Studies in Christianity and Judaism / Etudes sur Ie christianisme et Ie judai"sme Studies in Christianity and Judaism / Etudes sur Ie christi anisme et Ie judalsme publishes monographs on Christianity and Judaism in the last two centuries before the common era and the first six centuries of the common era, with a special interest in studies of their interrelationship or the cultural and social context in which they developed.
GENERAL EDITOR: Peter Richardson
University of Toronto
EDITORIAL BOARD: Paula Fredriksen
John Gager Olivette Genest Paul-Hubert Poirier Adele Reinhartz Stephen G. Wilson
Boston University Princeton University Universite de Montreal Universite Laval McMaster University Carleton University
Studies in Christianity and Judaism / Etudes sur Ie christianisme et Ie judalsme: 9 ~
STUDIES IN CHRISTIANITY AND JUDAISM / ETUDES SUR LE CHRISTIANISME ET LE JUDAISME Number 9
TEXT AND ARTIFACT IN THE RELIGIONS OF MEDITERRANEAN ANTIQUITY ESSAYS IN HONOUR OF PETER RICHARDSON Edited by Stephen G. Wilson and Michel Desjardins
Published for the Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion / Corporation Canadienne des Sciences Religieuses by Wilfrid Laurier University Press
We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program for our publishing activities.
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Main entry under title: Text and artifact in the religions of Mediterranean antiquity: essays in honour of Peter Richardson (Studies in Christianity and Judaism", Etudes sur Ie christianisme et Ie judaYsme ESCJ ; v. 9) Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-88920-356-3 1. Bible. N.T. - History of contemporary events. 2. Bible. N.T. - History of Biblical events. 3. Church history - Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600. 4. Bible. N.T.Criticism, interpretation, etc. 5. Judaism - History - Post-exilic period, 586 B.C.A.D. 210 6. Jews in the New Testament. I. Wilson, Stephen G. II. Desjardins, Michel Robert, 1951- . III. Richardson, Peter, 1935- . IV. Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion. V. Series.
BS241O.T49 2000
225.9'5
COO-930959-4
Printed in Canada
© 2000 Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion / Corporation Canadienne des Sciences Religieuses Cover design by Leslie Macredie. Front cover photograph by Graydon Snyder is the arch before the apse of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. Floral motifs used for the back cover and section divisions are from the Eastern Gate of the Temple of Jupiter in Damascus. Photographs compliments of Silke Force.
Text and Artifact in the Religions of Mediterranean Antiquity has been produced from a manuscript supplied in camera-ready form hy the editors. All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyrights hereon may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means-graphic, electronic or mechanical-without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any request for photocopying, recDrding, taping or reproducing in information storage and retrieval systems of any part of this book shall be diJected in writing to the Canadian Reprography Collective, 214 King Street West, Suite 312, Toronto, Ontario M5H 3S6. Order from:
Wilfrid Laurier University Press Wilfrid Laurier University Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3C5
CONTENTS
Preface .................................................... xi Partners in Publication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. xiii Contributors ................................................ xv
Part One Peter Richardson: Writer and Teacher
1.
Giving to Peter What Has Belonged to Paul .................... 3 MICHEL DESJARDINS
2.
The Professor's House .................................... 31 LAURENCE BROADHURST
Part Two Text and Artifact in the New Testament World
3.
Reading the Text and Digging the Past: The First Audience of Romans ., ........................... , 35 LLOYD GASTON
4.
Peter in the Middle: Galatians 2:11-21 ....................... 45 L. ANN JERVIS
5.
Phoebe, the Servant-Benefactor and Gospel Traditions .......... 63 ROMAN GARRISON
6.
Paul and the Caravanners: A Proposal on the Mode of "Passing Through Mysia" ............ 74 ROBERT JEWETT
viii
7.
TEXT-AND ARTIFACT
Benefaction Gone Wrong: The "Sin" of Ananias and Sapphira in Context ................. 91 RICHARD S. ASCOUGH
8.
Isaiah 5: 1-7) the Parable of the Tenants and Vineyard Leases on Papyrus ........................... 111 JOHN S. KLOPPENBORG VERBIN
9.
The Parable of the Tenants and the Class Consciousness of the Peasantry ................. 135 WILLIAM E. ARNAL
10. Placing Jesus of Nazareth: Toward a Theory of Place in the Study of the Historical Jesus .... 158 HALVOR MOXNES
11. Irony, Text and Artifact: Cross and Superscription in the Passion Narratives ............. 176 PAUL W. GOOCH
12. On the Relation of Text and Artifact: Some Cautionary Tales ................................... 192 JAMES D. G. DUNN
Part Three Text and Artifact in the World of Christian Origins
13. Physiotherapy of Femininity in the Acts of Theda .............. 209 WILLI BRAUN
14. Sex and the Single God: Celibacy as Social Deviancy in the Roman Period .............. 231 CALVIN J. ROETZEL
15. "Good Luck on Your Resurrection"; Beth She'arim and Paul on the Resurrection of the Dead ........ 249 RICHARD N. LONGENECKER
CONTENTS
ix
16. The Earliest Evidence of an Emerging Christian Material and Visual Culture: The Codex, the Nomina Sacra and the Staurogram ............. 271 LARRY W. HURTADO
17. The Aesthetic Origins of Early Christian Architecture .......... 289 GRAYDON F. SNYDER
18. "Ascent and Descent" in the Constantinian Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem ........................ 308 WENDY PULLAN
Part Four Text and Artifact in the World of Late,Antique Judaism
19. Better Homes and Gardens: Women and Domestic Space in the Books ofJudith and Susanna .... 325 ADELE REINHI\RTZ
20. Tyros, the "Floating Palace" ................................ 340 EHUDNETZER
21. OI IIOTE IOYMlOI:
Epigraphic Evidence for Jewish Defectors ...................... 354 STEPHEN G. WILSON
22. Jerusalem Ossuary Inscriptions and the Status ofJ ewish Proselytes .. ".................................. 3 72 TERENCE L. OONALDSON
23. Behind the Names: Samaritans, loudaioi, Galileans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389 SEAN FREYNE
24. Friendship and Second Temple Jewish Sectarianism .............. 402 WAYNE O. McCREADY
25. What Josephus Says about the Essenes in his Judean War .......... 423 STEVE MASON
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26. The Archaeological Artifacts of Masada and the Credibility ofJosephus .............................. 456 WILLIAM KLASSEN
27. Mishnah's Rhetoric, Other Material Artifacts of Late-Roman Galilee and the Social Formation of the Early Rabbinic Guild ...... 474 JACK N. LIGHTSTONE
Part Five
Text and Artifact in the Greco-Roman World
28. Some Thoughts on Theurgy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 505 ALAN F. SEGAL
29. Apuleius to Symmachus (and Stops in Between): Pieras, Realia and the Empire ............................... 527 HAROLD REMUS
30. Apuleius the Novelist, Apuleius the Ostian Householder and the Mithraeum of the Seven Spheres: Further Explorations of an Hypothesis of Filippo Coarelli .......... 551 ROGER BECK
Indices
Modern Authors Index ....................................... 571 Ancient Sources Index ....................................... 584 Subject Index .............................................. 607
PREFACE STEPHEN G. WILSON
In itself the presentation of a Festschrift says a great deal about the respect and admiration in which we hold the recipient. Peter is likely, I imagine, to think that we have gone to excess, since he would argue (and has argued) that only the great and the good are deserving of such a signal honour, and in his usually unassuming way he would not include himself in that category. This book is evidence that we both agree and disagree. Festschriften do indeed appear rather more frequently than is justified. We emphatically believe, however, that Peter genuinely deserves one. There are, of course, his scholarly and administrative achievements. From his first book, one of the pioneering works on early Christian attitudes toward Judaism, through his work on Paul, to his recent studies on Herod and the architecture of early Judaism and Christianity, he has established himself as a scholar of both originality and depth. His labours as the editor of the series "Studies in Christianity and Judaism!Etudes sur Ie christianisme et Ie judai'sme" and of several volumes of collected essays, and as Managing Editor of the journal Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses, have been unstinting, allowing others to benefit from his sharp editorial eye, strong sense of style and shrewd judgment. In the Canadian Society ofBiblical Studies he was the key figure in initiating a series of extraordinarily productive seminars that have lasted now for more than twenty years and have themselves been the source of several published works. While he was an executive member, Secretary and President of the Society, and even now when he is just one of the regular old guard, we have benefited from his energy, his fertile imagination and his endless good will. His international work in the Society of Biblical Studies and the Society for New Testament Studies merely confirms the qualities that we in Canada have always known. Then there is the man himself-warm and generous, wise and thoughtful, entirely without pretension. Of course some occasions demand serious conversation and hard work, something that Peter (a closet workaholic) relishes.
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But never far beneath the surface is the rollicking laughter, the sense of the absurd, the uncanny ability to create an aura of welcome and friendship that so many of us have come to expect and enjoy. "He was not an enthusiastik man" is an epitaph I once saw. It tickled my fancy because it conjured up anything and everything, though nothing very complimentary. T umed around, the sentence could be applied to Peter: "He is an enthusiastik man." It could contain any and every compliment you might think of, and it is meant to. The theme ''Text and Artifact" seemed the best way to summarize Peter's career and abiding interests. Contributors were encouraged to give the most generous possible interpretation to "artifact"-as referring to anything outside a primary text that might illuminate it-and we are delighted that so many friends, colleagues and former students were able to contribute. There are several people to whom we owe special thanks and recognition. Sandra W oolfrey, then Director of Wilfrid Laurier University Press, from the start gave strong support and encouragement and facilitated publication by the Press. The Research Office of Wilfrid Laurier University generously provided a book preparation grant and the Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion a book publication subsidy. Bill Klassen single-handedly and enthusiastically canvassed for funds to cover production costs, most notably a large and generous initial donation from Edward J. R Jackman that made the raising of further funds so much the easier. We approached only a small group of family, friends and colleagues to become "partners in publication," in what we hope has been a successful attempt to preserve an element of secrecy. They too were most generous in their gifts. Bill Morrow, Treasurer of the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies, adeptly managed the finances. Chad Hillier and Tony Chartrand-Burke helped to prepare the indices. Graydon Snyder suggested and provided the illustration on the cover. Jenny Wilson, with her gimlet eye and unerring sense of style, gave the whole manuscript a thorough going-over at the final stage of preparation. To all of you, Michel and I are enormously grateful.
PARTNERS IN PUBLICATION
Michael P. Barnes Bracebridge, Ontario
Victor and Kay Fenn Port Hope, Ontario
Charles and Elizabeth Bates Mississauga, Ontario
Marty and Judy Friedland Toronto, Ontario
Marianne Beare Toronto, Ontario
Roman Garrison New Wilmington, Pennsylvania
Donna and Glenna Cameron Barrie, Ontario
Lloyd and Suzanne Gaston Lion's Gate, British Columbia
Jean Lois Cameron Barrie, Ontario
James T. Gollnick Waterloo, Ontario
Mary and Ed Cameron-Miller North Bay, Ontario
Paul William Gooch Toronto, Ontario
Alan T. Davies Toronto, Ontario
Peter D. Gooch Pickering, Ontario
Kingsley and Helen R. Dean Edmonton, Alberta
Janice and Peter Griffiths Toronto, Ontario
Michel Desiardins Waterloo, Ontario
Francess G. Halpenny Toronto, Ontario
Paul and Katharine Dingley Toronto, Ontario
Vern and Elfrieda Heinrichs London, England
Terry Donaldson Toronto, Ontario
Dona Harvey and William Klassen Kitchener, Ontario
Herb and Ida Drury Barrie, Ontario
John and Helen Hurd Toronto, Ontario
Donald A. and Heather]. Etliott Toronto, Omario
Amir Hussain Northridge, California
Helen L. Epp Waterloo, Ontario
Jack N. Lightstone Montreal, Quebec
Dorothy Farooque Mississauga, Ontario
John Marshall and Pamela E. Klassen Toronto, Ontario
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TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Paul and Kathy McCarroll Hamilton, Ontario
Susan Richardson and Eric Rogers Toronto, Ontario
Wayne O. McCready Calgary, Alberta
Elizabeth Sabiston Toronto, Ontario
Jerome Murphy-O'Connor Jerusalem, Israel
D. Moody Smith, Jr. Durham, North Carolina
Dan Nighswander Winnipeg, Manitoba
Graydon F. Snyder Chicago, Illinois
Carolyn Nullmeyer Barrie, Ontario
Jessica J. Steen Los Angeles, California
Charles and Ann Paris Vancouver, British Columbia
Mary Lou Strathdee Thornhill, Ontario
Henry and Lillian Regehr Warkworth, Ontario
Roy and April Tredgett Willowdale, Ontario
Harold Remus and Alice Croft Waterloo, Ontario
Donald and Gloria Wiebe Toronto, Ontario
David I. and Kathryn M. Richardson Toronto, Ontario
Steve and Jenny Wilson Ottawa, Ontario
James A. Richardson Toronto, Ontario
Sandra Woolfrey Quebec City, Quebec
John and Pam Richardson Toronto, Ontario
The Jackman Foundation - courtesy Reverend Edward Jackman
Jonathan Richardson Whistler, British Columbia
The University of Toronto
Mary Richardson and Sylvain Marcotte Simon, Lucas, and Lea Jean Marcotte Richardson Stoneham, Quebec
• President's Office, courtesy President Robert Prichard
Nancy Jean Richardson Toronto, Ontario
• Knox College, courtesy Principal Arthur Van Seters
Ruth A. Richardson and Andrew J. Duffy Toronto, Ontario
• Department for the Study of Religion, courtesy Joseph Goering, Chair
-University College, courtesy Principal Paul Perron
CONTRIBUTORS
William E. Arnal New York University New York, New York
Roman Garrison USA Presbyterian Church New Wilmington, Pennsylvania
Richard S. Ascough Queen's Theological College Kingston, Ontario
Lloyd Gaston Vancouver School of Theology Vancouver, British Columbia
Roger Beck University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario
PaulW.Gooch University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario
Willi Braun University of Alberta Edmonton, Alberta
Larry W. Hurtado University of Edinburgh Edinburgh, Scotland
Laurence Broadhurst University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario
L. Ann Jervis Wycliffe College Toronto, Ontario
Michel Desjardins Wilfrid Laurier University Waterloo, Ontario
Robert Jewett Garrett Theological Seminary Evanston, Illinois
Terence L. Donaldson Wycliffe College Toronto, Ontario
William Klassen Ecole Biblique Jerusalem, Israel
James D. G. Dunn University of Durham Durham, United Kingdom
John S. Kloppenborg Verbin St. Michael's College Toronto, Ontario
Sean Freyne Trinity College Dublin, Ireland
Jack N. Lightstone Concordia University Montreal, Quebec
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TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Richard N. Longenecker McMaster Divinity College Hamilton, Ontario
Adele Reinhartz McMaster University Hamilton, Ontario
Steve Mason York University Toronto, Ontario
Harold Remus Wilfrid Laurier University Waterloo, Ontario
Wayne O. McCready University of Calgary Calgary, Alberta
Calvin J. Roetzel Macalaster College St. Paul, Minnesota
Halvor Moxnes University of Oslo Oslo, Norway
Alan F. Segal Barnard College New York, New York
Ehud Netzer Hebrew University Jerusalem, Israel
Graydon F. Snyder Chicago Theological Seminary Chicago, Illinois
Wendy Pullan University of Cambridge Cambridge, United Kingdom
Stephen G. Wilson Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario
PART ONE
PETER RICHARDSON WRITER AND TEACHER
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1
GIVING TO PETER WHAT HAS BELONGED TO PAUL MICHEL DESJARDINS
Ambiguities remain about what, where and when Paul of Tarsus wrote, and the degree to which his extant works reflect the man that others knew. The situation is different with Peter Richardson, who has spent the better part of his academic career engaged with Paul and his world. We can locate and date his books and articles, make reasonable sense of them, and place them in a late twentieth-century context. This essay is an attempt to tease "Peter" out of his publications, to give his work some of the attention that has long been accorded to Paul by biblical scholars-asking what Peter's literary legacy tells us about his primary research interests and his approach to the material, and suggesting reasons for those concerns. The following intellectual biography is limited to the primary texts, but is also informed by twenty years ofinteractions I have had with this scholar, first as a doctoral student, then as a colleague.
A challenge for me has been to remain faithful to the texts. Realia and other non-literary resources would certainly have broadened the discussion. I think, for example, of videotapes and personal accounts of his classroom teaching. his interactions with other scholars in academic settings, reports from those who accompanied him on his Middle East tours, the sound of his hearty laugh, the twinkle in his eye as he engages others in his favourite academic topics, and the curve of his shoulders as he absorbs a new idea. Texts do not tell us everything about a person. Sketching the picture of that more fully realized Peter, though, I leave to others. 1. What Are His Primary Research Interests? Three topics have animated Peter Richardson's writings: Paul,Jewish-Christian interactions during the first Christian century and Herod. The first two are closely linked from the start. Paul, after all, represents the clearest early
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Christian example of someone trying to work out, personally and ideologically, the nature of "Christianity" in the context of Judaism. The interest in Herod first becomes public in Peter's 1985 Canadian Society of Biblical Studies (CSBS) Presidential Address, and subsequently develops into another one of his passions.
