one exception being the parable of the Good Samaritan” (194). The law of probability is working against Nolland, who determines that a Christological reading of Luke 10:29– 37 has little to commend it (181). On the Christology of Luke’s kyrios parables, e.g., see Rowe, Early Narrative Christology, 151–7. 267 This possibility undermines the category of the “Example Story,” for it opens open the prospect that the parable is not only about ethics, but also about the Kingdom.

3.4 Unraveling the Parable’s End

205

15:27; 17:15, 18; 22:45; 23:48, 56; 24:9, 33, 52), on two occasions he uses the rare verb ἐπανέρχοµαι (which appears nowhere else in the New Testament): the return of the Samaritan (10:35) and the return of the king who, after obtaining his kingship, called his servants to account for the money he had entrusted to them (19:15). The link is suggestive. In addition, Luke has made his Parable of the Pounds the one narrative stop on the road up from Jericho (19:1) to Jerusalem (19:28). If such clues are followed, the basic Christological allegory known to Irenaeus may not be such an imposition on Luke’s literal sense. Accordingly, we must be prepared to find in “the one who did mercy” an image of the Lukan Jesus. Few modern interpreters have explored this option, and the attempt of Birger Gerhardsson to establish the Christological reading on the basis of Hebrew word associations with the terms for “Samaritan” and “neighbor” is unconvincing.268 On the other had, his evocation of Ezekiel’s shepherd tending the weak is not far off the mark. In this connection, however, the striking Lukan description of Jesus as being “in your midst as one who serves (ὁ διακονῶν)” (Luke 22:27) provides more Christological traction. 269 The behavior of the Samaritan, in short, easily fits with Jesus’ ministry of eschatological hospitality. It is his specific identity as a Samaritan that poses the real problem. If Origen long ago pointed out that Jesus is called a Samaritan in John 8:48, it is possible, perhaps even likely, that “Samaritan” served as a slur against Galileans. This is helpful but hard to confirm, and an answer within the Third Gospel remains desirable. Here Jesus’ table fellowship with tax collectors and sinners unites him with outsiders, like Samaritans, to a considerable degree. This deserves to be taken seriously. Jesus’ identification with the marginal finds complex expression in the way he acts as both host and guest (e.g. Luke 24:29–30).270 In some fashion, Jesus, like this rare Samaritan, is at once rich and poor: a traveling outsider in need of welcome, yet one lavishing his charity on others. There is also another line of argument, however. In the context of Luke’s Travel Narrative, it is hardly accidental that the road to (or away!) from Jerusalem is the parable’s specific stage.271 The direction of the wounded man’s

268

Birger Gerhardsson, The Good Samaritan – The Good Shepherd? (Lund: Gleerup, 1958). See also J. Ian. H. MacDonald, “Alien Grace (Luke 10:30–36),” in Jesus and His Parables: Interpreting the Parables of Jesus Today (V. George Shillington, ed.; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1997) 35–52, esp. 38–9. 269 As Fitzmyer (Luke, 1418) notes, “The image is drawn from table serving, not the Servant motif of deutero-Isaiah.” 270 At Emmaus, “Though he [i.e. Jesus] is the guest, he assumes the role of host or paterfamilias,” Fitzmyer, Luke, 1568. 271 The location for the events of the parable is curiously concrete, like the appearance of Lazarus’ name in Luke 16:20. If “the road [down] from Jerusalem to Jericho” was a

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journey is striking in this context: Ἄνθρωπός τις κατέβαινεν ἀπὸ Ἰερουσαλὴµ εἰς Ἰεριχώ (10:30b). He proceeds down, away from Jerusalem, opposite Jesus’ own solemn movement to the Cross. Thus, while the patristic notion that the descent traced here is the path of Adam’s Fall might be a bit extravagant, there is indeed a real sense in which the man is moving away from the divinely appointed goal. Even as Jesus is leading a throng up to the Holy City, he finds a man helpless and halted along the downward path. The movement of the priest and Levite in the same direction may presuppose family property in Jericho, as many imagine, but the narrative itself presents another context. These figures (scribes and Pharisees) are blithely walking the wrong way (κατέβαινεν). Worse still, by passing the needy man in their scrupulous fog, they are complicit in his despoiling: in league with the robbers by withholding the mercy this neighbor is owed by right (cf. Luke 11:39; CD 6:16–17). If they hesitate to act because of purity halakha, they must stop neglecting “justice and the love of God” for such petty concerns, and should instead “give alms and all will be clean” for them (Luke 11:41−42). If the metaphor of the Way helps integrate the parable into Luke’s Gospel and distinguish between the right and wrong direction, 272 it is strange how little attention has been given to the fact that a Samaritan is also traveling on this road. Even if commerce between Samaritans and Jews was not unknown, Luke’s narrative gives no such indication. It relates, instead, the active resistance Jesus met from Samaritans at the beginning of his journey – simply because his destination was Jerusalem (Luke 9:52–53). Luke is overtly asking his readers to be startled at seeing a Samaritan on this road. His appearance is no mistake, however. Samaritans appear three times in Luke’s Gospel (Luke 9:52–53; 10:30–35; 17:11–19), and, significantly, in each case the road to Jerusalem is explicitly in view.273 The Samaritan texts

likely enough venue for highway robbery, as commentators like to mention, this did not distinguish it from countless other routes (cf. 2 Cor 11:26). 272 The “crooked” and “straight” ways become a theme in Acts, built on John the Baptist’s preaching. See Octavian Baban, On the Road Encounters in Luke-Acts: Hellenistic Mimesis and Luke’s Theology of the Way (Paternoster Biblical Monographs; Milton Keynes, UK: Paternoster, 2006). Baban notes that the Way motif is not limited to the Travel Narrative and concentrates on three later scenes: the encounter with the risen Lord on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13–35), the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8:25–40), and Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1–31). In each he identifies the hodos framework, the sacramental ending, and the reversal/restoration motif. The denomination of Christianity as ἡ ὁδός in Acts is also important here. See also Paul Borgman, The Way According to Luke: Hearing the Whole Story of Luke-Acts (Grand Rapids: Erdmans, 2006). 273 On the focus of the central section of Luke’s Gospel on the Samaritans, see Ravens, Restoration of Israel, 72–106, esp. 76–81.

3.4 Unraveling the Parable’s End

207

even help to structure the long movement of the Travel Narrative, with its notoriously fuzzy geography. The two most explicit topographical notices of Jesus’ movements in the whole journey (9:51–19:46) actually appear in the information provided in the Samaritan passages of 9:52 and 17:11. In the first the Samaritans will have nothing to do with Jerusalem, but in the second the Samaritan leper gets his bearings. He does not hesitate to head straight for the priests in the Temple – and by going that way he immediately discovers that the feet of Jesus are the true place for worship.274 Between these two comes Jesus’ own depiction of a Samaritan (Luke 10:30–35), and this unit represents the critical turning point between 9:52–53 and 17:11–19.275 The text advances Luke’s subplot of charity as the healer of divisions, here the division between the descendants of the split kingdoms of Israel and Judah. The fateful road stretching from north to south thus embodies a path toward national reconciliation,276 while the allusion to Num 20:14– 21 and Israel’s estranged “brother” (‫ )אחיך‬Edom in Luke 9:52–53 indicates that the fraternal strife topos is at play in Luke’s depiction of relations with Samaria. As Luke relays the parable, the Samaritan’s movement is significantly described with a different expression than the other characters: ὁδεύων ἦλθεν (Luke 10:33). This language resonates directly with the motif of Jesus’ journey (9:57; 10:4; 18:35; 19:36); and unless the man is imagined as a resident of Jerusalem, we must suppose his round trip voyage will bring him back home again to Samaria. The Samaritan would, in other words, like Jesus in the Gospel, be heading toward Jerusalem. 277 In this sense, the figure is identified with Jesus, climbing the mountain on his way to offer God true

274

See Hamm, “What the Samaritan Leper Sees,” 273–87. Ravens (Restoration of Israel, 86) observes: “Luke’s presentation of the Samaritans in the Gospel has a three stage development. He begins with the acknowledgement of the cultic division with the Jews and then moves on to the basis on which the division is to be healed: the recognition that they are neighbors, fellow members of Israel. On the assumption that the Jewish and Samaritan lepers go to the same priests, the final stage represents the transcending of the division.” For Ravens, healing the rift between the Samaritans and the Jews represents the reunification of Israel under the messianic David king. 276 Historically the Samaritan “schism” was gradual and had complex causes, including the building (and destruction) of the Temple on Gerizim. See Ravens, Restoration of Israel, 74–5; and R. J. Coggins, Samaritans and Jews: Origins of Samaritanism Reconsidered (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1975). It is still useful to observe that the major role economic exploitation played in the original split of north and south. See Brindle, “Causes of Division,” 223–33, esp. 228–30. 277 If this allows us to explain the inn as one of the pilgrim hostels in the holy city, Capper’s theory of a poor house in Bethany (see note 37 above) is an attractive possibility – particularly in view of the visit to Martha and Mary in Luke 10:38–42. Jerome identified the site of the inn as Ma’ale Adummim. See Yitzhak Magen, “The Inn of the Good Samaritan Becomes a Museum,” BAR 38 (2012). 275

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worship – yet also identified with those following Jesus on the way, the pilgrims streaming up with him to join him in the Pasch: a fitting polyvalence for the lesson involved. The ethical and Christological dimensions of the parable are in this fashion intertwined and not at all incompatible. In narrative context the traffic pattern of the parable is hard to ignore. Luke has told a tale in which Jesus’ epic journey is visibly paralleled by a charitable outcast – and opposed by the current of those of position in Israel. The one “who became neighbor” thereby becomes the exemplar for the lawyer (“Go and do likewise”) in a subtle imitatio Christi motif.278 Like the rich ruler, who was told to love the poor and follow after Jesus, the lawyer is told to love his neighbor by walking the path of the one who, unburdended by scruples, observes “justice and the love of God,” touching even the untouchable children of Abraham.

3.5 Conclusion 3.5 Conclusion

A summary of the results of this chapter must stress above all the massive and largely unexplored importance of charity discourse as a key to understanding the parable of the Good Samaritan. This hereustic lens not only helps explain the widely neglected ending of the parable and thereby the traditional Christological reading. When taken as the organizing motif, charity can accommodate the various accents that have split modern interpretations of the parable. Most importantly, the definition of neighbor finds it place within the boundary marking aspect of charitable praxis, while an implicit critique of the cult is centered upon the topos of charity as “spiritual worship.” At the root of Luke’s dense reworking of the Great Commandment tradition is an uncommon interpretation of Lev 19:18b shared with CD 6:20. The identification of this traditition not only secures the focus of Luke 10:25–37 as being explicitly placed on charity. It positions Luke’s charity theology within a highly suggestive Second Temple context. Just as 11Q13 provides an important reference point for understanding the Third Gospel’s sin as debt theology, so the Damascus Document highlights the unique centrality of almsgiving, understood as commanded directly by the Torah, within the worldview of both Luke and the Essenes. Such indices link Luke strongly with Qumran and point to the apocalyptic affinity explored in the following and final exegetical chapter: the bond between charity and the resurrection.

278

See B. E. Beck, “‘Imitatio Christi’ and the Lucan Passion Narrative,” in Suffering and Martyrdom in the New Testament (W. Horbury and B. McNeil, eds.; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1981) 28–47.



Chapter 4

The ΚΥΡΙΟΣ and His Prodigal Disciples: Charity, Resurrection, and Repentance 4.1 Introduction 4.1 Introduction

The study of Lukan wealth ethics has not neglected the remarkable material in chapter 16. The lessons of the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–13) and Lazarus and the Rich Man (16:19–31) are of obvious relevance, and it is a scholarly commonplace to observe that the chapter focuses on “the proper attitude toward and use of material possessions.”1 The unity of the chapter, nevertheless, remains a puzzle. How exactly do these two parables hang together? Is charity really the common thread? One passage has proven all but insoluble, while the other never actually mentions alms. In the effort to understand the coherence of Luke 16, scholars have not observed the manner in which, in addition to wealth, resurrection imagery also binds this chapter together – while lacing it simultaneously to the immediately preceding story of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11–32). The failure to acknowledge the interaction of these two concurrent motifs, money and resurrection, has led to a distorted perception of charity’s ultimate soteriological role in Lukan theology.2 At the same time, Luke’s ideas of sin as debt and Christ as a creditor have not been recognized for the way they illuminate Luke 16. This final exegetical chapter will attempt to address the basic interaction between Luke’s resurrection and charity discourse. Lukan soteriology is complex and has many moving parts, thus several other motifs will also emerge, notably µετάνοια. It is important to recognize, however, how deeply embedded charity is in this whole intricate network of Gospel themes, for the almsgiving motif has too often been approached in artificial isolation.

1

Fitzmyer, Luke, 1095. “Liest man das ganze Kapitel, wird deutlich, daß die Thematik der materiellen Güter entscheidend ist, aber auch, daß das Geld die sichtbare Seite dessen ist, was den Menschen ausmacht: seine Gerechtigkeit vor Gott,” Bovon, Lukas 3, 72. 2 Seccombe (Possessions and the Poor, 182 fn. 216) has marveled that studies of almsgiving in Luke have generally given “surprisingly little attention” to the interaction of the theme with Lukan eschatology. The classic debate in synoptic scholarship over the relationship between ethics and eschatology makes this all the more surprising. But see Hays, Wealth Ethics, 159–65.

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The chapter will progress in three stages. First, Luke’s use of a significant Jewish topos linking charity and resurrection will be explored (§4.2). Second, in the important central section, a contextualized reading of the parable of the Steward will be offered. This will demonstrate the continuity of Luke 16:1– 8a with broader elements in Luke’s narrative and theology (§4.3). Finally, the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man will be analyzed according to three fundamental Lukan motifs (§4.4).

4.2 Resurrection, Repentance, and Charity 4.2 Resurrection, Repentance, and Charity

The connection between charity and “eternal life” (ζωή αἰώνιος) has already been encountered in the parable of the Good Samaritan. Luke’s bold interest in the resurrection is, of course, ultimately grounded in his belief in the radical certainty (ἀσφάλεια) of Jesus’ rising from the dead. At the same time, Luke understands the resurrection to be the common hope of Israel (Acts 23:6) and he builds his ambitious theology of charity, understood as the key to eternal life, upon an inherited Second Temple topos – although this has thus far escaped the attention of Lukan scholarship. In this section, two things will be done. First, the Jewish tradition of almsgiving as an act meriting the resurrection will be treated in its rabbinic and Second Temple forms (§4.2.1–2). Second, Luke’s interaction with this tradition will be shown (§4.2.3). This will provide the proper background to examine the parables of the Steward and Lazarus and the Rich Man, which both suppose this same motif. 4.2.1 “Almsgiving Saves from Death” (Prov 10:2) A very important tradition stands behind Luke’s unique depiction of the resurrection. “Ill-gotten treasures profit not, but righteousness saves from death” (‫וצדקה תציל ממות‬, Prov 10:2; cf. 11:4). 3 In its original context, this proverb indicates the final worthlessness of wealth (cf. Isa 10:3; Ezek 7:19; Zeph 1:14–18) and the power of moral uprightness alone to save from “any catastrophe that strikes down wicked individuals…[or from] a final calamity that will happen to the wicked when the righteous will be left on the earth.”4 As the semantics of the word ‫ צדקה‬began to shift, however, the saying took on a new meaning.5

3

The significance of this text in the almsgiving tradition has been brought to light by Gary Anderson, “A Treasury in Heaven: The Exegesis of Proverbs 10:2 in the Second Temple Period,” Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 1 (2012) 351–67. A different view of the material is taken by Downs, Alms, 57–81. 4 Waltke, Proverbs, 486. 5 Ibid.

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Beginning particularly in the post-exilic period, the practice of charity towards the poor accelerated as a defining mark of ideal “righteousness.” This mark emerges in close connection with wisdom themes and, specifically, with the “best example” of upright living: the ṣaddiq. 6 As an archetypal character, “the righteous man” first appears in the pedagogic anthropology of the book of Proverbs as the living goal of moral education. Although the figure is a mosaic assembled from variegated aphoristic material, concern for the poor stands out as one of the defining features of his person (e.g. Prov 14:31; 21:26; 28:27; 29:7). 7 This discernible feature is significantly intensified in the later LXX version of the book (e.g. 3:27; 13:9, 11; 14:21; 17:5; 19:7; 22:9; 28:22; 31:28).8 While the specific title ṣaddiq recedes in the language of Sirach, the role of charity in the life of the sage impressively swells. 9 The same accent is also picked up in the wisdom portions of the psalter (i.e. Pss 37 and 112; cf. Ps 41:2), where the ṣaddiq is defined with yet more focus as the one who has dispersed (‫ )פרז‬and given to the poor (‫לאביונים‬ ‫)נתן‬, “whose righteousness/charity (‫ )צדקה‬endures forever” (Ps 112:12; cf. Ps 112:4–5).10 Semantically, the trajectory of the root Ṣ-D-Q thus traces an arc from the prototypical “wise man” (‫ )צדיק‬to his characteristic behavior, i.e. “charity” (‫)צדקה‬, and ultimately to the object of his charitable acts, i.e. “alms”



6 On the popular appeal the title ṣaddiq came to have, see Walter Jacob, “Hasid and Tzadik – The People’s Choice,” in Hesed and Tzedakah: From Bible to Modernity (Walter Jacob and Walter Homolka, eds; Aus Religion und Recht 6; Berlin: Frank & Timme, 2006) 11–27; and also Rudolph Mach, Der Zaddik in Talmud und Midrash (Leiden: Brill, 1957). On proto-type (“best example”) semantics, see George Lakoff, Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1987) 12–58. 7 So argues Sun Myung Lyu, Righteousness in the Book of Proverbs (FAT II 55; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) 33–59. Lyu identifies four essential marks of the character of the ṣaddiq: he is wise, powerful, happy, and compassionate. Only the last entails a concrete pattern of moral behavior. See Mach, Der Zaddik, 19–22. 8 This impressive phenomenon is greatly understudied. See Ronald Giese, “Qualifying Wealth in the Septuagint of Proverbs,” JBL 111 (1992) 409–25. 9 See Gregory, Everlasting Signet Ring. On the continuity between the Sirach’s sage and Proverbs’ ṣaddiq, see John Gammie, “The Sage in Sirach,” in The Sage in Israel and the Ancient Near East (John Gammie and Leo Perdue, eds.; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990) 355–72. 10 The reception history of Ps 112 is revealing. Paul’s quotation of v. 12 in the context of his collection appeal in 2 Corinthians 9 almost certainly plays on the notion of alms storing up an enduring reward. This understanding is still intact in Augustine’s commentary on the Psalm. See Epositions of the Psalms (Enarrationes in Psalmos 99–120 [Trans. Maria Boulding; Works of Saint Augustine III/19; New York: New City, 2003] 293.

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(‫)צדקה‬. 11 The process is complete by the time of Daniel and the Dead Sea Scrolls.12 The shift in meaning is prominently attested in the citation of Prov 10:2 in the translation of the book of Tobit, which replaces the LXX’s δικαιοσύνη with ἐλεηµοσύνη.13 Read in the light of this new understanding of ‫צדקה‬, Prov 10:2 reinforced the waxing estimation of charitable deeds. By the tannaitic period, almsgiving was extolled in superlative terms as the one thing stronger than death. It has been taught: R. Judah says: Great is charity (‫)צדקה‬, because it brings redemption (‫ )הגאולה‬nearer, as it says, Thus says the Lord, Keep judgment and do charity (‫ )צדקה‬for my salvation is near to come and my righteousness (‫ )צדקה‬to be revealed (Isa 56:1). He also used to say: Ten strong things have been created in the world. The rock is hard, but the iron cleaves it. The iron is hard, but the fire softens it. The fire is hard, but the water quenches it. The water is strong, but the clouds bear it. The clouds are strong, but the wind scatters them. The wind is strong, but the body bears it. The body is strong, but fright crushes it. Fright is strong, but wine banishes it. Wine is strong, but sleep works it off. Death is stronger than all, and charity saves from death, as it is written, Charity (‫)צדקה‬ delivers from death (Prov 10:2) (b. B. Bat. 10a).14

The “death” in view here (not merely the “righteousness”) has shifted from its earlier sense. It is no longer any variable catastrophe, as it originally signified, but literal, physical death. The story told of Rabbi Akiva and his daughter makes the point very clearly. The astrologers told him: the day she enters the bridal chamber a snake will bite her and she will die. He was very worried about this. On that day [of her marriage] she took her brooch [and] stuck it into the wall and by chance it sank into the eye of a snake. The next morning, when she took it out, the snake came trailing after stuck to it. ‘What did you do?’

11

See Avi Hurvitz, “Ṣaddiq = ‘wise’ in Biblical Hebrew and the Wisdom Connections of Ps 37,” in Goldene Äpfel in silbernen Schalen (Klaus-Dietrich Schunck and Matthias Augustin, eds.; Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1990) 109–13; and “The Biblical Roots of a Talmudic Term: The Early History of the Concept ‫צדקה‬,” Language Studies 2–3 (1987) 155–69 (in Hebrew). 12 See Franz Rosenthal, “Ṣĕdāqâh, Charity,” Hebrew Union College Annual 23 (1950– 51) 411–30; and Francesco Zanella, “Between ‘Righteousness’ and ‘Alms’: A Semantic Study of the Lexeme ‫ צדקה‬in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Hebrew in the Second Temple Period: The Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls and of Other Contemporary Sources (Steven Fassberg, Moshe Bar-Asher, and Ruth Clements, eds.; STDJ 108; Leiden: Brill, 2013) 269–88. 13 See Downs, Alms, 43, 51–3. Downs contests Anderson’s “monsemous” rendering of ‫ צדקה‬in Prov 10:2 and 11:4 as “almsgiving,” claiming that “Anderson’s position appears to be guilty of reading back into early biblical texts meanings that words later acquired.” Cf. Anderson, Charity, 139, 197; also Rosenthal, “Ṣĕdāqâh, Charity,” 428–9. 14 Translation adapted from Yosaif Asher Weiss, Talmud Bavli: The Schottenstein Edition: Tractate Bava Basra: Volume 1 (Hersh Goldwurm, et al. eds.; Brooklyn Mesorah Publications, 2005) 10a3.

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213

her father asked her. ‘A poor man came to our door in the afternoon.’ she replied, ‘and everybody was busy at the wedding banquet, and there was none to attend to him. So I took the portion that was given to me and gave it to him. ‘You have done a good deed,’ said he to her. Thereupon R. Akiva went out and expounded: ‘But charity saves from death’: and not [merely] from an unnatural death, but from death itself (b. Šabb. 156b).15

A tradition attributed to Rabbi Hiyya b. Abin extended the lesson and taught that, in fact, the line ‫ צדקה תציל ממות‬appears twice in the scriptures (i.e. Prov 10:2 and 11:4) to teach that almsgiving saves both from unnatural deaths and the eternal death of Gehenna (b. B. Batra 10a). In this view, which is not limited to Rabbi Hiyya, the practice of charity implicitly assured one a place in the resurrection. It is significant that scriptural narrative and not simply the gnomic Prov 10:2 provided the rabbis with a proof of the resurrecting power of alms. Rabbi Judan said in the name of Rabbi Zeira and Rabbi Joḥanan in the name of Rabbi Simeon bar Yoḥai: “Great is the merit of maintaining the needy, since it causes the resurrection of the dead to come before its time. The woman of Zarephath, because she maintained Elijah, was rewarded by having her son brought to life. The Shunammite, because she gave food to Elisha, was rewarded by having her son brought to life” (Cant. Rab. 2.5.3).16

These scriptural accounts give implicit precedent to an intercessory transferability of merit. The widows’ works of mercy, namely, profit those they love, rather than the women themselves (as was the case in the story of Akiva’s daughter). The intervention of the prophet figure in these configurations of the tradition is also important to observe, for it establishes a pattern congruent with later Christological developments, as will be seen. The interpretation of these stories from 1–2 Kings along the lines of Prov 10:2 is additionally of special interest, since Luke will cast all the resurrection miracles in his two volume work “in such a way as to resemble the prophets Elijah or Elisha, the only figures in the Hebrew Bible who were known to have raised the dead.”17

15

Translation adapted from Henoch Moshe Levin, Talmud Bavli: The Schottenstein Edition: Tractate Shabbos: Volume 1 (Hersh Goldwurm, et al. eds.; Brooklyn Mesorah Publications, 2005) 156b1. 16 Translation from Maurice Simon, Midrash Rabbah: Song of Songs (New York: Soncino, 1983) 110. The Hebrew text may be found in the Wilna edition of 1887. No critical edition of Song of Songs Rabbah is yet available. On the manuscript tradition, see H. E. Steller, “Preliminary Remarks to a New Edition of Shir Hashirm Rabbah,” in Rashi 1040–1990: Homage à Ephraim Urbach (Gabriella Sed-Rajna, ed.; Paris: Cerf, 1993) 301–11. 17 See Anderson, God Raised Him from the Dead, 119–22, here 119.

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4.2.2 Tobit and the “Resurrection” of Israel The rabbinic understanding of ‫ ממות‬in Prov 10:2 concerns the death (temporal or eternal) of individuals, but charity’s role in the corporate fate of Israel was not ignored. The text of Prov 14:34 – “righteousness (‫ )צדקה‬exalts a nation” – for instance, triggered a predictably nationalistic exegesis in the Babylonian Talmud: “Jerusalem will be redeemed only by charity” (b. Bat. 10b; b. Šabb. 139a). Earlier traditions attest the same consciousness of charity’s significance in the reversal of Israel’s corporate plight (cf. Isa 1:27 LXX where Zion and her captives will be saved by almsgiving, µετὰ ἐλεηµοσύνης [‫)]בצדקה‬. The book of Tobit, in its canonical form, is the critical Second Temple witness to this motif. The climatic prayer recorded in Tobit 13:1–18, perhaps the earliest example of an “eschatological psalm,” is crafted in close imitation of Deuteronomy 31–32, an influential text in the period.18 The prayer openly treats the experience of Exile (Tobit 13:3–4, 6; cf. 3:1–5) and the sad fate of Jerusalem and the Temple (13:9–10, 16–18). Echoing the pattern of Deut 32:39 19 – “I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal” – Tobit 13 sketches first Israel’s descent down to Sheol (εἰς ᾅδην) on account of her sins (13:2, 9a), then, after her repentance (13:6), her glorious rebuilding and renewal (13:9b, 16). The resonance of this national “death and resurrection” motif with the personal fate of Tobit is unmistakable: “Though he has scourged me, he has had mercy on me” (ὅτι αὐτὸς ἐµαστίγωσέν µε, καὶ ἠλέησάς µε, Tobit 11:15); “He will scourge us for our iniquities, and will he will again have mercy and gather us from the nations among whom you have been scattered” (Μαστιγώσει ἡµᾶς ἐπὶ ταῖς ἀδικίας ἡµῶν καὶ πάλιν ἐλεήσει καὶ συνάξει ἐκ πάντων τῶν ἐθνῶν, ὅπου ἄν διασκορπισθῆτε ἐν αὐτοῖς, 13:2). The fate of the nation and the man are openly fused in the penitential prayer in 3:1–5, where the punishments justly exacted for Tobit’s “sins” and for those of his fathers blend into one. Tobit, in short, is cast as an “Israelogical” figure, whose personal descent into the death-like darkness of blindness embodies Israel’s exilic existence, while his regained sight signals the reversal of Israel’s fortunes. 20



18 On eschatological psalms, see Steven Weitzman, “Allusion, Artifice, and Exile in the Hymn of Tobit,” JBL 116 (1996) 46–61; and David Flusser, “Psalms, Hymns, and Prayers” in Jewish Writings of the Second Temple Period (Michael Stone, ed.; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984) 556. On Deuteronomy 31–32 and Tobit 13, see Carey Moore, Tobit (AB 40A; New York: Doubleday, 1996) 285. 19 This text from Deuteronomy became a pattern for Second Temple handling of the resurrection, cf. 2 Macc 7:6 and Testament of Moses. See George W. E. Nickelsburg, Resurrection, Immortality, and Eternal Life in Intertestamental Judaism and Early Christianity (Harvard Theological Studies 56; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 2006) 29, 97. 20 The language of an “Israelogical” reading of texts is drawn from Phillip Cary, Jonah (Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible; Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2008) 19, 22. Cary

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This reversal from darkness to light is somehow enabled by Tobit’s exemplary charity (cf. Tobit 1:3, 16–20; 2:1–6).21 The key inter-text is, predictably, Prov 10:2: “Charity delivers from death and keeps you from entering the darkness” (4:10); “Charity delivers from death, and it will purge away every sin. Those who perform deeds of charity and of righteousness will have fullness of life” (12:9). Although he is cast as an innocent Joban figure, Tobit confesses his own sin along with those of the nation (3:1–5), acknowledging God’s just judgment, so that the “resurrection” Tobit enjoys corresponds at a covenantal level to the sin-exile-return pattern that regularly shapes the resurrection discourse of the period.22 The life of Tobit lauds alms as a recipe for repentance and restoration. Tobit is not the only figure set in the foreground as a living example, however. A very interesting tradition found in the text of Codex Vaticanus (MSS BA) tersely commends the case of Manasseh: Μανασσης ἐποίησεν ἐλεηµοσύνην καὶ ἐσώθη ἐκ παγίδος θανάτου (Tobit 14:10). Fitzmyer observes that, “the name Manasses in G1 is strange, but it is well attested in various MSS.” He then opines: “It is hardly a reference to King Manasseh of Judah (687–642), a scandalous ruler (2 Kgs 21:1–18), who was hardly recalled for his almsgiving.”23 It is true, the suggestion of Manasseh’s almsgiving here would represent a significant development of the biblical tradition; but the bold recasting of the wicked king’s character is already attested in 2 Chronicles and elsewhere. Moreover, the fictive Neo-Assyrian setting of Tobit during the reigns of Sennecharib and Essarhaddon – extended by Tobit’s full life of 158 years (14:11; cf. 14:2) – would make the reference to the king a perfect chronological fit. Most importantly, appeal to the tradition of the king’s exile, repentance, and restoration would be supremely apt in this portion of Tobit, where the return of Israel from her Exile and the rebuilding of the Temple are explicitly in view (e.g. 14:5–7). The real difficulty with the identification is how to understand the use of “Manasseh” in the immediate context of Tobit 14:10–11, where the name

applies the idea to the figure of Jonah, whose story plots a similar tale of national destiny through a descent into Sheol and subsequent “resurrection.” On this dimension of the Tobit narrative, see George W. E. Nickelsburg, “Tobit,” in Harper’s Bible Commentary (James L. Mays, ed.; New York: Harper & Row, 1988) 791–803. 21 According to Micah Kiel (“Tobit’s Theological Blindness,” CBQ 73 [2011] 281–98), this reversal has an illuminating effect, changing Tobit’s perspective from a “Deuteronomistic” retributive outlook to a rethinking of the Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang ethic. 22 See Anderson, God Raised Him from the Dead, 48–91; N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Christian Origins and the Question of God 3; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003) 85–206; and Jon Levenson, Resurrection and the Restoration of Israel: The Ultimate Victory of the God of Life (New Haven: Yale University, 2006). 23 Joseph Fitzmyer, Tobit (Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2003) 334.

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seems to stand in for “Ahiqar.”24 It is certain that “Manasseh” here is secondary; but simply calling the textual tradition of the names “badly garbled” is un-instructive. 25 Given our ignorance of the form of the Ahiqar tradition known to the author of Tobit, no full certainty can be had. Perhaps a key may be found in the nebulous figure of Αµαν – a name also unique to G1.26 However the name of Manasseh was ultimately introduced, the tradition evidently moves in the orbit of the famous Prayer of Manasseh, a composition suggestively modeled on David’s Miserere, presuming Manasseh’s change of heart and abjectly invoking the “God of those who repent” (ὁ θεὸς τῶν µετανοούτων, v. 13; cf. vv. 7–8).27 The allusion to Manasseh’s alms in Tobit 14:10 is likely an interpretation of the massive public works which the repentant and restored king undertakes in Jerusalem in 2 Chron 33:13–14. If this challenges the truncated contemporary notion of “almsgiving,” it is worth noting that in the more primitive construction of ‫צדקה‬, the repair of town walls was explicitly reckoned as an eminent obligation of charity (e.g. b. Batra 8a).28 Extreme individual cases like that of Manasseh serve a much broader purpose than merely encouraging isolated practitioners of charity. If Tobit is effectively an innocent sufferer, the rehabilitated idolater king is a personification of the fortunes of rebellious Israel. The nation’s experience of being “dead” in Exile and – more importantly – their hope of “resurrection” is somehow embodied in “Israelogical” figures like Tobit and Manasseh, who bear both the suffering and the restoration of Israel within themselves. If for the Chronicler Manasseh serves to urge upon Israel the need to “humble one-



24 From another perspective, “Ahiqar” is the problematic name. James Lindenberger (“Ahiqar” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Volume Two, 489 fn. 64) observes: “Unclear is the source of the reference in Tob 14:10 to Ahiqar’s being saved from death because of his eleēmosynē… None of the versions of Ah stresses his ‘good works’…and none of them speaks at all about his ‘almsgiving’…. J. R. Harris is probably correct in seeing an original Semitic ṣdqh (‘righteousness’ and ‘almsgiving’ in post-biblical Heb. and Aram.) behind Ahiqar’s eleēmosynē in the Tob passage.” 25 Lindenberger, “Ahiqar,” 489. 26 Moore (Tobit, 292) suggests “Aman” may be either a corruption of “Adam,” which appears in Codex Vaticanus, or perhaps the archvillain Haman (Esth 3:1). Possibly “Aman” designates the son of Manasseh, Amon (‫אמון‬, Αµων), who followed his father’s wickedness and succeeded him as king, but who had no space for repentance, being murdered in his palace (2 Kgs 21:19–25). This pairing would nicely parallel the relationship between Ahiqar and his wicked nephew/adopted son, Nadin, whose names are preserved in the text of G2 and 4Q199. Both 4Q199 and G2 read the traitor’s name as “Nadin” (‫;נדן‬ Nadab), and this corresponds to the Ahiqar narrative as we have it. 27 On the Prayer of Manasseh, see James Charlesworth, “Prayer of Manasseh, in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Volume One, 625–37. 28 On the expansive ancient sense of ἐλεηµοσύνη, see Heiligenthal, “Werke der Barmherzigkeit,” 289–301; and Chapter One §1.4.1 above.

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self” (‫ )כנע‬and return, offering a “spiritual pattern for his Jewish community of the Second Temple era,” Tobit has isolated a different dimension of Israel’s needful repentance in the act of ἐλεηµοσύνη.29 To a considerable degree, then, charity functions for the Book of Tobit as a marker of covenantal ‫תשובא‬, in which Israel might rest her hopes for new life. These hopes extend to include, it is important to note, after Israel’s own conversion, a subsequent “turning” of the Gentiles to the fear of God (καὶ πάντα τὰ ἔθνη ἐπιστρέψουσιν ἀληθινῶς φοβεῖσθαι κύριον τὸν θεὸν, Tobit 14:6). This event of eschatological significance will then inaugurate an age of love and charity. The Lord will exalt his people and all will “perform works of mercy for our brothers” (καὶ ὑψώσει κύριος τὸν λαὸν αὐτοῦ, καὶ χαρήσονται πάντες οἱ ἀγαπῶντες κύριον τὸν θεὸν ἐν ἀληθείᾳ καὶ δικαιοσύνῃ, ποιοῦντες ἔλεος τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς ἡµῶν, 14:7). It is not difficult to see how the national application of the sin as debt theology in foundational texts like Isaiah 40 and 61 (cf. 11Q13) would facilitate a correspondingly corporate outlook in the way rescue and repentance was imagined as coming through charity. Through contact with Prov 10:2, Israel’s fiscal recovery in heaven’s accounting – i.e. the erasing of the national “debt” through deposits made by charity – has been joined with the metaphor of resurrection: a potent symbol in this period of the people’s collective salvation from sin. The technique of narrating this theology of redemption through the life of an exemplary individual, such as Tobit, however, adds an inevitable element and idea of personal repentance into the picture.30 The eschatological value of charity that emerges in Luke involves a subtle blend of both these corporate and individual accents, so characteristically intertwined in the Second Temple period.31



29 John Endres, “The Spiritual Vision of Chronicles: Wholehearted, Joy-Filled Worship of God,” CBQ 69 (2007) 6–12, here 10. 30 This pattern corresponds to a similar shift in this period towards belief in personal resurrection – still balanced with a corporate expectation. Wright (Resurrection, 202) traces the progressive concretization of what began in Ezekiel 37 and Isaiah 26 as a metaphor for the return from Exile: “By the time 2 Maccabees was written the metaphor has become literal, having now the concrete referent of re-embodiment – getting back hands, tongues, entire bodies – without losing the larger concrete referent of national restoration.” 31 Richard Bauckham (“Life, Death, and the Afterlife in Second Temple Judaism,” in Life in the Face of Death: The Resurrection Message of the New Testament [Richard Longenecker, ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998] 88) explains: “Individual eschatology [i.e. in the Second Temple period] is not divorced from corporate eschatology. The fate of the individual after death is placed within the context of the final future of God’s people within the world. This is a consequence of the way Jewish eschatology developed. It was first and foremost a hope for God’s action, in salvation and judgment, in the world, for the coming of his kingdom in Israel and over the nations. When hope for the future of individuals entered the picture, it was hope that they would rise to share in the fulfillment of

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4.2.3 Meriting the Resurrection in Luke Kevin Anderson’s recent monograph on the subject of resurrection in Luke – the first and as yet only such study to appear on this decisive theme – contextualizes Luke’s major resurrection texts with a survey of Jewish and Hellenistic sources.32 Ultimately, Anderson stresses the strong link between the resurrection idea and a covenantal sin-exile-return pattern.33 This is a useful result that helps establish the broad context in which Luke’s resurrection language must be heard. Unfortunately, as an investigation into Lukan resurrection theology, Anderson’s study fails in an important way. He narrowly defines the relevant material and fails to identify Luke’s appropriation of the Wirkungsgeschichte of Prov 10:2. The importance of Prov 10:2, reinterpreted in its reception history, is now clear. Works of mercy were understood to entail a special claim on the resurrection. In the Second Temple period, moreover, charity was closely linked with a corporate eschatology: the repentance and “resurrection” of Israel, still suffering the penalty for its sins. The Gospel of Luke, committed to the idea of sin as debt, also accepts this understanding of charity as closely bound to the resurrection – of individuals and of Israel. While he never cites Prov 10:2 directly, there is strong evidence that charity held the power to “deliver from death” in Luke’s conception. Several texts in the Gospel help secure this point and illustrate Luke’s particular perception. 4.2.3.1 “Worthy of the Resurrection” (Luke 20:35) Like Mark and Matthew, Luke includes the story of the Sadducees’ question about the resurrection (Luke 20:27–40; cf. Mark 12:18–27; Matt 22:23–33). In reporting Jesus’ opponents’ contrived case of the seven childless brothers, Luke follows his Markan source very closely (Luke 20:27–34a; cf. Mark

God’s promises for the redemption and restoration of Israel. Hope for life after death is therefore not purely individualistic in the Jewish tradition.” 32 See Anderson, “God Raised Him from the Dead.” Anderson (13) defends the perhaps obvious but still important claim that “the resurrection of Jesus in Luke-Acts constitutes the pivotal act of God in the salvation of Israel and the whole world, and it is consequently the focus of the Lukan message of salvation.” See also Dennis Horton, Death and Resurrection: The Shape and Function of a Literary Motif in the Book of Acts (Cambridge: James Clark, 2011). Horton uses William Freedman’s criteria for identifying a literary motif in order to analyze the development and function of death and resurrection texts in Acts. 33 Anderson, God Raised Him from the Dead, 48–91. This is not an entirely original conclusion. In his review of Anderson’s book, Robert Brawley (CBQ 70 [2008] 589) remarks: “There is little here that one could not find also find in N. T. Wright’s The Resurrection of the Son of God.”

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12:18–23).34 The response Jesus gives to this unlikely scenario sounds a distinct note in Luke’s version, however: particularly Luke 20:34b-36, which diverges from Mark’s version in some striking ways. 35 Most interestingly, Luke describes those who enjoy the resurrection as “those worthy (καταξιωθέντες) of that age (τοῦ αἰῶνος ἐκείνου) and of the resurrection (ἀναστάσεως) of the dead” (Luke 20:35). Little notice has been taken of Luke’s language of merit here.36 A likely reason for this is the apodictic (Protestant) premise that, as the entry on ἄξιος in Kittel’s Dictionary remarks, although “the thought of merit in later Judaism found expression in ( ) which corresponds to ἄξιος…all thought of merit is excluded by the nature of the Gospel.”37 Problematic as this misguided principle is, focus has, in any event, generally been directed to the conception of the afterlife implied in the wider synoptic pericope (e.g. ἰσάγγελοι, Luke 20:36), so that the striking Lukan soteriology is often missed.38 David Aune has not overlooked the peculiarity of Luke 20:34b–36. He advances the thesis that the specific logion that ultimately found its way into Luke was at some point detached from its original context in the Markan narrative and reformulated in the baptismal setting of Syrian Christianity, whence it eventually reached the third evangelist.39 In this Enkratite/Gnostic

34

The echo of Tobit (3:8; 6:10–12; 7:11–13) is of interest here (cf. also 2 Macc 7). See Bovon, Lukas 4, 113. 35 On these differences, see ibid., 115–6. 36 Luke’s language of merit recalls the Latin “Regina Inscription” (JIWE ii 103), probably dated to the second century after Christ, “the best known expression of resurrection belief in Jewish inscriptions.” See Joseph Park, Conceptions of Afterlife in Jewish Inscriptions (WUNT II/121; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000) 167–8. The relevant lines (7–8) express hope for an eternal life in light for those worthy of the promised age: dignisque piisque quae meruit sedem venerandi ruris habere. 37 TDNT I, 379. 38 On the view of the resurrection in this text, see especially Otto Schwankl, Die Sadduzäerfrage (Mk 12,18–27 Parr.): Eine Exegetisch-Theologische Studie zur Auferstehungserwartung (BBB 66; Bonn: Athenäum, 1987). See also John Kilgallen, “The Sadducees and Resurrection from the Dead: Luke 20:27–40,” Bib 67 (1986) 478–95; Gilles Carton, “Comme des anges dans le ciel,” BVC 28 (1959) 46–52; François Dreyfus, “L’argument scriptuaire de Jésus en faveur de la resurrection des morts,” RB 66 (1959) 213–25; Gunther Baumbach, “Das Sadduzäerverständnis bei Josephus Flavius und im Neuen Testament,” Kairos 23 (1971) 17–37; F. Gerald Downing, “The Resurrection of the Dead: Jesus and Philo,” JSNT 15 (1982) 42–50; and, as an interesting episode in the history of reception, Gergely Juház, “Translating Resurrection: The Importance of the Sadducees’ Belief in the Tyndale-Joyce Controversy,” in Resurrection in the New Testament (R. Bieringer, V. Koperski, and B. Lataire; BETL 165; Leuven: Peeters, 2002) 107–21. Ses also Wright, Resurrection, 416–29. 39 David Aune, “Luke 20:34–36: A ‘Gnosticized Logion of Jesus?” in Geschichte – Tradition – Reflexion: Festschrift für Martin Hengel zum 70 Geburtstag, Band 3 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996) 187–202. See also Bovon, Lukas 4, 115.

