Persecution, Persuasion and Power
Readiness to Withstand Hardship as a Corroboration of Legitimacy in the New Testament
by James A. Kelhoffer
James A. Kelhoffer examines an often overlooked aspect of New Testament constructions of legitimacy, namely the value of Christians’ withstanding persecution as a means of corroborating their religious identity as Christ’s followers. The introductory chapter defines the problem in interaction with sociologist Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of cultural capital. Chapters 2-10 examine the depictions of persecuted Christians in the Pauline letters, First Peter, Hebrews, Revelation, the NT Gospels, and Acts. These exegetical analyses support the conclusion that assertions of standing, authority, and power claimed on the basis of persecution play a significant and heretofore under-appreciated role in much of the NT. It is also argued that depictions of persecution can have both positive implications for the persecuted and negative implications for the depicted persecutors in constructions of legitimation.An epilogue considers later examples of early Christian martyrs and confessors, as well as John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs . The epilogue also addresses the ethical and hermeneutical problem of asserting the withstanding of persecution as a basis of legitimacy in ancient and modern contexts. This problem stems from the observation that, although the NT authors present their construals of withstanding persecution as a basis of legitimation as if they were self-evident, such assertions are actually the culmination of numerous presuppositions and are therefore open to dissenting viewpoints. Yet the NT authors do not acknowledge the possibility of competing interpretations, or that oppressed Christians could someday become oppressors. Accordingly, this exegetical study calls attention to an ethical and hermeneutical problem that the NT bequeaths to the modern interpreter, a problem inviting input from ethicists and other theologians.
- By (author) James A Kelhoffer
Other Titles in this Series
Good Works in 1 Peter
Negotiating Social Conflict and Christian Identity in the Greco-Roman World
Volume 337
Vermittelte Gegenwart
Konzeptionen der Gottesprasenz von der Zeit des Zweiten Tempels bis Anfang des 2. Jahrhunderts n. Chr.
Volume 367
Der Nous bei Paulus und in seiner Umwelt
Griechisch-römische, frühjüdische und frühchristliche Perspektiven
Kontexte des Johannesevangeliums
Das vierte Evangelium in religions- und traditionsgeschichtlicher Perspektive
Die vier Evangelien und das eine Evangelium von Jesus Christus
Studien zu ihrer Sammlung und Entstehung
Volume 224
Die vier Evangelien und das eine Evangelium von Jesus Christus
Studien zu ihrer Sammlung und Entstehung
Volume 224
Die Pastoralbriefe und das Vermachtnis des Paulus
Studien zu den Briefen an Timotheus und Titus
Volume 476
Ethik der Zeit – Zeiten der Ethik
Ethische Temporalität in Antike und Christentum. Kontexte und Normen neutestamentlicher Ethik / Contexts and Norms of New Testament Ethics. Band XIV
Volume 510
Gemeinde ohne Tempel /Community without Temple
Zur Substituierung und Transformation des Jerusalemer Tempels und seines Kults im Alten Testament, antiken Judentum und frühen Christentum
Paul’s Anthropology in Context
The Image of God, Assimilation to God, and Tripartite Man in Ancient Judaism, Ancient Philosophy and Early Christianity
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