1.1 Paul Peter is particularly fond of Paul. The attraction begins early. His published dissertation, Israel in the Apostolic Church (1969a; "The Israel of God in Early Christianity," Cambridge University, 1965), in offering a historical survey of the first one hundred years of Christian experience, allots almost half its pages to Paul. In fact, Peter Richardson's writings on the whole display a far greater interest in Paul than they do in Jesus. He sees Paul, for instance, working out an integrative solution to the Jew-Gentile problem that had eluded others, including Jesus. His Paul is a sensitive pastor, a skilled mediator. A typical comment is the following interpretation of 1 Corinthians: The absence of "anti-Judaism" in 1 Corinthians arises not because there are no Jews but rather because Paul is being deliberately conciliatory, irenic, and accommodating. The stage of development in the Corinthian congregation is such that an intemperate blast might fragment it irreparably. Paul objects to two tendencies, one on either side of him. Because he perceives himself to be in the middle, he is in a position to try to effect compromises.... There is, first, ApoUos's tendency towards a loosening of the core beliefs and customs, based on a speculative wisdom which stresses imaginative understandings of the faith. Apollos and his followers are a part of the movement towards too great an assertion of freedom and too small a concern for others .... The second tendency, on this showing, is Cephas's inclination towards a concern only for the Jewish members of the community, predicated on the conviction that the Palestinian church's needs and perceptions are basic. Those who see Cephas as their mentor are deeply concerned to ally themselves as much as possible with Palestinian customs. In such a situation Paul attempts to conciliate. (1986b; 72-73) This fondness for Paul is occasionally mixed with mild criticism. He can reprimand him for not carrying through with his Galatians catchphrase, "in Christ there is neither slave nor free" (3;28); "As a slogan it seemed not to
GIVING TO PETER
5
catch even his own imagination except as an incentive to better Christian service" (1979a: 56). And he can wish that Paul had more clearly acted on the gender equality he posits-"though Paul," he is quick to add, "was not the male chauvinist he has been made out to be by critics" (169). But when all is said and done, his Paul remains "incisive and imaginative," "deeply concerned" for his converts, "a daring thinker," someone with "enthusiasm, excitement and vitality" (41,50,72,162). His Paul is also circumscribed. He is reconfigured from the letters, notably the "great" ones (Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, Galatians), and especially 1 Corinthians. Despite thinking that Paul wrote ten letters that now bear his name (e.g., 1969a: 111; 1979a: l4). excluding the Pastorals and with a question mark beside Ephesians, and that the author of Acts was closely connected to Paul (1973d also suggests that Luke wrote 1 Timothy), he shows only a slight interest in Acts and relatively little in letters outside the Corinthian corpus. Paul's Ethic of Freedom, for example, pays almost no attention to Colossians, Ephesians and the Thessalonian correspondencenor, for that matter, to the Pastorals. In a thematic book of this nature, the single most important source is 1 Corinthians. It is in fact remarkable that throughout the mid-1970s and the 1980s the work of both of the University of Toronto's two senior New Testament scholars, John Hurd and Peter Richardson, focussed on this one Pauline letter. To be sure, the specific concerns of these scholars differed. Neither one was captivated by theology (1973b is a fleeting exception; 1976a expresses a discomfort with philosophy)-including eschatology, which both nevertheless acknowledge as significant for Paul (e.g., 1980b; 1983a). Unlike John Hurd, however, Peter Richardson has shown little interest in Pauline chronology and holistic understandings, even of 1 Corinthians-although a forthcoming book (working title: Dear Saul) promises to offer a broad interpretation of Paul. What has continued to fascinate Peter is the issue of Pauline ethics. He has also explored the relationship between Paul and the Jesus traditions, in the process offering a few reflections on Jesus himself. Peter Richardson's views on Pauline ethics are best seen in Paul's Ethic of
Freedom (1979a). This book builds on several studies (1970a; 1973a; 1973e; 1974b; 1975; particularly two closely related pieces: 1973d; 1978a) and extends into other articles (1980c, refurbished in 1983a; 19860. Its eight chapters
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explore the Galatians 3:26-28 topics (erhnidty, slavery, gender) and four others ("firmness and flexibility," "love and license," "weakness and strength," "order and charisma"), before suggesting a few modern Christian applications. The thread he isolates is a Pauline emphasis on Christian freedom generated by the Spirit. Noting the complexity of the interpenetration of Paul's "immediate circumstances with his religious inheritance and his present religious experience" (1979a: 166), he argues that discerning the Spirit allows Paul, and modern Christians in turn, to develop an ethical system that builds on the past while allowing for ongoing individual creativity and mutual respect. The complemental articles point to matters of particular ethical interest. One is the emphasis on experience--e.g., "The early church ... constantly revised, rephrased and reapplied what it 'knew', but it did so in the light of what it had experienced" (1973e: 5). Subsequent articles develop his abiding interest in the related issues of sexual ethics and women's roles in the Pauline communities. For instance, two studies (1983a; a revision of 1980c) argue that in 1 Corinthians "all of chapters 5-6, including 6: I-II, has to do with sexual questions" (1983a: 37). And "From Apostles to Virgins" insists "that Paul and a few of his associates make the most important steps towards [gender] equality" (1986f: 251). Jesus concerns Peter Richardson primarily to the extent that he sheds light on Paul. But he does offer some opinions about Jesus alone, whose actions and teachings he does not on the whole consider as remarkable as Paul's. In fact, Peter tends to be disengaged from modern historical-Jesus scholarship. His work evinces no particular fascination with form or literary criticism and little with redaction criticism, the Gospel of John is ignored, and the Synoptics on the whole are thought to bring us reliably close to the historical Jesus after one removes the anachronistic elements. Moreover, his Jesus is both "fully human" and divinely generated/resurrected: He is not portrayed in the synoptics as some mixture of divine and human in a way that separates his existence from ours, else the cross is morally evacuated of content. However, he is totally and absolutely unique because his birth has no human origin (though every other feature of it is human) and his death-though human in every respect-has not the usual conclusion. God is the origin of Jesus, and God raises Jesus. (1973f: 37)
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The most extended examination of an incident recorded about Jesus' life comes in a Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) seminar paper that sets out to explain Jesus' "temple tantrum," as Peter and others have called it with a
twinkle in their eye. Even here, however, he is interested more in "the religious realities ofBfe in Israel in the first century" (1992: 508) than he is in Jesus. The argument is that the coin used to pay the Temple tax in the first century was a Tyrian shekel, which for Jews would have asserted "Melkart's importance, [the Tyrians'J offensive eagle.symbol and their statement of Tyre's preeminence" (520). Jesus' act of overturning the money changers' tables "is not a visionary's symbol of the destruction of the Temple but a reformer's anger at the recognition of foreign gods" (523) reflected on that coin, as well as at the annual payment required by the priests, rather than the once-in-a-lifetime contribution required by Torah. Since the mid-1980s Peter Richardson has written about the possible use and abuse of sayings attributed to Jesus in the Pauline communities. One coauthored article explores 1 Corinthians to "evaluate as carefully as possible the recollections ofJesus' sayings" (1984d: 40), and to consider what this might tell us about Paul's use of them. The conclusion: Iogia informed Paul's teachings, but were not considered by him as authoritative as the Bible and were likely not taught to the Corinthians. These "factors point in a single direction: a dominant concern for preaching the crucified and risen Christ; little concern to teach about Jesus' teaching; and little inclination to use sayings of Jesus as decisive arguments in his paraenesis" (56). Elsewhere, Peter Richardson links Paul's reticence in using Jesus' sayings to a dispute he had with Apollos, which he explains by revivifying a dormant Proto-Luke hypothesis. Two articles in particular provide the details (1984b; 1987). The beginning of 1 Corinthians suggests to him a conflict in which ApoIlos shows more affinity than Paul for Jesus' teachings: Paul stresses "cross" and ApoIlos stresses "wisdom." In addition, there are tensions created by baptism: someone (probably ApoHos) has baptized some of Paul's converts in Corinth; Paul, for his part, has re-baptized some of Apollos' converts in Ephesus.... [Sjome of the differences between Paul and ApoIlos were heightened by their different perceptions of the importance and authority of Q. (1984b: 107)
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Luke, we are told, uses this dispute to revise Q. He adds to Q, or a sayings source like Q, a passion narrative, resurrection accounts and some anti-Baptist polemical sections to create "Proto-Luke." Adding Mark to the mix would later result in the Gospel of Luke. This reconstruction injects Paul into gospel formation: Jesus' sayings, Peter argues, cause divisions among early Christians, resulting in a crisis in one of Paul's communities that eventually leads to the present form of the Gospel of Luke.
1.2 Jewish·Christian Interactions Peter Richardson's concern for the interrelationship of Judaism and nascent Christianity begins with his published doctoral dissertation (1969a; see also 1970b). The book explores how "Israel" evolves in meaning for Christians, until with Justin Martyr it becomes an appellation for "Christianity": There is a gradual but inevitable takeover by the Church of the attributes and prerogatives of the people Israel, so that at some point it becomes an uncontested assumption of the Church that it is "true Israel" and "old" Israel has lost all claim to that title of ancient privilege. Hand in hand with this goes a christological development culminating in Justin's assertion that Jesus is himselfIsrael: as we participate in him we become israeL (1969a: 1-2) This concern leads to articles (1986bj 1986c; 1991bj 1991c), special edited issues of Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses (1984e; 1985b; 1986d) and edited books (1986a; 1991a). These studies emerge from two seminars led by Peter and others that engaged a wide spectrum of scholars from the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies: "Anti-Judaism," from 1977 to 1982; and "Torah-Nomos," from 1983 to 1988. More recently he has continued his interest in Jewish,Christian interactions by studying places of worship. Two articles focus on the origin and function of the earliest synagogues. "Early Synagogues as Collegia in the Diaspora and Palestine" argues "that synagogues functioned as-and were perceived as-collegia in the diaspora, that the earliest evidence for synagogues is from the Mediterranean (not Mesopotamian or Babylonian) diaspora ... and that only gradually did they take on (especially in the Holy Land) a new set of characteristics deriving from the loss of the Temple" (l996b: 90). "AugustanEra Synagogues in Rome" adds that the synagogues in Rome "attest to the vigor of the Jewish community at the end of the first century BeE and the
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9
beginning of the first century CE" (1998b: 29). To some extent, these articles are atypical, since Peter rarely writes about Judaism outside its interactions with Christianity. "Architectural Transitions from Synagogues and House Churches to Purpose-Built Churches," though, provides this expected link by exploring the parallel development of synagogues and churches: Early on, both [Jews and Christians] used houses donated by patrons, both shifted to purpose-built structures, in a transitional phase both used meeting halts and basilicas; both eventually adopted the Roman basilica. These circumstances militate against the prevailing view that early Christianity and postdestruction Judaism were bent on differentiating themselves from one another, for JeWish and Christian communities behaved rather Similarly over a long period of time. (1998d; 386) A forthcoming book (working title: Jews, Greeks and Christians in Paul's Corinth) will gather previously published and some unpublished articles that emphasize the connections between Judaism and Christianity. Peter Richardson's writings have shown a long-standing concern with Jewish-Christian interactions in antiquity. This interest is in keeping with much New Testament scholarship since the late 19605, although the degree of attention he has paid to this topic is remarkable. His approach to ancient Judaism also reflects the more widespread "coming of age" that has characterized his generation of (mainly) Christian New Testament scholars in dialogue with Jewish scholars who themselves have re-visioned late-antique Judaism. In 1970, for instance, Peter could write: In Judaism women, though esteemed, were kept in a totally subordinated position .... The goal of Paul's exegesis appears to be, without I hope being unduly harsh, greater conformity with the Jewish (or Palestinian) view of the subordination of women.... To that extent he has not pushed Jesus' new view of women any farther, but has rather retreated ... to a more Judaic and rigidly Pharisaic view. (1970a: 36-37) A decade later more innovation is attributed to Paul, while the distinction between Paul and Judaism on this issue has not changed much. Jewish "exclusivism," he notes in Paul's Ethic of Freedom, is a problem solved by Paul, and in contrasting "Spirit" and "law" Paul's "freedom" from the law is depicted positively (1979a: 79). Part of the freedom is said to lie in pulling away from the
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treatment of women by men within Judaism. Moreover, the rhetorical skill he shows in contrasting Galatians 3:26-28 with the standard synagogue prayer serves to elevate Paul at the expense of traditional Jewish religiosity: Not only did the churches he founded break the usual pattern of Jewish restrictiveness toward women, he also broke at one level the theoretical subjugation of women. His statement in Gal. 3:28 is an exact reversal of a synagogue prayer: "Lord, I thank you that you did not create me a barbarian (Greek), a slave, or a woman." (1979a: 75) By the mid-1980s, though, we see him, and most of his colleagues, even more clearly in transition, working with a new paradigm of an increasingly diverse and less restrictive first-century Judaism. "From Apostles to Virgins" notes with approval recent work on early Judaism by Bernadette Brooten and David Goodblatt that suggests a more positive role for women in the Judaisms of that period; still, this article continues to argue that in dealing with women Paul "stands out from virtually all his contemporaries" (1986f: 249). Paul's distinctiveness is in fact central to Peter Richardson's writings. A subtle example of this occurs in the 1980 article; "'I Say, not the Lord,'" concerning 1 Corinthians 7. It begins by laying out phrases that present the
content of this Pauline chapter, and suggests that Paul "is a writer who is aware of his authority, who carefully spells out the sources of that authority, and who is self-conscious about his own role in giving authoritative advice" (1980b: 66). The bulk of the article is devoted to outlining the basic framework of rabbinic halakah, in the end arguing that the Pauline [ann of the argumentation in this chapter shows heavy dependence on halakhic form. Still, the concluding paragraph suggests a different root explanation for Paul's stance, "based on his perception of spiritual insight, aimed at an undivided response to the Lord, in an interim time when the urgency of imitating Christ took precedence over a rigorous pursuit of the law" (86). Rabbinic halakah might indeed go a long way toward explaining the rhetorical form of 1 Corinthians 7, he argues, but in the end Paul's "in Christ" experience is determinative. Nevertheless, Judaism remains Paul's main dialogue partner. Study after study (e.g., "Accommodation Ethics," 1978a) describes Paul as a Christian Jew working out his new religious understanding in the context of his mother faith, and meeting after academic meeting sees Peter probing early Judaism with his colleagues.
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1.3 Herod Herod, the major Jewish figure immediately before the rise of Christianity, has been on Peter Richardson's mind for the last fifteen years. "Religion and Architecture: A Study in Herod's Piety, Power, Pomp and Pleasure," the 1985 CSBS Presidential Address, first made this interest public. Revised a year later (1986e), this study formed the backbone to his magisterial Herod: King of the Jews and Friend of the Romans (1996a). A recent article, "Augustan-Era Synagogues in Rome" (1998b), extends the work by reconstructing a synagogue inscription to make a case for Herod's importance among first-century CE Jews in Rome. More is promised in a forthcoming book (working title: Herod's
Architecture and Urban Design), and several articles (FCa; FCb; FCc; Fed). The CSBS address centres on Herod's architecture. It argues for "a consistency in approach and style that suggests a dominating personality behind it-and that personality is probably Herod's own" (1985a: 19). Peter explores Herod in three arenas: Hellenistic architecture ("an exuberant postHellenic movement"), Romano-philia and the Orient (his "need for power and pomp and pleasure is to be understood more against the background of the East than in the light of the western Imperial power of Rome," 4). Peter's Herod is "fundamentally 'religious'" (18). His survey of the buildings covers the public (Temple to Yahweh, and numerous other places in other locations) and private structures (e.g., villas), and notes his interest in athletics-for instance, Herod
was named President for Life of the Olympic Games in 12 BCE after contributing a huge endowment to revitalize these games, and he constructed other athletic facilities in the East. Peter calls him an "Oriental despot" and notes that his artistic nature was "joined to depravity" when it came to dealing with his family (4, 17). Overall, however, this first piece is an encomium for Herod, particularly in regards to building projects: "Herod is one of the world's greatest builders" (9), from whom Augustus and others likely derived some of their architectural inspiration. In the revised form of this papcr, presented at a CSBS Torah-Nomos seminar, Peter Richardson highlights the extraordinary diversity that existed within Judaism in this pcriod, and offers a closer examination of Josephus's remarks about Herod. His conclusion is that Herod's buildings and actions, in the context of this broader understanding ofJudaism, show him to be concerned with Jewish piety, despite coming into serious conflict with the more orthodox
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members of his community. Herod, he argues, "voluntarily maintained a concern for Torah within Israel. . . . Hellenism could be accommodated to the second commandment. In this process of accommodation Herod is an important representative example" (1986e: 356, 360). The comprehensive 1996 reconstruction of Herod situates the Jewish king even more firmly within Judaism, and looks even more sympathetically on him as a man of action, sensitive to his religion and the power politics of his day: Obviously the primary sources tolerate different evaluations of the man. And while mine is not the only possible one, the somewhat more generous assessment of him which follows may be closer to the "truth" than the harsher evaluations of previous generations. (1996a: 13) The chapters alternate between a historical overview (beginning and ending with Herod's death, otherwise proceeding chronologically) and its contexts . (social, historical, archaeological, religious). Peter Richardson's interest in Herod complements his fascination with Paul. Both act as focal points for Jew-Gentile relations. Both are leading men of action, with supporters and critics. They were of different generations, but the Jewish ruler and the Christian missionary can be brought together by pointing on the one hand to Jesus' birth in Herod's kingdom, and on the other to Roman synagogues in Paul's day still apparently honouring Herod. Paul and Herod's descendants, though, were the ones left to struggle directly with Jewish-Christian relations. 2. How Does He Approach His Material? Combined interests in Herod, Jewish-Christian interactions and Paulespecially ethics, 1 Corinthians and Paul's use of Jesus traditions----dearly demarcate Peter Richardson within New Testament scholarship. Following are four less overt redactional tendencies that further distinguish him from others. They concern sources, historical reconstruction, community orientation and theories.
2.1 Sources Peter Richardson prefers primary to secondary literary sources. He works most often with Greek, less so with Hebrew, and infrequently with Latin texts. He
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eschews surveys ofsecondary litera ture, and his references show a higher~than' average sprinkling of British sources, some German and very little French. The primary sources are more often springboards for his own extended reconstructions. One example is a study that addresses the apparent inconsistency presented by the combination of 1 Corinthians 9: 19~ 23 (Paul's willingness to accommodate) and Galatians 2:11~14 (Paul's denunciation of Cephas for accommodating himself to an outside group). Peter begins here by examining the primary texts. Then he briefly summarizes the views of four scholars (Daube. Chadwick, Bomkamm, Barrett), quickly setting their resolutions aside. The bulk of the article sees him plowing his own furrow, in the process exploring aU the related Pauline passages-an unusual feature here is his reference to some patristic views, which he gets through Muurice Wiles's study-bcfore aliiving at his own reconstruction: Perer ... is being faced with contrary demands for two quite opposite courses of action. Each has its own kind of legitimacy. On the one hand he should continue to eat with uncircumcised Gentiles because to do otherwise would undercut Paul's effective ministry and would lead to a serious misunderstanding of the position of Gentiles with respect to the Law. On the other hand he should identify 1il'irh the representatives of the Jerusalem church, for to do otherwise would undercut his own ministry to the circumcision and would lead to a serious misunderstanding among Jews. (1980a: 360)
The use ofa wide range of primary sources has marked Peter's work. In the early years that range involved looking beyond the New Testament, at Jewish and non-canonical Christian sources, for infomlationabout nascent Christianity. In 1965, a Christian origins dissertation that extended from Paul to Justin raised eyebrows, as did a later study that touched on modem ethnology and jurisprudence in order to shed light on the ancient notion of "law" (1991b). More recently his work has incorporated reaHa from the ancient world. That interest, like the one concerning Herod, begins in 1985, his fifty-nrstyear, with the CSBS Presidential Address. A publication one year later includes a reference to an artifactuaI piece of information, a pair of Jerusalem Temple doors made out ofCorinthian bronze, to support a Corinthian Jewish presence of note (1986b). Then the floodgates open, and his publications become increasingly concerned with adding artifactual evidence to his reconstructions,
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"Religion, Architecture and Ethics," for instance, sketches "ways in which the architectural setting of worship influences the ethical approach of those who worship there, and reciprocally the ways the value system will influence the architectural system" (1988: 42). A clear description of this direction can be seen in his suggestions about what evidence should be heard and preferred in approaching the historical Jesus: The evidence is of several kinds: literary (easily manipulated and adapted to new situations), especially Jesus' words ... but also his actions (requiring interpretation as much as his words); archaeological (unspecific and general, not pointing directly to Jesus); and social-scientific (imposed from modern assessments, generally of modern cultures). Clearly no one kind of evidence will do .... The stark reality, however, is that most scholars use primarily literary evidence to develop their pictures of Jesus. Within that literary evidence, most concentrate on Jesus' sayings. This set of scholarly convictions needs to change. Dependence on literary evidence has Virtually exhausted itself. More-much more-needs to be made of Jesus' actions and of the context in which he is to be understood, especially from what can be reconstructed from archaeological data. (l997a: 306-307) He proceeds to offer examples of work that needs to be done, and that already has been done, to situate Jesus in his own place-e.g., using the excavations at Gamla, including its synagogue, and Yodefat, a middle-sized town in the centre of things in Lower Galilee, and paying attention to life in small communities. This study is unusual in dealing with a historical-Jesus question. On the other hand, it is consistent, not only with his long-time effort to combine different sorts of evidence to address a topic, but with his more recent attention to artifactual remains. Two forthcoming books (working titles: Religion and
Architecture in Late Hellenism, Judaism and Early Christianity; Herod's Architecture and Urban Design) and an article (FCd) promise to extend that interest.
2.2 Historical Reconstruction Peter Richardson's review of Northrop Frye's The Great Code is a rare critique of another scholar-in this case also a departmental colleague-that in both tone and content tells us much about the reviewer's own approach to the Bible.