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recasting of the saying, celibacy was recognized as the prerequisite that made one “worthy” to participate in the resurrection. Thus, in Aune’s view, Luke’s text “can be understood in the light of the Lukan interest in asceticism generally and celibacy in particular.”40 Aune has correctly highlighted the implicit ethical and ascetical thrust informing Luke 20:34b–36. He has, nevertheless, made two questionable judgments. First, he has overstressed the alien quality of these verses within the Lukan framework by arguing that a foreign source rather than Lukan redaction best explains the distance of Luke’s text from the Markan version.41 Second, in turning to Enkratite/Gnostic sources such as Pseudo-Titus Epistle, Menander, and Marcion, Aune has overlooked a more natural Jewish background to and interpretation of Luke’s language.42 The notion of meriting the resurrection through one’s ethical behavior requires no special thesis of Gnostic origins. The tradition of Prov 10:2 makes this clear. The resurrection could be attained through acts of charity. Hints of celibacy in Luke 20:34–35 are no objection to this (on the contrary!) and may be freely acknowledged, since forfeiting one’s money through charity consistently contextualizes Luke’s own interest in forfeiting marriage, as both Hans-Josef Klauck and Christopher Hays have shown.43 For Luke, the eschatological ethics of money and marriage belong together in a single, coherent ascetical paradigm of self-denial (e.g. Luke 9:57–62; 14:25–35; 17:20–35; 18:18–30; 20:20–40).44 In the context of Luke 20:27–40, of course, the connection to wealth is neither obvious nor direct. Klauck thus sees Luke 20:34–36 as the one exception to Luke’s otherwise regular conjunction of “Ehelosigkeit und Armut.”45

40

Aune, “Gnosticized Logion,” 189, also 192. Ibid. 188. 42 Ibid., 194–9. See also Turid Kerlsen Seim, “Children of the Resurrection: Perspectives on Angelic Asceticism in Luke-Acts,” in Asceticism and the New Testament (Leif Vaage and Vincent Wimbusch, eds.; New York: Routledge, 1999) 115–25. 43 Klauck, “Armut der Jünger,” 160–95, esp. 187–92; and Christopher Hays, “Hating Wives and Wealth? An Examination of Discipleship Ethics in the Third Gospel,” TynB 20 (2009) 47–68. 44 Susan Garrett (“Beloved Physician of the Soul: Luke as Advocate of Ascetic Practice,” in Asceticism and the New Testament, 85–7) locates Luke’s counsels against greed and family attachments together within a larger Hellenistic ascetical discourse aimed at the cure of excessive desires (ἐπιθυµία) and passions. “For Luke, as for the moral philosophers, the giving up of family, possessions, and life habituates the self to making right judgments about what truly matters.” In the Jewish context, both fiscal and sexual asceticism fit within a single context of supererogatory renunciation. See Diamond, Holy Men and Hunger Artists, 33–45. 45 “Mit Ausnahme von 20,34–36 stehen alle…angeführten Belege [i.e. Ehelosigkeitstexte] mit ihr [i.e. der Armutsfrage] in mehr oder minder direkter Berühung,” Klauck, “Armut der Jünger,” 188. 41

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This exclusive judgment is too hasty, however, and unaware of the significant tradition linking charity and the resurrection. Based on his broader pattern, Luke’s continued sensitivity to the charity motif appears likely and can be shown to operate on at least two inter-textual levels. (1) First, the Lukan addition of καταξιωθέντες directly echoes the Gospel’s paradigmatic text on the practice of charity. The Baptist’s call for the fruits “worthy” of repentance meant specifically works of mercy: clothing the naked and feeding the hungry (Luke 3:10–14). Luke adopted this ἀξιός language from the Double Tradition (cf. Matt 3:8), but his interpretation of the call to “worthiness” through almsgiving is his own. The theme is reinforced in the specific Lukan form of the story of the centurion, who is accounted “worthy” for his loving generosity towards the people (Luke 7:4) – despite his humble protests to the contrary (οὐ γὰρ ἱκανός εἰµι; ὀυδὲ ἑµατὸν ἠξίωσα, 7:6–7).46 Although the ἀξιός word family also still carries a broader sense for Luke (cf. 10:7; 12:48), this contextualized meaning in application to good works is prominent and clear. (2) A second, subtler point is that Luke’s re-tuning of Mark’s Sadduzäerfrage reinforces the view already explored in the charity text of Luke 10:25– 28, which will reappear in the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man (16:29– 31). 47 Specifically, as in his exchange about “eternal life” (ζωὴν ἀιώνιον) with the lawyer, Luke here once more reframes his Markan source to suggest that the issue is not a matter of reading the scriptures more accurately – but rather simply behaving as the scriptures so clearly prescribe. Thus, in Mark 12:18–27 an adversarial, academic tone predominates as Jesus attacks his questioners’ exegetical acumen (οὐ διὰ τοῦτο πλανᾶσθε µὴ εἰδότες τὰς γραφάς, Mark 12:24). The climax in Mark comes with Jesus’ triumphal drawing of an appropriate resurrection proof-text from within the Pentateuch (Mark 12:26–27). Luke, by contrast, goes another direction altogether and omits Mark’s charge about misunderstanding the scriptures. Jesus even gives an answer that some of the scribes can accept (τινες τῶν γραµµατέων εἶπαν, διδάσαλκε, καλῶς εἶπας, Luke 20:39; cf. Mark 12:27).48 Luke’s construal of Jesus’ interaction with the Sadducees effectively erases Mark’s vision of



46 See the discussion in Chapter Two §2.4.2.2. “We should not miss the contrasting self-evaluation in v 7a, using the cognate verb (ἠξίωσα, “I considered worthy”),” Nolland, Luke, 316. The Gentile centurion’s attitude of humble trust is contrasted with that found in Israel (Luke 7:10). The only other character in Luke who protests his unworthiness is the Prodigal Son, whose example contrasts with the leaders in Israel: οὐκέτι εἰµὶ ἄξιος κληθῆναι υἱός σου (15:19 cf. 18:13). 47 See the discussion in Chapter Three §3.2.2.2. 48 Luke carefully speaks of “scribes” here, for he knows well that the Sadducees do not accept resurrection (cf. Luke 20:27; Acts 23:8).

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agonistic exegesis and opens space for another focus.49 Namely, Luke “introduces into the Marcan rendition of Jesus’ words a moral tone.” 50 In Luke 20:27–40, Luke is interested in a question of orthopraxis quite as much as orthodoxy; and in employing the phrase “worthy of the resurrection” Jesus hints that a share in the age to come is not to be blithely presumed upon as one’s inevitable inheritance as children of Abraham (cf. 3:8). The question of eternal life is addressed explicitly three times in three different ways in the Gospel. The response in each case is consistent. As in the Good Samaritan and the story of the Rich Ruler, so by implication in 20:35, the way to “eternal life” in Luke requires a determined course of self-denial and charitable action – as patently demanded by the scriptures. 4.2.3.2 The Centurion(s) and Tabitha The controversy with the Sadducees is suggestive, and Jesus’ direct answer of charity to the question about inheriting “eternal life” in Luke 10:25 and 18:18 is still more impressive. Three additional texts help ground the claim that Luke understands that charity makes one “worthy” of eschatological life. (1) In the first instance, there is the story of the centurion from Capernaum (Luke 7:1–10). As already seen, the generous love of this soldier is shown in his building a synagogue for the people (see Chapter Two §2.4.2.2). Such liberality, the Jews insist, make him ἀξιός (7:4) of a miracle that would save his servant from death (ἤµελλεν τελευτᾶν): precisely the promise attached to ἐλεηµοσύνη in Prov 10:2 and widely celebrated in rabbinic circles. The close brush of the man’s servant with death corresponds directly to the stories told of characters like Akiva’s daughter. In Luke 7, however, it is not bare almsgiving that secures the rescue. As in the Elijah and Elisha stories, the intercession of a parent and the intervention of a prophetic wonderworker (προφήτης µέγας ἠγέρθη ἐν ἡµῖν, 7:16) are also involved in the salvation of the child (παῖς). This mediation is of decisive significance, for it reconfigures the efficacy of charity around the person of Jesus. Although in this case death is averted rather than reversed, similar to the case of Akiva’s daughter, it is striking that the next scene recounts the raising of the widow’s son in Nain (7:11–17). It appears that an intentional pairing is at work here.51 Just as the Sermon in Nazareth paired the widow of Zarephath and the soldier Naaman (4:25–27) and Acts will pair Tabitha and Cornelius (Acts 9:36– 10:48), so these two characters, a military man and a widow, belong

49

See Daniel M. Cohn-Sherbok, “Jesus’ Defense of the ‘Resurrection of the Dead,’’ JSNT 11 (1981) 64–73. Cohn-Sherbok shows that Jesus’ response does not conform to Tannaitic middot. 50 Kilgallen, “Sadducees and Resurrection,” 482. Bovon (Lukas 4, 116) similarly notes “ein Verb mit moralisierendem Beigeschmack.” 51 See Gregg Carey, “Between Text and Sermon: Luke 7:1–10,” Int 67 (2013) 199–201.

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together. 52 This link cements the resurrection coloring of the centurion tradition, and the coupled stories of these two give concrete content to Jesus’ sudden insertion of νεκροὶ ἐγείπρονται in his reiteration of Isa 61 in Luke 7:22 (cf. 4:18–19).53 (2) In Acts 9:36–42 Peter raises the disciple Tabitha from the dead. The implicit influence of Prov 10:2 here is impressive, as Gary Anderson, following Cyprian of Carthage (De Opera et Eleemosynis 5–6), has observed. 54 Luke places the attestation to Tabitha’s works of mercy front and center: “She was full of good works and acts of charity” (αὕτη ἦν πλήρης ἔργων ἀγαθῶν καὶ ἔλεηµοσυνῶν ὧν ἐποίει, Acts 9:36). 55 The theme is then underlined as the mourning widows display for Peter the garments Tabitha had made for them (9:39), representing her special minsitery of clothing the poor. 56 The unexpressed presupposition behind this scene is that it is precisely these good works of Tabitha that merit her rescue from death. As Cyprian concludes: “She, who had bestowed on suffering widows the means of life, merited to be recalled to life by the entreaty of the widows.”



52 The order appears reversed. One expects the Jewish widow, followed by the pagan soldier. Fitzmyer (Luke, 655) plausibly suggests that Luke depicts a progression in the miracles: from a near death rescue to an outright resurrection. Geographical considerations might also play a role. On the other hand, a reversal of the expected “first to the Jews, then to the Gentiles” pattern could signal a deeper theme (“the last shall be first,” cf. Luke 13:28–30; 7:9). In Nazareth, Jesus’ kinsmen have somehow already heard of the wonders done in Capernaum (Luke 4:23) before he heads there after his native folk reject him (4:31). 53 On the echo of 4Q521 in Luke 7:22, see Wold, “Agency and the Raising of the Dead,” 1–19; and Stephen Witetchek, “What Did John Hear? The Reconstruction of Q 7:18–19 and Its Implications,” NovT 56 (2014) 245–60. 54 Anderson, Charity, 170–3. After quoting Raphael’s citation of Prov 10:2 in Tobit 12:8–9, Cyprian remarks: “The angel reveals, and manifests and certifies that our petitions become efficacious by almsgiving, that life is redeemed from dangers by almsgiving, that souls are delivered from death by almsgiving…When, in keeping with his apostolic kindness, [Peter] had come quickly, the widows stood about him weeping and beseeching, showing the cloaks and tunics and all those garments they had earlier received, and interceding for the dead woman not with their voices but with her corporal works of mercy,” (Ante-Nicene Fathers: Volume 5: Fathers of the Third Century: Hippolytus, Cyprian, Cauis, Novation, Appendix (A. Cleveland Cox, ed.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2012, 477). 55 Ivoni Richter Reimer (Women in the Acts of the Apostles: A Feminist Liberation Perspective [trans. Linda Maloney; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995] 36–41) gives sustained attention to the significance of Tabitha’s benefactions. 56 The middle participle ἐπιδεικνύµεναι could mean “modeling,” but probably simply means “exhibiting.” Either way, the widows are evidently the beneficiaries of Tabitha’s work as a seamstress. See Richard Pervo, Acts (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2009) 255.

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While it is right to recognize the singular character of Jesus’ resurrection, too strong a distinction between Tabitha’s mere resuscitation/revivifaction and the Lord’s resurrection should not be pressed. 57 Indeed, Luke’s noted interest in the corporality of the risen Jesus invites direct comparison (παρέστησεν ἑαυτὸν ζῶντα / αὐτὴν ζῶσαν, Acts 1:3 || 9:41; cf. Luke 24:36– 43). Peter’s own intervention in this miracle, moreover, in which commentators rightly recognize Acts’ imitatio Christi motif, must be appreciated as an example of the Christological re-configuring of the almssaves-from-death topos. 58 Tabitha’s good works warrant her rescuse from death, but her claim on life still requires a Christological agency and takes a Christological form. (3) In close connection with both the Gospel centurion and the person of Tabitha, stands the figure of Cornelius in Acts 10.59 Like Tabitha, this character is depicted as performing many works of mercy, and like the earlier centurion his alms are specifically directed toward the Jewish people (ποιῶν ἐλεηµοσύνας πολλὰς τῷ λαῷ, Acts 10:2). The importance of this generous behavior is not at all incidental, since the angel reports that it is precisely Cornelius’ charity that comes like a prayer before God. “Your prayers and your alms have ascended like a memorial in the presence of God” (αἱ προσευχαί σου καὶ αἱ ἐλεηµοσύναι σου ἀνέβησαν εἰς µνηνόσυνον ἔµπροσθεν τοῦ θεοῦ; 10:4; cf. 10:31).60 If the charity theme is thus impressively stressed, the death-to-life motif is redirected and much more subtle. 61 A series of parallels with the Tabitha story (and larger the parallel to the paired centurion of Capernaum and the widow of Nain) suggest an intentional connection to

57

Pace Anderson, God Raised Him from the Dead, 114–7. The act of “throwing everyone out” (ἐκβαλὼν δὲ ἔξω πάντας, Acts 9:40) and performing the miracle in private recalls Jesus’ raising of the daughter of Jairus in Luke 8:51. See Pervo, Acts, 256. The D text adds “in the name of [our Lord] Jesus Christ” at Acts 9:40. See also 9:34. 59 See Robert Tannehill, “‘Cornelius’ and ‘Tabitha’ Encounter Jesus,” Int (1994) 347−57. Tannehill’s exercise in reader response criticism highlights the two figures of Tabitha and Cornelius as belonging to Luke’s poor-rich, low-mighty pairings – with a better result for the rich. On the important connections between the two centurions, see Justin Howell, “The Imperial Authority and Benefaction of Centurions and Acts 10:34–43: A Response to C. Kavin Rowe,” JSNT 31 (2008) 27–9. 60 The repeated mention of Cornelius’ alms is not to be accounted simply as the angel “bestowing suitable and well-earned compliments,” pace Pervo, Acts, 267. 61 Horton (Death and Resurrection, 74–5) notes: “The minor characters in Acts who experience a conversion often perform multiple functions within the narrative, creating a complexity that tends to obscure the mimetic presence of the death-resurrection motif… According to Ernst Haenchen, the primary purpose of Cornelius’ conversion is to show that ‘God instigated the mission to the Gentiles’…On a secondary level, however, Cornelius has another purpose: to reveal the crucial role of the messianic [i.e. deathresurrection] pattern within the conversion process.” 58

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the resurrection motif. 62 A ring structure binding Cornelius’ story with the raising of Aeneas (9:32–35), whose name inevitably conjures a return from the land of death, might also be perceived, notably in the threefold repitition of “rise” (ἀνάστηθι, 9:34; ἀνάστηθι 9:40; ἀνάστηθι,10:26). 63 Denis Horton oberves the critical symbolic moment. The heart of the conversion scene (10:24–48) opens with a symbolic, though brief, enactment of Cornelius’s death and resurrection, forshadowing the content of the actual conversion process. When Peter enters the house, Cornelius falls down at his feet (πεσὼν ἐπὶ τοὺς πόδας, v. 25). Not only does Cornelius’s low position allude to the depths of the grave, the wording strongly recalls the fatal posture of two others at Peter’s feet. Ananias and Saphira both fall down dead before the same apostle (πεσὼν ἔπεσεν...τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ, respectively in 5:5, 10). For Cornelius, however, this deathlike state proves temporary. Peter reaches down and “raises” (ἤγειρεν) him up, words that echo the resurrection event wherein God “raises” Jesus from dead. Moreover, Peter initiates the symbolic resurrection with the command for Cornelius to “arise” (ἤγειρεν), a command often issued to dead people prior to their return to life.64

To this it is necessary only to add that the contrast with Ananias and Saphira plays directly on the difference between their greed and the generosity of Cornelius: one leads to death, the other leads to life. If the baptism of the centurion ultimately embodies the new life of this righteous man, the critical verse comes only at the end, as an interpretation of the entire event of



62 On the pairing of these two scenes, see Pervo, Acts, 254. The gendered identity of Cornelius has been stressed by Bonnie Flessen, An Exemplary Man: Cornelius and Characterization in Acts (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011). This line may be taken too far, but it helps underscore Luke’s familiar man-woman pairing as part of the Tabitha-Cornelius unit. See Allen Black, “‘Your Sons and Your Daughters Will Prophecy…’ Pairings of Men and Women in Luke Acts,” in Scripture and Traditions: Essays on Early Judaism and Christianity in Honor of Carl R. Holladay (Patrick Gray and Gail O’Day, eds.; NovTSup 129; Leiden: Brill, 2008) 193–206. Although the raising of Tabitha is also linked with the healing of Aeneas in Acts 9:32–35 (cf. Haenchen, Acts of the Apostles, 340–1), the stronger linkage with Cornelius is secured by the common location in Joppa, the summoning of Peter through two messengers (Acts 9:38; 10:7–8), and the shared stress on the ἐλεηµοσύνη of the protagonists (9:36; 10:2). 63 A sandwich structure, centered upon the raising of Tabitha, connects the raising of Aeneas, the soldier founder of Rome, and the story Cornelius, the roman centurion of the Italian cohort. The name Dorcas (“Gazelle”) may be a reference to Dido in the Aeneid. See Dennis MacDonald, Luke and Vergil: Imitations of Classical Greek Literature (The New Testament and Greek Literature 2; Lanham, MD: Roman & Littlefield, 2015) 241. 64 Horton, Death and Resurrection, 73–4. Baukham’s “refusal of worship” motif is also certainly at work in Acts 10:26 (καὶ ἐγὼ αὐτὸς ἄνθρωπός εἰµι). This functions similarly to the invocation of the name of Jesus in the “raising” of Aeneas (9:34) and the mimesis of Jesus’ behavior in the raising of Tabitha (9:40). On the high Christology of Acts 10, see C. Kavin Rowe, “Luke Acts and the Imperial Cult: A Way through the Conundrum,” JSNT 27 (2005) 279–300.

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Cornelius’ reception of the Spirit: “Then God has also given the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life” (τὴν µετάνοιαν εἰς ζωὴν ἔδωκεν, 11:18). Eschatological life is here assigned as a promise attending true repentance (µετάνοια).65 In Acts 10, such saving repentance – no more confined by ethnic boundaries or the observance of the Law – is recognized in everyone who fears God and “does righteousness” (ὁ φοβούµενος αὐτὸν καὶ ἐργαζόµενος δικαιοσύνην, 10:35). 66 This language is not so generic as most translations suppose (e.g. he who “does what is right” NRSV; “acts uprightly” NAB; “tut was Recht ist” EÜ; “pratique la justice” BJ). In the case of Cornelius, the paradigmatic God-fearer (φοβούµενος τὸν θεόν...ποιῶν ἐλεηµοσύνας, 10:2), doing δικαιοσύνη is no moral abstraction (cf. Matt 6:1).67 This is precisely the ‫ צדקה‬that secures one’s life. 4.2.3.3 Sola Caritas: Resurrection, Israel, and the Nations In the rabbinic view, resurrection is an identity issue: “All Israel has a portion in the life to come” (m. Sanh. 11:1). If, as Israel Yuval remarks, this “Mishnah obviously refers to Israel carnaliter,” it is a polemic aberration.68 Earlier Second Temple traditions essentially operated on another principle: reward and punishment.69 In this context, Luke’s vision is a Second Temple perspec-



65 Luke provides a direct connection between repentance and “resurrection” in Luke 15:24/32. The “death” escaped is implied in Peter’s earlier call to repentance: “Repent (µετανοήσατε)…Save yourselves/be saved (σώθητε) from this crooked generation” (Acts 2:38–40). 66 It is noteworthy that in Luke 3:14 John’s the Baptist’s call to repentance already found a hearing among presumably Roman (cf. 7:1–10; Acts 10) soldiers. On the “extent of repentance” in the Second Temple context, see Mark Jason, Repentance at Qumran: The Penitential Framework of Religious Experience in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015) 145–56, esp. 151. The “turning” of God-fearing Gentiles like Cornelius corresponds to the expected eschatological moment anticipated in Tobit 14:6. 67 Pervo (Acts, 278) remarks: “For Luke, righteousness is primarily what one does, not a state declared by God.” 68 Israel Yuval, “All Israel Have a Portion in the World to Come,” in Redefining FirstCentury Jewish and Christian Identities,114–38. Yuval identifies redactional layers evident in the manuscript tradition and argues that the passage was crafted in a self-conscious polemic engagement with Christianity. 69 As Yuval (“All Israel,” 114) says, the affirmation in m. Sanh. 11:1 “contradicts the basic premise of the rabbinic concept of reward and punishment” and does not represent the earlier Pharisaic principle. On the Second Temple material, see Gathercole, Where is Boasting, 37–111; and Elliott, Survivors of Israel. Gathercole reveals the eschatological lacuna in E. P. Sanders’ system where “merit” discourse properly belongs: “Covenantal nomism, focused as it is on the categories of ‘getting in’ and ‘staying in,’ can gravely downplay the importance of the future dimension to salvation. In Sanders’ taxonomy there is a great deal of past (“getting in”) and present (“staying in”) but very little eschatology…The taxonomy itself…considerably downplays eschatological judgment (and by

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tive at once much wider and narrower than m. Sanh. 11:1. Eternal life belongs to all those who produce the fruits of repentance, which is perhaps another way of saying that the boundaries of Israel are in flux.70 Some ethnic sons of Abraham will be excluded (cf. Luke 3:8–9), while some righteous Gentiles from the far-flung nations will “get there” (Gathercole) to enjoy eschatological table fellowship. 71 “You yourselves will be thrust out. And people will come from east and west, from north and south, and will recline at table in the kingdom of God” (13:23, 28–29). Each of the three Lukan texts considered above (Luke 7:1–10; Acts 9:36– 42; Acts 10:1–48) in its own manner supports the idea that “charity saves from death.” Each also functions within a pairing of Jewish widows and gentile soldiers, suggestive of Luke 4:25–27 and the universal proclamation of salvation. The story of Cornelius most clearly manifests this unique Lukan development of the Prov 10:2 tradition. The centurion’s almsgiving clearly figures prominently in his being found worthy of life. In Acts 15:9, the effect of Cornelius’ charity is specifically seen to be his cleansing, as Timothy Reardon has shown (cf. Luke 11:37–44); and this purification is specifically ordered to membership in “a clean people.”72 By his alms, Cornelius has thus been freed from a morally defiling gentile existence, envisioned as a domain of death. His claim upon ζωή is thus construed not as a rescue from mortal

extension the role of works in judgment) in the pattern of Jewish soteriology…Final judgment on the basis of works permeates Jewish theology, Qumran included” (ibid. 23, 111). 70 Jacob Neusner (“Sin, Repentance, Atonement and Resurrection: The Perspective of Rabbinic Theology on the Views of James 1–2 and Paul in Romans 3–4,” in The Missions of James, Peter, and Paul: Tensions in Early Christianity [Craig Evans and Bruce Chilton, eds.; NovTSup 115; Leiden: Brill, 2005] 410) explains: “For the Rabbinic system, ‘Israel’ represents all those destined for eternal life, and ‘not-Israel’ encompasses those who will not rise from the grave: ‘All Israel has a portion in the world to come’ (m. Sanh. 11:1) yields, ‘those who have a portion in the world to come are all Israel’ – and no one else.” This may be accurate as a broad principle of Rabbinic thought, but as a contextual reading of m. Sanh. 11:1, Yuval’s argument prevails. 71 See Gathercole, Where is Boasting, 24. Gathercole nicely describes the eschatological addendum to Sanders’ schema of “getting in” and “staying in”: “getting into the world to come,” “getting in to the life in the future age,” or simply “getting there.” 72 Timothy Reardon, “Cleansing through Almsgiving in Luke-Acts: Purity, Cornelius, and the Translation of Acts 15:9,” CBQ 78 (2016) 463- 82, especially 465–9. Readerdon explains the issue of impurity behind Acts 10:28 thus: “Gentiles were thought to be morally impure…. Moral impurity [in contrast to ritual impurity]…was derived from sinful or immoral action, was not contact transmissible, was applicable to Jews and gentiles, and was remedied only through atoning sacrifice, punishment, or avoiding the behavior to begin with…for some Jews, gentiles were morally impure by nature, and for others gentile moral impurity is not natural (by φύσις) but rather was simply endemic to the gentile quotidian.… Contact with gentiles is not defiling in itself, but rather their idolatry and morally abominations are a danger.... Acts portrays Peter as avoiding the intimate association with gentiles for reasons of moral impurity.”

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danger or from actual physical death, but as “repentance,” confirmed by baptism in the Spirit, and ordered toward membership in the holy people of God. The close conjunction of charity with conversion/repentance, understood as a kind of resurrection, is very striking, but not confined to Luke. Broadly, it might be inscribed within the apocalyptic “divine Re-creation” vision of repentance described by David Lambert. 73 More closely considered, two concrete parallels are worthy of special notice. The sapiential affinities of both texts highlight the considerable hybridity of such “apocalyptic” thought and help pry Luke’s usage out of too narrow a categorization. The figure of Ahiqar in the book of Tobit presents a fascinating possibility, as Michael Weigl has argued. 74 While much remains murky (see §4.2.2), Ahiqar (rather than Manasseh) is identified in the G2 text of Tobit 14:10–11 as having been saved from death on account of his ἐλεηµοσύνη, in accordance with Prov 10:2.75 This reference to Ahiqar’s alsmgiving evidently makes allusion back to the two years of charitable care he had provided for his blinded “uncle” Tobit (τρέφω, 2:10), as well as to his similar behavior in generously raising Nadab (ἐκτρέφω, 14:10). What precisely the ungrateful snare laid for him by Nadab the book does not relate (the story is obviously known), but it clear that Ahiqar’s fate as a faithful servant of the king, who nevertheless falls into the darkness (εἰς τὸ σκότος) of “death” only to be rescused because of his charity, parallels the fate of Tobit precisely and echoes the “Schlussmoral” of the whole book. What is striking is that, as is obvious from the extra-biblical traditions, “Achikar is kein Jude!”76 Yet he intercedes on their behalf (Tobit 1:21–22), cares for them in their need (2:10), and celebrates their feasts with them (11:19). He is however, as Weigl assembles the evidence, transformed into a Jew by a deliberate theologico-literary fiction (“das bekanntermaßen Kontrafaktische”), when he is ostentatiously described as the son of Tobit’s brother, Anael, and a “close kinsman” (1:21–22; cf. 4QToba ar).77 Die Tora ist ihm fern und unbekannt. Dennoch: Er partizipiert, ohne es zu wissen, am Handeln Gottes, indem er ἀλήθεια, δικαιοσύνη, und ἐλεηµοσύνη in die Tat umsetzt… Entgegen aller historischen Evidenz und in Abrogation der religiösen Barriere, die zwischen seiner und der jüdischen Tradition steht, tritt er allein deshalb in die jüdische Großfamilie als ,,Bruder“, ja noch mehr: als nachahmenswertes Vorbild ein, und kann fortan zur ‫ משפחה‬Tobits gerechnet werden… Selbst der Autor des Tobit-Buches, der so großen Wert auf Gesetzesobservanz legte, hat dies erkannt, und mit dem theologischen Konzept der

73

Lambert, How Repentance Became Biblical, 123–33. Michael Weigl, “Die rettende Macht der Barmherzigkeit: Achikar im Buch Tobit,” BZ 50 (2006) 212–43. 75 See Ibid., 237–40. 76 Ibid., 227. 77 Ibid., 227. In Tobit 1:22 MSS BA read: ἦν δὲ ἐξάδελφός µου; while MS S expands this: ἦν δὲ ἐξάδελφός µου καὶ ἐκ τῆς συγγενείας µου. 74

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ἐλεηµοσύνη und δικαιοσύνη als gelebter Solidarität die Tür zur Integration von ,,Menschen guten Willens“ weit aufgetan: ‫ – צדקה תציל ממות‬δικαιοσύνη δὲ ῥύσεται ἐκ θανάτου: den gesetzestreuen Juden, den ,,praktizierenden“ Heiden, ja die gesamte Völkerwelt (vgl. Tob 13)…Achikar – Heide und Jude zugleich – wird zur Symbolgestalt der rettenden Macht der Barmherzigkeit Gottes.78

Ahiqar is effectively the sapiential inflection of a Lukan God-fearer, Cornelius in semitic rather than roman dress. While Ahiqar’s alms-driven “resurrection” remains unclarified and subsists on the same metaphorical level as all the resurrections in Tobit, it nevertheless assimilates the righteous pagan to the life cycle of Israel and thus integrates him into the community of the redeemed.79 The figure of Aseneth in Joseph and Aseneth is another interesting parallel to Luke’s Cornelius.80 Aseneth, the budding convert, at the culmination of a week of penance, casts all her rich clothes and jewelry out the window to “the poor” (τοῖς πένησιν) and distributes her crushed idols to “beggars and the needy” (πτωχοῖς καὶ δεοµένοις), before she devotes herself to the service of the one true, living God (10:12–13).81 Her conversion, significantly, is presented as a transition from death to life, including the reception of a new Spirit (Πνεῦµα ζωῆς); and one finds here “the first indubitable occurrence of

78

Ibid., 241–2. The Joban echoes of the Book of Tobit and the transformation of the righteous pasagan, Ahiqar, hint at a related phenomenon. An implicit connection between conversion, charity, and resurrection is also evident in The Testament of Job, where the extraordinary generosity (ch. 9–15) of the former idolater (ch. 2–5) is coupled with an explicit expectation of resurrection (cf. 4:9). At Job’s death, his soul ascends to heaven, while the poor, the orphans, and the helpless care for his body (52:1–53:8), presumably in anticipation of its rising. For an introduction to this important charity text, see R. P. Spittler, “Testament of Job,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Volume One (James Charlesworth, ed.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2011) 829–38. 80 For an overview of Joseph and Aseneth, see Eckhart Rheinmuth, ed., Joseph und Aseneth (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009); and Christoph Burchard, “Joseph and Aseneth,” in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, Volume Two, 176–220. Although Batiffol originally presented the text as a fifth century Christian work, “every competent scholar since has affirmed that Joseph and Aseneth is Jewish, with perhaps some Christian interpolations; none has put the book much after A.D. 200, and some have placed it as early as the second century B.C.,” (Burchard, 187). On this passage as a Bekehrungserzählung (ἐπιστρέφω), see Edward Pillar, Resurrection as Anti-Imperial Gospel: 1 Thessalonians 1:9b–10 in Context (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013) 59–63. 81 Lambert (Repentance, 160, 165, 184), while appreciating that the representations of repentance in Joseph and Aseneth “attain the highest degree of priority,” fails to take note of the charity theme at work here in the text, noting principally, in line with his general concentration of ritual lament, Aseneth’s tears. He does observe a vastly important dynamic however, which he dubs the “dual formula” – the combination of regret over one’s past life with a positive transformative effect – and perceives this at work in Joseph and Aseneth. 79

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ἀναζάω besides Luke 15:24 and Rom 7:9” (JosAs 19:11; cf. ἀνακαινόω, ἀναπλάσσω, ἀναζοωποέω, 8:9; 15:5; 16:16; 18:9).82 These important contacts invite comparison. Nevertheless, a couple revealing differences should be observed. First, Joseph and Aseneth, while a little foggy on the status of Aseneth’s post-conversion Torah observance (circumcision is obviously irrelevant), maintains a much stricter boundary mechanism between Gentiles and Jews, in its strenuous emphasis on endogamy (cf. Tobit), than does Luke-Acts.83 In proportion, and as a second and decisive point, the role of charity in articulating one’s identity among the redeemed is not nearly so strong.84 As Christoph Burchard remarks, although “ethics is an important concern for the author” in Joseph and Aseneth “it is not preparatory to, instrumental in, or a consequence of salvation.”85 In the case of Luke’s Cornelius, the situation is entirely different. Charity directly characterizes Cornelius’ liminal position – to the exclusion of other external markers like kašrût (cf. Acts 10:9–16). To the confounding of Luther’s preferred formula, moreover, Acts 10 looks to be an instance of iustificatio piorum, as Richard Pervo says.86 It is no surprise, then, that debate swirls around the apparent principle of the centurion’s salvation. In the end, Luke offers a hyper-endorsement of Prov 10:2, in which a strong corporate accent can be heard. Cornelius is an image for the Gentiles; and it is almost as if Luke read Prov 14:34 (‫ )צדקה תרומם גוי‬to mean the “nations” (‫)גוים‬. By multiple standards, then, Luke’s tolerance for the notion of meriting eternal life is uncomfortably high. It is too “Jewish” for modern Kantians, in its unabashed reward based morality.87 It is shockingly “Gentile” for first century Jews, in the break with kašrût and other boundary markers that such an alms-centered claim on eschatological life implies. Sola caritas,

82

Burchard, “Joseph and Aseneth,” 233 fn. l. On these motifs, see Ronald Charles, “Une lecture narrative de Joseph et Aséneth à la lumière du motif la ‘nouvelle creation,’” Science et Esprit 63 (2011) 73–84. Burchard (186) likes the Greek style of Joseph and Aseneth to Luke-Acts and the Testament of Job. 83 Ross Shepherd Kraemer (When Joseph Met Aseneth: A Late Antique Tale of the Biblical Patriarch and His Egyptian Wife, Reconsidered [Oxford: Oxford University, 1998] 46) suggests that since the story transpires before the food laws of Leviticus were instituted, the question of dietary observance is irrelevant. 84 See the discussion on charity as a boundary marker in Chapter Three §3.3.2 below. 85 Burchard, “Joseph and Aseneth,” 193. 86 Pervo, Acts, 277. 87 Bornkamm (Lohngedanke, 3) gives perfect expression to this point: “Wir befinden uns dem Lohngedanken des Neuen Testamentes gegenüber in einer merklichen Befangenheit. Erzogen in dem Kantischen Begriff der Pflicht, verbinden wir sofort mit dem Begriff Lohn die Vorstellung eines unterwertigen Eudämonismus, der die Reinheit sittlicher Gesinnung trübt.”

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Luke nearly seems to say: charity alone – without circumcision or other works of the Law – saves from death.88

4.3 The Prudently Prodigal Steward 4.3 Prudently Prodigal Steward

The relevance of Prov 10:2 as a topical background to Luke 16 is difficult to prove, but easy to apprehend. It provides the glue that binds the chapter’s two panels together. It solidifies the broad connection between afterlife imagery and charity motifs that characterize this portion of the Gospel. This is significant because the basic coherence of Luke’s discourse in chapter 16 is widely impugned.89 The importance of Prov 10:2 is also seen in another way, for Luke’s specific idea of works of mercy as the life-giving repentance given to outsiders opens up an important perspective on the corporate dimension of Luke 16. In particular, tax collectors and sinners here hold the place of the Gentile figures in Acts. It is a scandal to eat with either (Luke 15:2; Acts 10:14). But in God’s plan of mercy, a place at the heavenly banquet with Abraham is open to all – if only one shows mercy. A major obstacle to penetrating the integral rhetoric of Luke 16 is, of course, the vexing parable of “The Unjust Steward” (Luke 16:1–8a). Difficulty understanding this troubling text is by no means new.90 Many perplexities are, nevertheless, distinctly modern and have persisted because the parable



88 Reardon (“Cleansing through Almsgiving,” 482) translates τῇ πίστειin Acts 15:9 as a dative of respect and concludes: “God declares clean not by faith; rather God accepts those gentiles who fear God and work righteousness, quintessentially defined by prayer and almsgiving.” See also Longenecker, Remember the Poor and the discussion in Chapter Three §3.3.2–3. 89 “Very few chapters in the NT pose as many exegetical challenges as does Luke 16,” John Donahue, The Gospel in Parables: Metaphor, Narrative, and Theology in the Synoptic Gospels (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988) 162–4, here 162. But see André Feuillet, “La parabole du mauvais riche et du pauvre Lazare (lc 16, 19–31): antithèse de la parabole de l’intendant astucieux,” NRTh 101 (1979) 212–23. Feuillet apprehends “une grande unité doctrinale” linking Luke 16:9 and 16:26. This basic intuition is followed here, but the “caractère très fragmentaire” of Feuillet’s study leaves much to do. 90 See, e.g., Jerome, Letter 121 to Algasia (PL 22.850). Jerome writes to address his friend’s request for help in understanding the passage. Augustine criticizes (one imagines rhetorically) those who make the parable an excuse for theft and extortion. See Sermon 359 in Works of St. Augustine, Sermons on Various Subjects. Vol. III/10 (Edmund Hill, trans.; Hyde Park, NY: New City, 1995) 216. See also Gaudentius of Brescia (d. 410), Tract. 18 (S. Gaudentii Episcopi Brixiensis Tractatus [CSEL 68; Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft, 1936] 152), who moans that no one is an adequate interpreter of the parable.

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has been so consciously and consistently divorced from its Lukan setting.91 Indeed, in the vast literature devoted to this text, remarkably little sustained attention has been paid to its significance in the narrative. 92 While scholars will generally concede that, “the parable as it stands in its present redactional context concerns the wise use of possessions,” Luke’s narrative efforts here are nevertheless poorly understood and widely deemed inept.93 It will be the purpose of this second section to provide a contextualized reading of this problematic Lukan parable. In this way, a compelling insight into Luke’s narrative theology of charity will be exposed, consonant with the basic framework explored above. First, the context of the parable will be addressed, in order to counter the view of certain scholars whose diachronic preoccupations occlude the presence of the charity and eschatological themes (§4.3.1). Next, a new reading of the text will be developed in line with the “Creditor Christology” already identified in Chapter Two (§4.3.2). Finally, in harmony with the tradition stemming from Prov 10:2, the unabashed morality of “self-interest” in Luke 16:1–13 will be clarified and defended against those who argue that Luke speaks ironically against an ethic of reciprocity (§4.3.3). 4.3.1 The Steward in Context The complexities of the parable of the Unjust Steward are notorious.94 Unfortunately, the repetition of difficulties now largely resolved – notably the de-



91 This de-contextualization removes the parable not only from the larger discourse of Luke 15–16, but also from the immediate nimshal context in which Luke interprets the steward story (16:8b–13). “Most scholars deny that vv. 8b–13 have anything to do with the original parable and that the parable has anything to do with wealth,” Dave L. Mathewson, “The Parable of the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–13): A Reexamination of the Traditional View in Light of Recent Challenges,” JETS 38 (1995) 29–39, here 29 (emphasis added). 92 For a concise, but complete treatment of this parable, see Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 401–19. For a thorough history of interpretation see Dennis Ireland, Stewardship and the Kingdom of God: An Historical, Exegetical, and Contextual Study of the Parable of the Unjust Steward in Luke 16:1–13 (NovTSup 70; Leiden: Brill, 1992) 5–47; and “A History of Recent Interpretation of the Parable of the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–13),” WTJ 51 (1989) 293–318. See also Michael Krämer, Das Rätsel der Parabel vom ungerechten Verwalter, Lk 16:1–13 (Zürich: PAS, 1972); David Landry and Ben May, “Honor Restored: New Light on the Parable of the Prudent Steward (Luke 16:1–8a),” JBL 119 (2000) 287–309, esp. 287–94; and Eckart Rheinmuth, “Der beschuldigte Verwalter (Vom ungetreuen Haushalter) – Lk 16,1–8,” in Kompendium der Gleichnisse Jesu (Ruben Zimmermann, ed.; Gütersloh: Güterloh Verlagshaus, 2007) 634–46; and the ample bibliographies compiled by Bovon, Lukas 3, 66–70, 85–89; and Ryan S. Schellenberg, “Which Master? Whose Steward? Metalepsis and Lord-ship in the Parable of the Prudent Steward (Lk. 16.1–13),” JSNT 30 (2008) 263–88. 93 So Mathewson, “Unjust Steward,” 33. 94 Lehtipuu (“Eschatological Reward,” 235) calls the parable “certainly one of the most difficult and most controversial passages in Lukan scholarship.”

