Description
Book SynopsisFramed within a discussion on the propriety of using biblical texts for reasoning about social, cultural, and political realities, Roman Self-Representation and the Lukan Kingdom of God explores the construction of the kingdom of God in Luke and Acts through the lens of well-known examples of Rome’s presentation of its own empire. By evoking the audience’s lived experience of Roman rule—its stories and works of literature, its monuments and graphic programs—the Lukan narrative establishes categories within which it can communicate about the kingdom of God in a culturally meaningful way. It does so by mirroring, diverging from, or subverting the logic of these expressions of Roman rule. This study thus touches on a wide range of issues—including status disparities, strategies for religious and ethnic representation, economic and military imperialism, violence, and the relation of gender to imperial power—and is suggestive regarding both the Lukan vision of the kingdom of God and Lukan dispositions toward aspects of Roman rule.
Table of ContentsList of Figures
Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Part I: Introduction
1. Reading Luke and Acts within the Context of the Roman Empire
Part II: Juxtaposing Foundational Figures
2. Imperial Genealogies and Adam as God’s Son
3. Movement of Capital and Jesus’s Teachings
4. Commissions for Violence and Jesus’s Ascension
Part III: Juxtaposing Expressions of Inclusion
5. Aeneas: A Roman Way to Structure Luke’s Narrative
6. Imperial Violence and the Resuscitation of Tabitha
7. Status Inequality and Cornelius’s Obeisance
8. Divine Duplicities and Luke’s Union of Jews and Gentiles
Part IV: Epilogue
9. Summary and Reflections
Bibliography
About the Author