He objects to several aspects of The Great Code, particularly the way Frye imposes a unified view on the Bible:
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Frye's theory requites a kind of homogenization that obscures the personal idiosyncracies and even the theological differences of the immediate authors. . • . Frye hints at a mysterious process of compilation, . . . [C]utting and snipping the Bible so that it fits into a neat seven-phase typological pattern is to remove it from reality and tum much of it into an abstraction•..• [Frye] dQes not take the ordinary meaning of the individual texts as seriously as he should. (1983c: 404. 405, 406)
Peter insists on the particularity of the biblical materials, decrying the anti~ historical bias in The Great Code. His approach is a textbook example of historical~critical scholarship. Typically he begins by assessing the primary sources on their own and in their immediate contexts (in recent years, this has included non~literary remains), then he looks for contemporary evidence that will make these sources more comprehensible. With rare exceptions, he does not begin with, or get bogged down by, the secondary material. Unlike Frye, he does not view the texts through a clearly delimited modem lens (e.g., sociological, psychological, anthropological, theological, literary). He also does not stay exclusively focussed on those primary sources, nor does he argue that they can never be understood. Neither does he move directly from ancient source to modem application. The crucial middle step for him is a source's historical context. This context is what provides him with the pieces of the puzzle needed to bring clarity and form to a text or group of texts. He scours the ancient world for all the pieces he can find to the particular puzzle on which he happens to be working, then arranges them in as sensible a manner as he can: "Look, this piece belongs to the picture, and fits nicely here; this other piece that I've just found on the floor is the corner piece we've been looking for; that one over there has the same colour as the bottom group, so we'll keep it ready until we find others •... J> This approach is his trademark. One even finds it in his more popular works, like his walking tour of University College, which melds historical accounts into his deSCriptions of the buildings: Three stained glass windows at the east end commemorate three University CoUege undergraduates killed in battle •... While the City of Toronto brought their bodies back from Port Dalhousie, the great ben in the main tower toned once a minute, faIling silent only when the coffins reached the college reading room. (1984c: 14)
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The same can be said for his introduction to an endowed talk at University College by the classicist Walter Burkert (1991e), which vividly situates the individual after whom the lectureship is dedicated in the context of Canada's first student strike, at University College. One finds the approach again in another rare polemical work, directed at a piece by a long-time friend and colleague, Donald Wiebe. Peter objects here to an interpretation of the University ofToronto's Department for the Study of Religion that does not, in his view, pay full attention to the historical facts (1997b). One also finds this approach in virtually every one of his explorations of the ancient world. For instance, we see him situating Barnabas in historical context (Syro-Palestine, during Nerva's reign, in a decade of}ewish resurgency) in order to make sense of that letter's anti-Judaism (1986c) i grounding Jesus' Temple incident in "the religious realities of life in Israel in the first century" (1992: 508); and explaining 1 Corinthians 9: 12-18 in the context of patronage, that is, whether followers of Christ should eat anything given to them by a patron (1994b). Returning to his first book, we hear Peter acknowledge that his major interest in Paul is as a historical source in those first decades: "The heart of this book ... is the chapter on Paul. The reason for this is the obvious one that we have in these epistles good information about developments over a period spanning parts of three decades within early Christianity" (1969a: ix). Peter Richardson is rarely satisfied situating a source in a single context. He delights in "drawing on the widest possible evidence" (1998a: xi), finding as many pieces as he can, with his eye naturally falling on different colours and shapes over the years. His Proto-Luke explanation is one example. Muted tensions between Apollos and Paul reflected in the opening chapter of 1 Corinthians lead him beyond the letter, eventually to a reconstruction of Christian origins that brings a variety of people (the author of Q, Apollos, Paul, Luke) and texts (Q, 1 Corinthians, Proto-Luke, Luke, Acts) into a coherent whole (1984b). An interpretation of 1 Corinthians 6: 1-11 likewise begins by situating this handful of verses in the context of chapters 5-7 and their concern for sexual matters, then explores four possible settings for a context that can shed light on Paul's remarks (Dead Sea Scrolls, rabbinic sources, synagogue practice, Greco-Roman sources). This study eventually selects as the likeliest setting the special disciplinary privileges exercised by synagogues in the Diaspora, which in turn lead him to posit eight real-life possibilities, grouped
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under three categories: "a father and son-in-law arguing over the status of the younger man's wife; two men involved sexually or even non-sexually with the same woman; a man charging an influential 'leader' in a congregation with 'tampering'" (1983a: 55). As a result, his treatment of these eleven verses in 1 Corinthians takes readers on a long, imaginative journey through the ancient world of marriage, sexual and legal practices. In scouring and interconnecting sources, Peter is not inclined to dismantle them. He uses Q, not Ql or Q2; Philippians, not the putative letters that lie beneath it ("the claim to be able to isolate three separate letters ... is a piece of critical subterfuge," 1969a: 11). He connects 1 Corinthians 9:12b-18 with 8-10 (1994b), and 1 Corinthians 6:1-11 with 5-7 (1983a). On the whole, but not without the occasional strong reservation, he trusts both Josephus and the gospel accounts of Jesus. Not that he accepts everything they say, but he believes that each source tells us something directly about history if only we ask the right questions and have sufficient corroborative data. For instance, rather than dismiss Matthew's infancy stories about the star and the slaughter of the infants as entirely legendary, useful only in shOWing us how the evangelist wanted to portray Jesus, he links these stories with other pieces of evidence to show how they could be grounded in history: In brief, these accounts [including Luke and Josephus] suggest the following; (1) both John the Baptist (Luke 1:5) and Jesus (Matt. 2: 1) were born late in Herod's reign; (2) the birth of Jesus may have been in 7 BCE, two-and-a-half years before Herod's death; (3) the tradition of the "massacre of the innocents" reflected Herod's succession problems and the execution of three of his own children; (4) the flight to Egypt derived from scriptural allusions that were plausible because of the difficult conditions in Judea at the end of Herod's reign. (l996a: 298)
Bringing the sources together requires sympathetic imagination. Peter Richardson particularly likes to put himself in someone else's place and reconstruct a scene for his readers-e.g., "1 can almost hear Jesus-and for that matter the revolutionaries in 66 CE-say, then give to Melkart what is his and don't sully the Temple with foreign gods" (1992: 519). He imagines what might have been on the mind of Jesus (1969b: 3; 1992: 523), Herod (1985a: 5), the Corinthian community (1994b: 101), and Judaism at the time of the
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Maccabean revolt (1996a: 73). He builds this into a hermeneutical approach that has long been with him: If we are prepared to tackle the Bible on its own terms, to begin with, and see what it says, before judging what it must be, I think the attempt might go something like the following: a) Individual parts of the Bible would have to be studied against the background of an adequate knowledge of the social, cultural, religious, economic and historical setting. b) The interpreter, in seeking to understand this text, would have to enter into the writer's mind (empathy) to understand, so far as possible, why he wrote what he did in that setting. ... (1976a: 22; so also 1968a; 1968b) Peter's studies are attempts to convince readers that his reconstruction has correctly sketched the picture that would have existed in antiquity, but now perforce eludes modern interpreters.
2.3 Community Orientation Peter Richardson has spent his career working with other scholars, building communities. With one or two exceptions, noted above, one finds no open criticisms of other scholars in his publications. He likes to keep the peace. The same could be said of his explorations of the ancient world. He has portrayed Paul and Herod engaged in their broader contexts Oewish, Christian, Roman) j Christianity and Judaism emerging together like Rebecca's children, to use Alan Segal's felicitous turn of phrase; and both Paul and Herod with their positive sides amply displayed. This constructive orientation is not restricted to
the ancient world. An early essay laments the antagonism he encountered
between faculty and administration in his first year at Loyola of Montreal, now Concordia University, which threatened to obscure diversity and overlook integrity ("Division of any social entity ... into two camps is the greatest of errors. It prepares people for conflict and war," 1970c: 5). This spirit of collaboration is also reflected in his comments on the college system, including teaching, at the University of Toronto: A college system can encourage close academic contact among students and between students and faculty a sense of community, a healthy diversity arising out of differing perspectives .... Colleges can be places where social and cultural activities can be developed which will broaden narrowly specialized students, where concern can be expressed for the integrity of a
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student's education, and where the unity of knowledge in a fragmented university can be tested. Above all they can be places where students receive informed and concerned individual attention.... Colleges ... are places where breadth, experimentation, integration, culture, and personal worth can be encouraged. (1978b: 12) The whole community forms an environment that must be carefully nurtured and allowed to bloom. (1979b: 3) Peter Richardson has not only built communities within the University of Toronto system-first as Chairman of the Division of Humanities, Scarborough College, between 1974 and 1979; then as Principal of the University of Toronto's largest college, University College, between 1979 and 1989-but has played a similar role in the major biblical academic societies: the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies (e.g., Executive Secretary, 1978-82; President and Acting President, 1984-86), the Society of Biblical Literature (e.g., Chair of the Program Committee, 1996 to the present) and the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas (SNTS) (e.g., Chair of the organizing committee for the 1980 Toronto meeting). Several publications have emerged directly from his involvement in these societies: 1980cb, 1992 (SBL); 1998a (SNTS); 1984e, 1985a, 1985b, 1986a, 1986b, 1986c, 1986d, 1986e, 1991a, 1991b, 1991c, 1991d, 1996b, 1996c, 1997a, FCe (CSBS). His collaboration can also be seen in other ways. He has jointly written and edited a large number of pieces, some with colleagues (1978a; 1984a; 1984c; 1986a; 1991a; 1994a; 1998a; 1998c), others with graduate students (1983b; 1984d; 1986c; 1996c). He has been asked to add contributions to Festschriften (1970b; 1984b; 1993; 1994b; 1998d), and a foreword to the book surveying biblical studies in Canada (1982). A study group he led at St. Cuthbert's Presbyterian Church in Hamilton helped him to form his book on ethics (1979a). Moreover, he has worked closely with Sandra Woolfrey, the now former-Director of Wilfrid Laurier University Press, as well as with the Board of the Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion (CCSR) and the Canadian Federation for the Humanities (CFH), to enhance the quality and accessibility of Canadian academic publications. He has been a CFH Board member (1981-84), CCSR Vice-President (1990-93) and Managing Editor of the journal Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses (1986-96), and continues to
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serve as editor of the monograph series "Studies in Christianity and Judaism!Etudes sur Ie christiantsme et Ie judai'sme" (1990 to the present).
2.4 Theories Juxtaposed to this communal element is an equally pronounced tendency to offer theories that break new ground, reorganizing and presenting material in a novel manner. "Spirit and Letter," for instance, mentions Ernst Kasemann's discussion of the Pauline distinction between pneuma andgramma, then quickly adds: "What follows is an attempt to explore this, though in fairness to Kasemann 1 must add that I have gone my own way" (1973a: 208). This Sinatraesque comment also applies to his other publications. At times the stance has a tweaking-their-noses quality, as when he offers two Proto-Luke articles in honour of people who he knows do not look kindly on the hypothesis (1984b; 1987). Other times it is reflected in his experimental writing style. He likes to end his writings where they began-for instance, in his Israel in the Apostolic Church (1969a) the bookends address Justin; in "Philo and Eusebius" (1993) he opens and closes \¥ith Eusebius's comments about the Therapeutae. In Herod, though, Peter Richardson not only follows this practice but presents us with imaginatively reconstructed ancient documents. The first ("Introduction") is set at the time of Heroo's death. It begins with an imitation of the contemporary Acta Diuma, a daily gazette "posted daily in Rome and distributed to the provinces" (1996a: 1), and is followed by a variety of written accounts of Herod's death. The introduction touches on Herod's importance, the complexity of the world in which he lived and the different ways in which he was seen. The last document ("Chapter 13") is modelled on Augustus's Res
gestae and offers Heroo's appreciation of himself as he is about to die. It allows Peter to close the book with a positive appreciation of the grand figure he has painted. The fictional mode will continue in one of his forthcoming books (Dear Saul), which will include letters written (back) to Paul from a variety of ancient people, completing a project that has been on his mind for years. Some of Peter Richardson's most daring theories clearly display his individuality. The positive assessment of Herod immediately comes to mind: his book length reconstruction (1996a) offers a revisionist picture of Herod set firmly and positively within Judaism-a man of action, a great architect, in tune with the power politicS of his day. Proto-Luke, described above, also
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stands out as a theory that not only reconstructs the beginning of 1 Corinthians as nobody else had, but also resurrects a moribund source theory (1984bj 1987). "Jewish Voluntary Associations in Egypt and the Roles of Women" argues for the presence of Jewish priestesses in the temple at the military settlement of Leontopolis: "This evidence for Egyptian priestesses and for assimilation ofJews in Egypt to Egyptian religious practices provides a plausible background for the claim that the temple at Leontopolis has priestesses" (1996c: 238). In "Barnabas, Nerva and the Yavnean Rabbis," another article co-authored with a student, Barnabas is dated to the reign of the previously overlooked emperor Nerva (l983b), a novel theory at the time but one that has since gained wide acceptance. The Temple incident further exemplifies his love of challenging theories: in the wake oflong-standing, ongoing attempts to spiritualize the story of Jesus overturning the money changers' tables ("cleansing the Temple"), Peter takes the contrary view that Jesus likely overturned the tables in reaction to the political implications of the coin used for payment. Another article (1993) sets out partly to rehabilitate Eusebius's clearly apologetic, rarely considered, claim that the Therapeutael Therapeutrides were Christian: after surveying a wide range of evidence he wonders whether there might in fact have been early Christians who modelled themselves on this Jewish monastic group. Recent studies on synagogues noted above (1996b; 1998b; 1998cl) also fly in the face of what many others are saying about their origins (he points to the Mediterranean Diaspora, with synagogues functioning as collegia), development (modelled on the Roman basilica, changing in form over time), early presence in Rome (including a novel reconstruction of a fragmentary synagogue inscription to read "Herod"), and influence on the structure of Christian churches. 3. Why Does He Approach the Material the Way He Does? There are, of course, a great many contributing factors to Peter Richardson's interests and approach. His bachelor's degree in architecture in 1957 can naturally be linked to his present skills in deciphering Herodian architecture, and perhaps also the fascination with the topic itself, although several archaeological trips he took to the Middle East in the 1980s and especially the 1990s, including the people he met on those trips, probably are at least equally responsible for generating and sustaining that interest. The architectural
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interest, though, has remained vital to him throughout his career. The juxtaposition of religion and architecture that one finds in his more recent publications (e.g., 1985a; 1986e re: Herod; 1988 re: ethics), for instance, is also present in his earliest published article (1962), which explores how architectural expression unconsciously and consciously reflects theological convictions. His doctoral training at Cambridge in the early 19605 with
C. F. D. Moule can
readily be seen in the historical-critical approach, with its focus on the primary sources and a British delight in positing novel theories. His Canadian work experience led to publications concerned more (Loyola of Montreal, Theology, 1969-74), then less (University of Toronto, Religious Studies,
1974
to the
present), overtly with theological issues. The University of Toronto context has given him a steady stream of doctoral students with whom to work. Not to be forgotten are the intellectual contributions of former students like Martin Shukster and Peter Gooch, with whom he worked closely through most of the 1980s and who now express their creativity outside the academy. His duties as Principal of University College helped to foster community spirit. One can add to this the influence of his colleagues, mainly in the academic societies to which he has long belonged-colleagues amply represented in this volume, whose intellectual energy and views on Paul, Luke, Judaism, Christianity and unearthing the past have made their way into Peter's own writings. A full intellectual biography would also consider, inter alia, the formative roles played by his family, friends and various synagogue and church constituencies. Most important, though, seems to have been Peter's religious grounding. He self-identifies openly as a Christian in his earlier works. Not surprisingly, "we in the Christian faith" expresses his stance in an article written in the final year of his Bachelor of Divinity (1962: 12). A piece written when he was Assistant Minister at Knox Presbyterian Church in Toronto (1965-69) declares a basic set of Christian beliefs with a decidedly Pauline ring: Do I really believe that he is the Son of God, Son of Man, Messiah, King of Israel, Suffering Servant-the Truth? Do I believe he died on my behalf, to redeem me (rom sin? Do I believe he really rose from the dead? For if not, the Christian message is nonsense: Do I believe that the Holy Spirit's power is available to me now, while Jesus is absent from this world? (1967: 8; also 1968b: 16)
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It goes on to encourage Christians to stand up and be counted: "We cover up our uncertainty by speaking fuzzily, without conviction and without direction.... 'The desire to be inoffensive and mediating leads all too often to statements that have any, or no, meaning" (8). The Pauline heritage continues in a later article: "It is only as the Church recovers this notion that it is in Christ that everything finds its meaning that the ChUl'ch will become true to its heritage from Paul" (1970a: 37). "Fruit Pickers" (l973c) is a Christian sermon on joy, in honour of the tenth anniversary of CRUX, the journal in which he frequently published in his early years. He also speaks dearly as a believer in Paul's Ethic of Freedom: "We who identify ourselves as Christians.... For those of us who take the Bible seriously• . . . [Wlithout ever losing sight of the real goal of Christianity.... We can change with the assurance that 'Christ has set us free for freedom'" (1979a: 98, 166,98,172). Peter's hermeneutical approach also commonly entails an application to modem Christian experiences. His position is that Paul's way of approaching the Bible ("the world's greatest book," as he calls it in his Frye review, 1983c: 407) and interacting with his communities, rather than the specifics of what he says on any particular issue, should guide Christians today. We see that position expressed in several early publications (e.g., 1968b: 17#18; 1971: 26; 1973a: 218; 1976b: 8·9), and most dearly in Paul's Ethic of Freedom: A first step is to recognize that our use of Paul (and the rest of Scripture) should be analogous to Paul's use of Scripture. That is, just as Paul's view of freedom is a reinterpretation of the Old Testament in the light of Jesus and of the Holy Spirit, and just as Jesus is an interpreter of the prophets, and just as the prophets are the interpreters of the law, so we are interpreters of the message of Paul. The applicational and interpretive need is similar. This is not to deny that the Scriptural canon is dosed. . . . Scripture remains the norm and standard. But it is not always directiy capable of being applied to circumstances that are radically different.