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limitation of the parable proper (i.e. Luke 16:1–8a) – continues to burden much scholarship on this text. 95 Moreover and more importantly, a widespread interest in pre-Gospel strata (very common in parable scholarship) has deeply complicated the interpretative enterprise in some obtuse ways. Indeed, it has become a common assumption that, The interpretation(s) that follow the parable in 16:8b-13 are either only tangentially related to the parable or they represent misinterpretations of a parable told by Jesus by the author of the Gospel. In either case, interpretations that attempt to include 16:8b-13 are relatively rare.96

For those who prefer to interpret the Lukan material as it stands, however, hunting for the elusive “original” meaning of 16:1–8a is a precarious and unnecessary historical-hermeneutical agenda.97 As material often assigned to Luke’s special source (L), few controls are available to guide such an undertaking;98 and the disregard (or disapproval) of vv. 8b-13 – not to mention the wider context of the Gospel – is gratuitous. An effort to open new interpretative perspectives on this famous crux must, therefore, give new attention to the parable’s context. This includes, first, an affirmation of the monetary focus of the parable, together with its links to Luke’s other servant parable allegories (§4.3.1.1). Second, the con-



95 See Landry and May (“Honor Restored,” 288), who identify several older problems of interpretation “on which there is [now] something resembling a consensus,” including the delimitation of the parable. See also Reinmuth, “Der beschuldigte Verwalter,” 635. 96 Landry and May, “Honor Restored,” 289 (emphasis added). The authors themselves decline to consider “the relation of this parable to its surrounding literary context” (305), though they do strongly stress the connection of the parable to the Prodigal Son (305–9). Schellenberg (“Metalepsis,” 263) begins his article with the following remark: “It has become common practice to attribute the awkwardness of the miscellany of morals appended to the so-called parable of the Unjust Steward (Lk. 16.1–13) to Luke's own bafflement. Luke, as confused by this story as anyone, tried somewhat unsuccessfully to wrestle the parable into conformity with his moralistic themes of faithful stewardship and almsgiving.” 97 Bultmann (Synoptic Tradition, 199–200) may be correct that the original meaning of the parable is “irrecoverable.” For a good example of this precarious project of reconstruction, see the proposal of D. M. Parrott, “The Dishonest Steward (Luke 16.1–8a) and Luke’s Special Parable Collection,” NTS 37 (1991) 499–515. Parrot wishes to find an Aramaic question hidden beneath the Greek affirmation of Luke 16:8a (“Would the master have commended the dishonest steward for his cleverness?” Certainly not!). 98 On the stylistic affinities of this passage with L, see Joachim Jeremias, Sprache, 255– 7, 260–2; Fitzmyer, Luke, 84; and Gerd Petzke, Das Sondergut des Evangeliums nach Lukas (Züricher Werkkommentare zur Bibel; Zürich: Theologische Verlag, 1990) 141–51. On the difficult problem of distinguishing L from Lukan redaction, see Jeremias, Sprache, 8; and especially Fitzmyer, Luke, 82–5. “How can one be sure that such material is really derived from ‘L’ and not freely composed by Luke? The answer is, We shall never know” (Ibid., 83).

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crete and revealing placement of the parable alongside the Prodigal Son and Lazarus and the Rich Man must be addressed (§4.3.1.2). 4.3.1.1 Almsgiving and Eschatology Against the great bulk of scholarship, two recent studies, those of Ireland and Mathewson, have sought to defend the coherence of Luke’s parable in context.99 Ireland specifically positions the parable within an expanding series of concentric contextual rings: (i) Luke 16:1–13; (ii) Luke 15:1–16:30; (iii) Luke’s Travel Narrative; and (iv) Lukan theology in general (i.e. wealth ethics and eschatology). At each point, he finds confirmation of the monetary focus of the parable. At the outermost level, Luke’s deep interest in the use of wealth makes it natural to recognize (and expect) such a theme. Within the Travel Narrative, Jesus’ controversies with the Pharisees and instructions to his disciples on the matter of money make the charity motif more concrete (e.g. Luke 11:41–42; 12:33; 14:25–35); and this running theme illuminates the immediate context in chapter 16, where Jesus addresses his disciples in the hearing of the Pharisees (cf. ἔλεγεν δὲ καὶ πρὸς τοὺς µαθητάς, 16:1 ἄκουον δὲ ταῦτα πάντα οἱ Φαρισαῖοι, 16:14). 100 Open mention of the Pharisees’ “greed” (φιλάργυροι, 16:14) and the monitory story of Lazarus and the woebegone rich man (16:19–31) demonstrate Luke’s economic preoccupation in this section. And all of this only confirms the explicit and focused lessons drawn directly from the parable in 16:8b-13: “Make friends for yourselves with µαµωνᾶ τῆς ἀδικίας” (16:9); “If you are not trustworthy with ἀδίκῳ µαµωνᾷ, who will trust you with the true” (16:11); “You cannot serve both God and µαµωνᾷ” (16:13). While it is restrictive to speak narrowly of “the point” of the parable, it is certainly correct in view of Luke 16:9–13 to affirm that, in the Gospel as it stands, the story concerns a proper perspective on mammon. 101 The money motif in Luke’s context is unmistakable. Francis Williams recognized this

99

Mathewson sets himself the task of defending the “traditional view” espoused by Ireland against a series of (implicit) challenges, published after Ireland’s 1988 study (i.e. Scott, Loader, Kloppenborg, Parrott, Mann, Porter, du Plessis). 100 “Luke 16:1–13 falls within a segment of Luke’s well-crafted and organized central section that deals with the topic of the use and abuse of riches (16:1–31), an emphasis attested elsewhere in Luke, and the repetition oí mamonas in w. 9, 11, 13 and Luke's philargymoi in v. 14 tie this parable closely to this theme of one’s use of wealth,” Matthewson, “Unjust Steward,” 33. 101 This is recognized, even by those whose main interest is the diachronic sorting of strata. See, e.g., Jeremias, Gleichnisse Jesu, 30–3. Ireland (Stewardship, 115) is clear: “Even temporarily isolated from its broader Lucan context [i.e. the context beyond Luke 16:1–13] the parable of the unjust steward treats faithful, prudent use of material possessions.”

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many years ago, when he argued that, “whatever Jesus’ own attitude…may have been,” Luke’s story as it stands interpreted in the Gospel is quite clear.102 The parable concerns almsgiving.103 The plain stress on mammon immediately neutralizes the influential thesis of Dodd and others (e.g. Loisy, Dibelius, Bailey) that Luke 16:1–8a bears no specific monetary meaning, but simply handles the generic eschatological call “to think strenuously and act boldly to meet the crisis.”104 Perhaps in the Sitz im Leben Jesu this was the parable’s “original” purpose, but as an exegesis of Luke it could scarcely be more contextually insensitive. Only a denial of the eschatological force of the parable would be more implausible. Exegetes can be obtuse, however, and it is no surprise, perhaps, that a line of scholarship following Jülicher has also denied just this.105 To take a recent and respected example, John Kloppenborg’s suggestion that nothing in the tale “evokes an apocalyptic situation” can, from a synchronic perspective, promptly be dismissed.106 From the first words of interpretation in Luke 16:8b, contrasting οἱ υἱοὶ τοῦ αἰῶνας and οἱ υἱοὶ τοῦ φωτός, the language of apocalyptic can be plainly heard (cf. 1QM 1:1; 1QH 5:8; 1QS 3:21; 4QF11:8; 1QH 4:10; Ethiopic Enoch 108:11). 107 And while it is true that “the crisis experienced by the steward is not precipitated by a returning master and the rendering of accounts hardly requires any allegorizing to be



102 Francis Williams, “Is Almsgiving the Point of the Unjust Steward,” JBL 83 (1964) 293–7, here 293. 103 Lagrange (Saint Luc, 434) explains the critical lesson: “C’est ici [i.e. Luke 16:9] le coup d’ailes, la leçon religieuse de la parabole. La vraie habilité, celle des fils de lumière, consiste à donner l’aumône en vue de l’éternité.” So also, e.g., Kim, Stewardship and Almsgiving, 158. Hays (Wealth Ethics, 145) protests that “one ought not limit the activity implied to almsgiving” – but his notion of “almsgiving” is too small; for the other items he mentions (e.g., caring for the poor, giving clothes to the naked) belong to the ancient notion of ἐλεηµοσύνη. 104 Dodd, Parables of the Kingdom, 17. On the “non-monetary” line of interpretation, see Ireland, Stewardship, 14–24. Kenneth Bailey (Poet and Peasant: A Literary Critical Approach to the Parables in Luke [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976] 86–118) insists that the parable in vv. 1–8 and the “poem” in vv. 9–13 are radically independent, the first treating eschatology and the second wealth. 105 See Jülicher, Gleichnisreden Jesu, 511. Jülicher argues that the parable is about using the present wisely to ensure a good future. On this line of interpretation, see Ireland, Steward, 22–4. 106 John Kloppenborg, “Dishonoured Master (Luke 16, 1–8a),” Bib 70 (1989) 478–9. Landry and May (“Honor Restored,” 293) call Kloppenborg’s proposal “the most persuasive recent interpretation of the parable.” See also John Dominic Crossan, “The Servant Parables of Jesus,” Semeia 1 (1974) 46. Kloppenborg’s dubious hunt for a primitive wisdom Gospel, free of apocalyptic and Christology, is closely associated with his method in this study. The pointed theology of both Kloppenborg and Crossan can be detected in this claim about the non-eschatological character of Luke 16:1–8a. 107 See, e.g., Hays, Wealth Ethics, 161.

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intelligible” – if the context is confined to vv. 1–8a – the logion in v. 10 (ὁ πιστὸς ἐν ἐλαχίστῳ…) is unmistakably echoed in the Parable of the Pounds, when the servants are indeed called to offer an account to their returning lord (ἐν ἐλαχἰστῳ πιστὸς ἐγένου, 19:17).108 In other words, Luke provides every reason to hear his story of the Unjust Steward in line with the apocalyptic (and allegorical!) tale he makes so clear in 19:11–27. At the same time, a further clue to the eschatological horizon of the parable appears within the parable itself. The steward (οἰκονόµος) is praised precisely for acting φρονίµως (Luke 16:8a). This language directly recalls the story of the watchful servants, which answered the question: Who is ὁ πιστὸς οἰκονόµνος ὁ φρόνιµος? (12:43). These two prudent stewards, in fact, are the only two “stewards” (οἰκονόµνος) in Luke’s Gospel. The parable in 12:35– 48, of course, like 19:11–27, focuses upon the return of the master as a symbol of judgment. Readers of the Gospel must thus reckon with an established parabolic system of symbols in these master-servant/steward tales.109 The master’s demand in Luke 16:2 that the steward should give a reckoning of his actions is, therefore, an easily recognized trope for eschatological judgment. 110 Kloppenborg’s observation that no journey and return motif structures 16:1–8a is, nevertheless, of interest. This is not an indicator, however, that the parable is unconcerned with eschatological judgment. On the contrary, it is a variation on a theme, intelligible against the specific rhetoric proper to this portion of the Gospel (15:1–16:30). Jesus is not here responding to the overly excited kingdom expectation he confronts later as he enters the holy city in triumph: “He told a parable because he was near Jerusalem and they thought the Kingdom of God was about to appear immediately (παραχρῆµα µέλλει ἡ Βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ ἀναφαίνεσθαι, 19:11; cf. Acts 1:6–7).”111 Nor is he handling an inhouse question of Church leadership, such as he treats in 12:35–48, where accountability is the virtue in view. 112 Rather, Jesus is set the task here of

108

Kloppenborg, “Dishonoured Master,” 478–9. See Crossan, “Servant Parables,” 17–32; Mary Ann Beavis, “Ancient Slavery as an Interpretative Context for the New Testament Servant Parables with Special Reference to the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–8),” JBL 111 (1992) 37–54; and Rene Baergen, “Servant, manager of slave? Reading the parable of the rich man and his slave (Luke 16:1–8a) through the lens of ancient slavery,” Sciences Religieuses 35 (2006) 25–38. 110 So, e.g., Ireland, Stewardship, 214. 111 On the nuanced eschatology of this passage, see Laurie Guy, “The Interplay of the Present and Future in the Kingdom of God (Luke 19:11–44),” TynB 48 (1997) 119–38. 112 See, e.g., Lagrange, Luc, 368; Fitzmyer, Luke, 984–7; and Bovon, Lukas 2, 333. The question Peter puts to Jesus (“Is this parable meant for us or for all?”) seems to ask whether the command to sell one’s possessions and give alms is an instruction only for the inner circle of Amtsträger and not for all the disciples. Significantly, Jesus declines to give a direct answer. 109

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defending his consorting with sinners (15:1–2): 113 an apologetic effort he turns to the offensive in stressing that (in contrast to the grumbling Pharisees, cf. 15:25–32) many “tax collectors and sinners” have, in Jesus, already met and made their peace with the eschatological judge “along the way” (cf. 12:57–59).114 A journey-and-return allegory would accordingly be obtuse.115 It is the first coming, not the second, which is in view: οὐκ ἐλήλυθα καλέσαι δικαίους ἀλλ᾿ ἁµαρτωλοὺς εἰς µετάνοιαν (5:32). The image of a “lord” reckoning with and praising (!) his “wicked” steward thus address a specific controversy concerning Jesus’ own dealings with sinners. It presses the point that “now” – during his fast fading ministry – is the privileged moment of repentance (cf. τὸν καιρὸν ταῦτον, 12:54–56);116 and this repentance is understood to imply charitable deeds. 4.3.1.2 Schwestergeschichten Within the extended sermon beginning in Luke 15:1, the story of the Steward is sandwiched between the two longest and most detailed parables in the Gospel: the Prodigal Son (15:11–31) and Lazarus and the Rich Man (16:19– 31). Although a difficult unit of Zwischenverse appears in the middle of this remarkable stretch of material – Feuillet calls 16:14–18 “le tourment des commentateurs” – the sequence of three parables is clearly crafted with unusual care.117 Significantly, the parable of the Steward is deliberately bound to Luke 15:11–31. The modern chapter division has unfortunately obscured this for many interpreters, who too closely join the three parables in chapter 15. The two short tales of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin, however, which look like a classic Lukan parable pair (e.g. 13:18–20; 14:29–32), actually resemble one



113 On the close association of the material in Luke 15 and 16, see John Kilgallen, “Luke 15 and 16: A Connection,” Bib 78 (1997) 369–76. According to Hays (Wealth Ethics, 157), the evident eavesdropping of the Pharisees (Luke 16:14) means that Jesus’ address to his disciples in 16:1, “persists in his invective against the Pharisee in-group.” 114 See Chapter Two §2.5.3. 115 If the master is imagined as an absentee landlord, perhaps a “return” motif is implicit. The moment of judgment has, nevertheless, arrived. As Hays (Wealth Ethics, 141) notes, the master does “leave the stage” after v. 3. 116 The parable accents the realized aspect of Lukan eschatology, present in the Kingdom preaching of Jesus, and Ireland (Stewardship, 198) is correct to say that, “eschatology – the coming of the kingdom of God – is in a real sense the most basic context for understanding the parable of the Unjust Steward.” This claim about the Kingdom of God is not simply a statement equally true for any passage in the Gospels. The Kingdom motif of “bipolar reversal” is on more spectacular and vivid display in this chapter (16:14–31; cf. 6:20–27) than perhaps in any other passage in Luke-Acts, and in 16:16 the preaching of the Kingdom of God is explicitly named. 117 Feuillet, “Mauvais Riche et Intendant Astucieux,” 221.

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another much more than the Prodigal Son, which, though serving as a hinge, itself has stronger affinities with the material in chapter 16 in length, language, and substance. 118 The close links to 16:1–8a have not been overlooked, 119 and Michael Austin even prefers to speak of the parable of the “Prodigal Servant.”120 Both stories begin with a character “squandering” [i.e. διεσκόρπισεν, 15:13; διασκορπίζων, 16:1] property that properly belongs to another.121 Second, in each story a turning point is reached when the protagonist has a moment of self-awareness. In the Prodigal Son, the younger son “came to himself and said...” (15:17) and in the Unjust Steward the servant “said to himself…” (16:3). Third, each protagonist poses to himself a crucial question and each lays down a course of action which he then carried out.122

Both characters, the Prodigal Son and Prodigal Servant, ultimately face a crisis due to their grave misuse of money; then they realize a (self-interested) plan to procure hospitality for themselves (15:17–19; 16:4).123 Though neither story ever uses the word µετάνοια, the theme fills the whole context (e.g. 15:7; 16:30), and the note is struck in 16:3, when the steward significantly asks the Lukan “repentance question”: τί ποιήσω (3:10, 12, 14; 10:25; 18:18; Acts 2:37; 22:10). It was exactly this query that John the Baptist answered, in counseling penitent sinners to produce fruit in works of charity. The binding of Luke 15:11–32 to the material in chapter 16 goes farther. As Hanna Roose has recently highlighted, the Prodigal Son and Lazarus and

118

The unbroken chain of parables in Luke 15:3–32 and the change of audience in 16:1 give an obvious integrity to this opening salvo of the sermon. Still, the habit of speaking of the “lost Son” is unhelpful. Luke 15:11–32 properly functions as a hinge with important connections to both the two preceding and the two following parables. This is evident in 15:24, 32, the key verse that echoes both the lost and found theme of 15:4–10 and the resurrection theme of chapter 16: “This son of mine was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.” One might as justifiably speak of the parable of the “resurrected” as the “lost” Son. See §4.4 below. 119 See, e.g., the list of ten similarities in Donahue, Gospel in Parable, 167. Snodgrass (Stories with Intent, 405) succinctly observes, “several connections exist between this parable and the parable of the Prodigal. Both begin with ‘A certain man’ and use diaskorpizein (‘to squander’). Both the prodigal and the steward betray a trust, use soliloquy, seek relief from a crisis, and receive an unexpected response, a forgiveness that seems unfair.” 120 On this connection, see Michael Austin, “The Hypocritical Son,” EvQ 57 (1985) 307–15; and Landry and May, “Honor Restored,” 305–9. 121 It should be noted that these are the only two verses in the NT where this verb is used in the metaphorical sense of “squander” or “waste.” 122 Landry and May (“Honor Restored,” 306) summarizing Austin. 123 Kilgallen (“Luke 15 and 16,” 372) describes the prodigal son’s motivation as “nothing more than a desperate longing for self-preservation.” See also Nolland, Luke, 784. Austin (“Hypocritical Son,” 312) lays special emphasis on this self-interest, which he finds to be a theological offense that must be explained away.

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the Rich Man (16:19–31) are also paired as “sister stories.” 124 The parallels, both thematic and verbal, are compelling: Luke 15:11–32 11–13: The rich son squanders his fortune on feasting and entertainment. 14–16: The poor son hungers for food and is surrounded by unclean animals (ἐπεθύµει χορτασθῆναι).125 17–21: The son returns and his father sees him from afar (µακράν) and embraces him. The son asks for mercy and receives it.

22–24: The father welcomes his son and lays a feast (εὐφραίνεσθαι) for him because he “was dead and has come back to life.” 25–28: The elder brother (ἀδελφός) is urged to come into the father’s house (ἠγγισεν τῇ οἰκιᾳ) and join the celebration. 29–32: The father says that the younger son “was dead and has come to life again” (νεκρός ἦν καὶ ἔζησεν).

Luke 16:19–31 19: The rich man enjoys himself in sumptuous living (εὐφραινόµενος). 20–21: The poor Lazarus hungers for food and is surrounded by unclean animals (ἐπιθυµῶν χορτασθῆναι). 22–24: Lazarus dies and is welcomed into Abraham’s bosom. The rich man dies and “Father Abraham” (πατέρ Ἀβραάµ) sees him from afar (ἀπὸ µακρόθεν). He asks for mercy and receives none. 25–26: Father Abraham explains the principle of reversal. The poor man deserves comfort. 27–29: The rich man begs that his five brothers (πέντε ἀδελφούς) in his father’s house (εἰς τὸν οἶκον τοῦ πατρός µου) be warned. 30–31: Abraham says even if someone should rise from the dead (ἐκ νεκρῶν ἀναστῇ), the brothers would not repent.

The impressive alignment of these two stories addressed to the Pharisees builds a kind of chiastic frame around the steward’s model of a prudently repentant squanderer, while also binding the Steward and Lazarus texts together through the Prodigal Son. It seems, then, that one must reckon with a triad of Schwestergeschichten. Kilgallen has rightly perceived the essential logic joining this material. What was implicit in the story of the young man in Chapter 15, namely his sense to choose means which would save him, becomes explicitly the quality Jesus urges upon his disciples: they should act phronimôs, and thus find their secure way into the kingdom of God.



124 Hanna Roose, “Umkehr und Ausgleich bei Lukas: Die Gleichnisse vom verlorenen Sohn (Lk 15.11–32) und vom reichen Mann und armen Lazarus (Lk 16.19–31) als Schwestergeschichten,” NTS 56 (2009) 1–21. The chart below is modified from Roose’s (2–3). 125 Several textual witnesses (A, Θ, Ψ, etc.) read γεµίσαι τὴν κοιλίαν αὐτοῦ in Luke 15:16, rather than χορτασθῆναι (P75, ℵ, B, D, L, f 1,13 etc.). Nolland (Luke, 780) considers the latter to be a later “tasteful correction,” while the age and diversity of text types convinces Metzger of its originality (Metzger, Textual Commentary, 164. Even if Nolland is correct, the reading in P75 etc. would attest to a very ancient reception of the text, assimilating it to 16:21.

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The same quality is again implicitly urged upon the Pharisees; if they understand the story of the rich man aright, they, will, Jesus hopes, change their way and choose the means, here obedience to Moses and the prophets, which will bring them into the kingdom of God.126

Luke thus offers a trio of interrelated stories, and one can make out the narrative arc. The Pharisees, like the Elder Brother, grumble, but are urged to rejoice in the repentance of sinners. Jesus’ subsequent praise of the wisdom of escaping judgment through almsgiving only earns the Pharisees’ mocking laughter, however. Jesus thus counters with a dire warning, indicating that the greedy Pharisees stand in grave need of self-rescue by repentance, shown in charity to the poor. Significantly, resurrection imagery punctuates this three pointed narrative arc at every step, though the striking use of such language to describe the return of the Prodigal Son is seldom noted: “This son of mine/brother of yours was dead (νεκρός) and has come to life again (ἀνέζησεν)” (Luke 15:24, 32).127 It is, however, “das eigentliche Thema des Gleichnisses.”128 Based on the structural parallel with Luke 16:30–31, it seems clear that, in the first place, the “resurrection” the Pharisees are witnessing – yet without converting – is the coming to life of sinners before their very eyes. 129 Like the younger son, these sinners and tax collectors were indeed as good as dead, but their humble turn has saved their lives. Like the elder brother in 15:25– 32, however, the joyful miracle of a Prodigal Son’s µετάνοια/resurrection does not move the Pharisees. It may appear that the Prodigal Son’s “resurrection” – however prudently (φρονίµως) he acts in saving his own life – comes through a model of repentance imagined very differently than the giving of alms, for charity evidently plays no part.130 Roose is emphatic on this point.

126

See Kilgallen, “Luke 15 and 16,” 76. But see John Kilgallen, “The Parable(s) of the Lost Sheep and Lost Coin, and of the Resurrected Son,” Proceedings of the Irish Biblical Association 32 (2009) 60–73, esp. 66. Kilgallen concentrates on the parable collection in Luke 15, observing that 15:11–32 is distinct, among other reasons, because it shifts the lost-found language to dead-resurrected. Kilgallen does not probe the significance of the resurrection language or the link it creates with the following chapter. 128 Christof Landmesser, “Die Rückkehr ins Leben nach dem Gleichnis vom verlorenen Sohn (Lukas 15,11–32),” ZTK 99 (2002) 255. 129 This is a major contextual point, not seen by scholars, who focus on the (important) Christological echo and the possible connection with the raising of Lazarus in John. See, e.g., Jacob Kremer, “Der arme Lazarus: Lazarus, der Freund Jesu. Beobachtung zur Beziehung zwischen Lk 16, 19–31 und Joh 11, 1–46,” in À cause de l’Évangile: Études sur les synoptiques et les Actes: Festschrift Jacques Dupont (F. Refoulé, ed.; LD 123; Paris: Cerf, 1985) 571–84. 130 Landmesser (“Rückkehr ins Leben,” 256–7) systematically excludes all moral agency from the son’s repentance: “Der jüngere Sohn kehrt nicht in das Leben zurück, weil 127

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Während Johannes der Täufer stark auf die ‘Früchte der Umkehr’ (3.8) abhebt, hören wir davon in Lk 15 nichts. Johannes führt zu den ‘Früchten der Umkehr’ aus: ‘Wer zwei Untergewänder hat, soll dem abgeben, der keins hat, und wer zu essen hat, soll dasselbe tun’ (3.11). Der narrative Duktus in Lk 15.11–32 lässt aber gar nicht mehr zu, dass der zurückgekehrte Sohn im Sinne der Täuferpredigt handelt: Er kann den Armen schlicht deshalb nichts mehr geben, weil er bereits alles verschwenden hat. Nach Lk 15 ist ‘Umkehr’ – und die damit verbundene Annahme durch Gott – also auch dann möglich, wenn die ‘Früchte der Umkehr’ im Sinne von Lk 3 nicht mehr erbracht werden können.131

Roose makes an interesting point about the son’s destitution, and she is perfectly right that works of mercy never explicitly figure within the Son’s plan to save his life. His abject humility resembles, in this way, the tax collector’s empty-handed plea for mercy in the parable with the Pharisee in the Temple (18:9–14) – a well suited intertext on account of the characters engaged and a fitting illustration of Luke’s flexibility in portraying the multifaceted dynamics of repentance. Unfortunately, beginning with Roose’s inattention to the interconnections with the parable of the Prodigal Steward, she is insensitive to a wide range of textual clues in Luke 15:11–32 all pointing the same subtle direction. In fact, Lukan wealth motifs are hardly absent from the story of the Prodigal Son.132 The younger son’s remarkable greed in preemptively demanding his inheritance and his subsequent selfish misuse of money are, for Luke, not randomly chosen infractions. 133 Nor is the son’s ensuing experience of indentured debt slavery without its significant suggestion of debt as sin. 134 Desperate

er etwa selbst einen Schritt dazu getan hätte…. [W]as verloren ist, was tot ist, das kann sich nicht selbst lebendig machen, es muß gefunden vom Vater ins Leben zurückgebracht warden…. Μετάνοια ist die vom Vater, von dem das Leben neu schaffenden Schöpfer, im Akt der Vergebung bewirkte Rückkehr in das Leben.” 131 Roose, “Umkehr und Ausgleich,” 16. 132 “Das Geld spielt in diesem Gleichnis eine große Rolle, und die wirtschaftliche Lage der Protagonisten gliedert die Erzählung,” Bovon, Lukas 3, 46. Unfortunately, this has not generally been appreciated by authors working in Lukan wealth studies, e.g. Hays, Mineshige. See Nolland, “Role of Money and Possessions,” 178–209. 133 David Holgate (Prodigality, Liberality, and Meanness in the Parable of the Prodigal Son: A Greco Roman Perspective on Luke 15.11–32 [JSNTSup 187; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic 1999]) has argued that Luke 15:11–32 should be read against the Greco-Roman moral topos “on covetousness.” On the son’s possible inheritance rights, see Karl-Heinrich Ostmeyer, “Dabeisein ist alles (Der verlorene Sohn) Lk 15,11–32,” in Gleichnisse Jesu, 623–4. Whatever his legal rights, Nolland (Luke, 782) is right to say, “the son is behaving abominably toward his father.” See also Wolfgang Pöhlmann, Der verlorenen Sohn und das Haus: Studien zu Lukas 15,11–32 im Horizont der antiken Lehre von Haus, Erziehung unf Ackerbau (WUNT 68; Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 1993). 134 See J. Albert Harrill, “The Indentured Labor of the Prodigal Son,” JBL 115 (1997) 714–7. Harill identifies the son’s conditions of service as corresponding to the Hellenistic παραµονή. An excellent parallel from the reign of Trajan describes a certain Ares and his wife, who borrow twenty drachmae from one Lucius Bellenienus Gemellus, promising in

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hunger (15:16–17) is certainly evocative of Luke’s larger interest in charitable action (cf. 3:11; Acts 11:27–30); and the son’s shameful reduction to begging powerfully paints his sudden reversal of fortunes from rich to poor (cf. Luke 1:53; 6:20–26; also 16:3). The liberal sharing of possessions in the house of the Father appears as an example of the model of generosity cultivated throughout the Gospel.135 The important rivalry between the two brothers, finally, sounds a very revealing contextual note. The whole scenario rings with a strong echo of that earlier dispute of two brothers over an inheritance (12:13–21) – which became the occasion for an extended teaching on greed and gaining treasures in heaven (12:22–34). Ultimately, it appears that the parable of the Prodigal Son recapitulates a remarkable variety of themes from Luke’s wealth ethics. To claim that the “fruits of repentance” are not in view is, therefore, shortsighted. Read in the light of the two subsequent sister parables in Luke 16 these clues are activated as part of a broader Gestalt. In short, Luke paints a triptych, a cohesive repentance tableau in which distinct accents can nevertheless be heard. 136 Although Luke has not openly addressed charity when he begins the parable of the Steward in 16:1, the background of all three Schwestergeschichten is consistently concerned with the proper attitude toward wealth – and the way such a posture opens the door to eternal life. 4.3.2 The Kύριος as Christ the Creditor and Sin (Again) as Debt Once it is adequately appreciated that in Luke 16 Jesus is still responding to the accusation against his handling of sinners in 15:1–2, a decisive new light is shed on the story of the steward. Several authors, in fact, have proposed

lieu of interest that Ares will tend the landowner’s pigs for a year at the wage of twenty drachmae per month, with the stipulation that Ares repay the original loan at the end of the year. Harrill proposes translating ἐκολλήθη, literally “was attached/joined to,” more acurately as he was indentured carrying the sense of παραµονή (“remaining” with someone, i.e. in indentured service). 135 On this point, see Holgate, Prodigality, Liberality, and Meanness. Holgate’s exaggerated and reductionistically ethical reading, in which God plays no role, is directly countered by Nolland (“Role of Money and Possessions,” 179). Regrettably, however, Nolland finds it necessary to marginalize the economic imagery and interest of the story in order to sustain a theological message. “If the link between the father and God is secure, then it follows that the parable cannot be about attitudes to and the use of money or possessions” (205). Such an artifically forced choice fails (just as much as Holgate) to appreciate the theological potential of this wealth imagery – a vast potenial this entire thesis labors to expose and exploit. One can agree with Nolland this far, however: “The most immediately available comparison point is the parable of the two forgiven debtors (7:41– 43), where the remission of debt functions as an image for forgiveness by God” (205). 136 Landmesser’s question about the consistency of Luke’s concept of repentance should be persued in the context of these interlaced parables (“Rückkehr ins Leben,” 257).

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that on account of this context the parable should be read Christologically and that the steward himself represents Jesus. William Loader encapsulates the basic idea: Accused of unauthorized and scandalous behavior, in offering God’s grace freely outside the prescribed pattern of the Law to sinners and no-goods, Jesus provokes his hearers with the story of a rogue who, despite all, received his master’s approbation. The thinly disguised allusions to forgiveness, through the familiar debt motif, and to the authorization, in the position and activity of the steward, would not have been lost on the hearers faced with the controversies Jesus’ ministry evoked.137

Jesus, on this reading, is the Master’s agent charged with “unjustly” remitting sins, but approved in the end by God. At this point in the Gospel, the debt motif as a trope for sin is indeed familiar, much more than Loader knows. The Christological line of interpretation has this entirely right. Kloppenborg’s objection that the pressing economic realities of the parable’s “original auditors” (an underclass of peasants, “petty officials” and the like) would have, without “considerable coaching,” precluded them from hearing a such a reference in the debt language in Luke 16:1–8a is insensitive to the double layered meaning so resonant in the debt discourse of the period (e.g. 11Q13).138 More importantly, it gives no value to the powerful presence of this idea in the text of Luke’s Gospel. It is worth stressing, in this connection, that Luke mentions χρεοφειλέται elsewhere only in Luke 7:41, the tale of the two sinners.139 Moreover, in the immediate context, Jesus’ lingering story of the forgiveness of the sinful son poignantly evokes precisely the image of indentured debt-slavery (ἐκολλήθη, 15:15; cf. 15:32), deployed as the end result of wayward living. 140 It is accordingly natural to hear a ringing echo of “debt” as sin in 16:1–8.141 One must thus reckon with the strong possibility that Luke is here playing again with the sin as debt theme.



137 William Loader, “Jesus the Rogue in Luke 16:1–8A: The Parable of the Unjust Steward,” RB 96 (1989) 532. See also G. Baudler, “Das Gleichnis vom ‘betrügerischen Verwalter’ (Lk 16, 1–8a) als Ausdruck der ‘inneren Biographie’ Jesu,” TGW 28 (1985) 65–79; and C. Paliard, Lire l’Écriture, écouter la Parole: La parabole de l’econome infidèle (Lire La Bible 53; Paris, 1980) 60–2, 133–4. 138 Kloppenborg, “Dishonored Master,” 479. 139 Hays (Wealth Ethics, 159) points out that Luke says “debtors” rather than “tenant farmers” (γεωργοί, Luke 20:9–16), even if the difference should perhaps not be pushed too far. 140 See note 133 above. 141 This likelihood is increased since these parables are bound together. See §4.3.1.2 above.

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The proposal that Jesus depicts himself in the guise of the unjust οἰκονόµος is, nevertheless, problematic.142 Apart from the unlikely prospect that “the roguery of divine grace” accurately describes any real Christological motif in the Gospel,143 the theory takes no account of the significant fact that, in Luke’s narrative, Jesus is here addressing his disciples (πρὸς τοὺς µαθητάς, 16:1a) – albeit in the hearing of the Pharisees (16:14). In this connection, Luke’s use of the title οἰκονόµος (rather than simply δοῦλος, cf. 19:11–27) is almost decisive.144 In its only other appearance in the Gospel, it is applied explicitly to Church insiders in 12:41–48 (πρὸς ἡµᾶς τὴν παραβολὴν ταυτὴν λέγεις ἤ πρὸς πάντας?). The word, in fact, was often used in early Christian circles for both leaders and simple members of the “house” of God (e.g. 1 Cor 4:11; Titus 1:7; 1 Pet 4:10; Ign. Pol. 6:1).145 The word also, of course, carries the connotation of managing material goods: an essential component of Luke’s unique construction of discipleship.146 It is significant, ultimately, that the whole long discourse (15:1–17:10) shifts again to the disciples in 17:1 (πρὸς τοὺς µαθητάς αὐτοῦ) and ends with another servant parable (17:7–10) and an explicit identification of the disciples as servants: “Say, we are worthless slaves (δοῦλοι ἀχρεῖοί).” More than this strong terminological and conceptual hint, however, the “tax collectors and sinners” explicitly in view in this section (i.e. 15:1), i.e. Jesus’ followers, are a natural fit for this “unjust” slave facing judgment for misbehavior (16:1). In appreciating this alignment, a striking and important parallel should not be missed. The responsibility of the οἰκονόµος for recouping his master’s debts overlaps directly with the (unseemly) work of tax collectors. And just as those despised characters were directly charged by John the Baptist not to “collect more than what is due” (πλέον παρὰ τὸ διατεταγµένον, 3:13; cf. εἴ τινός τι ἐσυκοφάντησα, 19:1–9), so this steward must re-calculate and scale back what he demands of debtors (16:4–7), should he wish to escape the impending judgment (cf. 3:7, 17).

142

Ultimately, Loader’s embarrassed insistence that Luke 16:1–8a is “no more an allegory than other parables” (“Jesus the Rogue,” 521) misdirects his Christological insight and prevents him from a full understanding of the dynamics in the parable. 143 Loader (“Jesus the Rogue,” 532) is attracted by the depiction of Jesus as something of an outlaw. A dubious industry thrives on such interpretations of Jesus and his parables. See, e.g., Raymond Angelo Belliotti, Jesus the Radical: the Parables and Modern Morality (New York: Lexington Books, 2013). Unsurprisingly, Belliotti makes the Unjust Steward the climax of his provocative study. 144 Degenhardt (Evangelist der Armen, 118) understands the parable to be addressed to church leaders about to be removed from office. 145 TDNT V, 119. 146 See Kim, Stewardship and Almsgiving, 145–59, 68–217; and Johnson, Literary Function.

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The strong identification of the “tax collectors and sinners” who make up Jesus’ retinue of disciples with the figure of the Prodigal Son, honored by his forgiving father (to the outrage of the Pharisaic older son), only furthers this line of interpretation. The assimilation of the Steward to the Son, detailed above (§4.3.1.2), secures the connection. In his squandering, his crisis, his deliberation, and self-rescue the Steward looks precisely like those penitent sinners already allegorized in Luke 15:11–32. The steward’s internal deliberations (i.e. Luke 16:3–4) sound another Lukan note as well, returning to Jesus’ last teaching on discipleship before the interlude of chapter 15 (οὐ δύναται εἶναί µου µαθητής, 14:33). Like a king who sits down to “calculate the cost” and see if he will have sufficient strength to face the enemy or should seek to “purchase” peace (14:25–33; cf. 14:30, οὐκ ἴσχυσεν) – another image of repentance through one’s purse – the steward shrewdly determines what he lacks the strength to do (οὐκ ἰσχύω, 16:3), deciding he must buy his way out of trouble. These hints all point compellingly to the conclusion that the “unjust steward” contextually corresponds to the repentant tax collectors and sinners whom Jesus has mercifully received as his disciples. In Luke 16:1–8a, of course, the servant forgives debts, rather than the master. If this complicates the simple scenario laid out in a text such as 7:41–42, the balanced logic explored in the Our Father must be recalled: “Forgive us our ἁµαρτίας, for we ourselves forgive every one ὀφείλοντι to us” (11:4). For Luke, a mode of mercy proper to disciples is inscribed within the metaphor of God the Father’s “debt” remission. It is exactly this pattern, in fact, that we find structuring Luke’s context. First, he proposes a parable about a father’s forgiveness of sins (15:15–32); and this is followed by a tale about a disciple’s forgiveness of debts (16:1–8a). The coordination of these two levels of agency is reflected also in the specific relation of the master and his steward. In praising the steward’s shrewd plot of debt remission, the κύριος figure rehabilitates him in some real sense. Depending on how one understands the steward’s behavior in Luke 16:4–7, one might well imagine that the master’s praise leads him to forgive the man his sin and reinstate him; though this is not directly said (one of several key unterdetermined moments in the narration of Luke 16). Perhaps it is not necessary, however. Several scholars have observed that in v. 2 the master, who has heard charges of the steward’s misdealing, but as yet had no reckoning, only threatens a dismissal. 147 The subjunctive form of µεθίστηµι in 16:4

147

See, e.g., Thomas Hoeren, “Das Gleichnis vom ungerechten Verwalter (Lukas 16.1– 8a) – Zugleich ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Restschuldbefreiung,” NTS 41 (1995) 620–9, here 622. In this connection, Hoeren discusses a significant textual difficulty. Many MSS read the future δυνήσῃ rather than the present δύνῃ. See also Reinhard von Bendemann, Zwischen ΔΟΞΑ und ΣΤΑΥΡΟΣ: eine exegetische Untersuchung der Texte des sogenann-

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could suggest this uncertainty (ὅταν µετασταθῶ ἔκ τῆς οἰκονοµίας). 148 The echo in v. 8a of 12:41 also hints in the same direction, for it is precisely the “prudent” steward (ὁ πιστὸς οἰκονόµος ὁ φρόνιµος), who is set over his master’s household – suggesting that the master’s praise in 16:8b should be understood as alluding to a reinstatement of the “prudent” servant in his high post. 149 When one reads 16:1–8a against this text in chapter 12, moreover, and alongside the closely related parable in 19:11–27, it is rather striking that Luke records no graphic act of judgment: no severe beatings or cutting people in half (12:46–48), nor any slaying of people in the master’s presence (19:27). Implicitly, then, on form critical grounds, one might reason that 16:1–8a tells a story of the steward’s forgiveness. A key question must, nevertheless, be asked. What exactly does the master praise in lauding his steward’s “prudence” (καὶ ἐπῄνεσεν ὁ κύριος τὸν οἰκονόµον τῆς ἀδικίας ὅτι φρονίµως ἐποίησεν, Luke 16:8a)? It is certainly possible that, as Landry and May suggest, the master of the parable wishes to “approve” of his servant’s act of debt-relief in order to reap the community’s good will and profit from the honor attending such generosity.150 An eye to the master’s monetary self-interest is also possible, however, as John Goodrich indicates, since debt-remission was an attested economic strategy of just such absentee landlords, who hoped to recoup whatever funds they could.151 It may just as well be, however, that rather than thinking of his own honor or economic interests, the master commends the steward’s own self-interest and quick thinking. This might even come at the master’s own expense, if the

ten Reiseberichts im Lukasevangelium (BZNW 101; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2001) 233; and Rheinmuth, “Der beschuldigte Verwalter,” 635. Joseph Fitzmyer (“The Story of the Dishonest Manager (Lk 16 1–13)” in Essays on the Semitic Background of the New Testament [Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1974] 171 n 19) notes that διαβάλλω could mean slander or calumniate (cf. 4 Macc 4:1; Josephus, A.J. 7.11.3 §267), but rightly judges that the servant’s failure to defend himself implies his guilt. 148 Hoeren, “Der ungerechte Verwalter,” 623. See also Hans Drexeler, “Zu Lukas 16,1– 7,” ZNW 58 (1967) 288. 149 Given the hint of charity in the steward’s prudent dispensing of food in Luke 12:42 (τοῦ διδόναι ἐν καιρῷ τὸ σιτοµέτριον), the corresponding merciful action of the prudent steward in 16:1–8a becomes clearer still. On the wealth ethics of 12:42, see Hays, “Coercing Charity,” 41–60. 150 Landry and May (“Honor Restored,” 304) assert that ἐπῄνεσεν “is best translated here as ‘approve of.’” This accommodates their proposed reading, but does not give adequate force to the verb, which quite clearly means “praise.” See BDAG s.v. The sociological/ honor solution has been popular in recent literature (e.g. Hays, Kloppenborg, Combrink, Malina). 151 See John K. Goodrich, “Voluntary Debt-Remission and the Parable of the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–13),” JBL 131 (2012) 547–66. See also Drexler, “Zu Lukas 16,1–7,” 286–8.

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parable resembles a picaresque tale, as some imagine (e.g. the steward slyly cutting the principal to gain an advantage for himself). 152 Or, the master might simply be recognizing and praising the scoundrel’s honest turn – whether in removing his own exorbitant commissions,153 in eliminating unlawful, casuistically justified interest (’ăbaq-ribbît or, alternately, prōzbūl),154 or simply in being merciful.155 The idea of a Greco-Roman picaresque is rightly sensitive to the class rivalries that echo through Luke’s Gospel.156 Scholars take these tensions in a false direction, however, if they fail to note that Luke has steadily in view a healing of the divisions between rich and poor. The Aesopian and Plautine parallels, nevertheless, do provide a significant example of “slaves eulogized by masters for their roguery.”157 Most importantly, though, these examples of eulogies regularly depict a slave who by his wits escapes a threatened punishment and enters again into his master’s good favor – however temporarily (e.g. Life of Aesop 3, 65). The self-saving “craftiness” (φρονίµως) of such



152 See, e.g. Beavis, “Ancient Slavery,” 46–53; Dan Via, The Parables (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1967) 155–62; and in a slightly different key, Bernard Brandon Scott, “A Master’s Praise: Luke 16:1–8a,” Bib 64 (1983) 173–188. 153 See, e.g., Paul Gächter, “The Parable of the Dishonest Steward after Oriental Conceptions,” CBQ 12 (1950) 121–31; and Fitzmyer, “Dishonest Manager,” 170–8. 154 See, e.g., J. Duncan Derrett, “Fresh Light on St Luke XVI: The Parable of the Unjust Steward,” NTS 7 (1961) 198–219; idem., “Take Thy Bond…and Write Fifty (Luke xvi.6): The Nature of the Bond,” JTS 23 (1972) 438–40; and Hoeren, “Der ungerechte Verwalter,” 620–9. Hoeren (624) insists: “Das Gleichnis von dem ungerechten Verwalter läßt sich nur verstehen, wenn man sich die Bedeutung des Schulderlasses für das jüdische Recht vor Augen hält.” Mention might be made here of the “Deuteronomy Hypothesis,” in which Luke’s Travel Narrative parallels the contents of Deuteronomy 1–26. According to this thesis, Luke 16:1–18 corresponds to Deut 23:15–24:4, which treats slaves, usury, and divorce. See Craig Evans, “Luke 16:1–18 and the Deuteronomy Hypothesis,” in Luke and Scripture: The Function of Sacred Tradition in Luke-Acts (Craig Evans and James Sanders, eds.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993) 121–39. 155 See Ireland, Stewardship, 35–40. Ireland identifies a large number of interpreters who have specifically stressed the charity of the steward’s actions in Luke 16:4–7. L. J. Topel (“On The Injustice of the Unjust Steward,” CBQ 37 [1975] 216–27), expanding on the views of Fritz Maass (“Das Gleichnis vom ungerechten Haushalter,” Theologia Viatorum 8 [1962] 173–84]) strongly stresses the note of forgiveness in the steward’s actions. Those who imagine the steward playing upon the master’s honor often recognize the deed as an act of outright (though conniving) benefaction. See, e.g., Kloppenborg, “Dishonoured Master,” 491; and Bailey, Poet and Peasant, 101. 156 One may note, additionally, other echoes of New Comedy in Luke’s Gospel. See, e.g., Callie Callon, “Adulescentes and Meretrices: The Correlation between Squandered Patrimony and Prostitutes in the Parable of the Prodigal Son,” CBQ 75 (2013) 259–78. 157 Beavis, “Ancient Slavery,” 51.

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servants, in other words, is a topos ordered to reconciliation, not revenge.158 This pattern reinforces the suggestion that the tale in Luke recounts the steward’s rehabilitation with the master: namely, his forgiveness.159 The picaresque topos itself thus actually suggests that the “roguery” theme has been overplayed. The theme may suit the earlier act of mischief whose consequences the steward must now cleverly escape; but it is hard to sustain any deep saturnalian perspective in Luke’s Gospel.160 Read in the context of Luke 15–16, then, it appears best to accept the suggestion that the steward, like the penitent tax collectors and sinners, has simply discerned the best way to save his skin, and his self-seeking stratagem is doing a good turn by showing mercy.161 Such a reading, it bears noting, is not incompatible with considerations of the master’s own interests and honor, as some would suggest. Understanding a self-saving shift in the steward’s moral course naturally implies that the designation ἀδικία in Luke 16:8b refers back to the steward’s prior squandering in 16:1, not his debt reductions.162 The objection that the haste of his actions in vv. 5–7, signaled by the adverb ταχέως, is suspicious, betraying his shady dealings in rewriting the debts, is easily countered by a simple observation.163 The man is pressed by a looming judgment and does not have much time. Hence he acts with dispatch. This image corresponds perfectly to Luke’s presentation of the urgently shortening hour for repentance (cf. 12:54–13:9). The tax collectors and sinners have acted quickly, as they must, and thus they have escaped a certain judgment. It is interesting, perhaps, but not so important for our purposes (or for Luke’s!) to decide whether the steward has by his quick action eliminated usurious extortion or instead removed excessive personal commissions. The former is attractive, and Duncan Derret is able to explain the specific mention of wheat and oil on the hypothesis that the “dust of interest” (’ābāq ribbît) is

158

Pace Bernard Brandon Scott, Hear Then the Parable: A Commentary on the Parables of Jesus (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989) 255–66. Scott imagines that the steward is a “rogue,” but that the master is also a negative character who gets what he deserves. The lesson is a reorientation of the values of power and justice. 159 Beavis (“Ancient Slavery,” 51) helpfully comments about the steward in Luke: “There is no explicit statement that the steward is reinstated as a result of his stratagem, but that would be a more logical outcome of the story than N. Perrin’s proposal that he ‘takes the money and runs.’ It is unlikely that ancient audiences imagined the steward absconding with gallons of oil and bushels of wheat!” 160 Pace Via (Parables, 155–62), who argues that the parable portrays a “moral holiday” to rescue us from our dead seriousness. 161 See Kilgallen, “Luke 15 and 16,” 376; and Hays, Wealth Ethics, 159. 162 See Fitzmyer, “Dishonest Manager,” 171–2. 163 The interpretation of this language as a sign that “something shifty” is transpiring is common. See, e.g., Teresa Bednarz, “Status Disputes and Disparate Dicta: Humor Rhetoric in Luke 16:14–18,” Biblical Interpretation 21 (2013) 395.

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here presumed.164 Ultimately, though, whether the steward intentionally observes the prescriptions of Deut 15:1–11 or simply halts the abuse of his position, the effect would be more or less the same, since there is in any case some confusion between “interest” (‫ )נשך‬and “increase” (‫ )תרבית‬and both belong together (cf. Lev 25:35–36; m. Baba Mesia 5:1–9).165 The elimination of either falls under the broad category of mercy, which is the key point. Repentance for a man in the steward’s position implied one simple thing: “What should I do (τί ποιήσω)?... Do not collect more than what is due” (Luke 3:10, 13). The happy debtors on the other end are unlikely to have made fine distinctions about the bookkeeping. In this way or that, they would be ready to welcome the suddenly softened steward into their homes.166 A tension arises here from the imagined prospect that the steward is reinstated and placed again over the household, like the other “prudent” steward (ὁ πιστὸς οἰκονόµος ὁ φρόνιµος) in Luke 12:42. The success of the slave’s shrewd plan, specifically – and thus also the master’s praise of his servant’s prudence – would appear to be short-circuited, since the “friends” won by mercy never actually provide (or need to provide) their services of hospitality. A comparison with the Prodigal Son may be helpful here. Just as the Son’s original self-saving design angled after mere room and board and base treatment as a slave (15:17–19), but ended in the full restoration of his dignity (far beyond his own calculated hopes), so the steward’s plan achieves more than it intended. Accordingly, the steward’s tacit forgiveness and reinstatement in 16:8 would not unravel the lesson of 16:9, any more than the Prodigal Son (like the tax collector in 18:13) is wrong to express his abject need for mercy. It is wisdom to win friends with one’s mammon and to plead for mercy like a slave – even if in the end the Lord’s mercy will surpass the limits of one’s just deserts. All this, of course, only fills a gap in the narrative. The underdetermined nature of the parable, however, is itself revealing, for Luke apparently felt no

164

Derrett, “Fresh Light,” 207–8. The products recall Neh 5:11. See also Hoeren, “Der ungerechte Verwalter” 624–6. 165 See Jacob Neusner, “Aristotle’s Economics and the Mishnah’s Economics: The Matter of Wealth and Usury,” JSJ 21 (1990) 45–6. The illustration of “increase” supplied in the Mishnah entails speculation in crop futures. It could be that the steward was purchasing claims on future yields and pocketing the difference. 166 See Hays, Wealth Ethics, 142. Hays imagines a “modest benefaction” insufficient to warrant room and board for the rest of his life, but adequate perhaps to win a similar post. It is fair to observe the modest size of the benefaction, but one may also wonder if such small-scale debtors would have then been in the position to retain anyone as a household manager, as Hays thinks. The gaining of “friends” in “houses” in the plural (rather than conspiring with a single substantial debtor), suggests a temporary network of support more than focused job hunting, cf. Nolland, Luke, 798; and Moxnes, Economy of the Kingdom, 141.

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need to resolve the question of how precisely the steward settled his problem of housing, whether with his new “friends” or reconciled with the master. To this extent, the master figure and his act of praise simply co-opts the place where we expect to find an account of hospitality. Somehow, this smile of good favor – whether or not it brings the steward’s reinstatement – is decisive in itself (see further §4.3.3.2 below). The praise of the κύριος must be understood as a response to the steward’s own act of mercy (however self-interested); and here at last we find the key to the Christological dimension of this parable. On the one hand, since in Jewish law “a man’s agent is like himself,” the κύριος is unavoidably, ultimately the merciful creditor.167 Honor rightly accrues to him in this generous work of debt relief, and the sociological reading of the text is right to stress that the κύριος is the grand creditor in the scene. As John Donahue says of the steward and the parable, “it is not clear…that it is his story.”168 In this line, however, it is the master’s good will toward his steward, not to his debtors, that draws special attention. When read as a tale of the servant’s reform and escape from judgment, this good will of the master in a real way replicates the steward’s own show of mercy. The double sense of debt thus comes into play – for as a “squanderer” the steward is himself in debt to his κύριος. Indeed, the steward’s sinfulness is reckoned precisely in the debits his master (become creditor) has against him. In smiling on the steward, the κύριος confers the forgiveness of money and immorality in one selfsame act. Such double resonance of the debt language at the end of the story is tracked by the double resonance of κύριος in v. 8a (καὶ ἐπῄνεσεν ὁ κύριος τὸν οἰκονόµον τῆς ἀδικίας ὅτι φρονίµως ἐποίησεν). The problem here has been frequently reviewed.169 Is the referent of ὁ κύριος the master of the parable or Jesus himself? Although most scholars flatly reject Jeremias’ suggestion that the “Lord” in view here is Jesus, the recent proposal of Ryan Schellenberg offers a subtler analysis.170 Kύριος is indeed, as the majority sees, in the first place a reference to the steward’s “master” already mentioned in vv. 3 and 5. At the same time, however, there is a frame-breaking resonance with the diegetic κύριος who is relaying the parable. In light of the alignment of the

167

On this principle of Jewish legislation, see Derrett, “Fresh Light,” 201. Donahue, Gospel in Parable, 164. Donahue is correct that the parable makes a major point about the master’s mercy, but to describe the master as “blithely unconcerned over the supposed dishonesty” (168) misconstrues the issue. 169 See, e.g., I. Howard Marshall, “Luke xvi, 8: Who Commended the Unjust Steward?” JTS 19 (1968) 617–9. 170 Schellenberg, “Metalepsis,” 263–88. As Goodrich (“Voluntary Debt-Remission,” 551) rightly objects, Schellenberg overplays the “rich man” as a bad man and accordingly sets up an unnecessary opposition between the diegetic and metadiegetic levels. This leads to certain confusions in Schellenberg’s overall reading of the parable and understanding of Luke’s allegory. 168

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steward with Jesus’ disciples, this assignment of the role of creditor is hard to miss. Luke has already several times cast the person of Jesus in this guise (e.g. 4:18–19; 7:36–50; 12:57–59). Now, like the master in the parable, Jesus is prepared to forget the former misdeeds of tax collectors and sinners and praise anyone who acts quickly to save themselves by showing mercy. The case here is thus quite similar to Luke’s other master-steward parable, where “the story world created by the narration of the parable is intertwined with the Gospel narrative through the word κύριος.”171 Peter said, κύριε, are you telling this parable for us or for everyone? And ὁ κύριος said, “Who is the faithful and prudent steward whom ὁ κύριος will put in charge of his servants to give them their allowance of food at the proper time? (Luke 12:41–42)

Luke, the narrator at the extradiegteic level, has conspired to align the diegetic Jesus with the metadiegetic “master.” 172 The case of 16:8 is differently constructed, but functionally the same. 173 The reader, who in 16:8a initially construes the κύριος as the embedded “master,” must yet wonder why this master is commending his dishonest steward: a line of reasoning that leads to the disciples and the “Lord” outside the inner story world.174 The result of the metalepsis is that, as Schellenberg sees, “the unexpected praise of the κύριος...forces the audience to set the conception of lordship, stewardship, and debt that is implicit in the parabolic narrative over against the very different meaning these symbols have acquired in Luke’s primary narrative.”175 Jesus, the one who announces a great program of debt relief is here speaking about the way a disciple can find mercy from the judge.

171

On this text, Rowe (Narrative Christology, 153) comments: “The story world created by the narration of the parable is intertwined with the Gospel narrative through the word κύριος as it is read on both levels, as ‘master’ in the world of the parable, and as ‘Lord’ along the allegorical lines Luke so clearly provides.” See also Fabian Udoh, “The Tale of an Unrighteous Slave (Luke 16:1–8 [13]),” JBL 128 (2009) 326. 172 On this narratological language, see Chapter One §1.4.2 above. 173 Goodrich (“Voluntary Debt-Remission, 551) correctly observes: “In both of these other parables [i.e. Luke 12:42–28; 19:11–27], the character of Jesus is, as it were, woven into the narrative, so that the κύριος stands for the parabolic master who speaks and acts for Jesus.... In view of Luke’s other steward parables it is better to regard ὁ κύριος in 16:8 as referring to the parabolic master who embodies the character and concerns of Jesus.” 174 “Because it is inexplicable on the metediegetic level of discourse, this characterization of the steward engages the metaphorical understanding of prudent stewardship that Luke has already begun to develop in the primary narrative,” Schellenberg, “Metalepsis,” 279. 175 Schellenberg, “Metalepsis,” 278.

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4.3.3 Winning Friends: Self-Interest and Irony The manifest self-interest of the steward is for many interpreters the real scandal of the scene. It hardly appears a worthy model of discipleship. Ostensibly, Jesus himself warns against reckoning on exactly such reciprocity. If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return (Luke 6:34–35) When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and blind. And you will be blessed because they cannot repay you (14:12–13).

On the basis of such texts and a widespread modern disapproval of do ut des morality, a line of interpretation beginning at least in the nineteenth century has tried to read away what appears to be an inadmissible endorsement of self-interest in 16:1–13.176 A significant effort in this direction locates a deep note of irony in the story. Donald Fletcher, for instance, tries to take the words of Jesus in Luke 16:9 almost as a taunt: “Make friends for yourselves,” he seems to taunt; “imitate the example of the steward; use the unrighteous mammon; surround yourselves with the type of insincere self-interested friendship it can buy; how far will this carry you when the end comes and you are finally dismissed?”177

Paul Bretcher’s similar reading of v. 8a exposes the theology behind this view. “You surely are clever!” he [Jesus] might say. “You have displayed real ingenuity, yes, the very highest wisdom this world knows – the wisdom of disguising your sin, pretending righteousness, shrugging off the anger of God, quieting a guilty conscience by gaining the approval of men, showing off a few good works to cover a heart full of evil.”178

176

See, e.g., W. B. Ripon, “The Parable of the Unjust Steward,” Expositor 4,7 (1893 I) 26; R. L. Collins, “Is the Parable of the Unjust Steward Pure Sarcasm?” ExpT 22 (1910– 11) 525–6; Henri Clavier, “L’ironie dans l’enseignement de Jésus,” NovT 1 (1956) 3–20; Isak J. Du Plessis, “Philanthropy or Sarcasm? – Another Look at the Parable of the Dishonest Manager (Lk 16:1–13),” Neot 24 (1990) 1–20; and Stanley Porter, “The Parable of the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–13): Irony is the Key,” in The Bible in Three Dimensions (David J. A. Clines, ed.; JSOTSup 87; Sheffield: JSOT, 1990) 127–53. For an attempt to read the entire chapter in an ironic light on the basis of ancient rhetoric, see Bednarz, “Humor Rhetoric,” 377–415. 177 Donald R. Fletcher, “The Riddle of the Unjust Steward: Is Irony the Key?” JBL 82 (1963) 29. On this reading, see Ireland, Stewardship, 27–33. 178 Paul G. Bretscher, “The Parable of the Unjust Steward – A New Approach to Luke 16:1–9,” CTM 22 (1951) 757. Emphasis added.

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Good works, like the steward’s supposed mercy, if still soiled with selfinterest, never reach the heart and never justify. As an image of µετάνοια, then, the selfish steward necessarily fails; and Bretscher thus ultimately titles the lesson: “The Folly of Sinners Who, by Wisdom, Avoid Repentance.”179 The identification of irony in ancient texts is often risky, but it seems clear that the rhetoric detected by these scholars is off base. There is indeed a pointed subtlety in Jesus’ polemic language – but this moves in an entirely different direction than Fletcher and Bretscher and this school of scholarship thinks.180 It seems, in fact, that Jesus satirizes those who do not realize what lies in their own power to advance their own eternal self-interest: namely, repentance through works of mercy. Whatever post-Reformation theology might ultimately make of the meta-irony, the Gospel accuses those who do not perform sufficient good works as the ones set about on a project of Selbsterlösung (οἱ δικαιοῦντες ἑατοὺς ἐνώπιον τῶν ἀνθρώπων, Luke 16:14). The presence in the passage of this sharp irony (§4.3.3.1) and the commendation of authentic self-interest (§4.3.3.2) will be addressed in sequence. 4.3.3.1 The “Sons of Light” The suggestion that Jesus ironically ridicules the steward’s act of debt release, as though it presented too materially minded a model – an image of avoiding repentance – fails decisively. An analysis of Luke 16:1–13, in fact, shows the very opposite to be the case. An examination of the rhetoric of these verses can begin with the way Jesus addresses his hearers. After a long address to the grumbling Pharisees (Luke 15:1–32), the parable of the steward and the subsequent instruction are addressed πρὸς τοὺς µαθητάς (16:1).181 At the same time, the Pharisees still belong to the audience (ἤκουον δὲ ταῦτα πάντα οἱ Φαρισαῖοι, 16:14). Accordingly, a kind of double rhetoric contours these verses. In the first place, Jesus consolidates and promotes among his followers the value of practicing material mercy. At the same time, by a calculated sidelong glance, he provokes the “money-loving” Pharisees into a guffaw with his teaching on mammon (ἐξεµυκτήριζον αὐτόν). This ultimately elicits a second direct exchange with his unrepentant opponents in 16:14–30.182

179

Bretcher, “New Approach,” 759. Bednarz (“Humor Rhetoric,” 377–415), following Fletcher, misreads the parable; but she has correctly identified the humor of Luke 16 as cast in the forceful rhetorical style (“derogatory epithets, barbed wit, raillery, derisive hyperbole, fear-evoking taunts, and shock-producing dicta”). 181 On the force of this verse as a continuation of the preceding discourse in Luke 15, see Kilgallen, “Luke 15 and 16,” 369. 182 The discourse concludes at Luke 16:31. Apart from the change in theme, the transition back to the disciples in Luke 17:1 (εἶπεν δὲ πρὸς τοὺς µαθητὰς αὐτοῦ) significantly 180

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The rhetorical situation is very similar to Luke 12, where a similar discourse on wealth is developed and a similarly shifting double audience is maintained: unrepentant crowd (12:12), disciples (12:22; cf. 12:41), unrepentant crowd (12:54).183 Interestingly, a similar thematic pattern also structures the material in each of these major discourses: (i) the dispute of two sons over an inheritance (12:13–21 || 15:15–32); (ii) an admonition to the disciples on the use of wealth, centered on a stewardship parable (12:22–48 || 16:1–13); and (iii) warning words of judgment to those who must repent (12:54–13:9 || 16:14–30). Jesus’ perspective in Luke 12:32–34, the “Zieltext” of the wider unit, helps clarify the central thrust of his in-group wealth discourse in both chapters:184 Fear not, little flock (τὸ µικρὸν ποίµνιον), for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. Sell your possessions and give alms (δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην); provide for yourselves purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail (θεσαυρὸν ἀνέκλειπτον), where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also (Luke 12:32–34).

The treasure in heaven logic will be explored in detail below. But Jesus here constructs the identity of his followers not only on the basis of their radical ἐλεηµοσύνη, but in conscious contradistinction to outsiders. Thus, the Father’s gift of the Kingdom to the sectarian sounding “little flock” not only contrasts with the πάντα τὰ ἔθνη τοῦ κόσµου in the preceding verse (12:30). It also evokes a remnant eschatology (cf. Isa 41:8–10, 13–14; 43:1–7; 44:1– 3).185 Thus, even as Jesus commends his charity ethic, he hints at a split in Israel, and the two audiences he balances – Kingdom insiders and outsiders – are constructed along dualistic, apocalyptic lines. This same perspective shapes the language of 16:8b-13, where an eschatological in-group and an out-group are contrasted: “the sons of this age” (οἱ υἱοὶ τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου) and “the sons of light” (οἱ υἱοὶ τοῦ φωτός). David Flusser has heard in Jesus’ mention of the “sons of light” a jab in the direction of the Essenes. 186 This would account for the expression (cf. 1QS 1:9; 2:16; 3:13, 24, 25; 1QM 1:3, 11, 13; 4QFlor 1–2 i 8–9; 4Q177 10– 11:7; 12–13 i 7, 11; also 4Q‘Amramb 3:1; 4Q‘Amrame 1:9–10); 187 but as

omits the καί which serves as a binder to what had preceded in 16:1 (ἔλεγεν δὲ καὶ πρὸς τοῦς µαθητάς). 183 See Matera, “Conflict with Israel,” 72–3. 184 See Lagrange, Luc, 364–5. 185 See Wilhelm Pesch, “Zur Formgeschichte und Exegese von Lk 12:31,” Bib 41 (1960) 25–40, esp. 29. 186 David Flusser, “The Parable of the Unjust Steward: Jesus’ Criticism of the Essenes,” in Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls (James Charlesworth, ed.; ABRL; New York: Doubleday, 1992) 176–97. 187 On the background of this language, see Jacob Enz, “Origin of the Dualism Expressed by ‘Sons of Light’ and ‘Sons of Darkness,’” Biblical Research 21 (1976) 15–18.

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Christopher Hays replies, it is unlikely in the Lukan context, where Essenes are altogether unknown.188 Flusser’s instinct to detect in οἱ υἱοὶ τοῦ φωτός the critique of an outside group is noteworthy, however, since commentaries often assume without questioning that the disciples are the “sons of light” (cf. John 12:36; 1 Thess 5:5; Eph 5:8).189 Flusser’s argument ultimately depends on Jesus’ supposed critique of Essene halakah, taking µαµωνᾶ τῆς ἀδικίας in Luke 16:9 as an Essene cipher for non-sectarian wealth. 190 This misconstrues the mammon topos, as will be seen; but it perhaps rightly detects an opponent’s self-perception in “sons of light.” Specifically, we seem to find in this title an ironic labeling of the selfsatisfied Pharisees, just as in the preceding chapter they were mockingly designated “the righteous who have no need of repentance” (15:7). Although the title “sons of light” cannot be traced to any known Pharisaic expression, it would suit their separatist program and nicely play upon Luke’s motif of (Pharisaic) blindness and sight.191 The irony would also fit well with Luke’s careful linkage of the logion on the “light” of one’s eye being darkness (11:34–36) – an allusion to stinginess in giving (cf. Deut 15:9; Tobit 4:7; Sir 14:9–10; Prov 22:9 MT v. LXX; Test. Ben. 4:2; b. Shabbat 74a; also cf. Matt 5:14–16) – with his woes against the Pharisees, who fail to give alms (11:37– 41). 192 In the immediate context of chapter 16, the identification makes sense on at least three grounds. (i) First, by all appearances, the disciples correspond to “the sons of this age.” This is certainly how the Pharisees view them. Indeed, if the steward of the parable represents the repentant “sinners and tax collectors” of Luke 15:1, as suggested above, the logic of the passage is clear. Jesus takes up his opponents’ characterization of his disciples and says, in effect, sometimes it is precisely the “unrighteous” (ἀδικία, 16:8) worldly ones who know best how to take care of themselves. The sanctimonious “righteous” (δίκαιοι, 15:7) can

188

See Hays, Wealth Ethics, 146–8. See, e.g., Bovon, Lukas 3, 79. 190 Flusser, “Unjust Steward,” 184–5. 191 On this significant Lukan motif, drawn from Second Isaiah, see Dennis Hamm, “Paul’s Blindness and its Healing: Clues to Symbolic Intent (Acts 9, 22, 26),” Bib 71 (1990) 63–72; and Chad Hartsock, Sight and Blindness in Luke-Acts: The Use of Physical Features in Characterization (Biblical Interpretation Series 94; Leiden: Brill, 2008). 192 On this text see Dale Allison, “The Eye is the Lamp of the Body (Matthew 6. 22–23 = Luke 11. 34–36),” NTS 33 (1987) 61–83, esp. 74–8. Allison (78) ultimately says of the logion’s image of emitting light: “The proof of right religion resides in deeds, for that which is within is the source of that which is without (‘faith without works is dead’, Jas 2. 26)…light is the source of all good fruits, darkness of all bad fruits.” This understanding wonderfully suits Luke’s transition to the Woes and the saying on the inside and outside of the cup and the call to give alms. Jesus is actually still pronouncing his logion on the simple eye, when the Pharisee invites him to dine: ἐν δὲ τῷ λαλῆσαι ἐρωτᾷ αὐτὸν Φαρισαῖος ὅπως ἀριστήσῃ παρ᾽αὐτῷ (Luke 11:37). 189

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be downright (and dangerously) clueless.193 Thus, Jesus’ disciples – admittedly at one time “sons of this age” – are now praised by the Lord for being more “prudent” than the supposedly pristine Pharisees: in just the same way that the formerly “unjust” steward was praised for his “prudent” show of mercy by his own merciful master (v. 8a). (ii) Second, the alignment of the Pharisees with the “sons of light” simply continues the ironic adoption and subversion of their own self-perception begun in chapter 15. The Pharisees consider themselves to be the “righteous” and the obedient son, but this exposes them in Jesus’ rhetoric to a rather relentless reversal. The “little flock” (τὸ µικρὸν ποίµνιον) of stray sheep is prized more than the unrepentant crowd of ninety-nine (Luke 15:3–7; cf. 12:32). The repentant wastrel brings more joy than the dutiful brother (15:15– 32). And the “sons of this age” are praised more highly than “the sons of light” (16:9). In a word, “tax collectors and sinners” are entering the Kingdom, while the Pharisees stand and watch (cf. 13:28–30; 16:16; 17:20–21). (iii) Third, ironically calling the Pharisees “sons of light” in Luke 16:9 harmonizes with and helps prepare Jesus’ open attack on their hypocrisy.194 “You are those who make yourselves righteous before men (οἱ δικαιοῦντες ἑαυτοὺς ἐνώπιον τῶν ἀνθρώπων), but God knows your hearts” (16:15). In formulating this charge – which reveals that the designation of the Pharisees as “righteous” (δίκαιοι) was always tongue in cheek – Luke makes an important verbal connection with the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, addressed πρός τινας τοὺς πεποιθότας ἐφ᾿ ἑαυτοῖς ὅτι εἰσὶν δίκαιοι (18:9; cf. 18:14). If the Pharisees thus exalt their righteousness over the tax collectors and sinners who humbly beg for mercy, there is reason to suspect that the Pharisees’ false confidence is invested somehow in their riches. Wealth might present a deceptive veneer, covering sin in a display of tithes (cf. 18:12; 11:42) and enabling the rich to equate their wealth with God’s blessing.195 This precise hypocrisy is explicit in texts of the period. Woe to you, sinners, for your riches make you appear to be righteous, but your heart convicts you of being sinners (1 Enoch 96:4; cf. Jub 23:21).

Like 1 Enoch, Luke challenges the simplistic view of material prosperity as a sign of divine favor, and exposes the Pharisees’ wicked hearts (ὁ δὲ θεὸς γινώσκει τὰς καρδίας ὑµῶν, Luke 16:15). Luke undermines those who smug-

193

Luke’s rhetorical antithesis in the discourse, contrasting the “unrighteous” (ἀδικία) steward and the “righteous” (δίκαιοι) Pharisees, is a neglected but decisive clue to the proper interpretation of this vexing parable. 194 Luke gives less attention to the language of “hypocrisy” than Matthew (Luke 12:1– 3; 13:15; cf. Matt 6:2, 5, 16; 7:5; 15:7; 22:18; 23:13); but, even without this emphatic vocabulary, the Third Gospel certainly knows the idea that the Pharisees are righteous in appearance rather than within (e.g. 11:37–41; 16:15). 195 See Matthews, Riches, Poverty, and the Faithful, 53.

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ly suppose that worldly blessing will translate into an eternal reward. In fact, he insists, it is just the opposite (16:25; cf. 6:20–26). By their greed, the money-loving (φιλάργυροι) “sons of light” are in danger of making the lamp within them darkness (11:33–36). 4.3.3.2 Eschatological Self-Interest Fletcher and Bretscher have entirely misread the ironic thrust of the passage. The undisguised self-interest promoted in Luke 16:9 accordingly moves in a different direction than they suppose: the direction plotted by Prov 10:2. Their basic error is to have conflated two distinct orders of reciprocity: human and divine. On the first, earthly order, compensation should indeed be renounced – but only in order to receive it on the second. The coherent presence of this reward schema in Luke’s vision is indisputable. The divine passive expresses it in the Sermon on the Plain: Give and it will be given to you, a good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over will be poured into your lap. For the measure you give will be measured out to you (Luke 6:37–38).196

Later the Gospel makes the point expressly: When you give a banquet invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and blind. And you will be blessed because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection (Luke 14:12–13).

There is, at one level, nothing unusually Lukan about this model of reward. It is common to a great many sources. Francis Williams, thus, rightly argued that the “eschatological self-interest” of Luke 16:1–13 corresponds to a whole class of teachings in the synoptic tradition that counsel charity on the same logic (e.g. Luke 12:33; 14:13; 18:22; 6:38; cf. Mark 10:30; Matt 25:31– 46). 197 The identical idea is amply present in Second Temple and rabbinic Judaism. 198 Luke’s unique adoption of this paradigm can, nevertheless, be traced along two lines. First, Luke forges out of a known topos a unique blend of sapiential and apocalyptic themes (i). Second, he personalizes the logic of deferred repayment as a resurrection trope (ii).



196 See John Kloppenborg, “Agrarian Discourse,” 104–28; Kirk, “‘Love Your Enemies,’” 667–686; and Mott, “Giving and Receiving,” 60–72. 197 Williams, “Almsgiving,” 294. 198 See, e.g., Anderson, Charity, 123–35.

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(i) “Unfailing” Mammon Despite the derisive language used in Luke 16:9–13 (µαµωνᾶ τῆς ἀδικίας), money in Luke’s view can do much more than procure “insincere selfinterested friendship” doomed to disappoint (Fletcher). It can be turned to eternal profit. To appreciate this in context, it is important to recognize a repentance motif that has escaped many scholars, who have often searched only for precedents to Luke’s exact phraseology and neglected to take the final failure of wicked mammon into account.199 Luke’s collocation of the (i) pejoritive epithet µαµωνᾶ τῆς ἀδικίας coupled with the (ii) forecast of its certain failing at the judgment (ἐκλίπῃ) recalls a known motif from Israel’s wisdom tradition.200 This topos is aimed against (i) unreliable “treasuries of wickedness (‫אוצרות רשע‬, Prov 10:2) and “lying riches” (‫נכסי שקר‬, Sir 5:8) which (ii) “profit not on the day of wrath” ( ‫לא יועילו‬ ‫ביום עברה‬, Sir 5:8; cf. Prov 10:2; 11:4). Like the treasuries of the Rich Fool, which lure him into a mortally false security (Luke 12:15–21), this tradition targets an eschatologically unstable wealth, in which the doomed have placed their trust and grow complacent – and thus avoid repentance. Do not rely on your wealth Or say, “I have enough”… Delay not the time of your conversion (ἐπιστρέψαι) to the Lord, put it not off from day to day – for suddenly his wrath flames forth at the time of vengeance you will be destroyed. Rely not upon deceitful wealth; it will be no help on the day of wrath (cf. Sir 5:1, 7–8).

As a source of misplaced security, over-investment in the “wicked wealth” of this world impedes a person’s ability to turn (‫ )שוב‬and exposes him to disaster on the “day of wrath.” The treacherous wealth under attack in this trope is evidently not wealth per se, since a blessed enjoyment of material riches also elsewhere figures



199 See Pasquale Colella, “De mamona iniquitatis,” RivB 19 (1971) 427–8; Jean-Pierre Molina, “Luc 16/1 à 13. L’injuste Mamon,” EThR 53 (1978) 371–6; Georges Gander, “Le procédé de l’économe infidèle, décrit Luc 16.5–7, est-il répréhensible ou louable?” VC 7 (1953) 128–41; and Philippe Henri Menoud, “Riches injustes et biens véritables,” RThPh 31 (1943) 5–17. 200 Fitzmyer (Luke, 1109) notes that “the exact Semitic equivalent of this Greek expression [i.e. µαµωνᾶ τῆς ἀδικίας] has not yet been discovered elsewhere. However, in Qumran literature one finds a kindred phrase, hôn ḥāmās, “wealth of violence” (1QS 10:19), and hôn hāriš‘āh, “the wealth of evil” (CD 6:15; Cf. CD 8:15; 19:17).” It is misleading, however, when he says, “in none of these instances does the phrase clearly mean ‘ill-gotten gain’ or wealth iniquitously acquired.” As seen in Chapter Three, §3.2.1.1, CD 6:15–16 implies wealth wrongly acquired (i.e. by breaking Sabbath halakhah) and unjustly held.

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within these same wisdom traditions.201 In the Lukan context, however, the more positive sapiential outlook on wealth has been sidelined by a fixation upon this dangerous dimension of riches which stands opposed to repentance. Two elements of Luke’s critique of riches must here be disentangled, since both in different ways color the rhetoric of Luke 16. (1) In the first place, Luke derives a certain view of the wickedness of wealth from the apocalyptic temper he shares with traditions such as 1 Enoch. 202 It appears almost to be an assumption in these texts that the conspicuously rich have gained their wealth in some sinful fashion. Chapters 94–105 of 1 Enoch, for instance, make a simple and regular identification of “sinners” (ἁµαρτωλοί, ἄδικοι) and the rich (cf. Sir 13:17–20; 26:29–27:3). The “plunder” (ἁραπγή) Jesus accuses the Pharisees of harboring in Luke 11:39 shares a similar assumption and corresponds to the ‫ הון הרשעה‬seen in CD 6:15–16. 203 Luke depicts these rich figures shamelessly “robbing” widows, gaining or holding their wealth illicitly, then covering it over in a show of pious hypocrisy (e.g. Luke 20:47). Since this criminal accusation belongs to the sustained Lukan shaping of Jesus’ confrontation with the Pharisees over wealth (and the consequent need to give alms, cf. 11:42), it hovers distinctly in the background in Luke 16, to the extent that the “greedy” Pharisees are the targeted audience of Jesus’ polemic. At the same time, Jesus’ followers are not excluded, for the depiction of converted tax collectors like Zacchaeus indicates the extent to which extortion and fiscal abuse was an archetypal sin from which the disciples too had to repent (εἴ τινός τι ἐσυκοφάντησα ἀποδίδωµι τετραπλοῦν, 19:8; cf. 3:13).204 The steward’s former fixing of the books directly underlines this charge.

201

See Izak Spangenberg, “‘The Poor Will Always Be With You’: Wealth and Poverty in a Wisdom Perspective,” in Plutocrats and Paupers: Wealth and Poverty in the Old Testament (H. L. Bosman, I. G. P. Gous, and I. J. J. Spangenberg, eds.; Pretoria: J. L. van Schaik, 1991) 228–46. 202 On the contacts between Luke and 1 Enoch, see L. W. Grensted, “The Use of Enoch in St. Luke XVI,19–31,” ExpT 26 (1914–15) 333–4; A. O. Standen, “ The Parable of Dives and Lazarus and Enoch 22,” ExpT 33 (1921–22) 523; Sverre Aalen, “St. Luke’s Gospel and the Last Chapters of 1 Enoch,” NTS 13 (1966–67) 1–13; Nickelsburg, “Riches, the Rich, and God’s Judgment,” 324–44; and idem., “Revisiting the Rich and the Poor,” 547−85. 203 See Moxnes, Economy of the Kingdom, 111–12. 204 The example of Zacchaeus, with his extraordinary benefaction and promise of fourfold repayment, is paradigmatic and immediately relevant to the “tax collectors and sinners” of Luke 15–16. Such radical generosity on the part of the toll man must be imaged as the exact negative image of the rich ruler a few verses before (18:18–30). These two figures stand as vivid Lukan illustrations of the characters confronted with Jesus’ challenge in 16:1–13. Zacchaeus’ massive disbursal (ἰδοὺ τὰ ἡµίσιά µου τῶν ὑπαρχόντων...τοῖς πτωχοῖς δίδωµι) and promise of restitution should be understood as a performative act and resolution of reform – not a self-justifying statement of his previous good behavior (19:8–

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(2) At a deeper level, however, Luke 16 appears keyed to another more generic problem, handled earlier in the story of the Rich Fool (Luke 12:15– 21).205 All wealth – however licit – fails, for it makes one proud and forgetful of God.206 This idea also finds expression in the apocalytpic framework. The frequently noted Enochic woes, so near to Luke’s own, illustrate the perspective. Woe to you, rich, for in your riches you have trusted; from your riches you will depart, because you have not remembered the Most High in the days of your riches (1Enoch 94:8; cf. Luke 6:24–26).207

As frequently in the biblical tradition, those laden with earthly riches pronounce a hybris soliloquy. Woe to you who acquire gold and silver unjustly and say, “We have become very wealthy, and have gotten possessions, and we have acquired all that we wished. And now let us do what we have wished, for silver we have gathered up in our treasuries, and many goods in our houses” (97:8–9; cf. Hos 12:8–9; Sir 5:1).208

10). Bovon (Lukas 2, 266) describes two competing interpretations of this text: “Die erste Deutung konzentriert sich auf die Gnade Gottes, die sich an diesem Tag durch die heilswirksame Gegenwart des Menschensohnes gezeigt hat (siehe V. 10). Die zweite Auslegung betont das ethische Engagement jenes Mannes, der in einem gewissen Sinn sein Heil gemacht hat (siehe V 8).” The debate is largely misplaced, for it fails to recognize the tight interconnection of µετάνοια and works of mercy in Luke’s Gospel (e.g Luke 3:7–10). On this debate, see N. M. Watson, “Was Zacchaeus Really Reforming,” ExpT 77 (1965–66) 282–5; A. P. Salom, “Was Zacchaeus Really Reforming? (Reply to N. M. Watson),” ExpT 78 (1966–67) 87; Hamm, “Does Zacchaeus Defend or Resolve?” 431–7 and idem., “Zacchaeus Revisted Once More: A Story of Vindication or Conversion?” Bib 72 (1991) 248–51; Nolland, Luke, 906; R. C. Tannehill, “The Story of Zacchaeus as Rhetoric: Luke 19,1–10,” Sem 64 (1993) 201–11. See also Fitzmyer (Luke, 1220–1); and R. C. White, “Vindication for Zacchaeus,” ExpT 91 (1979–80) 21. 205 See R. Daniel Schumacher, “Saving Like a Fool and Spending Like it Isn’t Yours: Reading the Parable of the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1–8a) in Light of the Parable of the Rich Fool (Luke 12:16–20),” Review and Expositor 109 (2012) 269–76. Schumacher illustrates a series of important links between these two texts. On the view of mammon, see Marc Philonenko, “De l’intérêt des deutérocanoniques pour l’interprétation du Nouveau Testament” l’exemple de Luc 16,9,” Revue des Sciences Religieuses 73 (1999) 177–83; Fitzmyer, Luke, 1109; Flusser, “Unjust Steward,” 1992; and Hays, Wealth Ethics, 144 fn. 236. 206 Some patristic interpreters blend the abstract critique of all wealth with the charge of unjust acquisition. Basil, e.g., claims that all riches were at some point stolen from someone somewhere. See C. Paul Schroeder, trans., St. Basil the Great on Social Justice (Popular Patristic Series 38; Yonkers: St. Vladimir’s Seminary, 2009). 207 Translation taken from George Nickelsburg and James VanderKam, 1 Enoch. A New Translation (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2004) 145. 208 Ibid., 147.