(1979a: 168)
Peter Richardson's Christian stance can also be detected in the theoties he p0.sits, even when an explicit religious connection is now usually absent. The pieces of the ancient puzzle are scarce and rough#edged. They can be put together in different ways, and scholars' reconstructions invariably reflect their priorities and presuppositions. Peter searches in Paul's letters for what he sees
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as his "best insights" (1973d: 24), and he finds these in several places. A good example occurs in "From Apostles to Virgins," where he presents a multifaceted argument that makes a case for an egalitarian situation in the Pauline churches, "where women occupied fundamentally important positions, including such important 'offices' as apostle and deacon" (1986f: 257). He then sees this situation deteriorating soon afterwards: [The roles of] women came increasingly to be limited to those of widow and virgin, and to some extent deacon.... In brief, the roles for women in the very earliest period of the church come to be diminished, there is a growing tendency to emphasize gender-related roles (widows and virgins), and these are either associated with the contemplative life or are directed only to other women. (1986£: 258, 253) Others have sometimes configured the evidence differently-e.g., arguing for a Pauline hardening of gender lines, giving Jesus priority of place in striking out for gender equality; or arguing for a gender-biased Christianity at its roots. In Peter's reconstruction, Paul becomes a guide for modern Christians searching for gender equality in the Bible. Another example is his Proto-Luke hypothesis, which, despite its radical source-critical nature, in fact is grounded in a comforting scenario: Luke as a disciple of Paul, with both of them establishing the base of the New Testament. Peter Richardson's particular Christian stance also permeates his career in ways that are more foundational. The type of Christianity he admires in print is the one he has modelled in his career. It is based on what one does rather than what one says (1972: 3); it values exploration, diversity, respect for others, dynamism and change (1974a; 1978a: 127-29; 1979a: 100; 1986a: ix-x; 1991c: 147); it builds community (1970c; 1978b; 1979b); it is entrenched in its traditions-especially the primary sources and its Jewish matrix-while being guided by the SpirittG make changes when necessary (1962; 1979a: 170). The academic interests that have caught his attention, and the ways he has shaped them, all reflect these values. The Judaism and Christianity he develops both share these characteristics, at least in their better moments. Like him, Herod and Paul typify men of action, individuals who are willing to initiate thoughts and practices while remaining grounded in their religious traditions. Like Paul, this modern interpreter of Paul lives out his faith through his work. "Is it possible," he asks early in his career,
GIVING TO PETER
25
or even desirable for [a Christian] to playa distinctively prophetic role within the so-called secular University? Can his attitude to the University's function be sufficiently positive that he can genuinely be a member of that community in the full sense of the term while at the same time having a sufficiently different view of seeking and disseminating truth that his role is recognizably different? (1970d: 12)
He would answer "Yes" to these questions. For over a third of a century Peter Richardson has distinguished himself in the academy, which has become not only a home to him, but a reminder of a larger body to which he belongs as a Christian teacher and researcher: ulJ.€iC; oe e01;€ OWf!<X XPlO1;OU K<xt IJ.EA T) £K IJ.EpOUC;. K<Xl OUC; lJ.eV e8e-r:o 6 eEOC; tv 1:'TI tKKAT)oi~ TIp&nov cmoo1;oAouC;, O€l)-r;€POV npo4>~1;<XC;, 1;pi1;OV OtO<XOK(XAOUC; (1 Cor 12:27-28).
26
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
References (Complete Bibliography) 1962 1967 1968a 1968b
1969a 1969b 1970a 1970b
1970c 1970d 1971 1972 1973a 1973b 1973c 1973d
"Needed. a New Criterion: A Study in 'What Churches Should Look Like.'" Knoxonian 2/4: 12-16. "Challenge." Crisis and Dialogue 1/2: 8. "The Use of the Old Testament in Romans 9-11." Christian Brethren Research Fellowship Journal 17: 4-8. "The Interpretation of the Old Testament in the New Testament and Interpretation Today." Christian Brethren Research Fellowship Journal 17: 15-19. Israel in the Apostolic Church. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. "Mao and Jesus-Quo vadis?" AgapelLoyola News (October): 3. "Paul Today: Jews, Slaves and Women." CRUX 8/1: 30-37. "The Israel-Idea in the Passion Narratives." In Ernst Bammel (ed.), The Trial of Jesus: Cambridge Studies in Honour of C. F. D. Moule, 110. London: SCM. "WelThey Syndrome." Loyola Libre (March): 5. "Response to Paper II [by W. J. Farris]." CRUX 7/3: 12-13. "Biblical Variety in Ministry." CRUX 8/4: 24-26. "Editorial Introduction to 'Tongues Talk.'" CRUX 913: 2-3. "Spirit and Letter: A Foundation for Hermeneutics." Evangelical
Quarterly 45/4: 208-18. "Justification." In C. F. H. Henry (cd.), Baker's Dictionary of Christian Ethics, 362-6.1. Grand Rapids: Baker. "Fruit Pickers." CRUX lOll: 1-2. "Subjugated Wives and Emancipated Women in Pauline Thought."
CRUX 10/2: 17-25. 1973e 1973£ 1974a 1974b 1975 1976a 1976b 1978a 1978b 1979a
"Understanding Understanding." ARC 1/1: 4-5. [Co-founder ofARC in 1973] "Reflections on Jesus: End and Beginning." CRUX 11/1: 34-37. "Thirteen Questions on Violence." ARC 2/4: 10-11. "On Freedom: In Place of an Introduction." CRUX 12/2: 1-3. "Slavery and Freedom: In Place of a Conclusion." CRUX 12/3: 30-33. "Scripture." CRUX 13/1: 10-12, 15,21-23,25-29,40-42. "Weak and Strong: Changing a Metaphor." CRUX 13/2: 3-9. «Accommodation Ethics" (with Paul Gooch). Tyndale Bulletin 29: 89142. "The Colleges: They Do a Better Job than Their Critics Suppose." University of Toronto Bulletin 32/5 (October 10): 12. Paul's Ethic of Freedom. Philadelphia: Westminster.
GIVING TO PETER
1979b 1980a 1980b
1980c
1982 1983a 1983b 1983c 1984a
1984b 1984c 1984d
1984e 1985a
1985b 1986a
1986b
27
"A Teaching PrincipaL" Options 1: 2-5. "Pauline Inconsistency: 1 Corinthians 9: 19-23 and Galatians 2: 1114." New Testament Studies 26: 347-62. "'I Say, not the Lord': Personal Opinion, Apostolic Authority and the Development of Early Christian Halakah." Tyndale Bulletin 31: 65-86. "Judgment, Immorality and Sexual Ethics in 1 Cor. 6." In Paul Achtemeier (ed.), SBL 1980 Seminar Papers, 337-58. Missoula: Scholars Press. "Foreword." In John S. Moir, A History of Biblical Studies in Canada: A Sense of Proportion, ix-x. Chico: Scholars Press. "Judgment in Sexual Matters in 1 Corinthians 6: 1-11." Novum Testamentum 25: 37-58"Barnabas, Nerva and the Yavnean Rabbis" (with Martin B. Shukster). Juurnal of Theological Studies 34: 31-55. "Cracking the Great Code, or History Is Bunk." Dalhousie Review 63: 400-407. From Jesus to Paul: Studies in Honour of Francis Wright Beare. Ed. by Peter Richardson and John C. Hurd. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. "The Thunderbolt in Q and the Wise Man in Corinth." In Richardson and Hurd, From Jesus to Paul, 91-111. The Great Good Place: Exploring University College (unsigned; with John Parry). Toronto: University College. "Logia of Jesus in 1 Corinthians" (with Peter Gooch). In David Wenham (ed.), Gospel Perspectives, V: The Jesus Tradition Outside the Gospels, 39-62. Sheffield: JSOT Press. "Editorial." Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses 13/1: 3-4. [Guest editor of the issue] "Religion and Architecture: A Study in Herod's Piety, Power, Pomp and Pleasure" (CSBS Presidential Address). Bulletin of the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies 45: 3-29. "Editorial." Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses 14: 3-4. [Guest editor of the issue1 Anti-Judaism in Early Christianity, Vol. 1: Paul and the Gospels. Ed. by Peter Richardson, with David Granskou. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. "On the Absence of Anti-Judaism in 1 Corinthians." In Richardson and Granskou, Anti-Judaism in Early Christianity, 59-74.
28
TEXT AND ARTIFACT 1986c
1986d 1986e 1986f 1987
1988 1991a
1991b 1991c
"Bet ha-midrash and the Epistle of Barnabas" (with Martin B. Shukster). In Stephen G. Wilson (ed.), Anti-Judaism in Early Christianity, VoL 2; Separation and Polemic, 17,31. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. "When Is Torah nomos!" Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses 15: 275-76. [Guest editor of the issue] "Law and Piety in Herod's Architecture." Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses 15: 347-60. "From Apostles to Virgins: Romans 16 and the Roles of Women in the Early Church." Toronto Joumal of Theology 2: 232,61. "Gospel Traditions in the Church in Corinth {with Apologies to B. H. Streeter)." In Gerald F. Hawthorne and Otto Betz (eds.), Tradition and Interpretation in the New Testament: Essays in Honor of E. Earle Ellis for His 60th Birthday, 301-18. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. "Religion, Architecture and Ethics: Some First Century Case Studies." Horizons in Biblical Theology 10/2: 19-49. Law in Religious Communities in the Roman Period: The Debate Over Torah and Nomos in Post-Biblical Judaism and Early Christianity. Ed. by Peter Richardson and Stephen Westerholm. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. "Law in Religion: Origins and Present State." In Richardson and Westerholm, Law in Religious Communities in the Roman Period, 1,18. "Torah and nomos in Post-Biblical Judaism and Early Christianity." In Richardson and Westerholm, Law in Religious Communities in the
Roman Period, 147-56. 1991d 1991e
1992
1993
"Introduction" [to the index to volumes 1-20, which he also supervised}. Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses 20/4: 416. "Introduction: The Samuel James Stubbs Lectureship." In Walter Burkert, Oedipus, Oracles ana Meaning: From Sophocles to Umberto Eco. Toronto: University College, i-it "Why Turn the Tables? Jesus' Protest in the Temple Precincts." In Eugene H. Lovering (ed.), SBL 1992 Seminar Papers, 507-23. Atlanta: Scholars Press. "Philo and Eusebius on Monasteries and Monasticism-The Therapeutae and Kellia." In Bradley H. Mclean (ed.), Origins and
Method: Towards a New Understanding of Judaism and Early Christianity: Essays in Honour of John C. Hurd, 334-59. Sheffield: 1994a
JSOTPress. Gospel in Paul: Studies on Corinthians, Galatians and Romans for Richard N. Longenecker. Ed. by L. Ann Jervis and Peter Richardson. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
GIVING TO PETER
1994b
29
1998b
"Temples, Altars and Living from the Gospel (1 Cor. 9.12b-18)." In jervis and Richardson, Gospel in Paul, 89-110. Herod: King of the Jews and Friend of the Romans. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. [Book of the Month and History Book of the Month selections] "Early Synagogues as Collegia in the Diaspora and Palestine." In John S. Kloppenborg and Stephen G. Wilson (eds.), Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World, 90-109. London/New York: Routledge. "Jewish Voluntary Associations in Egypt and the Roles of Women" (with Valerie Heuchan). In Kloppenborg and Wilson, Voluntary Associations in the Graeco- Roman World, 226-51. "Enduring Concerns: Desiderata for Future Historical-Jesus Research." In William E. Arnal and Michel Desjardins (eds.), Whose Histarical]esus?, 296-307. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. "Correct, but Only Barely: Wiebe on Religion at Toronto." Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9: 233-47. Judaism and Christianity in First-Century Rome. Ed. by Karl P. Donfried and Peter Richardson. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. "Augustan-Era Synagogues in Rome." In Donfried and Richardson,
1998c
Judaism and Christianity in Rome, 17-29. Common Life in the Early Church: Essays Honoring Graydon F. Snyder.
1996a
1996b
1996c
1997a
1997b 1998a
1998d
1999
Ed. by Julian V. Hills, with Richard B. Gardner, Robert Jewett, Robert Neff. Peter Richardson, David M. Scholer and Virginia Wiles. Harrisburg: Trinity Press International. "Architectural Transitions from Synagogues and House Churches to Purpose-Built Churches." In Hills et al., Common Life in the Early Church. 373-89. Herod: King of the Jews and Friend of the Romans. Minneapolis/ Edinburgh: Fortress/T. & T. Clark. [paperback reprint of 1996a]
Forthcoming FCa
FCb FCc
"The Social-Historical Significance for Gentiles and Women of Herod's Temple Architecture." In Philip R. Davies and John Halligan (eds.), Second Temple Period Studies: The Roman Period. Sheffield: JSOT Press. "Herod's Religious-Architectural Strategy in the Diaspora." In Davies and Halligan, Second Temple Period Studies. "Herodians." In Larry Schiffmann and James C. VanderKam (eds.), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: Oxford University Press.
30
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Fed
FCe
Twenty-nine articles for Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans: "1 Corinthians," "Barnabas, Epistle of," "Barnabas, Acts of," "Salome" [two entries], "Alexandra" [four entries], "Philip" [five entries], "Mariamme" [six entries], "Antipater" [three entries], "Herod the Great," "Archelaus," "Antipas," "Philip," "Agrippa 1," "Agrippa II." "Archaeological Evidence for Religion and Urbanism in Caesarea Maritima." In Terence L. Donaldson (ed.), Religious Rivalries and the Struggle for Success in Caesarea Maritima. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
2
THE PROFESSOR'S HOUSE LAURENCEBRO,~HURST
Professor Richardson's students have noticed the good casting and the appropriate setting: his bushy beard, his large glasses framing those keen eyes, his ready smile, his warm voice, all accompanying a tall, trimly dressed man with a steady gait who roams the beautiful University College and toils away in his charming office. One reason so many of his students consider him such a fine professor is simply this: he fits the bill so well. As I polled as many of his current and former senior students as I could, however, I learned that they considered this package strictly preliminary. Recurring words appeared in conversations with these students. A simple list conveys the tenor: enthusiasm, knowledge, tolerance. humour. graciousness, honesty, charisma, humility, wisdom; dO?''11-to-earth, good-natured, organized, straightforward, open-minded, patient. insightful. co-operative, daring, prepared, supportive, approachable; teacher and friend. The particular combination of traits was consistently portrayed as both disarming and contagious. Circles of students, regardless of their pursuits post·Richardson, expressed a hope that they might one day be like him. For some, it was a hope to engage the attention of an inquisitive group, or to teach. or to earn such respect. For others, it was a hope to exhibit clear joy in one's vocation. (One student last year remarked to him that he must be awaiting his retirement eagerly. It was a comment, not a question, but he returned an earnest answer aU the same: "No.") As a current student noted, it might also simply be a "hope to treat others kindly, with interest and with dignity." Honourable, equal treatment of students is his trademark. Just one example of this is his insistence on including senior undergraduates in his graduate seminars, encouraging the fomler while checking the egos of the graduate students. His clearpteference for topics and approaches that mesh the
32
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
literary with the architectural never pens in those who wish to take another path-one thinks of his beaming face on the opening day of seminars as students introduce themselves and he avidly jots down notes on particular language skills, artistic talents, computer expertise and travel experience. Remarkable too is his obsessive deference to the primary sources. True, he begins each seminar with extensive bibliographies, but it is to the primary sources that he speaks, relentlessly. Not only does this program strongly direct his wards, but his additional decree on balanced treatment of the canonical and the non-canonical further shapes their training. Diligently, he acquaints his students with the accoutrements of academic life: conferences, colloquia, work-study programs, fellowships, grants and particularly other scholars. Most of the senior students of antiquity at the Centre for the Study of Religion have shared a drink with real, breathing New Testament luminaries. As well, for several years Professor Richardson has convened the Colloquium on Religions of Classical Antiquity at the Centre, a series that treats all presenters with equal respect. How many graduate students can say that they have presented in the same colloquium series as Jerome Murphy-O'Connor? Stimulating is his love of travel to the sites of the Roman Empire. How many excited students has he sent on their nervous way to excavations in the Middle East? How many have walked out of his classroom with abiding images of ancient Corinth in their heads, images created by his guided tour of an eclectic collection of slides? Because he showed them, how many now know the difference between a Greek and a Roman theatre; know why hillside audience buildings are not amphitheatresj and can identify a Roman temple, a bouleuterion, an odeon, a Roman house and even a latrine? Naturally, it was Professor Richardson who initiated and facilitated my trip to Turkey. For several years I had been studying the synagogue of ancient Sardis
with him. As I stepped off the bus in Sardis last summer, I made my way as if by custom to a looming structure, found myself standing in the synagogue and was overwhelmed by familiarity. I realized with a sigh that the long trip was exhilarating but superfluous: my professor had already taken me to ancient Sardis.
PART TWO
TEXT AND ARTIFACT IN THE NEW TESTAMENT WORLD
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3
READING THE TEXT AND DIGGING THE PAST: THE FIRST AUDIENCE OF ROMANS LLOYD GASTON
Critical history and especially archaeology are relative latecomers to the study of biblical texts, and that can make all the difference. As Norman Golb has argued in connection with Qumran archaeology, including the new texts, and the Essenes of classical texts, what was first known became privileged and what comes latertends to be used as corroboration (1980). It is therefore salutary to try in one's imagination to let the last become the first, to begin with
archaeology with no reference to the traditional interpretation of texts. Until recently a major function of Syro,Palestinian archaeology has been to demonstrate the historical reliability of biblical texts (Dever 1992). The archaeology of early Christianity has traditionally been used as a support for early evidence oflater theological doctrines and practices (Snyder 1985: 3-11; Frend 1996). The history and archaeology of Diaspora Judaism have been studied under the a priori assumptions of Christians and others about Jews (Kraabel1982j Rutgers 1995). Partly because of his strong interest in ancient architecture, Peter Richardson has been able to escape these traps. 1 In order to understand the purpose of an ancient writing it is necessary to know as much as possible about the historical situation of the author and especially those addressed. In most cases those situations have to be deduced solely from the writing in question. The circularity is as obvious as it is hard to overcome. What would help would be the perspective from a bit of evidence, no matter how small, from outside the circle. It probably is not wise, but I have chosen to discuss in this regard the audience of Paul's letter to Roman
I first met Peter Richardson in the spring of 1970 and he has been a friend and mentor ever since. It is sometimes difficult to keep up with him, but the present small essay is offered in gratitude by one who is still trying.
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Christians. z Most helpful would be material archaeological evidence. There is of course none directly from the first century CE, but finds from a later period can perhaps be used with care. Because more is needed I have deliberately spoken of "digging the past," to include also the antiquarian digging in old written sources to find some history outside the text. We shall try not to let traditional understanding of the text influence the interpretation of the later historical and archaeological evidence. 1. Location of the Early Roman Christians We have some idea of which parts of Rome contained Christians in the second and third centuries. Catacombs were presumably built reasonably close to the living. The later titulus churches may well have been built on the sites of earlier house churches. If there has been some continuity over the centuries, then we may imagine Christians in these areas already in the first century,from which we have no direct archaeological evidence. Among other places we can mention specifically Trastevere. 3 We are better informed about areas where Jews lived in the first century. Philo (Leg. 155) mentions specifically Trastevere, and also the location of the large Monteverde catacomb (there were of course others in different areas). Although there are no material remains, from epitaphs we know the names of some thirteen synagogues (Leon 1960; 135-66). It may be possible to date four or five of them to the reign of Augustus, and they may have been dedicated buildings (Richardson 1998a),4 as at Ostia (White 1998). Many would like to bring these two sets of data together as evidence for the origins of the Roman church in the synagogues. But that is to isolate them both much too much from their neighbours. Trastevere was certainly not a Jewish ghetto (an anachronistic concept), but rather one of the main quarters of the "unromanized" (MacMullen 1993). The inhabitants were mainly Greek-
2 I use this anachronism for the sake of convenience. Paul of course does not know the word "Christian," and he knows of no "church of Rome" comparable to "the church of God which is at Corinth." 3 The mostthorough study is that of Lampe (1989: 10-52), who also deals with other parts of the city, but Trastevere is enough for the present brief discussion. 4 Some additional support for his argument may be provided by Philo (Leg. 156, 157), who says that Roman Jews had 1tpooeuxai rather than ouvaywyai.
READING THE TEXT AND DIGGING THE PAST
37
speaking immigrants to Rome. some voluntary immigrants as traders and craftspeople, but mostly involuntary immigrants as slaves who remained after being freed. That many Jews and Christians lived in this area is because they were part of a much wider category, not because they were necessarily related to one another at all. 2. Social Status of the Early Roman Christians While Trastevere was not one of the most desirable neighbourhoods of ancient Rome, it would also be anachronistic to call it a slum filled with tenements of the poor. Social stratification tended to be vertical in buildings more than horizontal by area. The typical insula had small shops and workshops on the ground level. "luxury apartments" on the second and third floors (Acts 20:91), and small, dark single or double rooms higher up (Packer 1967). While early Roman Christians had no access to a domus, one can imagine their social situation to be almost as varied as that of Corinth (Theissen 1982; Meeks 1983). If one may extrapolate from the somewhat later documents 1 Clement and the Shepherd ofHermas, the early Roman Christians consisted of many poor but also some relatively wealthy people (Osiek 1983; Maier 1991; Gaston 1998). The situation among Jews seems to have been comparable (Rutgers 1995). When coupled i'iith later evidence from catacombs and inscriptions and the excavation of the remains of churches, study of the social circumstances of Jews and Christians in Rome can teach us much about the history of these two communities. In itself it does not show that they were in any way related. 3. Claudius·s Expulsion of the Jews from Rome
Ioudaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantes Roma expulit (Suetonius, Claudius 25.4). Rarely in history has so much been made to depend on such an obscure sentence. We are asked to believe that Suetonius really meant "Christus" when he wrote "Chrestus."s We are asked to believe thatSuetonius thought Christus was actually in Rome instigating disturbances (in 41 CEll, whereas in fact Jews were arguing abclUt the significance of the Judean person
5 But he knows how to spell "Christ!ani" (Nero 16.2), and his mends Tacitus (Ann. 15.44) and Pliny (Ep. lO.96-97) know how to spell both "Chrisms" and "Christiani."
38
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Christus. It is not sure whether Suetonius means that all Jews were expelled or only some, when it happened, or when some might have returned. The four other ancient sources do not clarify matters. It seems probable that when Philo in 41 CE writes of Augustus that "he never ejected them from Rome ... nor prevented them from meeting" (Leg. 157), it was with an eye to Claudius's actual or contemplated measures against the Jews (Slingerland 1997: 90,96). Acts 18:2 says that "all the Jews" were expelled,6 yet in Acts 28:22 the Roman Jews know nothing of a Christian "sect" in Rome, much less that they were the cause of such tragedy for the Jews in Rome. In the third century Dio Cassius
(Hist. 60.6.6-7) says explicitly that Claudius did not expel the Jews (there were too many) but only ordered them in 41 not to hold meetings. Finally Orosius
(Hist. 7.6.15-16) in the fifth century gives a date (49 CE) more compatible with Acts and many modems, but he appeals for this to the authority of Josephus, who (at least in our manuscripts) is completely silent about the whole event! Orosius also was the beginning of the modern understanding of Suetonius, in correcting the spelling to "Christus" and saying that the Jews were "agitating against Christ," i.e., resisting the gospel. 7 We should not follow his example. What then did Suetonius mean? After many years of dissatisfaction with my own speculations and those of others, I have finally found a convincing answer. After a very thorough philological analysis, H. Dixon Slingerland (1997;
167) concludes that the sentence must be understood as follows: "Chrestus being the cause, Claudius expelled from Rome the continuously rebelling Jews." He is able to put this action into the context of a persistent pattern of hostility of the Julio,Claudian emperors toward the Jews of Rome. The well~known (to the ancients, not to us!) Chrestus played a similar role for Claudius as Sejanus did for Tiberius. If we can escape the prejudice derived from Acts that Jews in fact tended to be troublemakers, we can see that the phrase "continuously rebelling" is an expression of Suetonius's own views. It is probable that Claudius took action at least twice to suppress Judaism in Rome, an important part of Roman Jewish history but not linked to the history of the early Roman church.
6
Leon (1960; 135·36) estimates the Jewish population in Rome at the time of Augustus to have been 40,000-50,000. 7 In terms of the history of interpretation, one could compare Ambrosiaster (Rom. prologue), who only a generation earlier maintained that the early Roman church originated in the preaching of Roman Jewish Christians. See also the Marcionite prologue to Romans.
READING THE TEXT AND DIGGING THE PAST
39
4. Inferences from the Letter Framework in Romans Modern commentaries often speak about the "double character" of the audience of Romans. On the one hand the letter framework apparently addresses the audience as Gentile believers, and on the other the body of the letter (1: 16-15: 13) seems to be a debate with Judaism, a defence of Paul's lawfree gospel over against Judaism. Since the latter is the point of contention, we shall look here only at the former. I understand that the letter framework is found in the exordium (1: 1-15) and the peroration (15: 14-16:16,21-24) (Wuellner 1991; Dunn 1987).8 The explicit audience is very clear: "we have received grace, i.e., apostleship, for [bringing about] obedience to [God's] faithfulness for the sake of his name among all the Gentiles, among whom also are ye, called ofJesus Christ" (1:56) j "in order that I might also have some fruit among you as among the other Gentiles" (1:13); "the grace given to me to be a [priestly] minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, acting as priest for the gospel of God, in order that the sacrifice consisting of Gentiles might be acceptable [to God]" (15: 15-16). How is this to be reconciled with what has been assumed to be a debate with Judaism in the body of the letter? One way is to note Paul's planned visit to Jerusalem (15:25) and his apprehension about how he might be received there by both Jews and Jewish Christians (15 :31). Given that preoccupation, the letter is then to be read as a kind of dry run of what Paul plans to say in Jerusalem. Another is
to
note the planned visit to Spain, with Rome's help
(15:24), and to think of the letter as an extensive self-recommendation to defend himself against earlier Jewish calumnies and thus to enlist Roman help for a Spanish mission. Another is to point out that five Jewish Christians are included among those greeted by Paul (16:3,7, 11). But of these two arc apostles (Andronicus and Junia) and two are long-standing associates (Prisca and Aquila), hardly people who need to be lectured to by the contents of Romans. Based partly on an indication of up to five house churches in Rome (16:5,10.11,14, 15), but mostly on the references to the "strong" and the "weak" in 14: 1-15:6, the most common assumption is that "ethnic issues" (Walters 1993) are a major concern of the letter. This needs to be tested by an analysis of the body of the letter.
8 While it is important not to separate chapter 16 from the rest of the letter, I have omitted two interpolations here.
40
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
5. Archaeology and the Origins of Roman Christianity Social history of the ancient church and synagogue, including extensive use of archaeology, has made great progress recently by emancipating itselffrom some theological presuppositions. Apart from the beginning assumption that he needs to explain how the earliest Roman Christians became independent of the synagogue (rather than whether they needed to do so), Peter Lampe's hook on the social history of Christians in Rome in the first two centuries remains a monumental contribution (Lampe 1989). Graydon Snyder has taught us to enter into the life of ordinary pre-Constantinian Chrisrians through his fine presentation of their art, architecture and inscriptions (Snyder 1985). Michael White has done extensive work on early Christian worship places (White 199697). There is of course much more work that cannot be listed here. The situation is similar with respect to the archaeology of ancient Jewish Rome. The approach of the classical study by Leon (1960) has now been much refined by Rutgers (1995). He is able to show that Roman Jews were neither isolated from nor assimilated to their neighbours, but were very much at home in their environment (see also Snyder 1998). Peter Richardson has done extensive work on ancient synagogues, including in Rome (1996; 1998a; 1998b). 6. Conclusion
In spite of my appreciation for aU this fine work, I cannot find that it casts any light on the origins of Roman Christianity. Even Paul does not think he is "build ling] on someone else's foundation" when he writes to and plans to visit Rome (15:20). While the letter has much to say about the relation of the Roman Gentile believers to Jews and Judaism in general, there is no hint of the presence of Jewish believers in Rome, even in places where one might expect it (11: 1). Tacitus knew of a large number of people called Christians in Rome in 64 eE and does not confuse them with Jews, even though he knows that the movement began with a certain Christ earlier in Judea (Ann. 15.44). What Wayne Meeks says in general about Pauline Christians and Judaism applies especially to Rome: there is remarkably little in the Pauline letters to suggest any continuing contact between the Christian groups and the organized Jewish communities in
READING THE TEXT AND DIGGING THE PAST
41
their cities.... Theologically it is correct to say that the scriptures and traditions of Judaism are a central and ineffaceable part of the Pauline Christian identity. SociaUy, however, the Pauline groups were never a sect of Judaism. They organized their lives independently from the Jewish associations of the cities where they were founded, and apparently, so far as the evidence reveals, they had little or no interaction with the Jews .... The scriptures and traditions from Judaism played a major part in the beliefs and practices of Pauline Christianity, yet the identity of the Pauline groups was not shaped by having once been within a Jewish context. (Meeks 1985:105,106, ]08)
This general impression seems to be correct. It may be that we can be more specific. We are back at our original starting point: if there is nothing outside Romans to indicate clearly who the first audience was, then we are completely dependent on the body of the letter itself. Rhetorical criticism has the potential to increase our understanding considerably. If we have difficulty in characterizing the letter's empirical audience, a rhetorical-critical perspective can indeed discover the implied audience embedded in the text itself. Two remarkable recent books are able to use this approach very successfully: Neil Elliott's The Rhetoric
of Romans (1990) and Stanley Stowers's A Rereading of
Romans (1994). As is to be expected, they do not agree on many of the details, but they both cast fresh light on how the letter functions. Most important for our discussion, both are very firm in insisting that the implied audience must definitely be Gentile. The letter has much to say about Jews, scripture, the law, and the election oflsrael, but always in terms ofhow Gentile Christians should understand their relationship to them. Given this fixed starting point. it might now be possible to resolve the much debated question of the purpose of Romans (Donfried 1991; Wedderburn 1988; jervis 1991). But that can wait for another day.
42
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References Dever, William G. 1992 "Archaeology, Syro-Palestinian and Biblical." In David Noel Freedman (ed.-in-cruet), The Anchor Bible Dictionary, 1. 354-67. New York: Doubleday. Donfried, Karl P. 1991 The Romans Debate: Revised and Expanded Edition. Peabody: Hendrickson. Dunn, James D. G. 1987 "Paul's Epistle to the Romans: An Analysis of Structure and Development." In Wolfgang Haase (ed.) , Aufstieg und Niedergang der romischen Welt, 2.25.4.2842-89. Berlin: De Gruyter. Elliott, Neil 1990 The Rhetoric of Romans: Argumentative Constraint and Strategy and Paul's Dialogue with Judaism. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Frend, William H. C. 1996 The Archaeology of Early Christianity: A History. Minneapolis: Fortress. Gaston, Lloyd "Faith in Romans 12 in the Light of the Common Life of the Roman 1998 Church." In Julian V. Hills er a!. (eds.), Common Life in the Early Church: Essays Honoring Graydon F. Snyder, 258-64. Harrisburg: Trinity Press International. Golb, Norman "The Problem of Origin and Identification of the Dead Sea Scrolls." 1980 Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 124: 1-24. Jervis, L. Ann The Purpose of Romans: A Comparative Letter Structure-Investigation. 1991 Sheffield: JSOT Press. Kraabel, A. Thomas 1982 "The Roman Diaspora: Six Questionable Assumptions." Journal of Jewish Studies 33: 445-64. Lampe, Peter [19871 Die stadtromischen Christen in denersten beidenJahrhunderten: 1989 Untersuchungen zur Sozialgeschichte. Second ed. TGbingen: Mohr. Leon, Harry J. 1960 The Jews of Ancient Rome. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America.
READING THE
TEXT AND DIGGING THE PAST
43
MacMullen, Ramsay "The Unromanized in Rome." In Shaye J. D. Cohen and Ernest S. 1993 Frerichs (eds.), Diasporas in Antiquity, 47-64. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Maier, Harry O.
1991
The Social Setting of the Ministry as Reflected in the Writings of Hermas, Clement and Ignatius. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
Meeks, Wayne A.
1983 1985
The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul. New Haven: Yale University Press. "Breaking Away: Three New Testament Pictures of Christianity's Separation from the Jewish Communities." In Jacob Neusner and Ernest S. Frerichs (eds.), "To See Ourselves as Others See Us": Christians, Jews, "Others" in Late Antiquity, 93-115. Chico: Scholars Press.
Osiek, Carolyn
1983
Rich and Poor in the Shepherd of Hennas: An Exegetical-Social Investigation. Washington: Catholic Biblical Association of America.
Packer, J. E. 1967
"Housing and Population in Imperial Ostia and Rome." Journal of Roman Studies 57: 280-95. Richardson, Peter 1996 "Early Synagogues as Collegia in the Diaspora and Palestine." InJohn S. Kloppenborg and Stephen O. Wilson (eds.), Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World, 90-109. London/New York: Routledge. "Augustan-Era Synagogues in Rome." In Karl P. Donmed and Peter 1998a Richardson (eds.), Judaism and Christianity in First-Century Rome, 1729. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. 1998b "Architectural Transitions from Synagogues and House Churches to Purpose-Built Churches." In Hills et al., Common Life in the Early
Church,373-89. Rutgers, Leonard Victor
The Jews in ute Ancient Rome: Evidence of Cultural Interaction in the Roman Diaspora. Leiden: Brill. Slingerland, H. Dixon 1995
Claudian Policymaking and the Early Imperial Repression 0/ Judaism at Rome. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Snyder, Graydon F. 1985 Ante Pacem: Archaeological Evidence of Church Ufe Before Constantine. 1997
Macon; Mercer University Press.
44
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1998
"The Interaction ofJews with Non-Jews in Rome." In Donfried and Richardson, Judaism and Christianity in First-Century Rome, 69-90. Stowers, Stanley K. 1994 A Rereading of Romans: Justice, Jews, and Gentiles. New Haven: Yale University Press. Theissen, Gerd 1982 The Social Setting of Pauline Christianity. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. Walters, James C. 1993 Ethnic Issues in Paul's Letter to the Romans. Valley Forge: Trinity Press International. Wedderburn, A. J. M. 1988 The Reasons for Romans. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. White, L. Michael 1996-97 The Social Origins of Christian Architecture. 2 vols. Valley Forge: Trinity Press International. 1998 "Synagogue and Society in Imperial Ostia: Archaeological and Epigraphic Evidence." In Donfried and Richardson, Judaism and
Christianity in First-Century Rome, 30-68. Wuellner, Wilhelm 1991 "Paul's Rhetoric of Argumentation in Romans: An Alternative to the Donfried-Karris Debate Over Romans." In Donfried, The Romans Debate, 128-46.
4 PETER IN THE MIDDLE: GALATIANS 2:11,21 L. ANN JERVIS
As Paul tells the story, at Antioch Cephas! was caught in the middle between two conflicting views. One view accepted Jewish believers in Christ eating with Gentile believers, another did not. Until the arrival from Jerusalem of the "men from James." Peter and the rest of the Jewish believers had eaten with Gentiles , (Gal 2: 12). ~ After the Jerusalem delegation came, Peter and the others stopped this practice. Barring acceptance of Paul's explanation of the reason for Cephas's equivocation-that he was a hypocrite who acted out of fear (2: 12~ 13)-the question before us is: what power did each position have for Peter so that he would be tom between them? That is, what was it about the opinions of Paul and the men from James which meant that Peter was caught in the middle of the Antiochean controversy? Several years ago Peter Richardson turned his attention to sorting out the issues in the Antiochean controversy (1980). He concluded that Peter and Paul shared a similar understanding of the need for accommodation, but differed over their interpretation of how to apply this principle in the circumstances at Antioch. I have chosen to continue work on this passage in order to pay tribute to the excellence of Professor Richardson's scholarship and his generous capaciry for encouraging his admirers to chart their own course. I suggest here that at one point Peter and Paul agreed over a type of law observance for Jewish believers but at Antioch came to disagree over whether this allowed for sympathy with Pharisaism.
Despite the ancient ttadition and modern discussion suggesting that Cephas is a different person from the apostle Peter, I will understand Cephas to be the Aramaic name for Jesus' disciple. Peter. 2 In contrast to Richardson (1980: 354), who considers that the "other Jews" are nonChristian Jews.
46
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1. The Persuasiveness of the Position of the Men from James
1.1 The Concerns and Identity of the Men from James Paul describes the men from James as ,OUI,; i:J
of property was rare. He suggests that since it was not rare within the Christian community admiration would not follow-"the more common such propertydonations were, the less fame and reputation there was to be gained from an affected self-elevation into the limelight" (1995a: 1742). Thus, Ananias was not "motivated by a desire for special praise" (1995a: 1743). As our inscriptions show, however, benefaction was commonplace and yet accorded great honour, and it was often accompanied by the suggestion that others should follow suit in supporting the group. It is precisely because dispersing one's wealth was commonplace that we should read this text in the context of benefaction.
3. Luke's View of Benefaction This understanding of the story of Ananias and Sapphira in light of benefaction fits within Luke's larger view of benefaction throughout the Gospel and Acts.
It is clear from the outset that Luke and his community rely on patronage. Luke opens his Gospel by addressing his patron by using an honorific: [1] t U
seemed good to me ... to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus" (Luke 1:3; cf. Acts 1: 1; Moxnes 1991: 267; Fitzmyer 1981: 300). The honorific Kpan01;oc; is used three other times by Luke, each case in an address
to
a Roman official (Acts 23:26; 24:3; 26:25), indicative of the high
regard accorded Theophilus. Elsewhere in Luke we find women who support Jesus' ministry by providing from their own resources (Luke 8:1-3). On two
BENEFACTION GONE WRONG
103
separate occasions centurions arc noted for their benefaction to the Jewish people, and both receive God's blessing upon them in turn (Luke 7:1-10; Acts 10:1-8,31,44-48). Benefaction within the Christian eKKA'Ilo{o: is suggested through the use of houses for meetings (12:12; 16:40; cf. 20:6-8). Luke uses the term "benefactor" (EUEpyi't'llC;) in only one passage, Luke 22:24_27. 19 Jesus responds to a dispute among the disciples as to who would be the greatest with an emphasis on service and humility, unlike the power structures in the Greco-Roman world, where the "kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors" (Luke 22:25). Luke has taken this passage from Mark 10:41-45 and relocated it in the Last Supper discourse. In doing so he has nuanced it differently. Most
Significantly, Mark's initial indication of "the supposed rulers [oi. OOKOUV't'EC;
apXEl v] over the Gentiles" has been changed to "the kings [ot po:alAeic;] of the Gentiles," and then Luke has added the note that these kings are called benefactors (EuEpyenH Ko:AOUV'tO:l). In contrast, the disciples are not to claim such titles or authority for themselves, despite their privileged place within the kingdom (Luke 22: 28-30). Although they perform a service they do not receive status or honour in exchange (Moxnes 1991: 261). For Luke, Jesus overturns the usual categories of benefaction and honour. 20 Jesus himself states that he is among others "as one who serves" (Luke 22:27). Through his miracles he seems to broker God's patronage for the people (Moxnes 1991: 258-60). Nevertheless, he never claims the honour due him. A point of contrast with the actions of Ananias and Sapphira can be found in the Gospel story ofZacchaeus (Luke 19: 1-10). Like Ananias and Sapphira. Zacchaeus has a secret about his personal finances. His secret, however. is the fact that he distributes it to others. When pushed by the criticism of the crowds he announces that he "already" gives half of his possessions to the poor and
19 Luke also uses €U€PY€(J(cx for Peter's good deed of healing a lame man (Acts 4:9), and €:v€pyeriw in recalling the deeds of}esus (Acts 10:38). 20 On the importance of benefaction to the writer of Luke-Acts see Danker (1976, esp. 6-17; 1988, esp. 5.10). Yet despite Danker's recognition of the importance of benefaction to Luke in his study of epigraphic texts and the New Testament, he (1982) makes no connection between benefaction and the actions of Ananias and Sapphira. This is particularly odd in light of the fact that Danker sees in Acts 2:44 and 4:32 clear evidence for Luke viewing as benefactors those who contribute to the holding of all things in common within the community (1982: 333). Capper (1998: 516-18) also notes Luke's interest in shifting the boundaries of benefaction but does not link Acts 5: 1·11 to this concern.