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This haughty and hoarding attitude openly contradicts the warning of Deut 8:17 – “Be careful not to say, ‘My own ability and skill have gotten me this wealth.’ You must remember the Lord your God, for he is the one who gives ability to get wealth” (cf. Jer 9:22–23). Such a critique, since it pinpoints not the restricted issue of illicit wealth, but the very nature of money as such (cf. Luke 16:13), is more susceptible to the absolutizing dualism of apocalyptic. 209 If 1 Enoch transmits a correspondingly relentless image of the unreliable “treasuries of wickedness” (‫)אוצרות רשע‬, however, Luke’s own use of the topos is more tempered. The Gospel maintains the relative position of “wicked” wealth, finding a positive place for riches in redemptive works of mercy.210 “Give alms and all will be clean for you” (11:42); “Make friends for yourselves with unrighteous mammon” (16:9). In this, Luke distinguishes himself decisively from the perspective of 1 Enoch – which leaves absolutely no path of repentance open for the rich:211 “No remedy will be available to you, thanks to your sin” (1 Enoch 95:4); “Give up any hope that you will be saved” (98:10).212 The Gospel’s commitment to the tradition of atoning alms (e.g. Dan 4:24 [4:27 LXX]; Sir 3:30) thus marks its critical distance from the species of apocalyptic found in 1 Enoch, with its terminal dualism. At the same time, Luke’s vision remains quite radical, for it seems that the best (and perhaps only) reason to have riches is to give them away. Luke’s language of “wicked wealth” thus fires in two directions. On the one hand, a standing charge against the Pharisees as unrepentant plunderers of the poor is implicitly recalled. This thickens the polemic quality of the chapter and colors the change in behavior praised in the converted tax collectors (who were mired in financial mismanagement like the steward, cf. Luke 3:13; 19:8). On the other hand, wealth is abstractly critiqued as an inherent impediment to repentance (cf. Sir 5:1–8). Within the immediate context of Luke 16:1–13 this latter discourse certainly prevails (though the parable of Lazarus sharpens the polemic against the Pharisees).



209 Loren Stuckenbruck (1 Enoch 91–108 [Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2007] 263), speaking of 1 Enoch, understatedly noted that the invectives against the rich reflect “more than a mere conditional criticism of wealth.” 210 See, e.g., Bovon, Lukas, 80–1. 211 On this point, see Outi Lehtipuu, The Afterlife Imagery in Luke’s Story of the Rich Man and Lazarus (NovTSup 123; Leiden: Brill, 2007) 175–81. 212 “The judgment brought on Israel for its injustice to the poor in the prophetic tradition was designed to bring about repentance and restore the nation… However the judgment of the wicked rich in the Epistle [1 Enoch 94–105] is placed in an eschatological context and their judgment is certain with no chance for repentance…the prophetic tradition envisions a correction of injustices while the Enochic tradition looks for a reversal of fortunes,” Matthews, Riches, Poverty, and the Faithful, 61.

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While Prov 10:2 and Sir 5:1–8 both supply the essential notion that wealth is bound to fail, only Sirach attests Luke’s specific interest in repentance: a commitment that ultimately proves stronger than the deterministic current of radical apocalyptic. In line with both Proverbs and Sirach, however, the idea of ‫ אוצרות רשע‬implies for Luke a contrasting wealth of “righteousness” (‫)צדקה‬. Treasures gained by wickedness do not profit But righteousness delivers from death (Prov 10:2).

In Luke 16:11, the Gospel poses the contrast in terms of “true” wealth versus wicked mammon: “If you are not faithful with τῷ ἀδίκῳ µαµωνᾷ, who will trust you with τὸ ἀληθινόν.” In 12:33, the same contrast is implied in the redactional notion of an “unfailing treasure (θησαυρὸν ἀνέκλειπτον) in the heavens” (12:33), posed as a direct counterpart to those unrighteous treasures that are, by contrast, sure to fail (ὅταν ἐκλίπῃ, 16:9). 213 Another compact expression of the same contrast comes in 12:21, in describing the Rich Fool as one who “stores up treasures for himself, but is not rich toward God” (ὁ θησαυρίζων ἑαυτῷ µὴ εἰς θεὸν πλουτῶν). This schematic pattern of pairing as antithetical parallels wicked/worldly and righteous/heavenly treasuries is intensified in the Third Gospel by its alignment with a sharp apocalyptic dualism. Luke’s plotting of the beatitudes as a direct antitype to his woes against the rich (6:20–26), for instance, effectively coordinates the blessed fate of the Lukan “poor” with the gathering of “righteous” treasures. Both poverty and righteousness somehow represent the opposite pole from wicked, worldly mammon. The collision of these two distinct constructs of “true” wealth – sapiential “righteousness” (‫)צדקה‬, on the one hand, and the eschatological possession of the poor, on the other – explains the essential structure of Luke 16, where both understandings come to distinct but conjoined expression in the two distinct parables. A similar fusing of wisdom and apocalyptic “immaterial wealth” motifs, in fact, appears in the wider Second Temple tradition (e.g. 4QInstruction).214 Luke has nevertheless introduced major adjustment to the entire thesaurus tradition in chapter 16 in his notion of winning friends.215

213

The phrase “treasure in heaven” in Matt 19:21 and Mark 10:21 notably lacks “unfail-

ing.”

214

“Immaterial wealth in Luke touches the domains of both practical instruction about the way of life expected of followers of Jesus and an apocalyptic focus on judgment (Luke 6:24 26), including an orientation towards the final age (cf. Luke 14:14, 18:30),” Hogaterp, “Immaterial Wealth,” 48. 215 On the development of the treasure in heaven metaphor and its connection with the Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang principle, see Anderson, Sin, 164–88.

4.3 Prudently Prodigal Steward

263

(ii) Personalizing the Logic of Deferred Repayment If a well-attested “treasure in heaven” concept (e.g. Luke 12:33) informs the rationale for “making friends” with worldly mammon in 16:9, Luke has still worked a significant modification in the inherited tradition. 216 The capital deposit in heaven is no longer pictured as a mound of money; it has morphed into a company of hospitable friends. This innovation appears unique. 217 Williams suggests that the ground may have been prepared here by a (later attested) notion of alms as “intercessors” (‫פרקליתין‬, παράκλητοι, e.g. b. Batra 10a; Shabbat 32a).218 Whatever the origin, Luke’s personification preserves the essential structure of the thesaurus logic and does not alter the selfinterest, but it does advance the heavenly reward metaphor in two substantial ways. First of all, Luke configures the Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang principle more nearly to the specific act of ἐλεηµοσύνη. Rather than blandly converting all charity into celestial coinage – as though giving alms were really no more than making a transaction with a heavenly banker – the one who acts with kindness here below can now specifically expect to receive kindness in return. This re-conception humanizes the topos and shifts the meritorious focus of almsgiving from its financial component to the genuine personal exchange. In this way, secondly, Luke’s notion of “making friends” supplies a reciprocal agency to the beneficiaries of one’s charity. Rather than standing in a purely instrumental posture as “a full-service ATM…a direct conduit for transferring funds from an earthly to a heavenly account,” a relationship is now contracted in which favors are exchanged between partners and the gap dividing rich and poor is bridged through an eschatological peerage.219



216 On the continuous logic binding 12:33 and 16:9, see Richard Hiers, “Friends by Unrighteous Mammon: The Eschatological Proletariat (Luke 16:9),” JAAR 38 (1970) 30–6. 217 A similar, but less explicit witness to this idea appears in 2 Enoch 50:6 [A]: “Stretch out your hands to the orphan and the widows, and according to (your) strength help the wretched, and they will be like a shelter at the time of the test.” Uncertain dating (very uncertain), uncertain provenance, and serious textual difficulties (e.g. the “shelter” does not appear in the [J] recension) make it hard to evaluate the comparative value of this tradition. On 2 Enoch, see F. I. Andersen, “2 (Slavonic Apocalypse) of Enoch,” in Charlesworth, Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Volume One, 91–100. 218 Williams, “Almsgiving,” 295–6. 219 Gary Anderson, “Faith & Finance,” First Things 193 (2009) 29–34. The embarrassing patristic “instrumentalization of the poor” lamented by many finds an important theological resource here. On this problem, see Johan Leemans and Johan Verstraeten, “The (Im)possibile Dialogue between Patristics and Catholic Social Thought: Limits, Possibilities, and a Way Forward,” Reading Patristic Texts on Social Ethics: Issues and Challenges for Twenty-first Century Social Thought (Johan Leemans, Brian Matz, and Johan Verstraeten, eds.; Washington, DC: CUA, 2011) 222–33, esp. 223.

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These are considerable differences, and it is worth enumerating some important implications. Most significantly, the introduction of the beneficiaries of one’s charity into the reward scene is ineluctably tied to a resurrection context. Obviously, sparing some lightning strike of good fortune, the poor cannot repay material favors in this life. This is the limited horizon of traditional wisdom teaching: “He who has compassion on the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his good deed” (Prov 19:17).220 On the apocalyptic supposition of Luke’s great reversal, however, the poor are destined for eschatological fullness, so that in the Kingdom they themselves can be the executors of God’s undersigned repayment.221 This promise of the eschatological reversal is crucial. It ultimately differentiates Luke’s vision from Ben Sira, whose this-worldly perspective also foresees enjoying a friend’s reversal of fortune: Be faithful to your neighbor in his poverty (πίστιν κτῆσαι ἐν πτωχείᾳ µετὰ τοῦ πλησίον), so that you might be filled with his good things. Remain with him in time of distress, so you will share his inheritance along with him (ἐν τῇ κληρονοµίᾳ αὐτοῦ συγκληρονοµήσῃς, Sir 22:23).

Luke’s reversal of fortunes motif reconfigures this image of faithful friendship and relocates the sapiential charity instruction in a new symbolic register. More specifically, the “counter-factual view of the world” which characterizes apocalyptic eschatology reinvents the poor as the present bearers of eschatological riches and heirs to the promise of God’s vindication.222 In this way, the recipients of charity are not understood simply as privileged loci of encounter with the divine (like, e.g., the priesthood). They represent, in addition, the ultimate point of contact with the Lord’s covenantal act of justice. Works of mercy, thus, confess one’s specific faith in the promise of resurrection. In God’s overturning the world and undoing the effects of sin, the raising of the dead and the good news for the “poor” belong together for Luke as the two climatic and conjoined expressions of the Kingdom reversal: τυφλοὶ ἀναβλέπουσιν, χωλοὶ περιπατοῦσιν, λεπροὶ καθαρίζονται καὶ κωφοὶ ἀκούουσιν, νεκροὶ ἐγείρονται, πτωχοὶ εὐαγγελίζονται (7:22).

220

The role of the poor as the celestial debtors of the rich appears in the patristic sources. See, e.g., Monique Alexandre, “L’Interprétation de Luc 16,19–31 chez Grégoire de Nyssa,” in Epektasis: Mélanges patristiques offerts au Cardinal Jean Daniélou (J. Fontaine and C. Kannengiesser, eds.; Paris: Beauchesne, 1972) 425–41. 221 On the reversal motif, see York, The Last Shall Be First. “The reader is conditioned to expect that certain, defined character types will experience a positive divine reversal. Other individuals, also with well-defined characterizations, will experience a negative reversal,” (ibid., 160). 222 On this “counter-factual” world-view, see Brian Robinette, Grammars of Resurrection: A Christian Theology of Presence and Absence (New York: Herder and Herder, 2009) 198.

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The eschatological horizon framing the logic of Luke 16:9 is strikingly anticipated in 14:14. Strictly speaking, the repayment language is still financial and spoken in the theological passive. Nonetheless, there is the very strong suggestion of a return “invitation” to be delivered by the poor at the resurrection. When you give a feast, do not invite your friends (φίλούς) or brothers or relatives or rich neighbors lest they invite you in return (ἀντικαλέσωσίν σε) and you be repaid (γένηται άνταπόδοµά σοι). Rather, when you give a feast invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind – and blessed will you be, since they have nothing to repay you (οὐκ ἔχουσιν ἀνταποδοῦναί σοι); for you will be repaid (ἀνταποδοθήσεται) in the resurrection (ἀναστάσει) of the just (Luke 14:12–14).

If the language here is plainly moving toward a vision of hospitality with the destitute of this age as eschatological benefactors, it is worth noting in view of 16:9 how the concept of “friends” is tacitly subverted. One’s intimates, whether friends or brothers or patrons, cannot function as one’s hosts in the resurrection – in fact, they even cheat one of a heavenly reward.223 Only those whose balance is invested entirely in the Kingdom, with nothing here to offer, can guarantee an invitation to the eternal banquet, where many who were last shall be first as they sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (13:28–30). One final, important point follows. Jesus alone is entirely invested in the Kingdom; he alone lives fully on the order of the resurrection and its reversal. In the personalization of the thesaurus metaphor, he accordingly occupies central stage. This helps clarify the question of the agency of the “friends” in heaven. If the climatic praise of the κύριος in the parable cuts short a resolution of the steward’s housing problems (see §4.3.2 above), this indicates only that another order of mercy has come into focus, symbolized in the master’s praise. Jesus as Lord is the minister of forgiveness, not of food and shelter (however much he also commands such works). Since the heavenly reward imagined by Luke is hardly so “spiritualized” that corporeal refreshment holds no placement (cf. Luke 16:24–25), the (condign) reciprocal agency of the poor (like Lazarus) is imagined as a real possibility in the resurrection. There is, in other words, a heavenly continuation of the logic of the strict earthly justice of measure for measure. This is represented in the persons of the poor. At the same time, on another plane of (congruent) reciprocity, an exceeding grace is given – a heaping measure – which answers earthly material mercy with the Lord’s own heavenly spiritual praise: the cancelling of the debt of sin.

223

The implicit reasoning here is known from rabbinic Judaism, e.g. b. Ta’anit 24b– 25a; b. Shabbat 31a. See Diamond, Holy Men and Hunger Artists, 68–71. Tasting benefits or rewards for one’s good deeds now “draws down one’s balance” of good things in the world to come. Those who receive a return invitation in the present age have accordingly used up their reward: “Woe to you rich, you have received your consolation” (Luke 6:24).

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4.4 “Friends in Heaven”: Resurrecting Lazarus 4.4 Resurrecting Lazarus

In Luke 16:1–13, treasure in heaven is pictured along with Prov 10:2 and the wisdom tradition as built up by “righteousness” (‫)צדקה‬, understood as charity. At the same time, an apocalyptic strand of thought also shapes Luke’s imagination. This tradition accredits heavenly wealth not to the righteous, but to the poor. In Luke’s personalized image of the poor as “friends in heaven,” these two patterns intersect and the full hybridity of Lukan resurrection theology is on display. Compensation in eternity can be the charitable person’s just reward, because compensation is already the secure possession of the poor. In this section, three reflections on elements in the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man will be offered. First, the apparent disjunction between the two soteriological models in Luke 16 will be considered (§4.4.1). Next, the use of Abraham imagery will be analyzed (§4.4.2). Finally, the resurrection language and appeal to the scriptures will be addressed (§4.4.3). 4.4.1 Luke’s Grammar(s) of Salvation Was the rich man punished for his lack of charity or simply for being rich? Many scholars insist upon the latter.224 The question exposes a pair of distinct soteriological patterns and Roose accordingly posits “zwei unterschiedliche ‘Schlüssel zum Paradies” in Luke’s Gospel: Umkehr and Ausgleich. 225 The former is characterized by those “fruits of repentance” demanded by John, while the later is posed in Luke’s language of reversal. At one level, these two models map rather easily onto the parables of the Steward and Lazarus and the Rich Man. The suggestion that these two distinct modes of salvation, conversion/repentance and compensation/reversal, are irreducible has already in part been refuted in the description of Luke’s hybridization of sapiential and apocalyptic themes. Thus, while Luke 16:19–31 is obviously tilted toward apocalyptic dualism, and although Richard Bauckham and James Metzger contend that the rich man is damned simply for living in conspicuous luxury, this fails to perceive the way Luke has softened the harsh Enochic perspec-



224 John Dominic Crossan (In Parables: The Challenge of the Historical Jesus [New York: Harper & Row, 1973] 67) calls the rich man’s damnation amoral. Kendrick Grobel (“‘. . . Whose Name Was Neves,’” NTS 10 [1963–64] 374) says: “One man is punished, the other rewarded. No reason is given for either.” See also Karl Heinrich Rengstorf, Das Evangelium nach Lukas (NTD; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1962) 193–4. Some imagine that the possession of riches itself implies their acquisition through fraudent means (e.g. Buzy, Paraboles, 371–2) or, rather, that the waste implied in sumptuous dining is the rich man’s crime (e.g. Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 135–6). 225 Roose, “Umkehr und Ausgleich,” 20.

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tive.226 Wicked mammon inevitably fails the rich man on the day of wrath, but µετάνοια (read charity) could have saved Dives from death (cf. Prov 10:2). The open appeal to “repentance” in Luke 16:30 (ἐάν τις ἀπὸ νεκρῶν πορευθῇ πρὸς αὐτοὺς µετανοήσουσιν) explicitly interweaves an idiom of Umkehr with the idea of Ausgleich and ensures a moral overtone to the rich man’s fall. Thus, while it is true that, in the parable, “the basis for judgment of the two men is not made explicit,” the rich man’s sin of omission needs no explaining.227 The helpless state of the poor man recalls the victim in 10:30– 35. 228 Contextualized by 16:9 and 14:12–14, the case is unmistakable. The rich man has banqueted in too exclusive a company, and instead of entertaining himself and his brothers, he should have “made friends” with the poor man at his door.229 In the sacramental vision of charity, the terrestrial port of entry into Abraham’s banquet is the rich man’s door that opens out on the reclining Lazarus.230 The patristic reception of Luke 16 attests to this perspective on charity, linking the Steward’s winning of “friends” in heaven with the figure of Lazarus.231 This is significant. It is precisely here, against this sacramental hori-



226 Richard Bauckham, “The Rich Man and Lazarus: The Parable and Parallels,” NTS 37 (1991) 232–3; and Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 155–6. See the good critique of these scholars’ positions in Hays, Wealth Ethics, 156. 227 Snodgrass, Stories with Intent, 429. Bauckham (“Rich Man and Lazarus,” 236) is sensitive to the sufficient power of the parable’s imagery: “The juxtaposition of the rich man’s luxury and Lazarus’ painful poverty expresses the parable’s point of view without any moralizing between the lines.” 228 “The juxtaposition of Lazarus and the rich man is not quite so pointed, but may be compared with that of the travelers and the man who had fallen among thieves in 10:29– 37. The perspective on this man’s poverty that emerges embraces his stricken state, his isolation, and his inability to provide for himself,” Nolland, Luke, 828. 229 Ronald Hock (“Lazarus and Micyllus,” 453) calls this “virtually the unanimous view of the scholarly tradition.” Hock’s attempt to dislodge this view imagines it as deriving from scholars’ “own moral sensitivities, not to mention their own tacit approval of wealth.” 230 See the interesting reflections on the significance of this door in Franz Schnider and Werner Stenger, “Die Offene Tür und die unüberschreitbare Kluft: Strukturanalytische Überlegungen zum Gleichnis vom reichen Mann und armen Lazarus (Lk 16,19–31)” NTS 35 (1978) 273–83. 231 Chrysostom, for instance, in his first Discourse on the Poor Lazarus, elaborates on “making friends from wicked mammon” (PG 48, 1006). He also alludes to Luke 16:1–8 in his second discourse (PG 48, 988), saying that the rich man must prove himself a good “steward” (οἰκονόµος). A collection of patristic texts on the parable can be found in Arthur A. Just, Luke, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2003) 253–64 and S. Thomae Aquinatis Catena Aurea in Quatuor Evangelia (Taurini: Marietti, 1953). Very few ancient commentaries on Luke survive; therefore the parables of the Steward and Lazarus are rarely treated sequentially in patristic literature. Tertullian (Contra Marcionem 4.33–34) is a notable exception.

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zon, that the Christological contours of the parable first come into view. It is no accident that Matt 25:31–46 often enters the fathers’ exegesis at this point.232 Lazarus is the embodied opportunity for Dives’ salvation. It is important, nonetheless, not to allow a moralizing thesaurus as “righteousness” rhetoric simply to overwhelm (as a discours totalisant) the prophetic rhetoric of a divinely driven reversal.233 If the rich man suffers for his lack of charity, Lazarus’ fate complicates this pattern. The identity of Lazarus is prominent and mystifying.234 His possession of a name resists reducing him to an indistinct stock character in a binary apocalyptic schema: τις πτωχός.235 It is challenging, however, to settle his significance. Contextually, Lazarus’ links to the figure of the Prodigal Son (e.g. ἐπεθύµει χορτασθῆναι, Luke 15:16; ἐπιθυµῶν χορτασθῆναι, 16:21) invests him with the aura of the tax collectors and sinners, just as the reintroduction of the Pharisees as φιλάργυροι (16:14) positions them to be identified with the character of the decadent rich man (τις πλούσιος).236 It remains difficult, still, to connect Lazarus himself to any act of saving repentance. He does seem to be saved simply for being poor – even if the purpose of the parable appears aimed in another direction: repentance (or lack thereof) on the part of the rich.237 A fascinating asymmetry thus emerges. The poor are saved by divine action, while the rich have effective custody over their salvation. Or, put another way, Luke 16:19–31 suggests that one might lose eternal life by one’s

232

See, e.g., Gaudentius of Brescia, Tract. 18; and Aphrahat, Demonstration 20:16. On a patristic tendency to eclipse aspects of the full biblical rhetoric of the poor, see, e.g., Leemans and Vertsraeten, “(Im)possible Dialogue,” 223. “The ‘have-nots’ are not so much important in themselves but are at least equally important as gate-keepers to the Kingdom of God for those who have. For a generation of Christians and theologians who have been affected by the preferential option for the poor such differences sit uneasily to say the least.” 234 On this still unresolved problem, see Bovon, Lukas 3, 120. See also Charles M. Amjad-Ali, “No Name for the Rich: The Parable of Lazarus,” Al-Mushir 32 (1990) 22–7; and Grobel, “‘. . . Whose Name Was Neves,’” 373–82. 235 “Der Reichtum des Armen besteht darin, daß er einen Namen trägt, und zwar einen verheißungvollen Namen,” Bovon, Lukas 3, 120. 236 See Kilgallen, “Luke 15 and 16,” 369–71. This description of the Pharisees is important, since it reorients the discourse in their direction and effectively shifts the resonance of the “rich man” character from its function in a creditor Christology framework (Luke 16:1–8a) to an image of the greedy Pharisees themselves, who, still stubbornly unrepentant, stand perilously near their final condemnation (16:19–31). 237 The likeness of Luke 16:19–31 to the blessing and woes in 6:20, 24 is unmistakable. Still, Bultmann (Synoptic Tradition, 196), in undermining the role of 16:27–31 as a late addition misapprehends the contextual thrust of the parable in the Lukan context (15:1– 16:18), which is not in the first place a message about consolation for the poor, but repentance. 233

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moral bearing, but not win it. The same pattern shapes the Prodigal Son. On the one hand, the son’s lust for wealth, misuse of it, and ultimate fall into the misery of debt-slavery points clearly enough to the moralizing message: greed and selfish indulgence leads to death. On the other hand, the observation that, in his state of poverty, he can perform no good works and must simply face his father empty handed registers an important point. 238 This Lukan depiction of the poor as somehow saved without their paying creates a tension with, and thus correction of, too rude a view of meriting the resurrection.239 Such a parsing of divine and human initiative between poor and rich corresponds, moreover, to the two broad patterns of “debt” forgiveness (ἄφεσις) identified in Chapter Two (§2.2): remission (e.g. Isa 61:1–2) and repayment (e.g. Isa 40:1–2). Insofar as one possesses the resources, one must produce what is demanded; but the destitute man can only have his debts remitted. Luke’s interest in radical remission, upon which he lays the primary accent (rather than upon repayment), was already observed in connection with his “Creditor Christology” in Chapter Two. The reading of the praise of the Steward suggested above allows this stress on remission to maintain the final word, even while incorporating a space for the disciples’ robust cooperation in claiming heaven. The construction of Luke 16:19–31 accomplishes something similar. Repentance (16:30) is embedded in a landscape of predestination (16:25). Though scholars have questioned the originality of 16:27–31 from a form critical perspective,240 the integrity of the story has been increasingly defended of late,241 and Fitzmyer is correct that “the parable as told by the Lucan Jesus carries its own double message.”242 The rich have what they require to find their way to life (vv. 27–31); while the poor will inevitably be consoled (vv. 19–26).

238

Roose, “Umkehr und Ausgleich,” 16. The scholastic language of condign (meritum de condigno) and congruent (meritum inadœquatum sive de congruo) merit helpfully captures this distinction. See Joseph Wawrykow, God’s Grace and Human Action: Merit in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University, 1996). Wawrykow illustrates how, for Aquinas, human salvation is at each stage (i.e. predestination, initial justification, perseverance, final beatitude) dependent upon God’s free and gracious action. 240 The Egyptian parallel produced by Gressmann (“Vom reichen Mann und armen Lazarus,” 1–91) has exerted great influence on this discussion; and Bultmann (Synoptic Tradition, 178, 196–7, 203–4) influentially split the parable into two: vv. 19–26, “meant to console the poor,” and vv. 27–31, indicating the “uselessness of the return of a dead person for the obdurate rich.” Horn (Glaube und Handeln, 152, 181) assigns v. 19–26 to his Ebionite source and vv. 27–31 to Luke. 241 See, e.g., Schnider and Stenger, “Die offene Tür,” 273–83. 242 Fitzmyer, Luke, 1127. 239

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In the apocalyptic topos of reversal, of course, God simply intervenes to turn the situation of the poor (and the world) upside-down: like Jesus pronouncing the Good News of debt remission in the synagogue in Nazareth. The irony is that this divine intervention on behalf of the helpless is no longer posed as mercy (e.g. remission), but as justice. “Remember, you received your good things (τὰ ἀγαθά σου) in your life, and Lazarus likewise the bad things; but now he is comforted here, but you suffer torment” (Luke 16:25). From this perspective, Ausgleich is not so much the opposite of Umkehr, as Roose imagines. It is rather Luke’s language of divine agency in salvation (whereas repentance articulates a human plane).243 Ultimately, Roose is correct to see that God’s final justice is somehow construed as a prejudice to mercy. “Die Armen sollen bekommen, was ihnen (an Gutem) noch zusteht, die Sünder hingegen, die umkehren, werden gerade davor bewahrt, was ihnen (an Strafen für ihre Sünden) eigentlich zustünde.”244 But the differentiation into opposing classes of “poor” (redeemed by justice) and “sinners” (redeemed by repentance) obscures Luke’s broader logic, which finds a way to see all the redeemed as both. As social outsiders, even wealthy tax collectors must in their poverty hear the good news of forgiveness proclaimed.245 In the end, all are poor before the message of God’s mercy, for it is he himself who also “gives repentance” (Acts 11:18) Luke’s shifting valence of rich and poor beautifully captures the doublesided posture of Israel before God. On the one side, Israel, like the Prodigal Son, is trapped in debt slavery by its sins, radically helpless, and requiring a redeemer (go’el). 246 At the same time, she is not empty handed. Like the



243 A connection might be made here with the two Second Temple soteriological patterns (“repentance” and “re-creation”) identified by David Lambert, “Did Israel Believe That Redemption Awaited Its Repentance: The Case of Jubilees 1,” CBQ 68 (2006) 631−50. 244 Roose, “Umkehr und Ausgleich,” 14. 245 York (Last Shall Be First, 162) comments: “In the case of Zacchaeus, the salvation of a wealthy person is possible because there is no honor attached to the wealth.” Perhaps it would be more accurate to say, Zacchaeus squeezes through the eye of the needle because in a real sense he is not just rich but poor. 246 The resonant imagery of debt slavery in Luke 15:15 lends some credence to the attempt of N. T. Wright (Jesus and the Victory of God, 125–31, 242, 254–55) to read Luke’s parable of a wayward son in a strange land as a story of Israel’s return from Exile. Real difficulties cripple Wright’s specific interpretation, as Snodgrass (“Reading and Overreading the Parables,” 61–76) and Josh Chatraw (“Balancing Out (W)right: Jesus’ Theology of Individual and Corporate Repentance in the Gospel of Luke,” JETS 55 [2012] 299–312, esp. 316–7) have shown. Above all, it is contextually implausible to reckon the older brother in Luke 15:11–32 as a symbol of the Samaritans, as Wright strangely suggests. Chatrow’s retreat back to an exclusively individual image of repentance must be questioned, however. The repentant son of the parable does carry a corporate identity, as commentators all agree. The Son represents the penitential remnant within Israel, i.e. the

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Elder Son, she is rich with all the richness of the father. She holds (by grace) everything required to rejoice in eternal life: the Law and the Prophets (16:29–31; cf. 10:25–28). 4.4.2 Raising Up Children of Abraham The prominent role of Abraham in Luke 16:19–31 points in serveal directions simultaneously and helps reinforce and rearticulate the nuanced soteriology sketched above.247 At one level, the evocation of the patriarch serves simply to summon Luke’s image of the heavenly banquet, which itself functions as a vivid expression of eternal life (13:28–30). For Luke, Abraham’s presence confirms an explicit resurrection context (20:37–38; cf. 16:30–31), even if scholars pedantically inquire about an intermediate state.248 Whatever the exact conception of the afterlife, an important link can be made between Luke’s broad imagery and such traditions as the Apocalypse of Abraham, in which Abraham ascends to heaven and sees those crying in fiery Gehenna (15:4–7), and especially the Testament of Abraham, in which Abraham also goes to heaven and witnesses the judgment of sinners.249 It is

tax collectors and sinners who have responded to John and Jesus. In this context, the Prodigal Son’s confession in Luke 15:21 (πάτερ, ἥµαρτον εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν καὶ ἐνώπιόν σου, οὐκέτι εἰµὶ ἄξιος κληθῆναι υἱός σου) suggestively echoes the same crushed spirit one hears in penitential prayers of the period (cf. Tobit 3:3; Prayer of Manasseh 10, 12). In typical fashion, a confession of guilt and acknowledgement of one’s just deserts underwrites a plea for mercy. The Prodigal Son is a kind of “Israelogical” figure, not so unlike Tobit, both corporate and individual. In the Lukan vision, however, he represents only one half of the picture. The penitential spirit that leads to “resurrection” belongs to a restricted constituency within Israel: those who have responded to the message of ἄφεσις and turned from their sins. Another branch of the eschatological family also exists: the older brother. 247 On Luke’s use of Abraham language and imagery, see Nils Dahl, “The Story of Abraham in Luke-Acts,” in Studies in Luke-Acts,139–58. Dahl stresses how Luke uses Abraham to underwrite a broad “proof-from-prophecy” (i.e. “promise to the fathers”) thesis. See also Friedrich Emanuel Wieser, Die Abrahamvorstellungen im Neuen Testament (EHS.T 137; New York: Lang, 1987) 22–5. 248 See, e.g., Joseph Osei-Bonsu, “The Intermediate State in Luke-Acts,” IBS 9 (1987) 115–30; and Jacques Dupont, “L’après-mort dans l’œuvre de Luc,” RThL 3 (1972) 3–21. 249 Both texts are dated to the first or second century after Christ. See R. Rubinkiewicz, “Apocalypse of Abraham,” and E. P. Sanders, “Testament of Abraham,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: Volume One (James Charlesworth, ed.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2011) 681–706 and 871–902; Dale Alison, Testament of Abraham (Commentaries on Early Jewish Literature; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2003); and M. E. Stone, The Testament of Abraham: The Greek Recensions (T&T 2; Pseudepigrapha Series 2; Missoula: Scholars, 1972). See also Martha Himmelfarb, Tours of Hell: An Apocalyptic Form in Jewish and Christian Literature (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983).

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of very special interest that in the Testament of Abraham, Abraham oversees an eternal judgment on the strict priciple of works (chapters 12–13).250 Closely allied with this idea, indeed perhaps in some ways behind it, is a perception of the patriarch himself as someone of exemplary righteousness. James 2:23 notably links Abraham with the principle of salvation by works and says that it was for his own righteousness that he was named the friend (φιλός) of God (cf. Is 41:8). The paradigmatic charity of the hospitable holy man was a commonplace in the Second Temple period (e.g. Heb 13:2; Philo, Abr. 107–117; Josephus, A.J. 1.196) as already mentioned (Chapter Two §2.4.2.3). The Testament significantly opens with great stress on just this point. The righteous man was very hospitable. For he pitched his tent at the crossroads of the oak of Mamre and welcomed everyone – rich and poor, kings and rulers, the crippled and the helpless, friends and strangers, neighbors and passerby – (all) on equal terms did the pious, entirely holy, righteous, and hospitable Abraham welcome (Test. Ab. 1:1–2).

The work also ends in Abraham’s tent (now a site of heavenly hospitality), with an appended Christian exhortation to ensure that no one will miss the call to imitate Abraham’s charity. The undefiled voice of the God and Father came speaking thus: “Take then my friend Abraham into Paradise, where there are the tents of my righteous ones and (where) the mansions of my holy ones, Isaac and Jacob, are in his bosom, where there is no toil, no grief, no moaning, but peace and exultation and endless life.” Let us too, my beloved brothers, imitate the hospitality of the patriarch Abraham and let us attain to his virtuous behavior, so that we may be worthy of eternal life, glorifying the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit: to whom be glory and the power forever. Amen. (Test. Ab. 20:14).

Abraham’s open tent in Test. Ab. 1:1–2 stands as an image of precisely the indiscriminate welcome enjoined in Luke 14:12–14. 251 The mention of friends and the tents of the heavenly tents of righteous, alongside Abraham’s bosom (Test. Ab. 20:14; cf. Luke 16:23), is also intriguing.252 In view of such parallels, it is compelling to understand the singular phrase “eternal tents” (τὰς αἰωνίους σκηνάς), assigned to “friends” (φιλούς) in Luke 16:9, an image that has puzzled interpreters, as pointing to the hospitality of the tentdwelling “friend of God,” Abraham (cf. Heb 11:9), in 16:19–31.

250

This text represents a major outlier in E. P. Sanders’ vision of Palestinian Judaism. The presence of Christian interpolations does not alter its high relevance in illustrating the Lukan thought world. Unfortunately, being generically an apocalypse but called a Testament, it slipped through the cracks of Justification and Variegated Nomism (Carson, O’Brien, and Seifrid). 251 See Ward, “Works of Abraham,” 285. 252 This is somehow missed by the commentators, e.g. Fitzmyer, Luke, 1132; Bovon, Lukas 3, 121.

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The wide hospitality of Abraham inevitably overlays the parable with a moral overtone. The righteousness that saves from death is implicitly the charity practiced by the patriarch presiding in heaven. In other words, Abraham, the embodiment of indiscriminate hospitable welcome, stands as an implicit reproach against the rich man, whose sumptuous daily dining is a flagrant violation of Luke 14:12–14, and whose fate is an imaginative portrayal of the personalized logic of 16:9.253 The wretched man’s futile appeal to “father Abraham” (16:24) only underscores the radically re-organized conditions of hospitality that prevail in the world to come. Ethnic ties and presumed patrons secure no seat in the resurrection. Thus the patriarch and living emblem of hospitality, “the father of all Hebrews” (Josephus A.J. 14.10, 22), when seen from “afar” (ἀπὸ µακρόθεν, 16:23) does not spring up from the door of his “heavenly tent” and “run to meet” the rich man as he ran to meet the three strangers (Gen 18:2) – or as the forgiving father ran from “afar” (µακράν, 15:20) when he espied his prodigal son. Dives has failed where the fortunate son succeeded, and this failure to repent is imagined as a cold reception: the rich man neglected to gain Lazarus as a host-friend and emissary of father Abraham’s welcome. Lacking charitable deeds as the “fruits worthy of repentance,” the “poor” rich man is embarrassingly exposed to the warning of John the Baptist: “Don’t begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham for our father.’ For I tell you God can raise up (ἐγεῖραι) children of Abraham from these stones” (3:8). John’s prophecy of raising up children of Abraham stands behind the image of Lazarus raised up to heaven – and it is precisely what appears in Jesus’ ministry to sinners. Luke depicts this action of ἐγεῖραι visibly with two scenes built around a graphic upward movement. First, the woman bent over is raised up, freed from bondage to the Enemy and declared to be a daughter of Abraham (Luke 13:10–17; cf. 1:74). Strikingly, based on Ps 146:8 – “the Lord raised those who are bowed down, the Lord loves the righteous” (‫צדיקים‬ ‫ – )יהוה זקף כפופים יהוה אהב‬the image of raising that which is bent appears as an image of the resurrection in 4Q521 2ii l. 8 and 4QPseudo-Ezekiel. 254 We should recognize a similar overtone in Luke 13. The diminutive Zacchaeus is likewise raised up in the sycamore tree as he gains a vision of Jesus, who looks upon this son of Abraham with mercy and picks him like fruit ripe for works worthy of repentance (Luke 19:1–10; Cf. 1:54, 78). Arguably, Luke offers these two “resurrected” children of Abraham as two glosses on the two

253

In his sermon “On Abraham,” Ambrose understands that a failure in charity/hospitality betokens a return lack of reception in the hereafter: “Let us be cautious that we be not harsh or negligent in receiving guests (duri aut negligentes fuerimus in recipiendis hospitibus), lest after the course of this life we be denied the hospitality of the saints (sanctorum hospitia denegentur).” 254 See Wold, “Agency and the Raising of the Dead,” 10.

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lines of Ps 146:8, with the charitable Zachaeus as the ṣaddiq of the second stich. In the rhetoric of Luke 15–16, the moral resurrection of Zacchaeus-like figures is explicitly in view (i.e. 15:1, 24, 32). The raising of Lazarus, however, resembles the fate of the bent woman, both in his condition and in the passivity of his salvation. In a sign of election, Lazarus is simply welcomed into Abraham’s bosom (ἐν τοῖς κόλποις, Luke 16:23; cf. Jub. 22:26; Test. Ab. 20:14).255 It is Jesus, of course, who raises both Zacchaeus and the woman. And he who shamed the “hypocrites” in the synagogue, those who show more mercy to their animals, which they water on a sabbath, than to suffering men and women (Luke 13:15), now confronts the elite again with their need to show mercy to the sons of Abraham, whether in repentant tax collectors or in the poor. Otherwise the Pharisees will find themselves begging vainly for the mercy of a drop of water (16:24; cf. 15:16; 16:21). 4.4.3 The Sign of Jonah The resurrection reference in Luke 16:31 is highly significant. “If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead (ἐάν τις ἐκ νεκρῶν ἀναστῇ).” The critical connection with the “raising” of the Prodigal Son (15:24, 32), indicating the Pharisees’ blindness before the sign of sinners’ repentance, has gone unobserved, perhaps in part because the use of resurrection imagery for an act of µετάνοια is peculiar.256 The coining of such a metaphor should not distract from the rich man’s petition, however. He is, in fact, among those in the Gospel who are vainly seeking signs.257



255 Though rarely if ever noted in the commentaries, this gesture of reception recalls an odd image of election found in Jubilees 22:26, when the dying Abraham welcomes Jacob into his bed and embraces Jacob in his bosom, blessing him and indicating that he represents the chosen line. To recline in the embrace of Abraham’s bosom expresses membership in Abraham’s family – for not all his descendents are chosen by the Lord ipso facto. “For the Lord did not draw near to himself either Ishmael, his sons, his brothers, or Esau. He did not choose them (simply) because they were among Abraham’s children, for he knew them. But he chose Israel to be his people” (Jub. 15:30). Most commentators note the late rabbinic parallels (Echa rabb. 1.85; Pesiqta rabb. 43 §108b; cf. Str-B 2. 225–7). See F. Planas, “En seno de Abraham,” CB 15 (1958) 148–52; Paul Haupt, “Abraham’s Bosom,” AJP 42 (1921) 162–7; and David Künstlinger, “Im Schoße Abrahams,” OLZ 36 (1933) 408. 256 Centuries of christian rhetoric have eroded the novelty of this application of the language. It is difficult, however, to find a good parallel to Luke 15:24, 32 anywhere in Second Temple Jewish literature, Aseneth’s new life notwithstanding, cf. Joseph and Aseneth 19:11. 257 On this point Bultmann (Synoptic Tradition, 196) is correct.

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An interesting connection thus emerges here with the Sign of Jonah tradition, which Matthew takes as the resurrection and Luke as repentance (Luke 11:29–32; cf. Matt 12:39–40; also Matt 16:1, 4; Mark 8:11–12).258 Whether Luke knows the resurrection form of this logion is hard to say. The association of Jonah with resurrection is ancient and attested outside the Gospel tradition (e.g. Lives of the Prophets 10:6; Gen. Rab. 98.11).259 Most, nevertheless, take Matthew’s understanding to be redactional.260 Here it is enough to stress the fact that in both Luke 11:29–32 and 16:31 Jesus presents repentance itself as the sign offered to sign-seekers, and that the sign sought in 16:27–30 is quite explicitly “someone from the dead” (τις ἀπὸ νεκρῶν). In some fashion, it seems that the conversion of sinners and Jesus’ bodily resurrection are formally conjoined in Luke’s mind. The rejection of sign seeking also appears in another key text in the Gospel. In Luke 17:20–21 the Pharisees ask Jesus about the coming of the kingdom, and he replies that visible signs will not appear: ἰδοὺ γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ ἐντὸς ὑµῶν ἐστιν (17:21). This verse has long been batted back and forth in the debate over Lukan eschatology (realized or future).261 A significant ancient interpretation has, nevertheless, been forgotten. Tertullian affords a basis in the very early history of the interpretation of Luke 17:21 for suggesting that “within you” meant “in your hands” or “within your power” in the sense that the Pharisees, as “lovers of money” (Luke 16:14), had the opportunity to gain the kingdom by opening their hands in reckless generosity to the poor. The commandment

258

On this text, see especially Simon Chow, The Sign of Jonah Reconsidered: A Study of Its Meaning in the Gospel Traditions (ConBNT 27; Stockholm: Almvist & Wiksell, 1995). Hans Bayer (Jesus’ Predictions of Vindication and Resurrection: The Provenance, Meaning, and Correlation of the Synoptic Predictions [WUNT II/20; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1986] 136–7), following Jeremias, argues that Luke also understands the sign to be the resurrection. 259 See Ibid., 29–31, 36, 43. In an early Jewish homily (De Jona), dated between the first century BCE and second century CE, composed in Greek but surviving only in Armenian, Jonah speaks of himself as a “sign of rebirth.” See Folker Siegert, Drei hellenistische-jüdische Predigten Ps.-Philon, “Über Jona”, “Über Simson” und “Über die Gottesbezeichnung ‘wohltätig verzehrendes Feuer’” Bd. 1: Übersetzung aus dem Armeni- schen und sprachliche Erläuterungen (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1980) 25. 260 So, e.g., Fitzmyer, Luke, 931; and Davies and Allison, Matthew 2, 355–6. 261 On this important text, see especially Tom Holmén, “The Alternatives of the Kingdom: Encountering the Semantic Restrictions of Luke 17:20–21,” ZNW 87 (1996) 204–29. Holmén definitively argues on philological grounds that the normal translation of ἐντὸς ὑµῶν ἐστιν as “in your midst” must be rejected, thereby inviting “an alternative explanation of the saying.” The reading of this text has been too enmeshed in the anachronistic nineteenth century debate between a spiritual Kingdom “within” (Schleiermacher) and its historical alternative, “in your midst” (Weiß). See also Illaria Ramelli, “The Kingdom of God is Inside You: The Ancient Syriac Versions in Support of the Correct Translation,” Hugoye 12 (2009) 171–8.