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repays fourfold anyone he may have defrauded (Luke 19:8).21 Despite his marginal status as tax-collector, and thus "sinner," Zacchaeus's encounter with Jesus is seemingly the first time he has articulated his actions publicly. Despite his obvious benefaction, he has not sought out the honours that were due him. 22 The significant contrast with Ananias and Sapphira lies in that which is received for one's actions. Unlike the death of Ananias and Sapphira, Zacchaeus receives praise from Jesus in the pronouncement that "salvation" (ow1:llP(a) has arrived, a declaration that also serves to restore him to his
place within the community (cf. Malina and Rohrbaugh 1992: 387). Other passages are likewise suggestive of a counter-cultural view of benefaction, not in terms of the cessation of the practice, but in terms of the expectation of rewards or honours. For example, in Luke 12:33-34 disciples are urged: Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. This is followed up later by the injunction to the rich ruler to "sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven" (Luke
18:22), an invitation too difficult for the man to accept. It is only when we get to Acts 2-5 that we find the attempt being made to fulfil this command in full,
at least within the Christian community. The suggested expectation for one who has sold everything is "treasure in heaven" rather than "honour on earth." In lying about the extent of their donation to the Christian community, Ananias and Sapphira were attempting to gain for themselves not only honour on earth, but greater honour on earth than they deserved. For Luke they serve as an example of worldly benefaction, wherein honours are received here and now. This motivation, however, causes them to lie about the extent of their benefaction and they are struck down.
21 The verb tenses are in the present rather than the future, and thus should be taken to refer to actions already in progress; see Fitzmyer (1985: 1220-21, 1225); Malina and Rohrbaugh (1992: 387). 22 In one regard Moxnes (1991: 255) is correct in stating that Zacchaeus "is never portrayed as a patron" insofar as he never receives the requisite honour due a patron. In his use of money, however, he is acting as a benefactor to those who receive his largesse.
BENEFACTION GONE WRONG
105
The story serves as a warning to those who would be benefactors in Luke's own Christian community, but who might expect honours in exchange. The message is not "give everything or else," but "do not seek recognition for more than you have contributed." One might act as benefactor without having to donate the complete amount of land or property to the association. For example, when Polycharmos donates a portion of his house to the local synagogue in Stobi, the dedicatory inscription makes it very clear that the rights to part of the property are to be retained by Polycharmos and his heirs (CU 1.694; cf. elL 3.659).
4. Conclusion Through these passages we see that Luke is presenting for his audience a message about benefaction. In fact, these passages seem to indicate that Luke is attempting to transform the culturally defined pattern of patron-client relationships and benefaction within his community (Moxnes 1991: 257, 265). While benefaction remains a necessary part of Christian communal existence, Luke wants to warn any potential benefactors that they should not expect praise (cf. Moxnes 1991; 266). Set within the larger context of both Luke-Acts and the world of the voluntary associations, the story of Ananias and Sapphira is a cautionary tale about wanting honours for benefaction, and a warning against those who act according to human conventions rather than divine conventions. 23 While their "sin" is their lie, their motivation is the desire for greater worldly honour. Their reward for holding back part of the proceeds while claiming to give them all was death. Clearly this is a case of benefaction gone wrong.
23 Moxnes (1991: 264-65) suggests that Luke's presentation of the people placing the proceeds from the sale ofland at the feet of the apostles turns the apostles into brokers of the benefaction of others. In distributing the goods on behalf of others, the apostles disallow the necessity for honour to be passed back onto the benefactors.
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References Barrett, C. K.
1994
The Acts of the Apostles. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark.
Bartchy, S. Scott 1991 "Community of Goods in Acts: Idealization or Social Reality?" In Birger A. Pearson (ed.), The Future of Early Christianity: Essays in Honor of Helmut Koester, 309-18. Minneapolis: Fortress. Boismard, M. E. and A. Lamouille 1990 Les Actes des deux apotres. 3 vols. New York: Norton. Bruce, F. F. 1988 (1951) The Book of Acts. Third ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Capper, Brian J. 1983 "The Interpretation of Acts 5.4." Journal for the Study of the New Testament 19: 117-3l. 1986 '''In Jer Hand Jes Ananias': Erwagungcn zu lQS VI,20 und der urchristlichen GGtergemeinschaft." Revue de Qumran 12: 223-36. 1995a "Community of Goods in the Early Jerusalem Church." In Wolfgang Haase (ed.) , AufstiegundNiedergangderromischen Welt, 2.26.2.1730· 74. Berlin: De Gruyter. 1995b "The Palestinian Cultural Context of Earliest Christian Community of Goods." In Richard Bauckham (ed.), The Book of Acts in Its First
Century Setting, Vol. 4: The Book of Acts in Its Palestinian Setting, 32356. Grand Rapids/Carlisle: EerdmansIPaternoster. "Reciprocity and the Ethic of Acts." In 1. Howard Marshall and David Peterson (eds.), Witness to the Gospel: The Theology of Acts, 499-518. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Cassidy, Richard J. 1987 Society and Politics in the Acts of the Apostles. Maryknoll: Orbis. Collart, Paul 1998
1937
Philippes, ville de Macedoine, dupuis ses origines jusqu'dla fin de l'epoque romaine. Paris: Boccard.
Danker, Frederick W.
1976 1982 1988
Luke. Philadelphia: Fortress. Benefactor: Epigraphic Study of a Graeeo-Roman and New Testament Semantic Field. St. Louis: Clayton. (1972) Jesus and the New Age: A Commentary on St. Luke's Gospel.
Second ed. Philadelphia: Fortress. Derrett, J. Duncan M. 1971 "Ananias, Sapphira, and the Right of Property." Doumside Review 89: 225-32.
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Duling, Dennis C. 1995a "The Matthean Brotherhood and Marginal Scribal Leadership." In Philip F. Esler (ed.), Modelling Early Christianity: Social-Scientific Studies of the New Testament in Its Context, 159-82. London;New York: Routledge. "Social-Scientific Small Group Research and Second Testament 1995b Study." Biblical Theology Bulletin 25: 179-93. Dunn, James D. G. 1996 The Acts of the Apostles. Valley Forge: Trinity Press International. Dupont, Jacques 1979 [1967] The Salvation of the Gentiles: Studies in the Acts of the Apostles. Trans. John R. Keating. New York: Paulist. Elliott, John H. "Patronage and Clientage." In Richard Rohrbaugh (ed.), The Social 1996 Sciences and New Testament lnterpretation, 144-56. Peabody: Hendrickson. Fitzmyer, Joseph A. 1981 The Gospel According to Luke, Vol. 1. New York: Doubleday. 1985 The Gospel According to Luke, Vol. 2. New York: Doubleday. Forkman, Gyouran 1972 The Limits of Religious Community: Expulsion from the Religious
Community Within the Qumran Sect, Within Rabbinic Judaism, and Within Primitive Christianity. Lund: Gleerup. Foucart, Paul Fran~ois 1873
Des associatioTJ5 religieuses chez les grecs: Thiases, erancs, orgeons. Paris:
Klingksieck. Fox, W. S. 1917
"Greek Inscriptions in the Royal Ontario Museum." AmericanJoumal
of Philology 38: 411-12. Garnsey, Peter and Richard P. Saller 1987 The Roman Empire: Economy, Society and Culture. London: Duckworth. Haenchen, Ernst 1971 [1965] The Acts of the Apostles: A Commentary. Trans. Bernard Noble, Gerald Shinn, Hugh Anderson and Robert MeL. Wilson. Oxford: Blackwell. Havelaar, Henriette. 1997 "Hellenistic Parallels to Acts 5.1-11 and the Problem of Conflicting Interpretations." Journal for the Study of the New Testament 67: 63-82.
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Jeremias, Joachim 1969 [1962) Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus: An Investigation into Economic and Social Conditions during the New Testament Period. Trans. F. H. Cave and C. H. Cave. Philadelphia: Fortress. Johnson, Luke Timothy 1977 The Literary Function of Possessions in Luke-Acts. Missoula: Scholars Press. 1992 The Acts of the Apostles. Collegeville: Liturgical Press. Klinghardt, Matthias "The Manual of Discipline in the Light of Statues of Hellenistic 1994 Associations." In John J. Collins, Michael O. Wise, Norman Golb and Dennis Pardee (eds.), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea
Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects, 251-70. New York: New York Academy of Sciences. Kloppenborg, John S. 1995 "Status and Conflict Resolution in Early Christian Groups." Unpublished Paper Presented at the Toronto School of Theology Biblical Department Seminar, September. "Collegia and Thiasoi: Issues in Function, Taxonomy and 1996 Membership." In John S. Kloppenburg and Stephen G. Wilson (eds.) , Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World, 16-30. London! New York: Routledge. Lake, Kirsopp 1933 "The Communism of Acts II. and IY.-VI. and the Appointment of the Seven." In Kirsopp Lake and Henry J. Cadbury (eds.), The Beginnings of Christianity, Part I: The Acts of the Apostles, 5.140-51. London: Macmillan. Ludemann, Gerd
1987
Early Christianity According to the Traditions in Acts: A Commentary. Minneapolis: Fortress.
Malina, Bruce J.
1995
"Early Christian Groups: Using Small Group Formation Theory to Explain Christian Organizations." In Esler, Modelling Early
Christianity,96-113. Malina, Bruce J. and Richard L. Rohrbaugh
1992
Social· Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels. Minneapolis:
Fortress. Marguerat, Daniel 1993 "La mort d'Ananias et Saphira (Ac 5.1-11) dans lastrategie narrative de Luc." New Testament Studies 39: 209·26.
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Marshall, I. Howard
1980
The Acts of the Apostles: An Introduction and Commentary. Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans. Moxnes, Halvor 1991 "Patron-Client Relations and the New Community in Luke-Acts." In Jerome H. Neyrey (ed.), The Social World of Luke-Acts: Models for Interpretation, 241-68. Peabody: Hendrickson. Munck, Johannes 1967 The Acts of the Apostles: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. New York: Doubleday. Neil, William 1973 The Acts of the Apostles. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. O'Toole, Robert F. 1995 '''You Did Not Lie to Us (Human Beings) but to God' (Acts 5,4c)." Biblica 76: 182-209. Pesch, Rudolf 1986 Die Apostelgeschichte. 2 vols. NeukirchenNluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Rackham, Richard Belward 1901 The Acts of the Apostles: An Exposition. London: Methuen. Richardson, Peter 1996 "Early Synagogues as Collegia in the Diaspora and Palestine." In Kloppenborg and Wilson, Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman
World,90-109. Schmithals, Walter
1982 Die Apostelgeschichte des Lukas. Zurich: Theologischer Verlag. Seccombe, David P. 1978 "Was There Organized Charity in Jerusalem Before the Christians?" Journal of Theological Studies 29: 140-43. Sterling, Gregory E. 1994 '''Athletes of Virtue': An Analysis of the Summaries in Acts (2:4147; 4:32-35; 5: 12-16)." Journal of Biblical Literature 113: 679-96. Talbert, Charles H. 1997 Reading Acts: A Literary and Theological Commentary on the Acts uf the Apostles. New York: Crossroad. Uhlhorn, Gerhard 1883 Christian Charity in the Ancient Church. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. Walaskay, Paul W. 1998 Acts. Louisville: WestminsterIJohn Knox.
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Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew 1989 "Patronage in Roman Society: From Republic to Empire." In Andrew Watlace-Hadrill (ed.), Patronage in Ancient Society, 63-87. London/New Yark: Routledge. Weinfeld, Moshe 1986 The Organizational Pattern and the Penal Code of the Qumran Sect: A
Comparison with Guilds and Religious Associations of the Hellenistic Period. G6ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Williams, Charles Stephan Conway 1964 [19571 A Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles. Second cd. London: Adam and Charles Black. Witherington, Ben, III 1998 The Acts of the Apostles: A Socia-Rhetorical Commentary. Grand Rapids/Carlisle: Eerdmans/Paternoster.
8 ISAIAH 5:1-7, THE PARABLE OF THE TENANTS AND VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS JOHN S. KLOPPENBORG VERBIN
Mark's parable of the tenants (Mark 12: 1- 12) has from the beginning of parables resea~h presented difficulties. It is one of the few parables that contains an obvious allusion to the Tanak and one whose point seems largely dependent on allegorization. While it is clear that Matthew, and certainly later Christian writers, displayed a strong tendency to interpret the parable as allegory, the dominant (though hardly unanimous) assumption in modern parables interpretation is that Jesus did not tell stories that required an allegorical code for their intelligibility. Hence, Synoptic parables are normaUy stripped of allegorical details in order to arrive at the "original" level. A parable that resists de-allegorization or whose point appears to require allegory, therefore, offers special problems. Either it must be treated as inauthentic, the creation of some later tradent; or, if a case for authenticity could be made, it constitutes evidence that might undermine a dominant assumption of parables research.!
Abbreviations of papyri cited: BO U, Agyptische Urkunden aus den koniglichen {staatlichen1 Museen zu Berlin, Griechische Urkunden. Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1895-1912; CPR, Corpus Papyrorum Raineri, eds. C. Wessely et al. Wien: Verlag der kaiserlichen koniglichen Hot~ und Staatsdruckerei, 1895-1995; PAmh, The Amherst Papyri, eds. B. P. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt. London: H. Frowde, 1900-1901; PBerlFrisk, Bankakten aus dem Faijum nebst anderen Berliner Papyri, ed. H. Frisk. Goteborg: Elander Boktr., 1931; PBerlLeihg, Berliner Leihgabe griechischer Papyri, cds. T. Kalen and the Greek Seminar at Uppsala. Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1932-77; PCairMasp, Papyrus grecs d'cpoque byzantine, cd. ]. Maspero. Le Caire: Institut franfHis d'archeologie orientale, 1911- 13; PCairZen, Zenon Papyri, ed. C. C. Edgar. Le Caire: lnstittlt fran~ais d'archeologie orientale, 1925-40; PCoIZen, Columbia Papyri. III: Zenon Paj)yri: Business Papers of the Third Century B.C. Dealing with Palestine and E&'YPt, eds. W. L. Westermann and E. S. Hasenoehrl. New York: Columbia University Press, 1934-40; PEdg, "Selected Papyri from the Archives of Zenon," cd. C. C. Edgar. Annales du Service des Amiquites de l'Egypte 18-24 (1918-24); PFlor, Papiri
112
TEXT AND ARTIFACf
1. The Problem of Realism in the Parable
The parable in Mark narrates one story but contains intertextual "tags" that refer to another. The first narrative is of a vineyard owner who leases a vineyard to tenants who, in violation of an implied tenancy agreement, default on their obligations. His several attempts to extract the rent result in the abuse of his agents and the death of his son, and, in turn, his destruction of the tenants and the re-Ieasing of the property. The parable in Mark invokes a second story, borrowed from Isaiah 5: 1-7, and by means of the intertextual tag causes the first narrative to be read in the light of the second. The second narrative is of a vineyard owner who builds a wall, plants a vineyard, tends it and, contrary to reasonable expectation, finds it producing thorns. His recourse is to break down the wall and to let the plot ofland return to its original wild state. The two narratives obviously intersect at several points: both have to do with an owner and his vineyard and both involve scenarios in which the owner's reasonable expectations for gain are frustrated; in both cases he takes remedial steps that adversely affect the vineyard (lsa 5:5-6) or the tenants (Mark 12:9). From the point of view of style, the remedy of the owner is
greco·egizii, Papiri Florentini, ed. G. Vitelli. Milan: U. Hoepli, 1906·15; PGiss, Griechische Papyri im Museum des oberhessischen Geschichtsvereins zu Giessen, eds. O. Eger, E. Komemann and P. M. Meyer. LeipzigfBerlin: Museum des oberhessischen Geschichtsvereins zu Giessen, 1910·12; PHamb, Griechische Papyrusurkunden der Hamburger Staats· und Universitilts· bibliothek, ed. P. M. Meyer. LeipziglBerlin: Teubner, 1911·1984; PHarr, The Rendel Harris Papyri of Woodbrooke College, Birmingham, eds. J. E. Powell et al. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1936·85; PKaln, KaIner Papyri, eds. B. Kramer et al. Ofpladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1976·1991; PlAur, Dai Papiri della Biblioteca Medicea lAurenziana, cd. R. Pintaudi. Hrmzc: Gonnelli, 1976·84; PLond, Greek Papyri in the British Museum, eds. F. G. Kenyon, H. 1. Bell, W. E. Crum and T. C. Skeat. London: British Museum, 1893·74; POxy, The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, eds. B. P. Grenfell et aI. London: Egypt Exploration Society, 1898·; PRyl, Catalogue of the Greek Papyri in the John Rylallds Ubrary, Manchester, eds. A. S. Hunt et al. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1911·52; PSI, Papin gred e latini, eds. Girolamo Vitelli et al. Firenze: Le Monnier, 1912·79; PTebe, The Tebtullis Papyri, eds. B. P. Grenfell et al. London: Oxford University Press, 1902·76; PVindSal, Einige Wiener Papyri, ed. R. P. Salomons. Amsterdam: Hakkert, 1976; SB, Sammelbuch griechischer Urkunden aus Agypten, eds. F. Preisigke and F. Bilabel. Strassburg/Wiesbaden: Trubner, 1915·; StudPal, Studien zur Palaeographie und Papyrus·kunde, eds. C. Wessely et aI. Leipzig: Avenarius, 1901.24.
VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
113
introduced by a question, "What more shall I do for my vineyard and what have I done for it?" (lsa 5:4), or "What then shall the owner of the vineyard do?" (Mark 12:9). From the point of view of genre, the Isaian text is a juridical parable (Yee 1981), told against the house ofIsrael and the men ofJudah (Isa 5: 7). In both Isaiah 5: 1-7 and Nathan's juridical parable of the ewe, the force of the parable rests on the realism of the story, which provokes the hearers to render a judgment on the case cited, unaware that in doing so they condemn themselves (Simon 1967: 220-21). The juridical aspects of Mark's story are also clear, for it is told against the chief priests, scribes and elders (Mark 11:27; 12: 12), who clearly are expected to understand the parable as an allegory. The Markan story as it stands is somewhat less realistic than Nathan's parable or Isaiah 5: 1-7, but the judgment in Mark 12:9 follows reasonably naturally from the outrages committed by the Markan tenants. Modern interpretation of the parable has proceeded along three contradictory lines. The first view, epitomized by AdolfJulicher (1898-99) and seen more recently in Ernst Kummel (1950) and Charles Carlston (1975; 178-
90), proceeds on the assumption that Jesus' (authentic) parables were not allegories and that since Mark 12; 1-9 cannot be de-allegorized, it is probably not authentic. It is argued, for example, that the sending of the "beloved son" and his murder so obviously recalls the death of Jesus that it cannot be ascribed to the historical Jesus; and the tenants' incredible expectation of inheriting a vineyard so resists a realistic reading that it can only have been formulated with Mark's polemic against the priestly rulers in view. A second exegetical tradition, represented by C. H. Dodd (1936), Joachim Jeremias (1952; 1970), John Dominic Crossan (1971) and Michel Hubaut (1976), agrees that Jesus' parables were not allegories, but proposes an "original" reading that is realistic, presupposing ordinary economic, social and political features of life in Jewish Palestine. The parable, so this tradition assumes, was originally intended as a story that would be immediately comprehensible to a Galilean or Judean audience without recourse to a special allegorical code. This line of interpretation has, in some forms, argued that the allusions to Isaiah 5: 1-7 and the quotation of Psalm 118:22 are secondary insertions, added in an effort to create an allegory amenable to later Christian usage.
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The final line of interpretation, represented in very recent scholarship by Klyne Snodgrass (1983), Bruce Chilton (1984), George Brooke (1995), Craig Evans (1996), Johannes de Moor (1998) and Wim Weren (1998), agrees with Jiilicher that Mark 12: 1-12 cannot be read except as an allegory, by virtue of the intertextual allusions to Isaiah 5:1-7. But by pointing out that the interpretation of Isaiah's vineyard as Israel or Jerusalem and its cult was a contemporary one in Jesus' day (Tg. Isa.
to
5:1-7; 4Q500), these authors
propose that the parable as it stands in Mark makes good sense as a story that Jesus directed against the priestly rulers of Jerusalem. There are far too many issues involved in the exegesis of this parable to treat in a short essay. What I should like to address is the rather narrow issue, raised by Dodd and Jeremias, of whether it is possible to recover a simple, realistic story behind the present form of the parable. Relying mainly on what we know from papyri about vineyard leases, I shall argue, first, that the juxtaposition of the Isaian story with the tenancy story creates an incoherence in the story that prevents the narrative from being read realistically and requires that it be read allegorically; and second, that the version preserved in the Gospel of Thomas , which lacks these incoherences, seems the best candidate for the earliest version of the story. Julicher found it impossible to read the parable realistically: The man who leases his vineyard to unreliable tenants, without any legal guarantees when he leaves the country, who sacrifices one servant after another to the brutal mistreatment of those good-for-nothings without noticing the futility of his system, and, when all his servants have been murdered nevertheless offers his only son when he also possesses the power at the end to dispatch (he tenants and the desire to find yet another set of farmers-this is a vineyard owner who is every bit as unlikely a being as tenants who not only withhold from the owner what belongs to him, but engage in meaningless provocation and calculate the murder of the son without taking the owner himself into account! Oillicher 1910: 2.402) Julicher took the quotation of Psalm 118:22 in Mark 12: 10-11 to be a secondary accretion. Whoever added it, he suggested, considered the retribution described in Mark 12:9 to be an inadequate conclusion to the story, and hence introduced the notion of the humiliation and exaltation of the Son=stone. While Mark 12:9 metes out punishment for the violation of the
V1NEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
115
tenancy agreement and the outrages committed on the owner's agents, and holds out the possibility of the owner fulfilling his original aims in the re-Ietting of the vineyard, Psalm 118:22 introduces the entirely extraneous notion that one of the agents (the son) achieves a special prominence, but in a manner wholly unrelated to the particulars of the tenancy story. It is patently a reference to Jesus' resurrection and exaltation and as such does not belong to the tenancy story. As Jillicher noted, moreover, the insertion creates something of an aporia, since the reaction of the interlocutors (Mark 12: 12) has nothing to do with the Psalm quotation; it is the parable (Mark 12:1-9) that is "told against" the rulers, not Psalm 118:22, which is directed to entirely different (christological) ends. Could the parable, stripped of vv. 10-12, be regarded as authentic? Julicher here was cautious: Mark 12:6-8 might be regarded as a vaticinium ex eventu. But it could not be denied in principle that Jesus regarded himself as the son, especially when he compared his activities with those of the prophets and John. And in view of Mark 14:21-24, he may well have anticipated his death at the hands of the authorities. Jiilicher, moreover, thought that Matthew's additional saying (21:43) aptly captured Jesus' attitude toward the "official representatives ofJewish piety." Nevertheless, he saw as just as likely the supposition that Mark 12: 1-9 was the composition of an early Christian, drawing on Isaiah 5 and knowledge of Jesus' parabolic speech to produce an allegorical justification of Jesus' death. "Every original trace, every subtle psychological motivation of the tenants or the owner, all poetic freshness are lacking, and the parable itself finishes oddly inasmuch as the addressees understand it and then attempt to effect on the speaker a murder which, as he has just explained to them, is both horrific and useless." Any attempt to reconstruct an authentic parable behind Mark 12:1-9 and Matthew 21:43 would be pointless: "Mark 12, down to the last detail, is a product of early Christian theology" Oulicher 1910: 2.406). Dodd sought to recover an authentic core of the parable, and did so by proposing a reconstruction that would cohere with what was known of the social conditions of Jewish Palestine in the first century. In doing so, he agreed with JUlicher's programmatic distinction between parable and allegory, and rejected the notion that Jesus' parables were "allegorical mystifications" (1961: 4), On the contrary, the parables give realistic depictions of the world and its
processes. They also provide "a singularly complete and convincing picture of
116
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
life in a small provincial town~probably a more complete picture of petit-
bourgeois and peasant life than we possess for any other province of the Roman empire except Egypt, where papyri come to our aid" (1961: 10). This approach obliged Dodd to give a realistic reading of the parable of the tenants. Accordingly, he suggested that it reflected the revolutionary ferment that had prevailed in Palestine since the time of] udas the Galilean in 6 CEo The parable depicted agrarian discontent caused by the tensions between foreign absentee landlords and nationalistic tenants. Given this line ofinterpretation, one might have expected Dodd to treat the allusion to Isaiah 5: 1-2 as secondary and to understand the tenants as the heroes of the story, attempting to throw off the yoke of Rome; but instead, Dodd interpreted the parable
through the double lens ofIsaiah 5: 1-2 and Mark 12: 12, and understood the tenants as the rulers of Israel who "refused their landlord [God] his due" and would accordingly be punished (1936: 126; 1961: 98). Dodd was perceptive enough to see not only that Mark 12:10-11 was an addition,Z but that the summarizing comment in 12:5 was probably secondary: it strikes the reader as "unreal" and seems designed to be an allegorical reference
to
the long line of Israelite prophets. 3 What troubled him more,
however, was the conclusion of the parable in v. 9b. Although Dodd argued that the statement was not specific enough to be a vaticinium ex eventu and that jesus himself probably spoke of the "disruption of the Jewish community," he thought it possible tharv. 9b was an addition. Besides, Jesus apparently did not answer his own questions in other parables. 4 Dodd's reading removed some elements of allegory-vv. 5, 9b, 10-Il-but he continued to treat the "son" as self-referential and the tenants as a figure for the chief priests. Moreover, he never addressed Jiilicher's list of improbabilities beyond excising v. 5 as secondary. This excision perhaps alleviated the motivational questions raised by the juxtaposition of the murder of the "many
2 Dodd:" All this progressive elaboration indicates that the Church ... was anxious to put [the parable's] interpretation beyond doubt" (1936: 128; 1961: 99). 3 Dodd (1936: 129; 1961: 100). The reference to "Mk. xii 4" as the addition must be a misprint. Dodd's summary of the original form of the parable (and his reference to the Gospel of Thomas in the revised edition [1961: 100 n.2l) indicates that it is v. 5 that he treats as secondary. 4 Dodd cites no parallels at this point but perhaps had in mind Luke 10:36 or Luke 16:20 (neither of which he dlscusses).
VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
117
others" (12:5) with the owner's decision to send his beloved son (12:6); but since Dodd already read the son as the "Successor of the prophets" (1936: 131; 1961: 101), the motivation of the owner (= God) was no longer reducible to the possible motivations of a Palestinian landowner. In an effort to avoid allegorizacion, Dodd fell back into allegory. Jeremias's attempt to de-allegorize the parable went beyond Dodd's. In the first editions of Die Gleichnisse }esu (1947; 1952, ET 1955) he seems to have regarded the quotation ofIsaiah 5:2 to be secondary, since he suggested that Luke 20: 10-12, which lacks most of the Isaian elements, retained "the features of a simple story" (1955: 56).5 The role of the son, though it might appear to be an extravagant element in the story and included for christological purposes, is part of the escalating logic of the story designed to underscore the depravity of the tenants. Besides, Jeremias says, an original Palestinian audience would not have identified the son as a messianic figure, since there was no evidence that the title "Son of God" was applied to the Messiah in Palestinian Judaism. He agreed with Dodd that Mark 12: 10-11 was added to the parable to compensate for the lack of a reference to the resurrection of Jesus, and the qualification of the son as aycmTp:6c;; is probably a first allegorical trace. The tenants' violent behaviour, however, seems quite in line with what could be surmised of the social situation of first-century Palestine. Citing Dodd, Jeremias suggested that most of the Galilee-including the northwest shore of the Kinneret and the "Galilean uplands" (Upper Galilee?)-was parcelled out to foreign landlords in the form oflatifundia. 6 It is essential, claims Jeremias, to realize that the landlord is living abroad (Mark 12: 1, Kat a1t€otlll TJO€v) and thus probably a foreigner. Hence, the parable reflects the "revolutionary attitude of the Galilean peasants towards the foreign landlords" (1955: 58). The main obstacle to Jeremias's realistic interpretation, namely the tenants' expectation of "inheriting" by killing the son, was overcome by the ingenious suggestion that the tenants had in mind a law according to which the estate of an intestate proselyte could be appropriated by a claimant who was
5 Jeremias (1955: 124) later seems to imply that the Isaian allusions are also original. 6 Jeremias (1955: 59 n.47) cited the Zenon papyri as evidence of foreign ownership oflands in the Galilee (PSI VI 594 [261-246 BeE]). He took Josephus's reference to an imperial granary at Gush Halav (Life 71) to imply that the surrounding villages belonged to imperial domains.
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TEXT AND ARTIFACT
already occupying it. 7 Hence, Jeremias suggested, the tenants believed that the son's appearance implied that the owner was dead, and that by killing the heir they would render the property ownerless (1955: 59). Despite the seemingly realistic reading that Jeremias supplied, his interpretation seems counterintuitive. Taking Mark 12: 12 as a reliable index to the original audience of the parable, Jeremias proposed that it had been directed against the priestly rulers. Yet the legal expedient that he suggests as the key to the tenants' actions is, to say the least, a footnote to Mishnaic law; without further elaboration, it seems doubtful that the priestly rulers would understand the point. There are indeed several problems with his reading. First, the verb (btOOTH.1EtV, while conveying absenteeism, implies nothing about the owner's ethnicity or even his present location. Second, there is nothing to indicate that the owner was a proselyte; hence, the Mishnaic ruling that Jeremias cites is of uncertain merit. Third, since Jeremias wishes to read the owner as God and the killing of the son as the "rejection of God's definite and final message" (1955: 60), it is odd that he suggests that the owner is also a foreign absentee landlord. Finally, there is nothing in the parable to suggest that the "others" are the poor; Jeremias cites Matthew 5:5, Matthew's redaction of Q's beatitudes, as his basis for this suggestion. By the time of the revised edition of Die Gleichnisselesu (1970, ET 1972), Jeremias had access to the Gospel of Thomas (65), whose version of the parable lacked both the Isaian allusions in 12: 1 and 12:9 and a parallel to Mark 12:5. This encouraged Jeremias to declare that the Isaian allusions-both the elaborate description of the establishing of the vineyard in Mark 12: 1 and the question and answer in 12:9-are secondary. Mark 12:5b, which caused Jiilicher such difficulties, was also an expansion (1972: 71). Jeremias even toyed with the possibili ty that Lu ke' s version of the story is an independen t tradition, 8 similar to that found in the Gospel of Thomas 65. But apart from these adjustments, Jeremias maintained the other details of his earlier interpretation: the owner was a foreign absentee landlord and the tenants availed themselves 7 The law of adverse possession (usucaptio): "When one lays claim to the estate of a proselyte, then if [the claimant] locked it in or fenced it in or made any breach whatsoever, this is considered valid usucaption" (m. B. Bat. 3.3; see further b. B. Bat. 53a55a; b. Gif. 39a). 8 Affirmed also by Bammel (1959: 12 n.6), Robinson (1975: 451) and Hester (1992: 32, tentatively) .
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VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
oflaws of adverse possession (usucaptio). Curiously, although he excluded both the Isaian allusions, by virtue of which the owner comes to be identified with God, and 12:9, which speaks of the transfer of the vineyard to "others," Jeremias still maintained that the parable vindicated God's offer of the gospel to the poor. Despite his exclusion of the Isaian allusion, Jeremias assures us that the audience would connect the parable with Isaiah 5:7 on the basis of the mention of a "vineyard." Hence, he brings back what he had just excluded and makes [saiah 5:1·7 determinative for the parable's original meaning. Derrett (1970) tried to correct some of the difficulties inherent in Jeremias's reading. The story itself, suggests Derrett, is realistic and required no allusions to Isaiah. It would be perfectly natural for a capitalist to plant a vineyard, rent it out and then depart until it came into full production. Like Jeremias, he insisted that the owner was some distance from the vineyard, since he had
to
communicate by means of servants. Because a new vineyard would
normally take four years to come into full production,9 Derrett recognizes that the owner would be required to pay the wages of the tenants during those unproductive years. But then he assumes-without any real warrant-that Mark's "in due season" (1:
Katp~,
12:2) means after the fourth year,
and-again without warrant-that the reason for the tenants' hostile reception of the first servant was that they had been unpaid for their capital expenditures during the entire period. Thus, "the fight was not necessarily a sign of ill.will, but of sincerity!" (1970: 299). Derrett also assumes that the sending of the second servant and the son occurred in two further successive years, hence, after the second and third harvests. At this point Derrett invokes laws of adverse possession in order to render reasonable the tenants' actions: the tenants believe that, in accordance with Baba Batra 3.1,10 three years of undisputed usufruct were sufficient basis for a
9 According tom. Peah 7.6 (interpreting Lev 19:23·25), the produce of a vineyard is forbidden as "uncircumcised" for the first three years, and in dle fourth must be redeemed at the Temple. Further e1alxJration of Leviticus 19:23-25 is found in m. 'Or. and m. B. Me~, 4.8. 10 m. B. Bat. 3.1: "The legal period for undisputed possession for houses, cisterns, ditches, caves, dovecotes, bath·houses, olive presses, irrigated fields, bondmen, and whatsoever else produces steady gain, is [obtained by occupation fori three years, from day to day. , .. R. Ishmael [b. Elisha, 120-40 eEl said, This [Le .• periodiC occupation for each of three years) refers only to a grain field, but in the case of an orchard, when one has brought in his crop ... this period [one month in the first year, twelve months in the second, one in the third] is deemed [as equivalent to] three years."
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claim of adverse possession. But since laws of adverse possession, both in the Mishnah and elsewhere, presuppose that such claims are valid only in the case ofundi5puted use ofland (or movable property), Derrett does not consider the sending of the first and second servants to constitute the landlord's continued assertion of property. It is difficult, however, not to see the owner's attempts to recover rent-regardless of whether the servants were sent yearly or at some shorter interval-as constituting claims to ownership. Derrett's insistence on the owner's remove from the vineyard, moreover, cuts against his case. As Baba Batra 3.2 makes clear, adverse possession is not valid if, for example, the property is in the Galilee or the Transjordan and the owner resident in Judah, or vice versa. 11 For the presumption of rules of adverse possession is that the owner knows of the occupation of his or her property and does nothing to recover its use. 12 To make matters even worse, Baba Batra 3.3 expressly excludes tenants from those eligible for making claims of adverse possession
(i1p~n), 13 for the obvious reason that not to do so would have made any tenancy agreement longer than three years a serious risk to the owner.
2. Papyrus Leases of Vineyards and Viticultural Labour In the attempts to recover a realistic scenario behind the parable, or even to decide whether a realistic story can be recovered at all, what is usually neglected is what is known about actual leasing agreements-in particular, leases of vineyards. 14 Of course, very few details of such agreements survive
11 m. B, Bat, 3.3 includes a rejected option ofR. Judah [b. IlIai, 140·65 eEl, who argued that the three year limit applied only to owners in Spain, since after occupation by another person for one year, it would take one year for the news to reach the owner, and another year for the owner to return to assert ownership. 12 Derrett cites BGU I 267 [199 eEl: "[Tlhey are established [in the landl for those living in another city, after 20 years, but for those living in the same city, after only ten years." But see Schulz (1951: 359), who points out that the law is from the time ofCaracalla. 13 m. B. Bat. 3.3: "Artisans, jointholders, tenants, and administrators-the law of usucaption does not apply to them." 14 An exception to this is Evans (1996), whose efforts are directed mainly to showing that tenants included not only peasants, but smallholders (BGU II 530, erroneously cited as BGG 174), decommissioned soldiers (BGU 1156; PColZen 54), large.scale public farmers (PLond Il 256), and other large cultivators (PCairZen 59292). Evans concludes from the clauses giving the lessor the right of execution on the lessee's property (e.g., PRyl IV 582 [42 BeE]) and heavy penalties in the case of def~ult (e.g., PI~ylIV 583 [170 BeE]) that the lessees could not be peasants or day labourers but must be "persons of means." There were,
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VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
from Jewish Palestine, for reasons of climate: in all but the Arava, the humidity and rainfall are too high to allow papyri or parchment to survive. But we have from Pwlemaic and Roman Egypt thousands of lease agreements, including many that deal with the particulars of vineyards. Papyri have been employed helpfully in two studies of this parable. The more substantial of the two, by Martin Hengel (1968), used selected Zenon papyri to show that the parable's basic scenario had the ring of verisimilitude. The Zenon papyri reflect a foreign (Ptolemaic) absentee landlord of estates
PSI VI 594 [261-246 BeE)). One of the estates in question was said to have 80,000 vines
near Beth Anath in the Galilee (e.g., PLond VII 1948 [257 BeE] j
and thus represents a property of approximately seventeen hectares, requiring (by Hengel's estimate) twenty-five workers or the (male) population of a small village. Hengel adduced a papyrus
(PSI VI 554 [258 BeE)) mentioning a
dispute between Melas, the manager of one of Apollonios's15 estates in Palestine, and the tenants who leased the estate in exchange for fixed taxes. The nature of the dispute is unclear owing to the fragmentary state of the papyrus, but it included the tenants' protests about taxes that Melas had forced them to pay and about quantities of grapes and figs. 16 These papyri illustrate for Hengel the likely tensions that resulted from the fact that the owner of this Galilean property was an Egyptian and that he dealt with the tenants by means of agents. The new-typically hellenistic-revenue intensive kind of management, in which agents charged with achieving delivery quotas certainly did not act with special deference, aroused the indignation of the Galilean farmers, who apparemly refused to pay the rent. (Hengel 1968: 15-16)
of course, large-scale leaseholders: one could cite PSI 393 (241 BeE), a vineyard of 60 arouras (= 16.5 ha); and PCairZen 59300 (250 BeE), a vineyard of 100 arouras (= 27.5 ha). But Evans mistakes the size of the property in PRyl IV 583 (6 arouras = 1.5 ha), which hardly indicates a wealthy tenant. Moreover, the execution and penalty clauses to which he refers are mostly formulaic and do not necessarily reflect the ability of the lessee to pay the penalty stipulated. It is clear, of course, that the leases are not with "day labourers," but neither PRyl IV 592 nor PRyllV 593 allows us to determine the social status of the lessees. On the structure of leases, see Taubenschlag (1955: 268-74); on penalty clauses, see Berger (1911: esp. 150-53). 15 Apollonios was the finance minister (O~O~1CfJt~C;) to Ptolemy II Philadelphos. 16 See Tcherikover (1937: 45-48) for a discussion of this fragmentary papyrus.