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implicit in Luke 17:21 is a commandment already explicit in 11:41, “Give as alms the things within [your possession], and look, everything is clean for you!” The latter is simply a clearer and more direct way of saying, “Look, the kingdom of God is in your hands!”262

If Tertullian’s reading appears surprising, a number of modern authors have, in fact, suggested a similar meaning (“in your power”) for the key phrase ἐντὸς ὑµῶν ἐστιν.263 The link to almsgiving, however, is an unexplored and intriguing possibility.264 The connection to the similar phrase τὰ ἐνόντα in Luke 11:41 is interesting. “What is within give as alms and behold all will be clean for you” (τὰ ἐνόντα δότε ἐλεηµοσύνην, καὶ ἰδοὺ πάντα καθαρὰ ὑµῖν ἐστιν).265 Normally, the “things within” are understood here in the light of Luke 11:39 to “refer to what is inside human hearts, which is greed and wickedness.” 266 This is a peculiar thing to give in alms, however. The attempt to save the sense by metonymy (i.e. the wealth gained by greed) is reasonable enough, but it may also profit to take in the larger context of the passage.267 The call to give alms in Luke 11:41 prominently prefaces Luke’s entire, solemn Weheruf (11:42–52). This is quite intentional and can hardly be Luke’s misreading of an Aramaic Vorlage (cf. Matt 23:36), as Wellhausen

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Michaels, “Almsgiving and the Kingdom Within,” 481. See, e.g., C. H. Roberts, “The Kingdom o f Heaven [Lk. xvii.21],” HTR 41 (1948) 1–8 (“in the hands of,” “in the control of”); Alexander Rüstow, “ἐντός ὑµῶν ἐστιν: Zur Deutung von Lukas 17:20–21,” ZNW 51 (1960) 197–224, esp. 214 (“im Einflußbereich,” “im Verftiefungsbereich,” “im Wirkungsbereich,” “im Machtbereich”); and G. R. BeasleyMurray, Jesus and the Kingdom of God (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986) 102 (“in the power of,” “within the reach of”). Holmén’s study allows that this meaning “within [your power]” is viable, but rests content with debunking “in your midst” and refrains from pronouncing on the positive meaning in Luke (“Semantic Restrictions,” 226). 264 Multiple ancient authors (Tertullian, Cyprian, Origen, Peter of Alexandria, Athanasius, etc.) connected Luke 17:20–21 with Deut 30:11–14. See Holmén, “Semantic Restrictions,” 224. Tertullian may thus play on the meaning of almsgiving as “the commandment.” See Giambrone, “‘According to the Commandment,’” 448–65. 265 Bede, reading the Vulgate’s quod superest, took this verse in just the way Tertullian’s reading would suggest. “Do that which remains within your power, that is, which is the only remedy remaining (solum remedium restat) to those who have been hitherto engaged in so much wickedness: give alms.” On this significant text in the tradition of the English Church, see Carolus Plummer, ed., Venerabilis Baedae Historiam Ecclesiasticum Gentis Anglorum: Vol 1 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1896) 46. 266 Bovon, Lukas 2, 228. 267 Most recently, see Reardon, “Cleaning through Almsgiving,” 481. The legal context of this logion has been treated by Jacob Neusner, “‘First Cleanse the Inside’: The Halakhic Background of a Controversy-Saying,” NTS 22 (1976) 486–95; and the tradition history by Risto Uro, “‘Washing the Outside of the Cup,’ Gos. Thom. 89 and Synoptic Parallels,” in From Quest to Q (J. Asgeirsson, ed.; BETL 146; Leuven: Peeters, 2000) 301–22. 263

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conjectured and many still accept.268 The series of Woes itself formally links the Pharisees and lawyers sitting at the banquet with the well-fed πλούσιοι targeted in the Gospel’s earlier airing of Woes (6:24–25). The litany of charges in Luke 11 then climaxes with a summative accusation. These Pharisees and lawyers hold the key of knowledge (κλεῖδα τῆς γνώσεως), but do not “enter” (οὐκ εἰσήλθατε) or allow others to “enter” (11:52). The “knowledge” at stake here is certainly knowledge of the Law,269 while the elliptical language of “entering” points to the Kingdom of God as a symbol for eternal life – and notably the struggle the rich have in getting in. “Strive to enter (εἰσελθεῖν) through the narrow gate, for many will strive to enter (εἰσελθεῖν) and will not be able” (13:23–24). “Go out into the streets and alleys and compel them to enter (εἰσελθεῖν), in order that my house might be full (14:23).270 “[The older brother] was enraged and did not want to enter (εἰσελθεῖν)”(15:28). “It is easier for a camel to enter (εἰσελθεῖν) through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter (εἰσελθεῖν) the Kingdom of God” (18:25). In the specific rhetoric of Luke 11, the leaders of Israel are urged to use their knowledge of the scriptures to escape the trap of wealth and enter the Kingdom of God. The key to the Kingdom is already in their hands. Knowledge is a different thing than wisdom, however. In the Sign of Jonah passage a few verses before, Luke paints repentance as an act of this σοφία (Luke 11:31).271 For Luke, this wisdom is ultimately shown by all who act φρονίµως, on the life-saving model of the “prudent” steward (16:1–13). 272

268

Wellhausen’s famous conjecture about this text – alleging that Luke confused the Aramaic dakkau (“purify”) with zakkau (“give alms”) – must be put to rest; cf. Julius Wellhausen, Einleitung in die drei ersten Evangelien (Berlin: Georg Reimer, 1911) 27; and, e.g., Günther Schwarz, “Gebt…den Inhalt als Almosen? (Lukas 11,40–41),” BN 75 (1994) 26–34. See the conclusive critique of Peter Head and P. J. Williams (“Q Review,” TynB 54 [2003] 132–6). Head and Williams expose the compounding improbability of the suggestion and raise several unanswerable objections. (1) Daleth and Zayin are not close orthographically or phonetically. (2) Matt 23:36 and Luke 11:41 are divergent in many details beyond this single word. (3) The Matthean text uses the singular imperative and the Lukan the plural, implying different Aramaic forms. (4) The verb “cleanse,” in fact, appears correctly at the end of the Lukan verse. 269 The language is probably pre-Lukan. See Bovon, Lukas 2, 237. 270 The ethical orientation of this tradition is revealed in the unwillingness of those first invited, whose preoccupied excuses betray their over-investment in wealth and wives (Luke 14:18–20). See Gregory Sterling, “‘When Two or Three are Gathered’: The Tradition History of the Parable of the Banquet (Matt 22:1–14/Luke 14:16–24/GThom 64,” in Thomasevangelium (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2008) 95–121; and Willi Braun, Feasting and Social Rhetoric in Luke 14 (SNTSMS 85; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1995) 98–131. 271 On this wisdom motif, see Bovon, Lukas 2, 202–3. 272 The σοφία idea also appears in Luke 7:35 – “wisdom is justified by all her children” – by those, namely, who repent (and thus save their lives) at the preaching of Jesus and

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Wisdom, for Luke, is finding mercy by showing mercy; and this wisdom is precisely what eludes Israel’s elite (cf. 7:29–30). In Luke 17:20–21, the rich Pharisees are still looking for the Kingdom in the wrong fashion and implicitly hoping for signs.273 They are told that the Kingdom is already staring them in the face, held in their hands – if they simply open them wide and offer alms (11:41). Similarly, in the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man, the rich man’s hope for a sign from heaven is rejected and he is left with the witness of the scriptures as something already in his reach, urging him to concern for the poor. “No, Father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.” He said to him, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.”

The connection between 16:19–30 and Tertullian’s reading of 17:20–21 is strong.274 Both concern (Pharisaic) sign seeking as the false way to enter the Kingdom. Both suggest a humbler route. In the end, no sign is given – except the sign of mercy seen in the conversion of characters like the prodigally generous Zacchaeus. If such a “resurrection” has no power to move the unrepentant in Israel, perhaps the problem is that they are slow of heart to believe everything written in the scriptures (Luke 24:25). The same sluggishness, numb to the logic of dying in order to rise, hinders minds from understanding the words “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35; cf. 1 Clem. 2:1).275 The rich man never repents, and after death it is too late. Unless it is the death of Jesus one is speaking about. The obvious Christological echo in Luke 16:30–31 hints that the mission of mercy Lazarus leaves undone, Jesus himself will do. The resurrection of Christ will bridge the un-crossable chasm

John (7:29–30). The link of this text to Luke 16 is secured, because (i) it initiates the theme of the Pharisee’s grumbling over Jesus as a friend of tax collectors and sinners (7:34); and (ii) it is bound to 16:16–18 as part of a single original unit of Baptist material. See Matthew Bates, “Cryptic Codes and Violent King: A New Proposal for Matt 11:12 and Luke 16:16–18,” CBQ 75 (2013) 74–93. 273 The Pharisees themselves never actually ask for a sign in Luke 17:20 or in Luke 15– 16. In each case, Jesus introduces the theme (cf. 11:16, 29). Nor are the Pharisees the only ones in Luke-Acts who struggle to understand the Kingdom (cf. Acts 1:6–7). 274 Though the word βασιλεία does not appear in Luke 16:19–30, the Kingdom imagery is clear from inter-textual echoes with explicit Kingdom texts (6:20–26; cf. 16:25; 13:28– 30; cf. 16:15b). 275 On Acts 20:35, see Hays, Wealth Ethics, 258–9. In the Acts of the Apostles, Luke’s focus on money will give way to the deeper issue separating the Pharisees from Christ’s believers: How far can one extend a shared “hope in the resurrection of the dead” (23:6)? Anderson (God Raised Him from the Dead, 47) also highlights that in Luke “the resurrection of Jesus, in initiating the restoration of Israel” nevertheless “effects… a division within Israel.”

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and bring, even to those who killed the author of life, “times of refreshment” should they repent (Acts 3:19).

4.5 Conclusion 4.5 Conclusion

At the end of this labyrinthine chapter it is necessary to draw together the threads of the foregoing argument. This may be done in a series of several interrelated propositions. (1) Luke adopts the popular Jewish interpretation of Prov 10:2. While this text is never directly cited in Luke-Acts, the pattern of charity saving from death appears in several places (Luke 7:1–10; Acts 9:36–42; 10:1–48). The less graphic notion of meriting “eternal life” by works of mercy, moreover, also finds direct (and indirect) expression in the Gospel (Luke 10:25; 18:18; cf. 20:35). The Second Temple charity topos thus provides a compelling and unexplored background to the interpretation of Luke 16. Though it remains implicit, read against such a template, the logic of the chapter indicates that the rich man could have enjoyed eternal life had he been charitable to Lazarus. Indeed, as Tobit represents a narrative commentary on the verse from Proverbs, Luke the parable in 16:19–31 appears as the negative inverse. In this context, the “friends in heaven” gained by the use of mammon are an image for the participation in the life to come made possible through the giving of alms. (2) Luke accesses the “Israeological” potential of the Prov 10:2 motif by bringing the tradition into contact with his special construction of µετάνοια. This operation is multifaceted. On the one hand, Luke follows a critique of worldly wealth found in Prov 10:2 and already structured around repentance in Sir 5:1–8 (see §4.3.3.1 [i]). The understanding that wealth inevitably fails because it breeds a kind of hubris inimical to repentance becomes, in the Lukan context, a call to forsake one’s riches. Coupled with a forceful notion of redemptive almsgiving, a door is thus opened in the Gospel (in contrast to 1 Enoch) for the enjoyment of eternal life by the rich. The rich are not the only unlikely candidates given access to the resurrection through charity, however. Since for Luke works of mercy represent the “fruits worthy of repentance,” it is exactly such enacted repentance that saves from death. Eternal life thus belongs to all those who so repent. This implies that not only is Israel corporately saved through almsgiving; the boundaries of eschatological Israel – the community of those with a share in the resurrection – are being redrawn by charity. As was shown, Acts 10 illustrates this quite forcefully. Cornelius’ symbolic “death and resurrection” (Acts 10:25– 26), closely bound to his generous alms, is not a rescue from mortal danger or from actual physical death, but rather a gift of “the repentance that leads to life” (τὴν µετάνοιαν εἰς ζωήν): namely, membership in the people of God,

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bound for eternal life. Within the Gospel, figures like the charitable centurion (who also enjoys, in a different way, the blessing of resurrection) point in the same “universalist” direction. Ultimately, however, it is the µετάνοια of the tax collectors and sinners – those with whom, as with Gentiles, one should not sit at table (Luke 15:2; Acts 10:9–16) – which shows the shifting boundaries of the community of those with a share in the world to come. Luke’s retooling of Prov 10:2 around repentance thus functions to articulate a reconstituted vision of the elect people. Both charity and resurrection were boundary markers for Israel. The former occupies an historical plane, however, while the latter is highly eschatological, an expression of the endtime community. In the idea of µετάνοια, identified in the Gospel both with charity (Luke 3:8) and with resurrection (15:24, 32), Luke finds a fitting historico-eschatological joint to hold these two together. The visible body of heavenly Israel is circumscribed by those who show repentance. (3) The triptych of parables in Luke 15–16 is braided together by Luke’s resurrection-charity-repentance complex. All three texts – the Prodigal Son, the Prodigal Steward, and the Rich Man and Lazarus – handle, in different ways, the themes of repentance, wealth, and resurrection. Read between the Prodigal Son and the story of Lazarus, the parable of the Steward becomes a tale about repentance and resurrection simultaneously (Luke 15:32; 16:30– 31). The centerpiece of this triad, in turn, radiates a charity theme both forwards and backwards. Interpreted through catchwords like “squandering” (διεσκόρπισεν, 15:13; διασκορπίζων, 16:1) and the appended logia concerning mammon (16:8b-13), the story of the Steward retrospectively illuminates the many wealth motifs tacitly shaping 15:11–32. (4) The parable of the Steward allegorically recounts the repentance through works of mercy of tax collectors and sinners and the forgiveness this behavior brings through Jesus. Luke urges this understanding upon the reader in a variety of ways. At the most basic level, Jesus’ controversy with the Pharisees and the block of three intertwined parables provides the critical context. In these three stories Luke forges a discernable narrative arc, allegorizing the larger plotline. The Pharisees, cast as the Elder Brother, are grumbling, but they are urged to rejoice in the repentance of sinners (15:11–32). Jesus’ subsequent praise of his disciples’ prudence for escaping judgment through almsgiving only earns the Pharisees’ derisive laughter, however (16:1–18). Jesus thus counters with a dire warning, indicating that the greedy Pharisees stand in grave need of the same self-rescue by repentance, shown in charity to the poor (16:19–31). Allegorized in this way, the flow of Luke 16:1–8 becomes clear. The tax collectors and sinners know they have been caught doing wrong. In the pure wisdom of self-interest they thus show works of mercy and manage to save themselves from complete disaster. The underdetermined end of the parable remains elusive. The praise of the κύριος could simply be his praise for the slave’s life-saving self-interest, or it

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might also additionally suggest the man’s rehabilitation. The imaginative prospect of the latter is compelling for a variety of intertextual and form critical reasons; but ultimately Luke directs the reader’s attention to the good favor of the κύριος as something of greater moment than resolving the question of the servant’s room and board. “Seek first the Kingdom and all these things shall be yours as well” (12:31; cf. 12:22–31). One way or another, Luke isolates divine mercy as that which is signaled in the master’s smile: a mercy either mediated by the friends one wins by one’s own acts of mercy – or, perhaps, a still greater mercy which is all the master’s own, which restores the man’s dignity and surpasses even the principle of measure for measure: not mercy won in strict justice, but unmerited mercy for a mercy justly won. This would realize the unqiue Lukan hope that God will grant to the merciful a “heaping measure” in return: a reward measured generously, “packed down, shaken together, and overflowing” (6:38).276 (5) The parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man exposes a major soteriological dialectic at the heart of Lukan charity theology. Two models of salvation collide in Luke 16: resurrection by works and resurrection by divine reversal. The employment of Abraham imagery in Luke 16:19–31, nonetheless, allows these alternate perspectives to cohere in a single ambivalent motif. The idea that “charity saves from death” naturally intones the redemptive power of good works, and against this tradition the rich man’s failure appears as a clear case of demerit. The appearance of Abraham in heaven supports the perspective, since the traditions of the patriarch, particularly in the after-life, openly stress the eternal reward he earned for his hospitable charity. At the same time, the special image of reclining in Abraham’s bosom was used explicitly in the Second Temple period to describe an act of pure election, with no reference to works (cf. Jub. 22:26). This corresponds to the elevation of poor Lazarus, who is seemingly brought to heaven simply for being poor. Ultimately, Luke thus finds in his family of Abraham motif a corporate (“Israeological”) soteriology with a twofold rendering of participation in the resurrection. The true children of Abraham are “raised up” either by a direct divine intervention, as with the bent woman bound by Satan; or by a gesture of repentance in the giving of alms, as with Zacchaeus. In the contact of these two soteriological paradigms – which parallel the great Second Temple charity grammars of repayment and remission – defer-

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The imagery here has been helpfully explained by Kloppenborg (“Agrarian Discourse,” 104–28) and Bernard Couroyer (“ De la mesure don’t vous mesurez il vous sera mesuré,” RB 1970, 366–70). In first century Palestine (as elsewhere) in various commercial transactions, the same measuring vessel was used to ensure precise equality both in loaning and repaying. Thus a bushel given would be the same bushel received. Luke’s image is like a “heaping teaspoon” in cooking: a just measure, but generously loaded, not exactingly meted out. The scholastic language of condign and congruous merit find here a striking scriptural resource.

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ence in Luke is ceded to God’s divine action. Nevertheless, Luke has specifically tailored the God-driven paradigm of apocalyptic dualism to include a place for repentance, and in this way he has fused together in a single depiction the disparate models of divine predestination and human responsibility. This innovation is highly significant. God will not (and in some sense cannot) compel repentance by signs and wonders (cf. 16:31). He has, in fact, already given all that is necessary to turn – both in the scriptures and in the sign of mercy for repentant (“resurrected”) sinners. Eternal life lies within the reach of the rich. On the other hand, in the poor God reveals his full readiness to intervene and overwhelm the world with his compassionate justice. He who “fills the hungry with good things” (1:53) is the ultimate almsgiver, and the Great Reversal is Luke’s own idiom for how God’s righteousness (more than human) saves from death.



Chapter 5

Lukan Charity Discourse as “Biblical Theology” 5.1 Introduction 5.1 Introduction

In this final chapter an attempt will be made to synthesize the findings of this study and briefly place them in a proper theological perspective. The common tendency of Lukan wealth studies to move from exegesis to a contemporary moral “application” will, nevertheless, be resisted.1 Despite the strong orientation to praxis of the material here considered, this probe into Lukan thought has attempted to expose the Gospel’s unwavering concern with Jesus Christ and the mystery of human salvation, pursuing a new order of reflection on the economic aspect of Luke’s message. The exegetical character of the present project invites an effort at “biblical theology.” The uncertain nature of this label has occasioned much reflection.2 The complexities of the debate cannot here be explored. In the present context, it is enough to discipline one’s reflections and modestly limit the enterprise. Three straightforward reflections will thus be pursued in order to inscribe the Lukan material in a range of intersecting theological contexts. First, drawing upon the foregoing exegesis, the basic contours of Luke’s scriptural narrative about charity will be summarized (§5.2). Next, Luke’s



1 On this trend, see Chapter One §1.1.1.2. The decision to pursue another line of reflection is not intended as a dismissal of the project of articulating the normative present day significance of the biblical text. See the PBC document, “The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church,” IV, A. For an interesting effort at actualization, see, e.g., Christopher Hays, “Beyond Mint and Rue: The Implications of Luke’s Interpretative Controversies for Modern Consumerism,” Political Theology 11 (2010) 383–98. Hays detects a prophetic challenge to modern “idealist consumption of symbols and status.” For a related but more radical perspective, see Metzger, Consumption and Wealth, 193–200. 2 For a collection of recent views, including a history of “Biblical Theology” from Gabler to Von Rad, see Paul Hanson, Bernd Janowski, and Michael Welker, eds., Biblische Theologie: Beiträge des Symposiums “Das Alte Testament und die Kultur der Moderne” anlässlich des 100. Geburtstags Gerhard von Rads (1901–1971) Heidelberg, 18.–21. Oktober 2001 (Altes Testament und Moderne 14; Münster: Lit. Verlag, 2005). On the related project of “New Testament Theology,” see the two helpful essays of C. Kavin Rowe: “New Testament Theology: The Revival of a Discipline: A Review of Recent Contributions to the Field,” JBL 125 (2006) 393–419; and “For Future Generations: Worshipping Jesus and the Integration of the Theological Disciplines,” Pro Ecclesia 17 (2008) 186–209.

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place in the broader framework of New Testament thought will be addressed (§5.3). Finally, the Lukan data will be considered in connection with several classical doctrinal topoi (§5.4).

5.2 Narrative Soteriology: Luke, the Law, and the Prophets 5.2 Luke, the Law, and the Prophets

The Gospel of Luke consciously plots itself within a larger biblical story.3 It is accordingly impossible to apprehend the story Luke tells without tapping his canonical host narrative. The topic of charity, moreover, is intentionally laced to this enveloping scriptural frame, for Luke repeatedly binds the theme of almsgiving directly to “the Law and Prophets” (Luke 10:25–28; 16:29–31; cf. 4:18–19; 20:27–40). At one level, this evocation of the Law and Prophets is an abstract gesture. For Luke, as for Tertullian, “This commandment of distributing to the poor is spread about everywhere in the law and the prophets” (Contra Marcionem 4:5). At the same time, Luke’s special view of charity as profoundly grounded in Israel’s scriptures includes a complex interaction with real texts. Central among these are Lev 19:18b, the heart of the heart of the Torah, and Isa 61:1– 2, a key text from the “post-exilic exile.” These two scriptural foci, one from the Law and one from the Prophets, represent at some level the archetypal witness of scripture in Luke’s eyes. When transposed into narrative form, these texts correspond broadly to the two “lost threads” in scholarship identified in Chapter One (§1.1.2.1): conflict and eschatology. (1) Quarreling over the Inheritance. Halvor Moxnes helpfully identified the role of conflict in Luke’s presentation of wealth, and a waxing polemic against the Pharisees (and lawyers) shapes all the texts considered in this study. The trajectory of this contest leads to the decisive rejection of Jesus by the (rich) elite. A major element contextualizing Luke’s re-casting of Jewish charity theology is, accordingly, the evangelist’s idea that Israel has been split in two. This idea, which Jervell localized in Acts, has an important and unexplored Gospel antecedent, however. Luke 12 was identified as a key text in this regard for the way the “division” motif is there openly engaged as part of a discourse on wealth ethics (Luke 12:14, 46, 51–53; see Chapter One §1.1.2.1 and Chapter Two §2.5). Read through the allusion to Exod 2:14, Luke presents this dispute between

3

This binding of the Gospel with the Old Testament is accomplished in at least two recognized ways: the mimicking of LXX Greek and the use of direct and indirect scriptural allusions. “An important element of Luke’s narrative art lies in the way in which he evokes echoes of Israel’s Scripture and thereby leads readers to a complex intertexually formed perception of his central character,” Richard Hays, Reading Backwards: Figural Christology and the Fourfold Gospel Witness (Waco, TX: Baylor University, 2014) 57.

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two brothers over their inheritance as a patterned image of Israel’s congenital fighting (Luke 12:13; cf. Acts 7:26–27).4 Jesus himself adopts the same image of two brothers brought into conflict over their father’s inheritance in allegorizing the divisive effect of his ministry (Luke 15:11–32). The special force of this Gospel portrayal of conflict is intensified since the image of a schism within Israel has been grafted onto a potent Old Testament trope: fraternal strife. The profound exploration of this motif in Genesis inevitably stands behind Luke’s depiction of a contest between two brothers over the question of inheritance. 5 The deeper implications of this typology should, therefore, not be overlooked. Jon Levenson, in particular, has exposed the profound manner in which this framework of brothers quarreling over the inheritance illuminates the self-understanding of Christians over against their Jewish peers.6 Rewritten Bible texts of the Second Temple period, including Luke’s miniature “rewritten Bible” in Acts 7:2–53, were widely attentive to the theme of fraternal rivalry as a leitmotif of Israel’s history (οἱ πατριάρχαι ζηλώσαντες τὸν Ἰωσήφ, Acts 7:9). And as described in Chapter Three (§3.2.1.1), this envy topos controls the prevailing understanding of Lev 19:18. The legal text was, specifically, fleshed out and interpreted through the Genesis narratives of fraternal discord. The fraternal struggle was not linked with the matter of money, however; and to love your “neighbor” was understood as the negative command not to murder your brother. In evoking the same Pentateuchal imagery of sibling rivalry and focusing it on the monetary aspect of the inheritance, Luke thus maintains, but repositions this whole narrative-legal tradition. He indicates, first, what he sees standing at the root of Israel’s fraternal discord: greed. At the same time, he makes clear what the appropriate healing remedy must be: love of “neighbor/brother” understood as generosity. The extension of the sibling rivalry between Jacob and Esau to the national level, in the enmity of Israel and Edom, appears in the Bible and in Jubilees,



4 J. Duncan M. Derrett (“The Rich Fool: A Parable of Jesus Concerning Inheritance,” HeyJ 18 [1977] 131–51) detects an intricate “inheritance” motif extending beyond the quarrel of the brothers and informing the story of the Rich Fool and Luke’s “treasure in heaven” imagery (Luke 12:21, 33–34). The sapiential connotations of death and possessions discourse evokes the notion of “inheritance” as Rindge (Parable of the Rich Fool) demonstrates. 5 This pattern of allusion is characteristic of Luke’s use of the Old Testament. “The things that happen in Luke are the kinds of things that happened in the tales of the patriarchs and prophets, and the plotted action, while never simply identical to the OT stories is often suggestively reminiscent of Israel’s sacred past,” Hays, Reading Backwards, 59. 6 Jon Levenson, The Death and Resurrection of the Beloved Son: The Transformation of Child Sacrifice in Judaism and Christianity (New Haven: Yale, 1993) 200–19.

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and it also figures within Luke’s conception.7 The allusion to Num 20:14–21 in Luke 9:52–53, in particular, casts Samaria as Edom, withholding hospitality from his “brother Israel” (‫אחיך ישראל‬, Num 20:14) – eliciting fire-breathing death threats in response (Luke 9:54). Jesus directly rebukes this response (9:55), and in the charity of the Good Samaritan, a counter-image of reconciling brotherly love is displayed (see Chapter Three §3.2). Read against such Pentateuchal stories, the use of possessions emerges as symbolic placeholder, signifying more than simply the people’s response to “the Prophet” (Jesus), as Luke Timothy Johnson supposed. Possessions can also carry symbolic force as a deeper “inheritance,” the blessing promised to Abraham’s heirs (Luke 1:55).8 If at the level of personal discipleship the just sharing of one’s goods with the poor embodies the spiritual response of individuals to the preaching of the Gospel, at a collective (“Israelogical”) level, the same harmonious sharing of wealth with the poor represents a charitable readiness to share the nation’s spiritual inheritance. This call to concord invites fraternal feeling with all the estranged: sinners, Samaritans, and ultimately with God-fearing Gentiles – whoever proves themselves “neighbor” by being filled with brotherly love. It is the challenge of just such sharing of just such riches with just such (impoverished) late-born sons that is ultimately splitting Israel apart in Luke’s perception. The Gospel’s careful molding of the “children of Abraham” motif must be read in connection with this inheritance idea. “Who are the true heirs of Israel, the legitimate line of Abraham?” Luke asks (Luke 3:8 and Chapter Four §4.4.2). The question points to the unique vision of “universalism” animating the Gospel: a vision inseparable from the extension of charity, as both the Good Samaritan and Cornelius show (Chapter Three §3.3.3 and Chapter Four §4.2.3.2). Hospitality is not only a privileged form of charity in Luke. It signals openness to table fellowship with untouchables, i.e. Gentiles. 9 Nor is greed and hoarding simply foolish disregard for the coming judgment. It provides a parabolic image, an allegorical Realsymbol for the stinginess with election that would enforce an unbridgeable division between the (spiritually) rich and poor. (2) Jubilee Release. Alongside Lev 19:18, Luke’s story of charity finds a scriptural center in Isa 61:1–2. This text brings the eschatological “poor” directly into focus, and in a real way this controls the deeper Lukan storyline. In particular, the perception that greed lies at the root of Israel’s divided family reveals a more fundamental (economic) Lukan language of conflict

7

On this topic, see Bradford Anderson, Brotherhood and Inheritance: A Canonical Reading of the Esau and Edom Traditions (LHBOTS 556; London: T & T Clark, 2011). 8 Derrett (“Rich Fool,” 131–51) has shown the way Luke considers the “treasure in heaven” as an inheritance, lifting the inheritance rhetoric to the level of immaterial riches. 9 See Pao, “Waiters or Preachers,” 127–44.

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than quarrelling brothers: rich and poor. In this pattern of communal division, Israel’s inner split is drawn by the injustice that allows the rich to watch the poor suffer in want (Chapter One §§1.1.1.2 and 1.1.2.1). The dualistic, apocalyptic, remnant framework that Luke draws on here has, of course, been significantly adapted. Luke rejects the intransigent Enochic idea that not even the eye of a needle is open to the rich. Rather, through repentance a way to communal healing and heavenly reward is made. The sharp rich-poor dichotomy, nonetheless, remains part of a highly charged post-exilic national story, and this corresponds to the second “lost thread” mentioned in Chapter One (§1.1.2.1): eschatology. In Luke’s Gospel, poor Israel – destitute on account of her sins – finds herself still awaiting “redemption” (λυτροῦσθαι τὸν Ἰσραήλ, Luke 24:21). This national expectation fits with the fragmentary hints of a New Exodus/bondage to the devil plotline coursing through Luke-Acts (e.g. Luke 1:74; 9:31; 10:18–19; 11:20–22; 12:14; 13:16–17; 22:3, 31–32; cf. Acts 5:3; 10:38; 13:4–12; 19:8–20; 26:18). The announcement of a great Jubilee release, solemnly made in the “fulfillment” of Isa 61:1–2 in Luke 4 (σήµερον πεπλήρωται ἡ γραφὴ αὕτη ἐν τοῖς ὠσὶν ὑµῶν) – together with the Great Absolution offered on the cross (Luke 23:34) – represents the central act in this narrative of the people’s eschatological release. Making the words of the prophet his own, Jesus announces a great amnesty at the advent of the Reign of God. Within this Second Temple story of indigent Israel’s release from its debt slavery, two major reconfigurations are observable. First, similar to 11Q13, which inserts Melchizedek into Deutero-Isaiah’s framework, Luke introduces Jesus into the center of Israel’s debt/sin dealings with the Lord. In this way, Jesus represents the divinely authorized agent who proclaims the good news of Israel’s “forgiveness” (ἄφεσις). Second, in contrast to the metaphor as it appears in 11Q13, Luke, like Nehemiah 5, gives attention to Israel’s behavior in response to God’s great show of mercy. 10 Israel must release her own slaves in answer to her freedom. These two lines of development drive the two most important narrative dynamics in Luke’s unique story of charity: creditor Christology and repentance through works of mercy. Luke’s Scriptural Story. Neither the focused study of wealth in Luke-Acts nor essays into his wider narrative theology have given adequate attention to the deep story within a story dynamic of Lukan theology. The charity parables, for their part, are actually stories within a story within a story. Through techniques like metalepsis the interaction of these inner story-worlds can be tracked, but the permeability of the Third Gospel narrative to Israel’s scriptures must not be forgotten. The penetration of definite Old Testament texts into the Lukan frame is actually relatively rare and unmarked in comparison

10

Baltzer, “Liberation from Debt Slavery,” 482.

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to a work like Matthew. This makes the focused appearance of Lev 19:18 and Isa 61:1–2 all the more important. The embedding of more diffused scriptural traditions, notably the reinterpretation of Prov 10:2 (evident in the Greek text of Tobit), if more elusive than direct quotations, is still a major structural influence on the Gospel with which interpreters must also reckon. Following examples of narrated wisdom, like Tobit, Luke gives flesh to this proverb in a variety of vivid scenes (i.e. Luke 7:1–10; 20:35; 16:1–31; Acts 9:36–42; 10:1–48). The power of such a text, even at some remove, to contour a theme as central to the Gospel as resurrection illustrates the depth to which Luke’s careful ordering (ἀκριβῶς καθεξῆς) reveals a fundamentally scriptural logic and how almsgiving has somehow become shorthand for the whole story of Jesus’ death and resurrection – as foretold in all the scriptures (cf. Luke 24:27). This underlines a key point made in Chapter One. Throughout Luke’s work – and very much in connection with his charity ideals – Israel’s scriptures anchor and shape his thought. While extra-biblical indices such as CD, 11Q13, and 1 Enoch all help contextualize the particular ways Luke appropriates the traditum, an attempt has been made in the three main chapters of this study to show how the shape of Luke’s narrative theology of charity is decisively organized around three specific points within the Jewish canon of scripture.

5.3 New Testament Theology 5.3 New Testament Theology

Luke holds a central place within the New Testament, uniquely aligned both with the Synoptic tradition and with Paul, but also, in less certain ways, with John. Situating Luke’s theology of charity within the broader horizon of New Testament Theology is thus of obvious importance. The effort made here must, nevertheless, remain quite modest. 5.3.1 Luke Among the Gospels In the matter of charity, among the Gospels, Luke’s affinity clearly aligns him with Matthew.11 What Nathan Eubank has shown for the First Gospel, is now also clear for the Third. Both engage Second Temple almsgiving theology quite robustly (e.g. sins as debts, treasure in heaven). Both Gospels like-

11

The Johannine tradition has surfaced very little in this study, although one of the key texts in the discussion of Luke’s contact with John’s Gospel was directly handled (i.e. Luke 7:36–40; John 12:1–8). John’s own theology of charity is not so explicit as what appears in Matthew and Luke. It would be a mistake to imagine that charity theology has not shaped the Johannine tradition, however. The combination of almsgiving and fraternal envy in connection with Lev 19:18 was observed in 1 John 3:11–16.

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wise work Christological reconfigurations of this material. It may be surprising, then, how distinct the deployment of these traditions is in each text. The handling of Lev 19:18 is perhaps illustrative of the special density of Luke’s own conceptualization of charity. Matthew cites the text three different times in three different ways, while Luke gathers all these senses together in a single compact idea with his Good Samaritan. At the same time, in a central “debt” text like the Our Father, Luke divides in a way Matthew does not. A word may be said about the theology of each of these texts. (1) The One Who Shows Mercy. Perhaps the key place where Luke and Matthew diverge is in the placement of Christ within the charity framework. For Matthew, Jesus is linked unambiguously with the poor (Matt 25:31–46), an idea already implicit in Mark 14:7–8. Luke hints tentatively in this direction in a few ways, notably, through the homelessness of the Son of Man (Luke 9:58), who suffers from his birth the fate of those denied the humanity of hospitality (cf. 2:7; 9:53).12 Above all, however, Jesus’ consistent, unambiguous identification with the cause of the “poor” (materially and in a covenantal sense) identifies him with this sector in Israel. This alignment essentially represents a free posture of solidarity, however, and characteristically in the Gospel Jesus is the one who shows mercy, not he who receives it. Although speculation on the audience of the Gospel can easily exceed the bounds of proper caution, it is useful to imagine how persons of standing like Theophilus might have found in this Christological model an easy point of self-identification. 13 By contrast, if Matthew’s Gospel proceeds from the context of a more beleaguered milieu of conflict with the synagogue, extending to the point of persecution, the identification of Jesus with the dispossessed disciples would resonate well.14 Either way, a paradigm of discipleship

12

The Christology suggested in this motif might actually be rather “high.” See Adelbert Denaux, “The Theme of Divine Visits and Human (In)hospitality in Luke-Acts: Its Old Testament and Graeco-Roman Antecedents,” in Unity of Luke-Acts, 255–79. See also Chapter One §1.3.1.1 (3) and Prov 14:31. 13 The broad point of scholars like Yan Yang (“The Rich Ruler and Chreia Rhetorical Practice in Roman Society: Luke’s Strategy to Exhort the Rich Ordo in Roman Society,” Asia Journal of Theology 29 [2012] 3–28) and Jean-Paul Gérard (“Les riches dans la communauté lucanienne,” BETL 71 [1995] 71–106) can be affirmed here. Esler’s idea (Community and gospel, 187) that Luke preaches “good news for the poor” and “grim news for the rich” is probably accurate in envisioning a mixed community of rich and poor, but misleading in the way its hides Luke’s nuanced perspective on wealthy persons, which is not confined to Enochic-style woes. On the methodological difficulties of describing a “Lukan community” see Luke Timothy Johnson, “On Finding the Lukan Community: A Cautious Cautionary Essay,” in Society of Biblical Literature Seminary Papers 1979 (Paul Achtemeier, ed.; Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1979) 87–100. 14 On the conjectured circumstances of Matthew’s community see, e.g., Douglas R. A. Hare, The Theme of Jewish Persecution of Christians in the Gospel according to St. Matthew (SNTSMS 6; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1967); and Anthony Saldarini,

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is offered through charity Christology, each Gospel accenting its own end of the pole. Luke’s coordination of Jesus with the giver of mercy is more complex than a simple moral model for the rich, however. The figure of the Good Samaritan pointedly indicates that characters that dispense mercy can stand as absolute outsiders and pariahs – or, for that matter, even be the quintessentially “poor” (Luke 20:45–21:4). It would be wrong, then, to imagine the Lukan Jesus or his Creditor Christology as the mere tailoring of an ethical exemplum for rich readers. On the contrary, the position of power in which Jesus stands is determinedly not a worldly status (22:25–27). He is as “other” as the Samaritan, stands in the world as one who serves (ὡς ὁ διακονῶν), and his ministry of mercy is a prototype on a different order. 15 This alterity of Jesus points to Luke’s unique idea of imitatio and the second important point of comparison with Matthew. (2) Mimetic Mercy. A theme of major consequence in Luke’s structuring of charity traditions, and a significant variation from Matthew, is the notion that works of mercy imitate on a human plane the forgiveness of sins (ἄφεσις) that God alone uniquely offers (cf. Luke 11:4; Matt 6:12). Thus, where Matthew imagines a mimetic imperative compelling disciples to forgive one another as God forgives (while also making God, in his own way, imitate human mercy), Luke much more carefully reserves the forgiveness of sins to God, and takes charitable works as the proper human correlate of divine mercy. This Lukan distinction plays upon the inherent double meaning in the Semitic notion of “debt/sin” and underlines a real disjunction in the correspondence between God’s mercy and our own. With his stratification of mercy into human and divine, Luke affords theology an analytic precision obscured by Matthew’s univocal “debt” language. On the other hand, Matthew’s vision ensures a place within discipleship for both corporal and spiritual works. Luke himself, of course, also understands the act of human forgiveness (Luke 17:3–4), even if he has greatly marginalized its role in comparison with Matthew. It neither appears as a massive

Matthew’s Jewish-Christian Community (Chicago Studies in the History of Judaism; Chicago: University of Chicago, 1994). 15 The example of Jesus’ role-reversing servant leadership (Luke 22:25–27) belongs to the Gospel’s Great Reversal motif. “Indem er das menschliche Autoritätssystem und die Machtausübung umdreht, fordert der Jesus des Lukas (doch dürfte er hier den historischen Jesus widerspiegeln) von dem, der oben ist, er solle heruntersteigen,” Bovon, Lukas 4, 267–8. Commenting on the Christological reading of the Good Samaritan, Joseph Ratzinger (Jesus von Nazareth: Erster Teil. Von der Taufe im Jordan bis zur Verklärung [Freiburg: Herder, 2006) nicely highlights the divine otherness of the figure: “Gott selbst, der für uns der Fremde und der Ferne ist, hat sich aufgemacht, um sich seines geschlagenen Geschöpfes anzunehmen. Gott, der Ferne, hat sich in Jesus Christus zum Nächsten gemacht.”