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TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Perhaps foreign absenteeism contributed to the tensions, but, as will be shown below, tensions could just as easily arise when the landowner was much closer to the tenants. The papyri cited by Hengel-and many others that might have been adduced-illustrate well the use of agents. In the case of the Beth Anath estate, Apollonios used Melas, the manager of the estate, a KWIlOI.H08uHtlC; (probably a royal official responsible forthe leases and keeping the corresponding contracts), and the writer of the letter, probably another agent of Apollonios. The use of agents, however, is not purely a function of Apollonios's residence in Egypt. On the contrary, it was customary for landowners to deal through agents, especially for owners who were high on the ladder of status. In other words, the conclusion that Hengel wishes to draw, that by analogy to the Zenon papyri the owner in Mark 12 is likely resident some significant distance from the vineyard, is possible, though hardly necessary. Tensions between tenants and owners and the use of agents were part and parcel of vineyard leasing. Hengel cites two further papyri to illustrate points pertaining to the avenues available for resolution of legal disputes. The first, PCairZen 59018
(258 BCE), relates the attempt of Zenon (Apollonios's OiKOVOIl0C;) to recover a debt from a certain Yeddous, probably a village chief. Zenon had sent a senior agent, Straton, to collectthe debt and had asked a local official (Oryas) and his underling (Alexandros), probably in the vicinity of the village, to assist Straton. Claiming to be ill, Alexandros sent a slave (vE<xvioKOC;) with Straton but both were expelled from the village (EK~<xA.[Eivl EK tllc; KWIlTJC;) and the slave was assaulted by Yeddous. Hengel suggests that Zenon here encountered the reluctance oflocal officials (presumably Oryas and Alexandros) to disturb the peace simply in order to comply with the requests of distant Egyptian officials (1968: 27). A second papyrus, PCairZen 59015 (259-258 BCE), 17 contains the drafts of five letters sent by Zenon to various Egyptian officials in Marisa, asking that they assist Straton in recovering three runaway slaves that Zenon had bought there. Hengel suggests that Zenon's requests illustrate the energy
17 Hengel (1968: 27 n.89) mistakenly cites it as PCairZen 50915 and suggests that PCairZen 50915 indicates that the slaves were later in Zenon's possession, so that the attempts at recovery were presumably successful. Hengel perhaps means PCairZen 59537 (259-258 BeE), which, however, is too fragmentary to permit a clear interpretation.
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VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
required to motivate officials to comply with requests for assistance, even those coming from an official of Zenon's status (1968: 27). There is room for doubt here. As S. R. Llewelyn has pointed out, even if Alexandros (of PCairZen 59018) feigned illness to avoid Yedda us's anger, one cannot conclude that all officials acted in this manner (Llewelyn 1992: 101). He points out, moreover, that by sending Oryas a copy of the letter that Straton was bearing to Yeddous, Zenon fully expected Oryas and his underling to co-operate and to assist Straton. In other words, there is no reason to assume that Zenon anticipated resistance or reluctance from local officials. The interpretation of PCairZen 59015 that Hengel gives is also open to question. In the first place, the five letters are not a sequence of letters, attempting to resolve the matter, but letters to five different individuals who could assist Straton (or not interfere with him by imposing on him any obligations). As Llewelyn notes, the letters indicate that Zenon has a close personal relationship with some of the correspondents: he asks for Pasikles's assistance "as a friend," reminds him of an alabaster chest that he wanted to purchase, and offers to Peisistratos anything he wants from the
xwpa
(1992: 104). Nothing in the
correspondence requires us to assume that Zenon anticipated administrative resistance. A second study that uses papyri is Snodgrass's (1983) monograph on Mark 12: 1-12. Snodgrass was concerned to answer the list of objections raised by Jiilicher, Kummel and others in regard to a realistic reading of Mark 12: 1-12: 1. A man would not plant a vineyard and then leave it. 2. A vineyard would not be rented immediately after construction since the first fruits come after five years. 3. The behavior of the tenants is improbable. 4. It is psychologically improbable that a man would repeatedly send slaves when they were repeatedly and progressively mistreated. 5. It is even more improbable that a man would send his only son. 6. There is no justification for the tenants' belief that they would inherit the vineyard. 7. It is questionable whether the owner could simply kill his tenants. 8. It is unlikely that the owner would give the vineyard to others; rather, he would look after it himself. (Snodgrass 1983: 31)
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TEXT AND ARTIFACf
Snodgrass cites POxy XIV 1631 (280 CE) to answer the first and the final objections. It confirms that "it is unlikely that a man who was rich enough to own much land would cultivate it himself' (1983; 33). In order
to
respond to
the second point Snodgrass appeals to Derrett's view that the collection of rent in Mark 12;2 came only after the fourth year and that, in the meantime, the tenants had supported themselves from other crops planted in the vineyard
(1983: 34). He cites Hengel's treatment of the Zenon papyri to illustrate rebellions among tenants and the supposed reluctance oflocal administrators to co-operate with the requests of distant landowners,18 although he refrains from insisting that the landlord of Mark 12 is a foreigner. Unfortunately, as Llewelyn has also pointed out (1992: 95), the papyrus does not co-operate fully with Snodgrass's intentions. POxy XIV 1631 concerns not a new, but a producing vineyard. It is not, strictly speaking, a vineyard lease at all, but a "lease" of the viticultural labour (alJ.1tEAouPYUCCt epya) for which the "lessees" receive wages (f.Lw8o() of 4,500 drachmae, 10 artabas of wheat and four jars of wine (11. 18-20), rather than paying a rent (<j>6po~) in kind or in money, as would be the case in vineyard leases (see below). The lease does mention the leasing of an "old vineyard" (1taAalCt af.L 1tEAoc;), now evidently used to grow dates, olives, figs, peaches, citrons and melons, for which the lessees will pay a special rent (ElC<j>6pla) in kind (ll. 21-25). Thus, while it is true that the lessees derived some income from the produce of the old vineyard, it is clear that a major portion of their yearly income-the lease is for one year-was the wages they received for the viticultural labour. POxy XIV 1631 also illustrates the issue of "absenteeism," but not in the manner that Snodgrass supposes. The lessor, Aurelius Serenus (also called Sara pion) , was a metropolitan in Oxyrhynchus and the lessees were a father and son from Oxyrhynchus and a villager from Tanais, the location of the vineyard itself. As Jane Rowlandson (1996: 270) points out, Serenus/Sarapion both owned and leased property. Besides the vineyard in Tanais, in the Middle toparchy (20 kilometres from Oxyrhynchus), he owned 5 arouras of land for wheat production near Mermertha in the Upper toparchy (22 kilometres from Oxyrhynchus) (POxy XIV 1689). But he also leased 7.5 arouras of land for
18 Snodgrass (1983: 35-37) extends Hengel's point about administrative resistance to include Zenon's supposed reluctance to "use force to regain what was legally his" (apropos of PCairZen 59015, also mis-cited as 50915).
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VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
green vegetables (XAwpoi) in Paimis (POxy XIV 1646), situated next to Oxyrhynchus. Serenus/Sarapion presumably preferred to lease and cultivate farmland near Oxyrhynchus and to lease out his more distant grain farm in Mermertha. For the vineyard in Tanais, however, he needed specialized labour and found this in the combination of two metropolitans and a local vinedresser. Thus POxy XIV 1631 illustrates neither foreign nor necessarily wealthy landowners, but a landowner who leased the viticultural work in his vineyard to tenants, possibly out of consideration for distance, but more probably because he required specialized labourers (for we have no indication that Serenus was himself a vinedresser). Despite the extremely modest distance between Oxyrhynchus and Tanais, Serenus used agents
to
supervise the
vineyard work. The papyrus illustrates a form of "absenteeism," but hardly of the sort that Snodgrass and Hengel wish us to imagine for Mark 12. Vineyard leases represented a particular type of agricultural lease. 19 Unlike the lease of farmland on which the tenant might plant one of several possible annual crops, the lease of a vineyard involved the care of a perennial crop representing a significant capital investment. Vines normally took five years to become productive20 and required constant irrigation. They could suffer damage through neglect, and the proper operation of a vineyard regularly involved care for an adjoining reed plantation, from which supports for the vines were obtained, periodic manuring of the vines and maintenance of water installations.
19 The following vineyard leases are known from Ptolemaic times: PRyl IV 583 (Philadelphia, 170 BeE); PKiiln III 144 (Arsinoite nome, 152 BeE). From Roman and Byzantine times we have the following: BGU IV 1122 (Alexandria, 13 BeE); BGU II 591 (Fayum, 56/57 eEl; PLond II 163 (Fayum, 88 eEl; POxy IV 729 (Oxyrhynchus, 137 eEl; PFIoT III 369 (Hermopolites, 1391149 eEl; PAmh II 91 (Theadelphia [Fayum] 159 eE); POxy XIV 1692 (Oxyrhynchus, 188 eEl; PHarr I 137 (Oxyrhynchus, II eEl; CPR 1244 (Fayum, II-III eEl; PBerlLeihg [ 23 (Theadelphia, 252 eEl; POxy XLVIII 3354 (Oxyrhynchus, 257 eE); POxy XIV1631 (Oxyrhynchus, 280 eEl; PLaUT IV 166 (189-90 eEl; PSI XIII 1338 (Oxyrhynchus, 299 eEl; PVindSal8 (Hermopolites, 325 eE); PFlor 184 (Hermopolites, 366 eEl; PFlor III 315 (Hermopolites, 435 eEl; SB 4481 (Fayum, 486 eEl; PBeTlFrisk 4 (Hermopolites, 512 eE); PCairMasp I 67104 (Antaiopolites, 530 eEl; PLand III 1003 (Hermopolites, 562 eEl; PHamb I 23 (Antinoupolis, 569 eEl; PGiss I 56 (Hermopolites, VI eEl; SB 4774; 4482, 4486 (Fayum, VI-VII eEl; StudPal XX 218 (Hermopolites, VII eEl. 20 This is reflected in the fact that tax structures in the Ptolemaic period recognized that newly planted vineyards would come into full production only after the fifth and sixth years (PEdg 38 [III BCE]; Rostovtzeff 1922: 99; Westermann 1926: 43-44). PTebt I 5 (Kerkeosiris, 118 ReE) 93-97, reporting tax laws of Ptolemy II Euergetes, left vineyards untaxed for five years and allowed a reduced tax for the following three years.
126
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Leases could be of several types. The first type is analogous to leases of other agricultural land, in which the tenant agreed either to care for the land in exchange for a share of the crop, or to assume all of the harvest and pay a fixed rent (<j>6poC;), or some combination of the two arrangements. In many cases, vineyards were connected with fruit orchards or vegetable gardens, which could also command a rent. In one of the earliest vineyard leases extant, PRyl IV 583 (170 BCE), for example, Nichomachos leased a 6 aroura (1.5 ha) vineyard near Philadelphia, apparently for one year, for a rent of two-thirds of the crop (after deductions had been made for an agricultural tax and the hire of the wine press and treaders). Only a few of the responsibilities were joint: both the lessor and the lessee, Apollonios, were required to provide jars for the wine and both had to carry the must for themselves. Otherwise, most of the duties fell to the lessee. The lease enjoined upon Apollonios the duties of pruning and dressing the vines, weeding and watering, and required him to shift fifty rows of vines (at his own expense). All of the monthly wages (of the casual labourers) were the responsibility of Apollonios. Nichomachos was permitted to station a guard on the vineyard, presumably around harvest time, to prevent theft and fraud. Although Nichomachos presumably paid the wages associated with guard duty, Apollonios was expected to give the guard other work in the vineyard and to pay him as a monthly worker. The lease contains typical clauses imposing fines on Apollonios should he abandon the lease or fail to pay the wages of the labourers, and ends with the standard clauses requiring that the vineyard be returned to Nichomachos in good order (i.e., free of weeds, rushes and other contaminants) at the expiration of the agreement.
POxy IV 729 (Oxyrhynchus, 137 CE) presents a somewhat more complicated but perhaps more typical situation. The lessor, Sarapion, himself a lessee, leased a vineyard of uncertain size and a reed plantation to two tenants, Ammonios and Ptollas, for a period of four years. Rent was on the basis of half-shares , but the lessor was to receive an additional fifty jars of wine. The area also included a disused vineyard leased for three years starting the year after the vineyard lease and used for grain production, on which the lessees would pay a special rent of sixty drachmae and (probably) one-half of the crop. The lessor, however, seems to have been responsible for the taxes and allowed the lessee to use the farm buildings.
127
VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
The lessees and lessor shared the expenses for manuring the vineyard and, as in PRyl IV 583, Sarapion was entitled to post his own guard on the crop (at his own expense). The lessees were evidently responsible for the harvest and the pressing, with the lessor providing sufficient jars for his share of the wine. Stiff penalties are imposed for any damages or failure to perform the necessary work, and the lessor acquired the right of execution on the lessees' property should any default occur. The lease contains a detailed list of the viticultural duties expected of Ammonios and Ptollas, and an equally detailed description of the expected state of the vineyard at the expiry of the lease. These two leases, like POxy XIV 1631 cited by Snodgrass, concern producing vineyards, and so are poor analogies to Mark 12:1-12. A better analogy is offered by BGU IV 1122 (Alexandria, 13 BCE) , in which two vinedressers, Papos and Ptolemaios, leased from Gaius the viticultural labour in a small (2 aroura) vineyard. They were responsible for planting the shoots at the proper depth, watering the plants and caring for the vineyard for a period of three years. Gaius was to supply the plants, stakes and reeds, and Papas and Ptolemaios were to receive a yearly wage of 450 drachmae, paid in installments. The lease contains standard provisions for the return of the vineyard in good order at the expiration of the lease, imposes penalties for abandoning the lease and for damaging the vines in any way, and gives Gaius the right of execution on the property of the tenants should a default occur. From a century and a half earlier comes another lease for viticultural labour. PK81n III 144 (Arsinoite nome, 152 BCE) contains the agreement between the lessor, Euarchos, and three "Judaeans" to lease the a".l7teA~Ka epya: of his vineyard. Neither the size of the vineyard nor the duration of the lease is known, but the lease states that the wage (j..L1.<Je6~) to be paid the lessees is 1,700 drachmae per aroura (11. 8, 27).21 Although the end of the papyrus is missing and much of the detail of the lease unrecoverable, the phrase "to have contracted from Euarchos
-cu
aj..L1teA~Ka
epycc 1tIxV'Ca: -cou
eupe8T]<Joj..Livou pa:xou" ("all viticultural labour of the thicket [hedge?],
21 The lease also states that an aroura is equivalent to 400 vines (I. 27). The editors (Kramer, Hiibner, Erler and Hagedorn 1976-91: 3.92) suggest that this figure is rather low; Pliny (Hist. Nat. 17.171) indicates that vine rows are normally planted five feet apart (but up to eight feet), which would yield a figure of 1,300-1,500 vines per aroura. According to Schnebel (1925: 253-54), however, intercultivationofvegetables was common, which fact might account for the reduced density of vines.
128
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
regardless of its condition") suggested to the editors that the vineyard had been neglected and hence required restoration. 22 This would account for the fact that the payments take the form of wages to the lessees rather than rent to the lessor and that there is no mention of pressing or delivery of the vintage, since, presumably, the vineyard is not yet in production. Other instances of newly planted vineyards might be cited,23 but one of particular interest is POxy IV 707 (Oxyrhynchus, 136 CE), the record of a trial which preserves part of the speech of the plaintiff, Plutarchos. Plutarchos had leased from Demetria a vineyard in Seruphis (near Oxyrhynchus), previously leased for six years to two other tenants, Philinos and Antistios, both from Oxyrhynchus. Since the vineyard was newly planted, the first lease stipulated that the first four years were to be rent-free (21: 1l'l10ev (mep <popou) but that the lessees were to pay the taxes. 24 For the final two years of the lease, rent would be paid (though the terms are not stated). The lessees would receive from Demetria 2,000 drachmae, on the condition that they also rebuild the walls of the vineyard and build a new waterwheel. Plutarchos's complaint notes that Philinos did not perform the work required, although he took the wages, did not build a wheel of the appropriate size, left the walls in disrepair and neglected the vineyard. The papyrus breaks off with the comment that his brother Antistios had to stand surety for Philinos's default. Since the papyrus breaks off at this point, it is unclear how Plutarchos's lease has been affected by Philinos's negligence, but it is possible that he found himself liable for work, in particular on the wheel and the walls, that he had not expected. The pattern established by the leases cited above is sufficiently clear at this point. For producing vineyards, the lease might provide either for wages to be paid to the lessees (as, for example, in POxy XIV 1631 and POxy XLVII
22 Kramer et al. (1976-1991: 3.91). Llewelyn (1992: 166) raises questions about this interpretation, pointing out that heurethesomenou indicates a future, not a present, condition, but suggests that it is spoken from the lessees' aspect, i.e., "the lessees acknowledge that they have undertaken all the viticultural duties of the thicket regardless of the condition in which they find it." 23 Besides PKoin III 144 (Arsinoite nome, 152 BeE) and BGU IV 1122 (Alexandria, 13 BeE), PBerlLeihg 123 (Theadelphia, 252 CE) records the application to lease a new vineyard of 2 arouras; PSI XIII 1338 (Oxyrhynchus, 299cE) concerns a new vineyard for which the lessees receive wages of l,200 drachmae per aroura and pay rent in kind on a vegetable garden. 24 Because it was a new vineyard, the taxes would be much reduced.
VINEYARD LEASES ON PAPYRUS
129
3354),25 or for the lessees to receive a portion of the crop (as in PRyl IV 583 and POxy IV 729). Whether the lessor decided to take the full crop (and thus pay wages) or agree to crop shares depended, presumably, on the ease with which each party could market the wine. In the case of newly planted vineyards, however, there was no product to be sold, apart from intercultivated vegetables and grain or fruit that was grown on other parts of the leased land. Hence, the normal pattern would be for the lessor to pay wages (flto8oi) to the lessees for their viticultural labour. It is this set of facts that makes the scenario proposed by Mark 12:1-2 incoherent, for Mark clearly speaks of a newly planted vineyard and therefore one that would not come into production for five years, and at the same time describes the landowner sending agents to the estate to collect a share of the harvest (AaPn IX1tO 1'WV Kap1tWV 1'ou IXfl1t€AWvOpaYflDv TCEpl€8t)Ka, unattested in Hebrew); like Mark, the LXX uses (XflTC€AO
but Rutgers (1995: 268-73) argues that most such inscriptions are not Jewish and that, if found in a Jewish context, they come from Jewish converts-a view not unlike Frey's (Cl} 2.445). Off-the-shelf tombstones may have come with the formula already inscribed, and there is evidence for secondary use merely to block off a new tomb.
362
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
Eu,l..oyrrr6 434
TEXT AND ARTIFACT
not in fact. His widow Alexandra both seemed
(c56~a)
to be pious and really was
(oij, 1.108). It was because the Pharisees were reputed to be unusually pious (ooKew, 1.110) that they deceived her, who really was (oij) reverent of the Deity (1.111). It is a perfectly Josephan thing to say, therefore, that the Essenes both were reputed to train themselves in dignity and truly did. Also the delayed identifying phrase, "called Essenes," has close parallels elsewhere in Josephus, especially in War (War 2.101; 7.43,329,359,375; Ant. 4.72; 17.41,324). Second, the first illustration Josephus gives of the Essenes' exemplary character, written in three
flev ... Oi contrasts is significant: it concerns their
(male) attitude toward the passions, sex and women. "Although they shun the pleasures [iJoovai] as vice [KaK(a] , they regard self-control [eYKpatE1.a] and not submitting to the passions as virtue [apE'tij]" (2.120). "Although they hold marriage in contempt," they adopt the children of others "and they impress their principles of character [,,8eow] upon them" (2.120). "Although they do not abrogate marriage and the succession [of humanity] from it, they protect themselves from the wanton actions of women [yuvaLKwv aOeA. y€(a