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jubilee (7 x 70 = 490) on a private scale, as in Matt 18:22; nor does it bear any special relationship to reconciliation with God. It is, rather, part of an instruction on the duty of rebuking and patiently dealing with errant brethren. 16 Sevenfold fraternal indulgence may resemble in real ways the true dynamics of conversion, but God’s mercy in the Third Gospel actually often appears considerably less patient with sinners (e.g. Luke 13:1–9). The µετάνοια of the Kingdom is certainly never cast as chronic wavering, requiring God’s repeated acts of mercy. 17 It is always represented as a decisive, life-changing turn.18 Luke’s differentiated understanding of divine and human mercy represents a subtle but very significant adaptation of the common imitatio Dei charity motif. God’s behavior, specifically, is elevated to an inimitable redemptive plane, beyond the merely beneficent creative order (i.e. “God gives his rain to good and bad alike”). Contoured by Luke’s vibrant Jubilee eschatology (e.g. Luke 4:16–30; cf. 11Q13), this perception that God decisively intervenes and shows his mercy in granting release to sinful Israel accommodates a focused Christological agency. At the same time it invites a mode of human participation in Israel’s salvation. As a result, Luke’s unique depiction of mercy, in contrast to Matthew’s, is sifted across a two-branched soteriology: God’s redemption (remission) and human µετάνοια (repayment). An enormously important dimension of Luke’s imitatio Christi motif is that repentance implicitly bears the structure of Jesus’ death and resurrection. As Tobit “died” in an image of Israel’s exile, suffered on account of sins (e.g. Tobit 3:4–5; 13:5), and was “resurrected” by his alms, so every Prodigal Son in Luke passes through a “death” in sin before he comes to life again through repentance (Luke 15:32). At the same time, in another key, the pattern of discipleship is imagined as a kind of death to this world and a claim on the resurrection to come. Abandoning one’s possessions, like abandoning one’s

16

The logic of Luke 17:1–4 is difficult to discern, but the reference in v. 3 to the law of fraternal rebuke in Lev 19:17 appears to be the central idea. The scandal caused by public sin is to be avoided at all costs (vv. 1–2), and this problem of overgrown, open sin can be nipped in bud by the act of correction (v. 3). In contrast to CD 9:20, however, which legislates strict judgment after a first rebuke, Luke seems to envision a much more lenient program, patiently working toward the sinner’s reform with a policy of longsuffering forgiveness (cf. also 1QS 5:25–6:1; Test. Gad 6:1–7). On the tradition history of this text, see David Catchpole, “Reproof and Reconciliation in the Q Community: A Study of the Tradition-History of Mt 18,15–17.21–22/Lk 17,3–4,” SNTU 8 (1983) 79–90. Catchpole argues that Luke attests a truncated form of the original Q logion preserved by Matthew, but more recent scholarship prefers to see variant forms of the original tradition. 17 Scholars generally understand that µετανοήσῃ in Luke 17:3 does not carry the normal Lukan meaning, whether or not they prefer to see the word as a pre-Lukan expression. See, e.g., Noland, Luke, 838 (“repentance has an everyday sense and not the repentance toward God called for by the Gospel challenge”). 18 See Nave, Role and Function of Repentance, 145–224.

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family, is a way of picking up one’s cross alongside Jesus and mystically “dying” (Luke 14:25–33). By investing in heavenly treasure through almsgiving to the poor, the disciples place their trust in the truth of the resurrection (cf. Prov 10:2). The promised reward for the “death” of material discipleship is thus a share in the new life already won by Jesus. The complementarity of Matthew and Luke is noteworthy.19 In depicting Christ as respectively poor and richly empowered, the act of charity, with its reciprocal participants, is ennobled (even divinized) from both sides. In also showing the diverse ways human mercy stands in relation to God’s forgiveness, the two Gospels in tandem also helpfully preserve a balanced logic of analogy. God is merciful, as we are merciful, but in a way of “hyperpredication.”20 5.3.2 Luke and Paul As mentioned in Chapter One, Luke’s involvement with Paul has haunted scholarship from the beginning. The issues are far too complex to treat in any comprehensive way. Two points, however, may be taken as given. First, if one follows Fitzmyer and recognizes the evangelist as a “sometime companion” – and more than that, an admirer – of the apostle, it becomes difficult to sustain exaggerated statements of Luke’s ignorance of Paul’s theology. 21 Second, the occasional nature of Paul’s correspondence implies an entirely different set of themes and accents than the Lukan project of drawing up a careful two-volume diegesis entailed. 22 The result is the expectation that these two early Christian authors should share similar commitments and fundamental ideas, but speak in independent ways. In approaching the theological propinquity of Luke and Paul on the theme of charity, then, it best to remain at a global level.



19 Frank Matera (New Testament Theology: Exploring Diversity and Unity [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2007]) appropriately imagines New Testament Theology as a study in “diversity and unity.” Unless the descriptive enterprise of “compare and contrast” is coordinated under the synthetic rubric of complementarity, however, the project makes no act of judgment and remains sub-theological. 20 The metaphysical doctrine of anologia entis was naturally far from the evangelists’ minds. The applicability of the theory nevertheless obtains. Matthew affirms the real similitudo and Luke the simultaneous maior dissimilitudo. On this language, see Thomas Joseph White, ed., The Analogy of Being: Invention of the Antichrist or the Wisdom of God (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011). 21 Fitzmyer, Luke, 47–51. Fitzmyer’s nuancing of the position of Phillip Vielhauer is welcome, though modest, since in the end Fitzmyer himself imagines only an “insufficient and brief acquaintance” between Luke and Paul. 22 This point is all the more true if we accept the view that the Gospels were in not written for narrowly defined communities (cf. Bauckham, Gospel for All Christians).

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Deep concerns with the New Perspective project should be evident by this point (however needful the thrust against entrenched anti-Judaism). Sanders’ well-intentioned, but unfortunate mischaracterization of Palestinian Judaism severed a major line of continuity between Second Temple soteriology and the early Church. Luke, for his part, represents an important Christian witness to a manner of “works righteousness” uncomfortably close to Paul and his Gentile mission.23 At the same time, importantly, the bold Christocentrism of Luke’s vision finds creative avenues of narrative expression. Paul’s ἐν Χριστῷ language is, of course, not reproduced by Luke, but a participationist model is suggested in the Gospel’s imitatio motif. For Luke, the decisive redemptive work of mercy is accomplished and available uniquely in the person of Jesus; while the disciples’ own life of charity conforms them to the shape (and promise) of Jesus’ death and resurrection. The coordination of these diverse Lukan perspectives may pose problems for systematicians, but Luke’s conjunction of Christocentrism and merit theology invites a search for the rules of Luke’s own thinking. It would be wrong to bend Paul into false conformity with Luke (just as much as vice versa), but two interesting points of contact attract notice. Both represent recent trends in Pauline studies.24 (1) “Remember the Poor.” The value of charity as a conspicuously moral boundary marker represents a problematic datum for the New Perspective. If salvation apart from “works of the Law” is, as a matter of definition, taken as the nullification of Judaism’s ritual marks of belonging (circumcision and food laws), the remainder is not simply a community redefined apart from meritorious ethical performance. 25 On the contrary, charity as a boundary

23

The conclusion of Horn (Glaube und Handeln, 279) must be forcefully rejected: “Es ist bereits gezeigt worden, daß Lk die Wohltätigkeit nicht, wie die spätantik-jüdischen oder frühchristlichen Bezeugungen nahelegen könnten, als ein “Universalmittel” im Kontext der Sühne eingeführt hat, welches die Gabe des ewigen Lebens zwangsläufig nach sich zieht.” Horn would have Luke represent a point of double discontinuity on the matter of redemptive almsgiving – precisely the opposite of what we should expect. This conclusion only comes from programmtically assigning the problem texts to a pre-Lukan Ebionite origin. In this way, Horn means to save the evangelist from advancing an embrassingly Jewish (and “early Christian”) soteriology. 24 It should be mentioned that, since the historic Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification in 1999, new possibilities for an ecumenical understanding of Pauline theology have been opened. See David Aune, ed., Rereading Paul Together: Protestant and Catholic Perspectives on Justification (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2006). 25 James Dunn has particularly advanced this understanding, equating ἔργα τοῦ νόµου and covenantal nomism seen in the sociological terms of boundary marking. “‘Works of law’ are nowhere understood…either by his Jewish interlocutors or by Paul himself, as works which earn God’s favor, as merit-amassing observances. They are seen as badges: they are simply what membership of the covenant people involves, what mark out the Jews as God’s people…in other words, Paul has in view precisely what Sanders calls ‘covenan-

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marker and “the commandment” par excellence remains in place as the organizing center of Christian identity.26 The primitive Christian understanding of “love” as the fulfillment of the Law must, in other words, be taken much more seriously in the discussion of Paul’s Gospel. It may well be that the classic distinction between the (abrogated) ceremonial and (perduring) moral precepts of the Law is indeed an accurate understanding and makes the most concrete sense of Gal 5:14 and Rom 13:18.27 Bruce Longenecker’s recent monograph provocatively argues for this general position, and the prominent role of charity in Paul is emerging in recent study.28 It is already clear that Pauline Christianity was far from disinterested in the question of charitable praxis, which must be reckoned with as a much more serious priority for Paul than heretofore imagined. 29 Financial amity certainly functions within Paul’s image of a Christian community at peace (e.g. “brothers” wrangling over inheritance can have no part).30 The role of the Jerusalem Collection plays a major but still uncertain role in this reevaluation, and Longenecker’s thesis on Galatians must be tested especially on 2 Corinthians 8–9.31

tal nomism.’ And what he denies is that God’s grace extends only to those who wear the badge of the covenant…‘works of the law’ do not mean ‘good works’ in general, ‘good works’ in the sense disparaged by Luther and his heirs, works in the sense of achievement,” James D. G. Dunn, Jesus, Paul, and the Law (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1990) 194–5. See also idem., The Theology of Paul the Apostle (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) 334–89, esp. 354–9. 26 On this designation for charity in the Pauline context, see Nathan Eubank, “Almsgiving is ‘The Commandment’: A Note on 1 Timothy 6.6–19,” NTS 58 (2012) 144–50; but also the critique of Giambrone, “‘According to the Commandment,’” 448–65. 27 Love of neighbor in Paul’s understanding covers all moral prohibitions (Rom 13:18) as well as positive injunctions to do good (Gal 5:14). The commandment thus exhausts the logical space of the Law, resembles 1 John 3:11–16, and hints at Luke’s minority view on Lev 19:18. On Aquinas’ classic formulation of the ceremonial, judicial, and moral precepts of the law, see Steven Casselli, “The Threefold Division of the Law in the Thought of Aquinas,” Westminster Theological Journal 61 (1999) 175–207. 28 See, e.g., Downs, Alms, 143–73. Downs acknowledges having changed the view expressed in his dissertation (The Offering for the Gentiles: Paul’s Collection for the Gentiles in its Chronological, Cultural, and Cultic Contexts [WUNT II/248; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008]) since reading “the trenchant argument of Bruce W. Longenecker” (Alms, 144 fn. 1). 29 See Longenecker, Remember the Poor, 135–56. 30 See Michael Peppard, “Brother against Brother: Controversiae about Inheritance Disputes and I Cor 6:1–11,” JBL 133 (2014) 179–92. Peppard shows how Paul plays upon real fraternal disputes over inheritance to inculcate a fictive family ethic of peacefully sharing the immaterial “inheritance” of the Kingdom. The use of this metaphor is very striking in view of the quarreling brothers motif in Luke 12 and 15 explored above. 31 Paul’s consistently cultic perception of the Collection has recently been stressed. See Downs, Offering for the Gentiles; and idem., “The Offering of the Gentiles in Rom 15.16,”

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Once Luke is brought into consideration, the relationship between Galatians 2 and Acts 15 must also be addressed. 32 Though Luke says nothing about the Collection in the context of the Jerusalem Council, he does depict Paul as both a practitioner and promoter of charity (Acts 11:27; 20:35; 24:17) and, through Cornelius, Luke relates the extension of the Gospel to the Gentiles with the Gentiles’ material charity towards the Jews. Though posed in narrative form, this prototypical scene is not distant from Paul’s own vision of a Jewish-Gentile exchange of spiritual and material goods (Rom 15:27). The Pauline resonance of Luke’s “children of Abraham” motif must not go unobserved in this connection. Paul, of course, uses Abraham as ammunition for his doctrine of salvation of the Gentiles by faith, while Luke (like James) moves in another direction. Luke nevertheless knows of children of Abraham simply saved by God’s good favor (Luke 13:10–17; 16:19–31), and the evangelist (who knows Paul’s doctrine, Acts 13:39; cf. 15:11) has no difficulty understanding the justificatio piorum as forgiveness of their sins through belief and the gift of the Spirit (Acts 10:43; cf. Luke 7:36–50).33 This juxtaposition should challenge false dichotomies. On faith and works, Luke (like 1 Clem. 10:7) seemingly stands somewhere between Paul and James, both of whose occasional, epistolary theologies must indulge more extreme formulations than the Gospel. (2) Christus Victor. Without intending to settle towering problems in Pauline studies, this investigation of Luke suggests the value of approaching Paul’s soteriology in a particular manner. At one level, the imaginative space explored here makes Fitzmyer’s contentment to enumerate a list of differing metaphors for the effects of the Christ-event (without obsessing about finding die Mitte) appear as the most sensible approach. Within this supple perspective, however, the story world opened in the metaphor of sin as debt, while only one way of modeling salvation, should by no means be underestimat-

JSNT 29 (2006) 173–86. The quotation of Ps 112:9 in 2 Cor 9:9 also strongly suggests Paul’s use of a redemptive almsgiving motif. It is less evident how charity (rather than circumcision) as a community identity marker might function in the Corinthian context. 32 See, e.g., Clayton Bowen, “Paul’s Collection and the Book of Acts,” JBL 42 (1923) 49–58; David Downs, “Paul’s Collection and the Book of Acts,” NTS 52 (2006) 50–70. Downs argues that Acts never mentions or alludes to Paul’s Jerusalem Collection. The text of Acts 24:17 (cf. Acts 11:27) in his view describes almsgiving simply as an element of Paul’s private piety. See also Klaus Berger, “Almosen für Israel: Zum historischen Kontext der paulinischen Kollekte,” NTS 23 (1977–1978) 180–204. 33 The role of the Spirit in the case of Cornelius is worthy of special note. In the Gospel (i.e. prior to Pentecost) the Holy Spirit is principally a power of prophecy. Accordingly, it plays no special role in describing the share in resurrection promised through charity. In some sense, charity in the Gospel holds certain functions of the Spirit in Acts and Paul’s letters, cf. Rom 5:5 (ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ θεοῦ ἐκκέχυται ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ἡµῶν διὰ πνεύµατος ἁγίου τοῦ δοθέντος ἡµῖν). See Don Jackson, “Luke and Paul: A Theology of One Spirit from Two Perspectives,” JETS (1989) 335–44.

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ed. 34 In this context, the controlling narrative behind Paul’s theology may have deep links with Luke’s idea of the “Devil’s Ransom.” Only the vaguest gesture can be made here, but inasmuch as it has spawned a school of scholarship beholden to neither the New Perspective nor the more traditional Reformation school of thought, the classic proposal of J. C. Beker in stressing the apocalyptic event of Jesus’ triumph, may offer Pauline scholars something significant in their ongoing attempt to find a way forward. 35 Beker’s highly contextualized embedding of Pauline theology within an eschatological worldview establishes a point of historical/theological continuity with Judaism unrecognized in Sanders’ system. The implausibility of incommensurate Pauline and Palestinian Jewish “patterns of religion” is thus avoided. In the last five years, two gargantuan and complex projects have labored in various ways to push Pauline studies in Beker’s basic direction (in some ways at least). Douglas Campbell’s noticeably self-assured attempt to demolish “Justification Theory” is simply too large and picks far too many fights to be an uncomplicated witness;36 but his grand theory that Paul has an apocalyptic, participationist, Christus Victor theology is forcefully propounded and has found sympathy with several major interpreters.37 Along these broad lines, at least, Campbell’s Paul stands in real continuity with Lukan theology. N. T. Wright’s own dust jacket endorsement of Campbell’s book indicates that the weight of his own two oversized volumes on Paul’s theology moves in a similar direction.38 If Wright’s analysis is deeply tied up with some problem-

34

Joseph Fitzmyer, Paul and His Theology: A Brief Sketch (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1988). 35 See especially J. Christiaan Beker, The Apostle Paul: The Triumph of God in Life and Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980). See also the similar approach of J. Louis Martyn, Theological Issues in the Letters of Paul (London: Continuum, 2005). 36 For a good example of the reaction Campbell has provoked, see Barry Matlock, “Zeal for Paul but not according to Knowledge: Douglas Campbell’s War on ‘Justification Theory,’” JSNT 34 (2011) 115–49. 37 Douglas Campbell, The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Re-reading of Justification in Paul (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009); and idem., “An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul: or, An Overview of the Argument of Douglas Campbell’s The Deliverance of God – by Douglas Campbell,” ExpT 123 (2012) 382–93. See also idem., “An Attempt to Be Understood: A Response to the Concerns of Matlock and Macaskil with the Deliverance of God,” JSNT 34 (2011) 162–208. 38 N. T. Wright, Paul and the Faithfulness of God (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014). Both Campbell and Wright take aim at the traditional Reformation reading (“Justification Theory,” “Lutheran reading”) and accept an apocalyptic meta-narrative of Israel as a structural force in Paul’s theology. Significant differences of opinion still separate the two exegetes, however, notably on the interpretation of Romans 1–4. See Douglas Campbell, “Is Tom Right? An Extended Review of N. T. Wright’s Justification: God’s Plan and Paul’s Vision,” Scottish Journal of Theology 65 (2012) 323–45. Campbell ultimately says he disa-

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atic New Perspective commitments, the determined application of a narrative approach to understanding the Apostle responds directly to a perceived deficiency in Sanders and opens an obvious and important door to a more fruitful engagement with Luke’s theology.39 Indeed, without such a methodological turn – the dangers of which must be squarely faced – it is difficult to see how these two New Testament authors can be confronted in any convincing way.40 The redemption of an Israel still somehow in “exile” provides the shared horizon against which the Jesus of both Luke and Paul must be seen.

5.4 Adjusting the “Pressure” 5.4 Adjusting the “Pressure”

Luke’s Gospel is of rare importance in comprehending the scriptural doctrine of charity. It reveals with unique clarity the centrality of this theme in the Law and Prophets, and, through its focus on Lev 19:18, Isa 61:1–2, as well as Prov 10:2, provides a framework in which a (proto-Augustinian) hermeneutic of caritas prevails.41 Within the New Testament context, Luke consolidates this Jewish scriptural vision and develops it through a distinctly Christocentric lens. To this extent, Lukan charity theology represents a critical element within any synthetic account of the biblical testimony. It is appropriate, then, in these final reflections to consider the doctrinal dimension of the Third Gospel’s contribution to the systematic theology.

grees with Wright on some of the “necessary ‘tactics on the ground’ for the overarching strategic goal on which I think we are agreed.” 39 See, e.g., N. T. Wright, Paul: A Fresh Perspective (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005) 8. The influence of Hans Frei on Wright’s narrative recasting of the New Perspective project is significant. Recent efforts to understand Paul from a narrative perspective are increasing. See Bruce Longenecker, “The Narrative Approach to Paul: An Early Retrospective,” CBR 1 (2002) 88–111. See, e.g., Sang Meyng Lee, The Cosmic Drama of Salvation: A Study of Paul’s Undisputed Writings from Anthropological and Cosmological Perspectives (WUNT II/276; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010). On the difficulties and possibility of embracing a narrative reading of Paul, without embracing the central elements of Wright’s New Perspective paradigm, see Mark Seifrid, “The Narrative of Scripture and Justification by Faith: A Fresh Response to N. T. Wright,” Concordia Theological Quarterly 72 (2008) 19–44. 40 As Seifrid (ibid., 26) rightly observes, “Narrative approaches to biblical theology, such as that of Wright, face special difficulties when dealing with the Letters of Paul and other didactic texts that primarily explain God's works rather than narrating them.” In this connection, Richard Hays (Echoes of Scripture, 29–33) proposes some important methodological considerations for detecting the implicit narrative behind Paul’s more propositional theology. 41 On caritas as the res of scripture in Augustine, see Hermann-Josef Sieben, “Der ‘Res’ der Bibel in ‘De Doctrina Christiana,’” Revue des études augustiniennes 21 (1975) 72–90.

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Adopting language coined by Brevard Childs, Kavin Rowe has written on the doctrinally directed “pressure” exerted by scripture.42 The biblical text is not inert, but instead exerts a pressure (“coercion”) upon its interpreters and asserts itself within theological reflection and discourse such that there is (or can) be a profound continuity, grounded in the subject matter itself, between the Biblical text and traditional Christian and theological formation.43

The scriptures, in other words, enforce a certain orthodox “trajectory” in the development of doctrine. It is characteristic of Rowe’s perspective that, while he identifies this Nachleben to be hermeneutically and theologically sound (“the actuating influence of the divine will through the divine Word”), he finds the reciprocal “pressure” exerted upon scripture by doctrine to be highly suspect.44 Certainly, one may agree with this latter concern to some extent. Historical criticism is right to identify anachronistic and distorting forms of eisegetical coercion from the side of dogma. The flagging of sola fide in Chapter One (§1.2.1) as a distorting factor in New Testament exegesis was proposed as exactly such a case. Nevertheless, at stake in Rowe’s stark asymmetry is a massively important and still unresolved Reformation question. What is the mutually norming relationship between inspired scripture and that magisterial authority that somehow gives determined voice to the Church’s creeds?45 It is certain, after all, that risk is not a one-way street and that various forms of scriptural “pressure,” no less than doctrinal pressures, can also lead theology astray.46 The Arians, after all, were (in their own way) the more staunchly scripture-based party.47 Catholic and Protestant sensibilities will inevitably diverge here, whatever substantial agreement there will also be on many points of principle and confession. This discord may convince some that the present work (of a Catholic

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C. Kavin Rowe, “Biblical Pressure and Trinitarian Hermeneutics,” Pro Ecclesia 11 (2002) 295–312. 43 Ibid., 308. 44 Ibid., 309–10. 45 For a helpful commentary on the theological and ecumenical dimensions of this issue, see Joseph Ratzinger, “Commentary on the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation” in Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II: Volume 3 (Herbert Vorgrimler, ed.; New York: Crossroads, 1983) 170–98. 46 The heterodox scriptural “trajectories” traced by Robinson and Koester indicate as much. It exceeds caution, however, thereby to assert that the underdetermined internal thrust of scripture implies that “the emergence of a normative Christianity becomes an instance of conforming to a trend of the times” (Trajectories through Early Christianity, 15). 47 See, e.g., John Henry Newman, “Text of Scripture Not a Sufficient Protection to the Revealed Dogma,” in Arians of the Fourth Century (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame, 2001) 143–50, and 219.

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priest – and worse, a Dominican) is dogmatically predetermined. To that, it can only be answered: contextualized readings are in vogue; while the aspiration to think beyond particular times and places (ubique, semper, ab omnibus) offers the particular catholic mind an unusually liberal perspective. 5.4.1 Narrating Nicea Rowe’s significant study of Luke’s narrative Christology delivers a decisive result. Though Luke has long been associated with a “low” or “primitive” Christology (i.e. prophet, teacher, righteous martyr, etc.),48 the Third Gospel, in fact, in a form proper to its own diegetic style, asserts the divinity of Jesus. 49 This assertion of an “Early High Christology” aligns Rowe with a weighty and articulate movement in New Testament studies (Hengel, Hurtado, Bauckham, Hays, Gathercole, et. al.), and provides an important reference point for further exploring Lukan theology.50 Broadly speaking, this school of scholarship has stressed the effectively Nicene orthodoxy of the Gospels.51 The invocation of Hurtado’s concept of “Christ-Devotion” in Chapter One (§1.4) meant to place the present study within this general scholarly framework. Rather than pursuing a titular Christology, in the manner of Rowe’s project, however, an attempt was made instead to trace Christomorphic “mutations” within Jewish charity theology as signs of an emergent, if implicit claim of Jesus’ divinity. This was found, above all, in a pattern labeled here as “Creditor Christology.” In casting Jesus as the creditor who forgives the debt of sin, Luke directly positions Jesus in a narrative role conventionally reserved to God. This becomes quite evident when the Second Temple sin-as-debt discourse is recognized as a narrated form of Israel’s Heilsgeschichte, in which Israel enters



48 C. F. D. Moule (“The Christology of Acts,” in Studies in Luke-Acts, 159–85) influentially argued that Luke abstained from attributing superhuman status to Jesus in the Gospel, reserving his “high” Christology for after the resurrection in the Acts of the Apostles. 49 “In coupling ὁ θεὀς with ὁ κύριος, John has said something that Luke has not, namely, that at least eventually, to speak of him as κύριος is to speak of him also as θεὀς. In my judgment, this is indeed the direction in which Luke’s use of κύριος points – the ‘pressure’ of the Lukan narrative logic – but John is the one who actually says it,” Rowe, Early Narrative Christology, 229–30. Rowe makes two fundamental arguments. First, Luke’s use of κύριος for both God and Jesus binds the identity of the two. Second, that this usage serves to unify the earthly and the resurrected Jesus. Rowe’s work has been generally well received, though questions have also been raised. Peter Head (JSNT 29 [2007] 60–1), e.g., worries that the cumulative manner of argument may be “maximalist.” John Carroll (Int 64 [2010] 203–4) detects an overestimation of Luke’s literary subtlety and coherence. 50 See, e.g., Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ; Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel; Simon Gathercole, The Pre-existent Son: Recovering the Christologies of Matthew, Mark, and Luke (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006); Hays, Reading Backwards. 51 See, however, the (appreciative) critique of this school in Giambrone, “Neo-Arians.”

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debt-bondage on account of its sins, and the Lord himself intervenes to “release” the people from their slavery.52 Luke’s uniquely Christological appropriation of this tradition is seen strikingly in the contrast between the two distinct debtor tales formulated in Matt 18:23–35 and Luke 7:36–50. Where Matthew presents a conventional image of God as the merciful king/creditor releasing debts, Luke consistently positions Jesus in this divine role (i.e. Luke 4:16–30; 7:36–50; 12:57–59; 16:1–13; see Chapter Two §2.4 and Chapter Four §4.3). It is clear that, even more than for the other evangelists, for Luke “forgiveness” (ἄφεσις) – a critical and neglected point of reference in previous study of Luke’s wealth ethics – is a distinctly divine function (i.e. Luke 5:21; 7:49; see Chapter Two §2.3.2). 53 It is noteworthy in this regard that Jesus commands forgiveness from the cross, while Stephen at his death can only beseech it of the Lord in heaven (ἄφες αὐτοῖς, Luke 23:34; κύριε, µὴ στήσῃς αὐτοῖς ταύτην τὴν ἁµαρτίαν, Acts 7:60).54 The authoritative action of Jesus in proclaiming God’s forgiveness of debt/sin (e.g. Luke 4:18–19) is, nevertheless, comparable to the action of an intermediary agent figure like Melchizedek in 11Q13. Here the Christological claim must be carefully moderated and an apparently “Arian” (subordinationist) doctrinal pressure should be honestly acknowledged.55 The insertion of Jesus into the mechanics of Prov 10:2, on the model of Elijah’s instrumentality in the raising of the charitable widow’s son, also accents this mediating role Jesus holds in Luke’s charity theology (see Chapter Four §4.2.3.2). Whatever prophetic elements may inform Luke’s Christology at this point, it is interesting to consider this (exalted!) mediating dimension in a priestly light. 56 The person of Melchizedek suggests as much (cf. Gen 14:18; Ps 110:4; Songs of Sabbath Sacrifice [4Q400]; Heb 7:1–19), and Jesus’ Jubilee announcement of ἄφεσις in Luke 4, a priestly act, fits within a larger priestly conception in the Gospel. Specifically, the blessing pronounced by the risen

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Luke’s reliance here upon the redemption motifs of Deutero-Isaiah invites comparison with the major role of these chapters in other expressions of “Christological monotheism.” See Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel, 41–51. 53 On the Christological claim behind the claim of forgiving sins and the corresponding blasphemy charge, see Gathercole, Pre-existent Son, 57–61. 54 On the textual issue surrounding Luke 23:34, see Metzger, Textual Commentary, 180. 55 See Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel, 14–16; and Giambrone, “Neo-Arians.” 56 J. C. O’Neill (“The Charge of Blasphemy at Jesus’ Trail before the Sanhedrin,” in The Trial of Jesus: Cambridge Studies in Honour of C. F. D. Moule (E. Bammel, ed.; London: SCM, 1970) 72–7, here 73) identifies Jesus’ claim to forgive sins as a prophetic authority derived from God: “The claim to forgive sins was a claim to pronounce validly that God had forgiven the sinner. Even if the scribes held that the sickness was God’s direct punishment of sin, they could not have denied God’s right to reverse his verdict, and to announce that reversal through a prophet.”

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Christ in Luke 24:50–53 plays upon Sirach 50 – perhaps even suggesting the formal closing by the High Priest of the Jubilee “year of favor” opened at the Gospel’s outset.57 Whatever exactly the priestly mediation envisioned in this grand, overarching Jubilee motif, it is significant that no evidence exists that the Jerusalem priesthood ever actually pronounced absolution for sins (i.e., at the time of the Jubilee or otherwise).58 One must, thus, imagine for Luke some higher form of priesthood (and some eschatologically definitive Jubilee) than the ministry that belonged to the earthly Temple.59 Luke is very careful how he poses the replacement of the Temple motif, of course (e.g. Luke 13:34–35; 19:45–46; 21:5–7; 23:45; Acts 7:48–50; 17:24–25); and the highly supersessionist rhetoric of Hebrews 7–10 is not Luke’s, whatever the ConzelmannHaenchen line of scholarship may imagine. 60 Still, the Gospel’s apparent depiction of Jesus’ death on the cross as an atonement sacrifice, somehow newly efficacious, is very significant.61 The conclusion of a recent dissertation is worth quoting.

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The Jubilee Year was announced on Yom Kippur, the day evidently envisioned in Sirach 50. See Patrick Skehan and Alexander DiLella, The Wisdom of Ben Sira (AB 39; New York: Doubleday, 1987) 550–1. Jesus’ priestly posture in Luke 24:50–53 is widely acknowledged. “Dass Hände sich erheben, Worte gesprochen werden, dass Gesegnete dankbar niederknien, das alles spricht auch für einen priesterlichen Akt Jesu,” (Bovon, Lukas 4, 616; cf. also 613 on the connection to Sirach 50). The priestly and prophetic imagery are again blended in this passage. See Ulrich Kellermann, “Zu den Elia-Motiven in den Himmelfahrtsgeschichten des Lukas,” in Altes Testament: Forschung und Wirkung: Festschrift für Henning Graf Reventlow (Peter Mommer and Winfried Thiel, eds.; Frankfurt: Lang, 1994) 123–37. 58 See Otto Hofius, “Vergebungszuspruch und Vollmachtsfrage. Mk 2,1–12 und das Problem priestlicher Absolution im antiken Judentum,” in Neutestamentliche Studien (WUNT 132; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000) 57–69. Hofius shows quite clearly that, contrary to the claim of certain authors, there is no substantial evidence that the Jewish priests granted absolution. 59 See Otto Hofius, “Jesu Zuspruch der Sündenvergebung: Exegetische Erwägungen zu Mk 2,5b,” in Neutestamentliche Studien, 38–56. Hofius sees a direct divine agency behind Jesus’ forgiveness of sins. Given the parallel between Luke’s Jesus and Melchizedek in 11Q13, it is significant that Van de Water (“Michael or YHWH?” 75–86) argues, in terms reminiscent of Bauckham, that Melchizedek in 11Q13 is not an created angelic intermediary, as often proposed, but a figure comparable to Philo’s λόγος. 60 See Weinert, “Abandoned House,” 68–76. Weinert helpfully challenges excessively supersessionist readings of the Temple built upon the “Conzelmann-Haenchen Consensus” (cf. Chapter One §1.2.2). This is one of several difficulties the theory of Lukan authorship of Hebrews must face, pace David Allen, Lukan Authorship of Hebrews (NAC Studies in Bible and Theology 8; Nashville: B & H Academic, 2010). 61 Since the priestly blessing followed the blood ritual, a highly suggestive parallel emerges: both the High Priest, Simeon, in Ben Sira and Jesus in Luke “impart the blessing after the atonement sacrifice. Simeon’s blessing concludes the ceremony on the Day of

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Releasing human beings from their debts of sin in the sight of God is the effect of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross… Accordingly for Luke, Jesus, through his sacrifice on the cross, fulfilled and surpassed the OT cultic institution together with its priesthood. Further Jesus, according to Luke, is the supreme high priest and the perfect mediator between God and humankind. That is why he concludes his Gospel narrative with the priestly blessing of the risen Lord.62

Greater care should perhaps be taken in articulating the precise way Jesus’ priesthood relates to the Mosaic dispensation, and how his death is understood; but the key point is clear. For Luke, Jesus’ mediating agency in the release of “debts” has a priestly character somehow bound up with his Great Release upon the cross (Luke 23:34). This hieratic Lukan coloring presents an interesting complement to Matthew’s striking Christological identification of Jesus with the poor (Matt 25:31–46; cf. Mark 14:5–8). Just as the sacramental place of the poor developed in close association with a priestly prototype (see Chapter Three §3.2.1.1), so it appears that the two evangelists accent alternate elements of this complex of tradition. For Luke, (Pharisaic) hospitality shown to Jesus, but not to the needy (e.g. Luke 14:1–24), is no more effective than gifts made to the priests, but not “perfected” (τελειόω) by openhandedness with the poor (Sir 7:31–32). The works of the Temple require the works of mercy to reach their proper end (cf. Hos 6:6). 63 Likewise, a share in the fruits of Jesus’ priestly offering for the forgiveness of sins requires an exercise of charity towards the poor. Seen from this priestly angle, Luke presents a distinctly “higher” charity Christology than Matthew.64 In associating Jesus more closely with the “divine” member of the priest-poor complex, Luke invests Jesus with the glory of heavenly service (cf. Sir 50:5–12). Without diminishing Matthew’s sacramentality, the first evangelist plots Christ along a fully kenotic axis; whereas, anthropologically speaking, Luke could not have found a more suitable symbol for the divinely appropriated, vertically oriented and numinous sacramental humanity of Jesus. The priest, despite all this, remains a created image of God. Here Bauckham’s helpful distinction between the mediation of “principal agents” and the

Atonement and Jesus blesses after his atonement sacrifice on the cross,” Andrews George Mekkattukunnel, The Priestly Blessing of the Risen Christ: An Exegetical-Theological Analysis of Luke 24:50–53 (New York: Peter Lang, 2001) 226. 62 Ibid., 226–7. 63 The min in Hos 6:6b is comparative, not negative. “Sacrifice is not denigrated; it is simply put in second place,” Francis Andersen and David Noel Freedman, Hosea (AB 24; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1980) 430. 64 Matthew has other resources, it is important to acknowledge, where his own Christology is “higher” than Luke (e.g. προσκυνεῖν). See Leim, Matthew’s Theological Grammar.

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divine identity of “hypostatized divine aspects” must not allow the High Christology school to marginalize or obscure the patterns of created agency accommodated in the Gospels – including the supposedly “low” elements in Luke’s picture. Otherwise, the narration of Nicea and rightful stress on Jesus’ divinity will become a caricature, insensitive to important “pressures” pushing on towards Chalcedon. The early Church was not without insight in assigning its symbol to Luke’s Gospel. This book of the Gospel well befits a calf, because it begins with priests and ends with the calf who, taking upon himself the sins of all, was sacrificed for the life of the whole world. So he was a priestly calf. For the same is both calf and priest. Priest, because he is our propitiator – for we have him as an Advocate with the Father; calf, because he redeemed us with his own blood.65

Luke is indeed the cult-centered Gospel, and this must have its implications. The priest is inevitably a bridge, at once identified with God and with the people. The resources for a Lukan inflection of Jesus as inseparably θεός ἀληθῶς and ἄνθρωπος ἄληθῶς are available in a variety of ways.66 Perhaps the priestly character of the Jesus in the Third Gospel provides a privileged scriptural language for (and revelation of) this mystery. 5.4.2 The (Divine and Human) Works of Salvation The Third Gospel and the early Church stand in substantial harmony on the essential question of who Jesus is.67 To this extent, the endorsement of patristic and rabbinic models of interpretation at various places in this study – both in broad perspective (allegory) and on specific points – serves to underline such continuity and close the gap often posed between the world of the New Testament and the Church of the fourth and fifth centuries. 68 A traceable

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Saint Ambrose of Milan, Exposition of the Holy Gospel According to Saint Luke (Theodosia Tomkinson, trans.; Etna, CA, Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies, 1998) 14–5. 66 It is natural that the Gospel that identifies Mary as ἡ µήτηρ τοῦ κυρίου (Luke 1:43) – where “Lord” recalls the God of Israel (cf. Rowe, Early Narrative Christology, 34–49) – might have a unique sympathy with the theology implicit in the later title Theotokos. To the extent that monophysitism imperils the full humanity of Christ, it is worth observing the apologetic nature of Luke 24:36–40, which is widely held to be directed against an early form of docetism. See Daniel Smith, “See a Pneuma(tic Body): The Apologetic Interests of Luke 23:36–42,” CBQ (2010) 752–72. 67 Richard Hays (Reading Backwards, 72) rightly speaks of the “the theological coherence between Luke’s narrative testimony and what the church’s dogmatic tradition has classically affirmed about the identity of Jesus.” 68 Without disavowing the real distance between the world of the New Testament and the post-Constantinian Church, the more genuine and difficult gap is that which separates modern readers from this ancient context. If the modern historical-critical effort itself can

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“trajectory” runs from Second Temple Judaism, though the Gospel, to the theological culture(s) of Origen, Ephrem, and Augustine. In at least one bold patristic topos – the “Devil’s Ransom” theory – Luke’s charity discourse even stands as the critical link in the chain (see Chapter Two, Excursus). Stress on such continuity will inevitably be challenged in certain quarters of New Testament studies. An informed and confident interpretative community, nevertheless, exists which will welcome this result. Within this still forming academic-confessional context, however, it remains much easier (and more pleasant) to rally around Nicea and Chalcedon than Trent or Luther. Unfortunately, the scriptural data uncovered in this study drives not only towards a new embrace of classic, creedal Christology, but also towards the sadly divisive controversies of the sixteenth century. As indicated in the first chapter, an adverse doctrinal “pressure” has seemingly misshaped New Testament exegesis. The long wake of the Reformation has long disturbed a clear perception of biblical charity traditions. 69 A key result of this study, however, has been the demonstration that Luke’s Gospel pushes back against any attempted erasure of merit theology or so-called “works righteousness.” In continuity with a deeply written Jewish worldview, Luke simply accepts the idea that, as sin contracts a debt, so credit accrues for performing good works – even to the point of meriting the resurrection. The recent (2016) volume of David Downs, an Episcopalian evangelical scholar, marks the distance protestant scholarship has traveled since Roman Garrison’s 1993 monograph. Where Garrison found the notion of redemptive almsgiving to be a disturbing subversion of orthodox atonement through Christ’s cross alone, Downs is more generous. Although he begins his book with the same rhetorical confrontation of atonement by Christ versus atonement by works of mercy, he ultimately follows another line. “In contrast to earlier assessments of atoning almsgiving, it shall be argued here that – far from compromising or contradicting the affirmation that salvation and forgiveness of sin come through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus – patristic proponents of atoning almsgiving generally represent a faithful hermeneutical embodiment of the early church’s inherited Scriptures, particularly since the biblical texts themselves present care for the poor as having the

help locate patristic modes of thought in the scriptures, however, an important path is opened to the revitalization of such interpretation. See the thoughtful remarks of Brian Daley, “Is Patristic Exegesis Still Usable?” in The Art of Reading Scripture (Ellen F. Davis and Richard B. Hays, eds.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003) 69–88. 69 This does not imply that practical concern for the poor evaporated as a result of the Reformation. It was, nevertheless, fundamentally transformed. Lutheran historian Carter Lindberg (Beyond Charity: Reformation Initiatives for the Poor [Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1993]) provides a fascinating account of the transition from medieval almsgiving piety to expressions of social care derived from the theological principles of the Reformation.

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potential to secure future reward, and even the cleansing of sin, for those who practice mercy.” 70 An additional, fresh avowal comes in Downs’ acknowledgement that “it is a false assumption that all giving (or ‘true’ giving) must be free and disinterested…[and] the expectation of return – a return either from the recipient or from God – invalidates the gift.”71 This effectively overturns the entrenched Kantian deontology that, as Klaus Koch said, made the notion of heavenly treasure “für den Protestanten eine abscheuliche Vorstellung.”72 One of the striking and peculiar aspects of Downs’ treatment, however, which leaves his attempt to articulate a scripturally based theology of atoning alms curiously crippled, is his resistance to the idea that heavenly treasure appears in Second Temple thought (e.g. Tobit, Sirach).73 Connected with this position is Downs’ conscious decision not to foreground the economic metaphor of redemption (e.g. Dan 4:27 [MT 4:24]).74 As he observes rightly and helpfully enough, other metaphors for the treatment of sin also exist in the scriptures (e.g. covering, cleansing, destroying, extinguishing, lightening,



70 Downs, Alms, 5–6; also 278–81. Throughout the book, Downs is admirably sensitive to “Protestant traditions suspicious of the notion that atonement for sin can be obtained on the basis of a human deed like caring for the poor” (177; cf. 178 fn 8). 71 Ibid., 18. 72 Koch, “Schatz im Himmel,” 52. 73 See Downs, Alms, 57–81. Downs interprets Tobit 4:9, for instance, in an intramundane sense: “In its context in the narrative of Tobit… the phrase ‘storing up a good treasure for yourself against a day of necessity’ refers simply to security against future fiscal disaster… by lending to others in the present” (64). The localization of a strong almsgiving ethic specifically in deuterocanonical books like Tobit and Sirach has obviously played a significant role in the eclipse of the praxis in Protestant theology. Downs decides to treat the “Apocrypha” in a different chapter than the “Hebrew-Aramaic Bible and Its Greek Translation.” He admits the artificially of this procedure, which reinscribes the 16th century canon debates. He likewise wonders aloud with T. Michael Law how Protestant theology might change if the LXX were again read as an authoritative source for Christian belief and practice, as it was in the early Church (285–6). 74 Ibid., 50–6. Against a considerable number of semitic philologists, Downs contends that ‫ צדקה‬in Dan 4:24 MT, though combined with ‫“( במחן ענין‬mercy to the oppressed”), cannot be understood to mean “alms” but should be taken simply as the just administration associated with royal ideology. “In the present context, Daniel is addressing a king whose responsibility is to maintain justice throughout the land. Nebuchadnezzar is not called privately to make charitable contributions to the poor from his personal resources.” Anderson (“Treasure in Heaven,” 38) responds by asking Downs, who attributes the meaning “alms” to the Greek translation of the text, to provide a discussion of the Aramaic evidence, which he has ignored in favor of, as Downs calls it, “the larger sociopolitical context.” This objection highlights Downs’ methodological option in favor of a contextually configured “monosemic bias,” which frequently disinclines him from understanding ἐλεηµοσύνη as “almsgiving.” See Alms, 37 and passim.

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washing, etc.). 75 It remains true, nonetheless, that the debt/credit thesaurus metaphor retains a logical primacy in the essentially economic matter of almsgiving, so that re-applied images of atonement like “covering” in 1 Pet 4:8, borrowed from another, cultic discourse, owe their existence in connection with works of mercy to the prior conceptual emergence of redemptive alms.76 In the end, Downs’ honest “attempt to tell the story of the emergence of atoning almsgiving” has taken a significant, but still hesitant step in the direction of early Christian “works righteousness.” The result is often a surprisingly horizontal rendering of the earliest sources, still wary perhaps about too bold a rhetoric concerning the heavenly effects of earthly charity. Ironically, this leaves the work insensitive to the whole sacramental dimension of almsgiving explored in this study as the base for a Christological re-orientation of Jewish charity traditions. It is this precisely dimension, however, that offers the key to the problem that both Downs and Garrison pose about the compatibility of atoning human works of mercy and a Christocentric soteriology. Downs sees quite clearly that the early Church saw no problem on this front, but it is not always clear how Downs himself justifies the theological Wirkungsgeschichte he so ably exposes.77 The question of divine-human cooperation in salvation must thus continue to be pressed. Gary Anderson’s creative reposing of the relation of works and faith represents an irenic and very valuable contribution to the controversial aspect of this issue.78 Above all he provides, through the worldview of charity, a perspective in which both the divine and human moments of salvation are seen to interpenetrate. Faith and works cohere because in a real way acting is believing, and “the giving of alms need not be construed as a purely human work.”79



75 “The term ‘atoning almsgiving’ represents a departure from ‘redemptive almsgiving,’ the latter of which has become the most commonly used phrase,” Downs, Alms, 8–9; see also 175–201. 76 One might note that Jacob Milgrom argues that ‫ כפר‬carries two basic understandings of atonement: “purify” (ritually) and “redeem” by substitution. The latter meaning stands behind the scapegoat ritual in Lev 16, and “in this usage, kipper derives from kōper, ‘ransom,’ as may be seen from the collection of ‘atonement money’ as a kind of head tax (Ex 30:16) and the prohibition against ransoming someone guilty of murder (Nu. 35:31– 33),” TDOT VII, 293. 77 See Anderson, “Treasure in Heaven,” 39. 78 See, e.g., Anderson, Sin, 152–63; and Charity, 37–52. 79 Anderson, Sin, 159. Anderson also cites Aquinas, who (underscoring a theme developed by Anderson himself) indicates how almsgiving can be understood as an act of worship (latria) rather than simply satisfaction. Reardon (“Cleansing through Almsgiving,” 474), reacting to a false dichotomy of interior faith and exterior works remarks: “Almsgiving is a representation of the whole self. One’s actions are part of one’s being, so that almsgiving embodies one’s existence, not simply exterior works.”

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This hardly settles the old Reformation debates. Nevertheless, it challenges a certain satisfied monergistic view and any simplistic schema of “getting in” by grace and “staying in” by works. Such a progression certainly distorts the soteriological apportioning of divine and human agency (and tacitly reembeds a sixteenth century prejudice within the work of New Testament scholars).80 From Luke’s perspective, clearly, the gift-giving of God and the gift-giving of men stand in a much more nuanced and profound relation. Luke’s special contribution to the ordering of this very difficult area of theology might be captured in three key ideas. (1) Tempered Apocalyptic. Any full doctrine of God’s “unsearchable” (ἀνεξεραύνητα) act of predestination must take into account an array of biblical witness. Paul’s disturbing vasa honoris and vasa contumeliae (Rom 9:11– 13) has classically played a major role, but the Lukan contribution to such a synthesis is weighty and has not been properly felt. It lies above all in the evangelist’s moderated apocalyptic view. Luke’s adaptation of apocalyptic dualism explicitly disrupts an extracanonical Second Temple pattern of double predestination. 81 In the Third Gospel the rich enjoy the possibility of repentance and have (in the Law and Prophets) all that is required for their salvation. Luke accordingly eliminates God’s active reprobation of the rich, as this is found in 1 Enoch and other similar deterministic contemporaneous sources. While the poor are still passively saved by God’s preferential predilection, the redemption of the rich operates on the plane of their active works. One is saved, then, either by predestination (poverty) or by repentance, and these two orders of salvific causality, divine and human, function in some uncertain asymmetric concord. It would be possible to extract from Luke’s handling of the rich a notion of gratia mere sufficiens (i.e. not all grace is gratia efficax), though this would only expose deeper underlying issues. To the more fundamental question of free will (i.e. both in the state of sin and in confrontation with grace), Luke’s commitment to the possibility of repentance is (as Erasmus argued) perhaps

80

The distinction between operative and co-operative grace was endorsed by Aquinas (and Augustine!), centuries before Calvin (cf. ST I-II, q. 3 a. 2), and this binary does not articulate a contradictory manner of opposition. The language of monergism, however, is more problematic since it is (generally) understood as incompatible with synergism. In a related way, the metaphysical consistency of Luther’s doctrines of justification and the cooperation of God and human in salvation has been forcefully challenged by a variety of scholars. See Eilert Herms, “Opus Dei gratiae: Cooperatio Dei et hominum: Luthers Darstellung seiner Rechtfertigungslehre in De servo arbitrio,” Lutherjahrbuch 78 (2011) 61– 135. 81 Esler (Community and gospel, 189–91) commends Luke’s departure from 1 Enoch, but only since such Enochic apocalyptic is an inferior precursor to Luke’s this-worldly social ethic. Because Esler neglects the theological substructure of Luke’s vision, he reduces the evangelist’s perspective to a moralizing, immanent construct.

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as direct and bold an affirmation as can be expected, short of open philosophizing.82 But just here Luke’s association with Paul and acceptance of Pharisaic theology as the doctrinally correct and formally normative expression of Judaism is highly relevant.83 The Pharisee Josephus depicts his party (with whatever imported philosophical coloring) as that group in Israel that simultaneously affirms both fate (εἱµαρµένη) and free will (τὸ πράττειν τὰ δίκαια καὶ µή), in contrast to the fatalistic view of the Essenes (A.J. 18.1.3; 13.5.9; B.J. 2.8.14; cf. m. Aboth 2:16).84 Luke’s own objectives in writing the Gospel provide no occasion to make such a direct double affirmation. Nevertheless, in positioning himself relative to the types of dualism found at Qumran, he recognizes both the fact of a sin-bound captivity to Satan/Belial – and that entering the Kingdom yet “lies within your power” (Luke 17:21). Luke’s discerning reception of apocalyptic traditions provides an important point of reference for contemporary theology, which in various ways is both attracted and repulsed by the apocalyptic temper.85 The Gospel also speaks directly to Reformation era thought. It would be fascinating to investigate how the massive swell in apocalyptic moods during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries corresponds to the rise of double predestination as a confessional position. 86 The two trends are not unrelated. Whatever socio-

82

On the denial of free will in the early Reformation context, see Wilfried Härle and Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer, eds., Prädestination und Willensfreiheit: Luther, Erasmus, Calvin, und ihre Wirkungsgeschichte: Festschrift für Theodor Mahlmann zum 75. Geburtstag (Marbuger theologische Studien 99; Leipzeig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2009). See also Council of Trent, Session VI, canons iv-v. 83 Luther’s enlistment of Paul as a star witness in De Servo Arbitrio must imagine the Apostle’s complete break with the Pharisaic affirmation on free will. Such historical discontinuity would correspond to Luther’s highly antithetical (and problematic) construction of Law and Gospel. 84 For a very thorough discussion of the issues in the interpretation of these texts, see Steve Mason, Flavius Josephus on the Pharisees (Leiden: Brill, 1991) 132–55 and “Appendix B,” 384–98. 85 Luke offers contemporary theology a more assimilable mode of apocalyptic, than the unwholesome fierceness of the “apocryphal Jewish apocalypses which,” Hans Urs von Balthasar says, “grew in an inauthentic position between the genuine old covenant and the Gospel of Christ,” The Glory of the Lord VI: Theology of the Old Covenant (San Francisco: Ignatius) 316. Von Balthasar’s simultaneous revulsion and fascination with apocalyptic theology is striking. See Cyril O’Regan, Theology and the Spaces of Apocalyptic (Père Marquette Lecture in Theology 40; Milwaukee: Marquette University, 2009). O’Regan detects a general 20th century “turn to apocalyptic” and attempts to construct a typology for the ways these themes find expression within systematic theology (“epistemic and ethical”). 86 See, e.g., Robin Barnes, “Eschatology, Apocalypticism, and the Antichrist,” in T & T Clark Companion to Reformation Theology (David Whitford, ed.; New York: Bloomsbury T & T Clark, 2012) 233–55; Richard Bauckham, Tudor Apocalypse: Sixteenth Century Apocalypticism, Millenarianism, and the English Reformation: From John Bale to John

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historical explanations might help explain the period’s preoccupation with these themes,87 it is certain that Luke’s Gospel – apart from its dubious enlistment in the service of Molina’s contrafactuals – did not make an adequate impact on the predestination debate.88 (2) The “Heaping Measure.” Luke’s assignment of forgiveness of sins to God and forgiveness of debts to disciples ensures a clear partition between divine and human agency in salvation (cf. Luke 11:4).89 In the dialectic of mercy and justice, however, these two levels of mercy nevertheless intersect in an important way. In particular, the exercise of human mercy invites a return demonstration of heavenly justice. This is the reciprocity ethic driving the Luke’s Sermon on the Plain material (Luke 6:27–36). At times this principle of justice (Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang) is imagined as a strict exchange: mercy given for mercy earned – thus, in some strict sense, justice and not really mercy (or mercy as justice). This perspective of even exchange predominates when human agents are envisioned as the reciprocators or executors of the heavenly reward (e.g. “friends in heaven”).

Foxe and Thomas Brightman (Oxford: Sutton Courtenay, 1978); and Irena Backus, Reformation Readings of the Apocalypse: Geneva, Zurich, Wittenberg (Oxford Studies in Historical Theology; Oxford: Oxford University, 2000). 87 Interest in double predestination is wider than the Reformed tradition, with which it is usually associated. Though the doctrine became a point of special controversy between Lutherans and Calvinists, there are early Lutheran expressions of the idea. See Robert Korb, “Nikolaus von Amsdorf on Vessels of Wrath and Vessels of Mercy: A Lutheran’s Doctrine of Double Predestination,” HTR 69 (1976) 325–44. The codification of the Bezan position against Arminius and the Remonstrants at the Synod of Dordt (1618–19) bears a noted resemblance (in some respects) to the Catholic controversy between Bañez and Molina. Jacob Arminius was acquainted with and incorporated elements of his contemporary Luis de Molina’s theory of middle knowledge. See Eef Decker, “Was Arminius a Molinist?” Sixteenth Century Journal 27 (1996) 337–52. See also William den Boer, God’s Twofold Love: The Theology of Jacob Arminius (1559–1609) (Reformed Historical Theology 14; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2010) 144, esp. fn. 305. 88 A scientia media – dubiously grounded in Jesus’ “counterfactual” apocalyptic Wehruf against Choarzin (Luke 10:13 || Matt 11:20) – was not the only available bulwark against arbitrary divine reprobation. The Dominican school, close as it was to the Calvinist camp, found Molina’s Concordia a false and prurient effort to harmonize divine and human freedom, but also preferred an apophatic reserve not exercised at Dordt. The Dominican solution was simply to acknowledge two parallel ranges of scriptural texts (mapping onto two orders of causality), without seeking a univocal resolution. 89 The mingling of Isa 61:1–2 and Isa 58:6 in Luke 4:18–19 represents the same coordination of divine and human mercy seen in Luke 11:4 and elsewhere in the Gospel. Luke has detected a double agency in Isaiah’s language: the Lord’s anointed releases Israel from the bonds of their captivity (Isa 61:1–2); yet Israel itself is also asked “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke” (Isa 58:6), through works of mercy like feeding the hungry and clothing the naked (Isa 58:7).

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In certain contexts, however, the divine show of justice by which human mercy is repaid is imagined as a proportional manner of recompense, a loosely (favorably!) measured thing. How, after all, could resurrection, eternal life, really be a just reward for the mere giving of alms? Luke captures the blending of justice and mercy with rare success through the use of a unique image: “the heaping measure,” a divine passive expressing the generous, yet measured way human mercy is repaid by God’s merciful justice. “Give and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure you measure out will be measured back to you” (Luke 6:38).90 The scholastic language of meritum de congruo (vs. de condigno) was already noted in the last chapter as a fitting way to encapsulate the substance of this evocative image: God’s uncontainable mercy, apportioned with a liberal (not miserly or exacting) justice. Even in measured, contractual exchange, God remains a generous giver – just as he asks his disciples to be. Whether or not one fills the narrative gap at the end of the parable of the Steward with such a show of God’s more than just mercy, the language of “giving” in Luke 6:38 belongs to the same expansive charity discourse as the Steward’s act of debt release. In various ways, in aphorism and allegory, the Third Gospel thus points to a kind of human initiative, a moral space defined by the disciples’ own behavior, which God respects for the (wide or meager) parameters it sets to his own expansive display of uncontainable mercy. This Gospel dynamic of providing the judge with the measuring cup by which his own excess of mercy will be ladled out offers a potent imaginative reconciliation of God’s full respect for human action and simultaneous freedom to act beyond its bounds. (3) Charity as Sacrifice. Reformation controversies over the sacrificial character of the Eucharist have, in large sectors of Christian theology, resulted in a major lost resource for the theological imagination. The close association of early (and medieval) Christian charity with the Eucharistic cult has thus not been exploited as it might be.91 It is an accurate context, however,



90 See Kloppenborg, “Agrarian Discourse,” 104–28; and Couroyer, “il vous sera mesuré,” 366–70. 91 Anderson (Charity 174–81, 184–6) has drawn attention to continuous logic binding biblical charity and the medieval offering of masses for the souls in purgatory. Downs saves his final footnote and thus the book’s last word to address “Anderson’s defense of the Catholic doctrine of the church’s thesaurus meritorum, purgatory, and indulgences” (Alms, 286 fn. 31). It is representative that Downs sees the major difference from Anderson’s theology as a question of doctrines grounded in a canonical dispute – not simultaneously in a divergence of ecclesial, sacramental praxis. Downs’ theological project has the very protestant (and very good!) aim of showing the hermeneutical grounding of early Church praxis and theology in scriptural texts – and a similar protestant insensitivity to the sacrificial imagery of the same, e.g. Tobit 4:11. On the Catholic debate about the material

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for approaching Luke’s unique contribution (see Chapter One §1.3.2 and Chapter Three §3.3.3). The deep Second Temple connection between almsgiving and the priestly cult is critical for understanding Luke. It establishes the space in which he poses his hieratic ἄφεσις Christology. In enabling this forceful image of divine-human mediation focused on the person of Jesus, however, the priestly power of charity to atone for sins invites a tremendous Christian reorientation. In place of the Jewish link between charity and the cult Luke makes a link between Jesus’ death on the cross and the sacrifice of charity. The text of Acts 10:3–4 is important here, for Cornelius’ almsgiving and prayer are described in cultic terms as a memorial offering (εἰς µνηµόσυνον, Acts 10:4).92 Francis Carpinelli has strongly stressed this sacrificial status of charity in Judaism and Luke-Acts. The non-ritual institution of almsgiving is expiatory in Israel… Acts 10:3–4 and Acts 10:30–31 show that the implied author shares the belief in its expiatory efficacy when it is conjoined with liturgical prayer. God atones for himself, usually through a priest, in order that the people and an individual person may offer worship that is acceptable (δεκτός). To that end he provides the expiatory means, namely, memorials which give the worshiper hope for mercy and blessing…by sacrificial prayer with acts of mercy (ἐλεηµοσύνη) an Israelite, according to both the LXX (in Tobit and Sirach) and to Luke-Acts, obtains a memorial before God… Alms atone. With prayer made in unison with the temple liturgy they extend the sacrificial system.93

Carpinelli is careful to say that the union of charity with the Temple cult is essential. It is the conjunction with priestly atonement that somehow invests charity with its ultimate atoning power, for the offerings of charity and the cult reciprocally perfect one another. Cornelius’ own pattern of praying διὰ παντός (which should be translated as “regularly” rather than “constantly”) and the angel’s visit during his customary time of prayer at the ninth hour (cf. Luke 1:10–11) – when the daily Tamid sacrifice was offered in the Temple – demonstrate that Cornelius’ piety, expressed as inseparable charity and prayer, was ritually synchronized

sufficiency of scripture, see Daniel Eichhorn, Katholisches Schriftprinzip? Josef Rupert Geiselmanns These der materialen Schriftsuffizienz (Studia Oecumenica Friburgensia 66; Münster, Aschendorff, 2016). 92 A very similar idea appears in Tobit, where charity is viewed as a δῶρον ἀγαθόν...ἐνώπιον τοῦ ὑπψίστου (4:11) and as a memorial. Macatangay (“Acts of Remembrance,” 79) comments: “Tobit asserts that the purpose of the practice of righteousness and the doing of charity and almsgiving is to remember God and to praise his name. Through acts of charity, those outside the land confirm that they remember God.” 93 Francis Giordano Carpinelli, “‘Do This as My Memorial’ (Luke 22:19): Lukan Soteriology of Atonement,” CBQ 61 (1999) 74–91, here 83–5, emphasis added.

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with the sacrificial cult. 94 This coordination with the sacrificial cult is no accident.95 It is probably correct that “when Luke alludes to the Tamid service, it is not to fasten attention on a particular ritual,” but to conjure up the most characteristic service: the daily heartbeat of the Temple.96 Even so, it is interesting to note that the Tamid was funded by the Temple Tax, since such monetary gifts to the sanctuary were understood as a way of making all the contributors “present” and thus partakers of the Temple sacrifice (like the ma‘amadot).97 Like his prayer, Cornelius’ gift of charity somehow sets him in the Temple, represents him as a memorial in the heavenly court itself (ἔµπροσθεν τοῦ θεοῦ, Acts 10:4) As important as Cornelius’ attunement with the Temple cult, is Luke’s unique portrayal of the Eucharistic ritual in the same cultic terminology of a memorial sacrifice (εἰς τὴν ἐµὴν ἀνάµνησιν, Luke 22:19): an offering instituted to remind God of human need.98 The Tamid itself was Israel’s great memorial (Exod 28:29); and, in this case, Jesus’ institution of a memorial of bread and wine depict him “establishing a new ritual parallel to (and contrasting with?) other cultic memorials, such as the Passover (Luke’s immediate framework) and the daily Tamid service.” 99 Jesus’ own death at the ninth hour, moreover, presents his own bloody offering in direct parallel with Israel’s sacrificial lamb (i.e. the daily Tamid lamb directly, but by association also the Passover lamb). Through the binding of the bread memorial to the cross, then, this new lamb offering somehow perfects the bloodless Eucharis-

94

See Denis Hamm, “The Tamid Sacrifice in Luke-Acts: The Cultic Background behind Luke’s Theology of Worship (1:5–25; 18:9–14; 24:50–53; Acts 3:1; 10:3, 30),” CBQ 25 (2003) 215–31. 95 An attunement to the sacrificial life of the Temple was part of Jewish daily prayer during the period. See Jeremy Penner, Patterns of Daily Prayer in Second Temple Period Judaism (STDJ 104; Leiden: Brill, 2012) 35–72. 96 Hamm, “Tamid Sacrifice,” 231. 97 “Since the daily sacrifice was performed on behalf of all Israel, and since all Israel could not be physically present at the Temple every day, the representative laymen and the public financing allowed the entire community a symbolic presence,” Murphy, Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 231. There was actually a dispute over how the Tamid should be financed, whether from public (so the Essenes and Pharisees) or private (so the Sadducees) funds. 98 Carpinelli, “My Memorial,” 75–80, 87. Carpinelli goes astray when he sharply distinguishes atonement (ἱλάσκοµαι, ‫ )כפר‬and “redemption” (λυτρόω) as though the latter concerned only liberation from “some historical evil” while the former dealt with sin. To acknowledge that “in the Third Gospel Jesus liberates [i.e. redeems] by defeating Satan,” and to see that λύτρον could refer to the money paid as a ransom from slavery, demonstrates that in Luke’s Second Temple context, in which sin and debt slavery were aligned, “redemption” would have implied salvation from sin. See, e.g., Augustin George, “Le sens de la mort de Jésus pour Luc,” RB 80 (1973) 186–217. 99 Hamm, “Tamid Sacrifice,” 227.

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tic offering, in the same way that Cornelius’ spiritual sacrifice of charity (λογική λατρεία) is perfected by its attunement to the blood of the Temple cult. A decision on how precisely the sacrifice of Christ on the cross might perfect and inform charity, as the cross perfects and informs the Eucharist, or, from the other perspective, how charity might allow one to share in the fruits of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, ultimately depends on how Luke imagines the relationship between the Tamid (understood as representative of the whole Temple system) and the parallel offering of Christ on the cross at the ninth hour. Luke’s redactional movement of the tearing of the Temple veil to the moment before Jesus’ death seemingly suggests his communion with the Temple more than its replacement.100 If the Temple cult and Christ’s selfoffering coexist and coalesce in some significant sense, so that the Christian orientation to the Temple becomes inseparable from the new pattern of worship bound to Jesus’ sacrificial death, the distance between the Eucharistic meal and Cornelius’ almsgiving in Luke-Acts would seemingly be bridged.101 Christ’s self-offering, coordinated with and fulfilling the sacrificial status of the Temple cult, would thereby invest redemptive charity with its sacred power. Charity would be quasi-Eucharistic, a mode of participation in the God-man’s unique priestly work of ἄφεσις. The Christian Agape would be a seamless expression of divine and human love. These are hefty exegetical and theological proposals, however, and they are obviously made far too quickly in this context. The resolution of such long-standing controversies will not be accomplished in a few pages. The sins of Christian brother against Christian brother have made more chaos than we

100

See Denis Sylva, “The Temple Curtain and Jesus’ Death in the Gospel of Luke,” JBL 105 (1986) 239–50. 101 The “regular” prayer of the disciples in the Temple at the hours of prayer (διὰ παντός, Luke 24:23), even after Jesus’ resurrection, is as strong a confirmation as the Gospel could give of the coordination of the Temple cult and the new pattern of worship established by Jesus. The gift of Peter’s “alms” to the lame beggar, a “good deed” (εὐεργεσία, Acts 4:9) that exceeds any gift of silver and gold, is significantly offered at the “hour of prayer” (3:1). Here the Tamid sacrifice, underway at that very moment, is explicitly conjoined with the Name of the risen Jesus, by which Peter’s offering of “alms” is (more than) perfected. Peter fulfills Isa 60:1–2 with the surpassing power of Jesus’ own mission to the “poor.” The theme of eschatological joy in Acts, which begins here, is a response the “good news” offered to the poor. The absence of this pericope from studies of almsgiving in Luke-Acts neglects perhaps the most important witness to Luke’s vision of Christian charity as uniquely empowered and elevated by Christ. This charity, which has moved beyond the sharing of wealth to become, through the resurrection of Jesus, a generous sharing of life (ζωή), promises to bring about the restoration of Israel from Exile (Isa 35:6 LXX). On this symbolism of healing lame Israel, see Dennis Hamm, “Acts 3:12– 26: Peter’s Speech and the Healing of the Man Born Lame,” Perspectives in Religious Studies 11 (1984) 199–217.

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can undo. We require a miracle of God’s mercy. Reconciliation and communion in common acquiescence to the Truth must be a divine work – in which we participate.

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Index of Subjects and Names ’ăbaq-ribbît, 247 ’Abot – de R. Nathan, 154–155, 174 – mishnah, 36, 203 Abraham, 112–113, 134, 160, 173, 180, 208, 222, 227, 231, 239, 265–267, 271–274, 278, 281, 286, 295 agape – agapan in Luke, 100–109, 175 – agape feast, 183–184, 313 Ahiqar, 216, 228, 229 allegory, 2, 61, 62, 64, 142, 202, 205, 237, 244, 250, 303, 310 alms/almsgiving. See charity Anderson, Gary, VIII, 2, 13, 23, 29, 45, 48–52, 54, 56–57, 68–74, 77–80, 82–83, 85–87, 93, 133, 139, 146– 147, 169, 199, 210, 212, 218, 223, 257, 262–263, 305–306, 310, 353 anti-Judaism, 32, 36–37, 39, 46, 142, 293 apocalyptic, 3, 12–13, 18, 20–21, 56, 59, 60, 76, 78, 208, 228, 235, 254, 257, 259, 261–262, 264, 266, 268, 270, 282, 287, 296, 307, 308–309 Aquinas, Thomas, 48, 50, 57, 146, 269, 294, 306–307 Aramaic, 68–69, 77, 80–81, 88–89, 103–105, 112, 126, 153, 197, 233, 276–277, 305 Aristides, Apologist, 85, 178 Aseneth, 229–230, 274 atonement, 23–24, 28–29, 77–78, 133, 155, 227, 301–302, 304–306, 311– 312 Augustine, 30, 35, 61, 146, 190, 211, 231, 297, 304, 307 avodah (ǎbôdâ), 51, 155, 163

Beatitudes, 262 beggars, 10, 173, 229, 242 boundary marking, 11, 180, 183–185, 188, 191–192, 196–198, 208, 230, 237, 254, 280, 293 Brown, Peter, 1, 11, 22, 29 Bultmann, Rudolf, 26, 32, 54, 80, 164, 233, 268–269, 274 Calvin, John, 50, 307–308 Calvinism, 32, 309 Catholicism, 26, 31, 35–36, 49–50, 101, 134, 263, 293, 298, 309–310 Chalcedon, Council of, 303–304 charity – and dispossession, 21, 24, 26 – and evangelization, 178, 185, 188– 190 – and faith, 19, 264, 306 – and the cult, 51, 55, 145–147, 152, 154–156, 161–163, 174, 184, 294, 306, 310–311 – as enacted repentance, 126, 279 – atoning almsgiving, 24, 28–29, 85, 93, 153, 167, 261, 295, 304–306 – eleēmosynē, 25, 57–58, 93–94, 107– 108, 171–175, 181, 190, 212, 216– 217, 222, 225, 228–229, 235, 254, 263, 305, 311 – in the early Church, 1, 22, 29, 176– 179 – legislation, 45, 143, 147, 149, 152, 154, 157, 162, 172 – meritorious almsgiving, 50, 93, 127, 155, 203, 263 – organized charity (tamḥ ûy, qûppâ), 147, 178, 185 – redemptive almsgiving, 23, 52, 68, 93, 99, 113, 116, 127, 306, 313

362

Index of Subjects and Names

– saves from death, 3, 169, 210, 212– 213, 223, 227, 231, 273, 279, 281– 282 – works of mercy, 3, 24–25, 27, 51, 56–58, 94–95, 110, 117, 126, 137, 142, 149–150, 169–170, 172–175, 192, 198, 213, 217, 221, 223–224, 231, 241, 253, 260–261, 279–280, 287, 290, 302, 304, 306, 309 cheirographon, 133 Christology – almsgiving Christology, 30, 52, 110 – Christological mutation, 2, 52, 299 – Creditor Christology, 3, 68, 95, 118, 127, 232, 269, 290, 299 – debtor Christology, 3 – divine identity, 98, 303 – high Christology, 225, 299, 303 Christus Victor, 133–134, 139, 295, 296 commandment – as almsgiving, 108, 115–116, 154, 160, 169, 276, 294 – double commandment, 108, 152– 155, 157, 163, 165–166 – entolē, 163, 169 – equal to all, 180, 193–194, 198 – the greatest, 149, 157, 161, 163, 166, 169, 194, 198, 208, 294 Community Rule (1QS), 34, 43, 44, 69, 124, 131, 146, 149, 181, 235, 254, 258, 291 Conzelmann, Hans, 7, 23, 27, 30, 38, 43, 134, 139, 301 Cornelius – centurion, 24, 108, 173, 188–189, 222, 224–227, 229–230, 279, 286, 295, 311–313 – pope, 1, 178 credit, 3, 13, 49, 68, 70, 85, 106, 125, 193, 199, 252, 304, 306 Cyprian of Carthage, 1, 23, 203, 223, 276 Damascus Document (CD), 2, 3, 18, 143–152, 156, 171, 174, 179, 181– 182, 185, 195, 199, 206, 208, 258– 259, 288, 291 de Auxiliis controversy, 35

debt – debt-bondage, 59, 66, 73–75, 79, 81, 83–84, 93, 131–133, 137–138, 241– 243, 269, 300 – debtors, 66–67, 71, 81–85, 89, 91, 93, 95–96, 98–99, 117–119, 121, 124–126, 132–133, 137–138, 192, 196, 199, 242–244, 249, 250, 264, 300 – release, 67, 74, 78, 80, 88, 95, 99, 100, 111, 118, 126, 131, 253, 310 – remission, 3, 73, 75, 77, 79, 80, 82, 92, 95, 100, 130, 132, 242, 245–246, 269–270, 281, 291 denarii, 95, 110, 147, 175, 199, 203– 204 Devil’s Ransom, 3, 68, 127, 132, 137, 296, 304 Didache, 116, 154, 159, 160, 178, 180, 184, 190 Downs, David, VII, 22–23, 28–29, 50, 93, 108, 153, 203, 210, 212, 294– 295, 304–306, 310 eleos, 148, 173–174, 217 Enoch, First Book of, 3, 13–14, 16–18, 36, 84, 235, 256, 259–261, 279, 288, 307 Ephrem, 50, 99, 100, 304 Essenes, 143, 147–148, 150, 174, 180– 182, 185, 195, 208, 254–255, 308, 312 Eucharist, 51, 55, 183, 310, 313 euergetism, 108 Exile, 70, 74–76, 78, 84, 138, 195, 214– 217, 270, 313 forgiveness – ‘zb, 77 – aphesis, 21, 56, 94–95, 127, 287, 300 – by Jesus, 67, 92, 97, 102, 126, 139, 265, 287, 300, 304 – divine, 92, 96, 99, 117, 127, 290, 292 – of debts, 78, 95, 99, 121, 243, 245, 250, 269, 300, 309 – of others, 85, 92–94, 99, 119, 290

Index of Subjects and Names – of sins, 28, 63, 78, 88, 92, 95–96, 99, 102, 119, 134, 243, 245–246, 250, 280, 290, 295, 300–302, 304, 309 – šbq, 80 – by Jesus, 280 free will, 307–308 Frühkatholizismus, 27–28, 37 generosity, VIII, 6, 13, 19, 52, 81, 99, 107–108, 111, 116–117, 121, 123, 149, 151, 184, 186, 189–190, 196– 197, 203, 221–222, 224–225, 229, 242, 246, 250, 259, 275, 278, 279, 285, 304, 310, 313 gimîlût ḥăsādîm, 110, 160, 172, 175, 193 God-fearers, 63, 226, 229 Good Samaritan, 3, 25, 59, 108, 140, 141–142, 157, 161–164, 167, 170, 171, 174, 183, 189, 198–205, 207– 208, 210, 222, 286, 289, 290 good works, 27, 50, 101, 104, 106, 117, 124, 142, 189, 216, 221, 223–224, 252–253, 269, 281, 294, 304 grace, 27–28, 34–36, 50, 69, 77, 94, 243–244, 265, 271, 294, 307 great reversal, 13, 237, 282, 290 greed, 18–19, 24, 121–122, 136, 168, 220, 225, 234, 241, 257, 269, 276, 285–286 Haenchen, Ernst, 38, 41, 185–186, 224– 225, 301 harlot, 112, 114–116 Hellenism, 2, 3, 17, 30, 39, 41–46, 54, 68, 80, 87–88, 90, 93, 107–108, 148, 191, 206, 218, 220, 241 hospitality, 5–6, 55, 100, 111–113, 126, 174, 182, 188, 193, 202, 205, 238, 249, 250, 265, 272–273, 286, 289, 302 Ignatius of Antioch, 58, 184, 244 imitatio Christi, 20, 52, 208, 224, 291 imitatio Dei, 20, 52, 107, 159, 190, 291 immanent frame, 47 impurity, 145, 170, 182, 227 innkeepers, 198, 200 Irenaeus, 203, 205

363

irony, 32, 36, 192, 252–253, 255, 270 Isaiah, Book of, 2, 3, 17–18, 51, 63, 70– 78, 80, 96–97, 128–132, 135–139, 145, 150, 153, 155, 174, 179, 210, 212, 214, 223, 254, 269, 284, 286, 287–288, 297, 309, 313 James, Letter of, 112, 155–157, 174, 183, 187, 255 John the Baptist, 18, 46, 101, 206, 238, 244, 273 John, First Letter of, 104, 153–154, 158, 161, 163, 183, 195, 288, 294 Josephus, 40–41, 95, 104, 110, 112, 131, 148, 150, 154, 171, 174, 180, 182, 200, 219, 246, 272–273, 308 Jubilee, 50, 56, 59, 65, 68, 70–71, 74– 82, 89, 93–94, 97–98, 110–111, 127–132, 137, 139, 188, 191, 286– 287, 291, 300, 301 Jubilees, Book of, 76–77, 144, 149–150, 152, 154, 156, 158, 195, 270, 274, 281, 285 Jülicher, Adolf, 2, 60–62, 65, 101, 202, 235 justification, 269 Justin, Apologist, 107, 183–184 kašrût, 180, 230 Law, See Torah Leo the Great, 1, 29, 57, 146, 193 loans – among insiders, 175, 177, 191, 197, 200 – as social justice, 129, 157, 192–193 – in Deuteronomy, 107, 130–131, 192, 196–197 – in the Greco-Roman world, 83, 107, 124 – ḳ ebbelanūt, 199 – to God, 50, 125, 193, 203, 264 love – of enemies, 106, 142, 159, 160–161, 164, 190 – of God, 108, 152–155, 163, 170– 171, 206, 208 – of neighbor, 108, 151–152, 154, 161, 163

364

Index of Subjects and Names

Lucian, 39, 85, 176–178 Luther, Martin, 105, 230, 294, 304, 307–308 Lutheranism, 26, 296, 304, 309 mammon, 19, 153, 234–235, 249, 252– 253, 255, 258, 260, 261–263, 267, 279, 280 Manasseh, 215–216, 228, 271 Marcion, 37–38, 89, 178, 220 Matthew, Gospel of, 30, 46, 52, 58, 79, 81–86, 88–93, 95–96, 99, 105–110, 115, 117–119, 122, 125, 145, 154, 156, 157–161, 164–165, 167, 173– 174, 183, 186, 189–190, 194, 202– 203, 218, 221, 226, 255–257, 262, 268, 275–278, 289, 290–291, 300, 302, 309 Melchizedek, 77–78, 82, 98, 131–132, 287, 300–301 – 11Q13, 2–3, 77–78, 82, 98, 127– 128, 131–133, 208, 217, 243, 287– 288, 291, 300–301 merit, 13, 27–28, 30, 35, 49–50, 66, 124, 213, 219, 223, 226, 269, 281, 293, 304 met mi ṣ wâ, 171 metalepsis, 61, 142, 232–233, 250–251 metanoia, 46, 109, 125, 127, 209, 226, 238, 240, 253, 260, 267, 274, 279, 280, 291 middling classes, 10, 11 Midrash Rabbah, 113, 136, 145, 169, 180, 185, 194–196, 213, 275 narrative theology, 65, 98, 232, 287, 288 Nazarenes, Gospel of, 160–161, 168 Neusner, Jacob, 13, 32–34, 36, 74, 195, 227, 249, 276 New Exodus, 70, 73, 122, 133, 135, 287 New Perspective, 31, 34, 36, 198, 293, 296–297 Nicea, Council of, 299, 303–304 Origen, 61, 133–134, 160, 173, 204– 205, 276, 304 Our Father, 25, 67, 79, 81, 83, 86, 89, 94–95, 117, 245, 289

Passover, 51, 181, 184, 312 Paul – Pauline churches, 175, 185, 294 – Pauline Collection, 294–295 – Pauline scholarship, 31, 36, 44, 293, 295–296 – Pauline theology, 27–28, 37, 101, 113, 139, 155, 295–296 Pharisees, 15–16, 19, 32–33, 55, 63, 97, 101, 108, 110, 115, 121, 123, 161, 166, 168, 170–171, 189, 201, 206, 234, 237, 239–240, 244, 253, 255– 256, 259, 261, 268, 274–275, 277– 278, 280, 284, 308, 312 philanthrōpia, 155 Philo, 34, 96, 98, 110, 146, 148, 150, 171, 174, 180–181, 190, 193–195, 197, 219, 272, 301 poor – Armenfrömmigkeit, 12, 44, 146 – Christ in the, 30, 51, 110, 289, 302 – in Luke, 9, 11–13, 15–16, 262, 264, 270, 286, 289, 290 – ptōchos, 10–11, 17, 268 poverty, 5–6, 10–12, 14, 18, 44, 60, 91, 131, 151, 184, 191, 262, 264, 267, 269–270, 307 predestination, 3, 269, 282, 307–309 priesthood, 162, 264, 301–302 Prodigal Son, 63, 141, 200–201, 204, 209, 221, 233–234, 237, 238–242, 245, 247, 249, 268–271, 274, 280, 291 Proverbs, Book of, 2–3, 50–51, 107– 108, 150, 153, 159, 169, 193, 203, 210–215, 217–218, 220, 222–223, 227–228, 230–232, 255, 257–258, 262, 264, 266–267, 279–280, 288– 289, 292, 297, 300 prōzbūl, 81, 196, 247 purgatory, 85, 310 Qumran, 3, 12–13, 17–18, 43–44, 58, 69–70, 72, 78, 108, 130–131, 143– 144, 153, 181–182, 208, 226–227, 308 Rahab, 112–114, 116–117, 126

Index of Subjects and Names redemption, 68, 70–72, 75, 82, 85, 93, 100, 134–135, 137, 197, 212, 217– 218, 287, 291, 297, 300, 305, 307, 312 Reformation, 26, 28, 36, 38, 50, 53, 253, 296, 298, 304, 307–308, 310 repayment, 3, 70, 73–74, 137–138, 159, 195, 202, 257, 259, 264–265, 269, 281, 291 repentance, 3, 14, 16, 18, 21, 38, 46, 63, 67–68, 84, 90, 95–96, 98, 109, 112, 115, 117–118, 121, 123–124, 126– 127, 166–167, 189, 214–218, 221, 226–229, 231, 237–238, 240–242, 245, 248, 253, 255, 258–259, 261– 262, 266, 268, 270, 273–275, 277– 282, 287, 291, 307 resurrection, 3, 18–19, 21, 52, 56, 59, 65, 208–210, 213–221, 223–226, 228–229, 238, 240, 257, 264–266, 269, 271, 273–275, 278–281, 288, 291, 293, 295, 299, 304, 310, 313 reward, 21, 24, 27, 31, 46, 50, 52, 159, 196, 202–203, 211, 226, 230, 257, 263–266, 281, 287, 292, 305, 309, 310 Sacrament, 2, 51–56, 206, 267, 302, 306, 310 ṣaddiq, 211, 274 Sanders, E. P., 31–36, 49, 78, 111, 226– 227, 271–272, 293, 296–297 ṣedāqâ, 58, 144, 159, 163, 172, 175, 193, 210–214, 216, 226, 229, 230, 262, 266, 305 Selbsterlösung, 32, 50, 94, 253 self-interest, 232, 238, 246, 252–253, 257, 263, 280 šĕmiṭṭ â, 131, 191, 196 Septuagint, 17, 20, 45, 50, 74, 76, 80, 93, 103–104, 128–129, 130–131, 144, 170, 173, 179, 211–212, 214, 255, 261, 284, 305, 311, 313 sin – as debt, 70 – as debt, 3, 49–50, 67–69, 71–73, 77– 80, 82, 84, 86, 89–90, 95, 99, 118, 126–127, 208–209, 217–218, 243, 295, 299

365

– as defilement, 69 – as weight/burden, 68–69, 71, 134 – capital forms, 34, 115, 195, 259, 291 – remedies for, 305 Sirach, Book of, 14, 17, 51, 85, 94, 125, 146–147, 153, 156–157, 172–174, 181, 190, 203, 255, 258–262, 264, 279, 302 sola fide, 27, 101, 298 soteriology, 3, 21–23, 25, 27–30, 32, 34–36, 46, 50, 56, 68–69, 73, 79, 109, 139, 166, 209, 219, 227, 271, 281, 291, 293, 295, 306 spiritual sacrifice, 81–83, 91, 109, 120– 121, 124, 142, 153, 155, 161–162, 173, 208, 217, 265, 275, 286, 290, 295, 313 Stephen, deacon, 1, 93, 300 Synoptic Problem, 58 Tertullian, 169, 173–174, 177–178, 183, 185, 190, 267, 275–276, 278, 284 Testament of Job, 133–134, 173, 186, 229–230 Thomas, Gospel of, 64 Tobit, 2, 14, 21, 29, 106, 172, 175, 180– 181, 212, 214, 215–217, 219, 223, 226, 228–230, 255, 271, 288, 291, 305, 310, 311 Torah, 12, 27, 31–35, 37, 40, 45, 54, 73, 75, 77–78, 107, 128, 131–132, 141, 144, 146–147, 149, 151–152, 155– 158, 161–163, 165–170, 187–188, 192, 194–200, 204, 208, 226, 230– 231, 243, 271, 277, 284, 293–294, 297, 305, 307–308 treasure in heaven, 13, 24, 52, 57, 120, 125, 158–161, 254, 262–263, 265– 266, 268, 285–286, 288, 306, 310 Tun-Ergehen-Zusammenhang, 14, 20– 21, 46, 85, 215, 262–263, 309 Unjust Steward, 3, 209, 231–238, 243– 244, 246–247, 250, 252, 254–255, 260 usury, 192–200, 247, 249 wealth, 5, 7, 9–10, 16, 18–19, 43, 48, 56, 58, 94, 109, 120, 122, 124, 145,

366

Index of Subjects and Names

167, 176, 179, 189, 241–242, 254– 256, 258–262 wisdom theology, 13–14, 17, 20–21, 56, 59–60, 85, 115, 193, 211, 228–229,

235, 240, 249, 252, 257–259, 262, 264, 266, 277–278, 280, 285, 288 works righteousness, 27, 33, 293, 304, 306