The author and setting of the Gospel of Luke have been, over the years, notoriously difficult to place. There is general agreement that the author was Hellenistic and urban, but beyond that most discussions of Lukan context tend to conclude with statements such as the following: “As for the place of the composition of the Lucan Gospel, it is really anyone’s guess. . . . In the long run, it is a matter of little concern, because the interpretation of the Lucan Gospel and Acts does not depend on it.”[1] While I acknowledge the imprecise nature of this search and lack of clear evidence for a specific locale, I cannot agree with Joseph Fitzmyer that it is immaterial to our study of Luke-Acts. On the contrary, for this project the early settings in which the Third Gospel was written, and even more importantly, heard and read, will be central to our understanding of what the status reversals might have meant to those first audiences. Luke, like all biblical narratives, is a “cultural product . . . a representation of the values and contexts within which it was generated,” which both reflects and challenges the world of its composition.[2] The hierarchy and system of domination that characterized Roman rule colored every part of daily life, including the writing and reception of New Testament literature, and the placement of its readers and writers within the imperial provinces and their status groups will deepen our understanding of the text by clarifying something of its import in such a context.
Certainly there are limits to the search for a Gospel community.[3] But even small insights into the character and context of author or audience, when coupled with historical inquiry, have great potential for illuminating the text. We will begin with a few significant textual clues that point to Luke’s own contextual assumptions. In several passages, rural Palestinian situations are adapted for urban Hellenistic ears: for example, the turf roof of Mark 2:4 becomes a tile one in Luke 5:19, and house foundations replace rock and sand in the parable of the wise and foolish builders (Luke 6:48-49; cf. Matt. 7:24-27). Additionally, a change of Semitic titles to their Greco-Roman counterparts (e.g., ῥαββουνί in Mark 10:51 to κύριος in Luke 18:41; and γραμματεύς in Mark 12:28 to νομικός in Luke 10:25) is another indication of Luke’s Hellenistic setting, although it need not indicate a solely Gentile audience, as Fitzmyer argues.[4]
These characteristics strongly imply a context in non-Palestinian, Greek-speaking cities, but that does not negate the possibility of a significant Jewish presence. Archaeological evidence from synagogues in Asia Minor shows a high degree of assimilation among Hellenistic Jews, from a predominance of the Greek language in their names and everyday dealings to Greek-style education, awards, and official titles.[5] Luke’s affinity for and familiarity with city settings is confirmed by the centrality of Jerusalem in both the Gospel and Acts, and the urban focus of the Acts mission narrative. Luke-Acts contains by far the most uses of the word πόλις (city) in the New Testament, as much as the rest of the books combined.[6] But no single city can really be identified as a likely setting for Luke-Acts’s origination on the basis of the biblical text alone.
Later extracanonical sources attempted to fill this gap and offer some answers. The earliest copy of the full Gospel (late second or early third century) attributes it to Luke, usually thought to be the physician mentioned as Paul’s companion in Col. 4:14 (cf. Philem. 24 and 2 Tim. 4:11). An ancient prologue, dated to either the third or the second century ce,[7] further identifies Luke as a native of Syrian Antioch who wrote the Gospel “in the regions of Achaea.” Other cities with a proposed Lukan connection include Ephesus,[8] Philippi,[9] and other Macedonian locales.[10] Obviously, this is not a puzzle that we can solve with any certainty, but even the general context of a city in Roman-controlled Greece or Asia Minor, when examined in some detail, is helpful. It is possible to identify some “‘typical’ aspects of urban life in a Greco-Roman city” and glean some insight into Luke and Acts.[11] Many scholars argue that Luke was writing for an audience wider than a single community of Jesus-followers.[12] Whatever he intended, it is certain that Luke’s work did indeed circulate widely among Greek-speaking Christians, and thus it becomes vital for us to consider how the surrounding culture influenced what they read and heard. Among other aspects of the Gospel of Luke, the status reversals on which I am focusing illustrate that the author had a keen awareness of and interest in the constant status competition that characterized the daily lives of both himself and his audience. My goal in this chapter, then, is to elaborate upon the Gospel’s Hellenistic milieu and its author’s and audiences’ experience within it.
Roman domination in the Greek East was, in many ways, a different experience than it was in other provinces or in Italy itself. Many of the city-states there were involved with Rome in some fashion well before Augustus and the establishment of the empire, through support of one side or another in Rome’s civil wars, and often to the Hellenistic city’s detriment. For example, Pompey, Brutus, Cassius, and Mark Antony all demanded money and troops from the cities of Asia Minor;[13] Corinth was destroyed by Roman forces in 146 bce;[14] and Athens suffered a significant loss in prestige and wealth when it supported Antony in his losing battle with Octavian.[15] One scholar goes so far as to classify the Greek East as “bankrupt” at the end of Rome’s civil wars.[16] But Octavian, later Emperor Augustus, expended a considerable amount of effort and resources to secure the support of local Hellenistic elites through patronage, debt cancellation, and other financial aid. In 20 bce, for example, after an inspection of the province of Asia, he issued monetary gifts to cities in need of aid, although at the same time he increased the tribute owed by others.[17] Augustus also outlawed extortion by his provincial procurators and other administrators, according to Cassius Dio.[18] He is hailed by an Ephesian inscription as “a god made manifest and the common savior of human life.”[19] In a similar manner, Strabo writes that Augustus’s successor Tiberius aided the Asian city “Sardis and many others” after they suffered extensive earthquake damage.[20]
Thus by Luke’s time the pax romana had proved to be quite beneficial to the prosperity of the area[21]—or at least to that of its elites, whose privileged position now required significant cooperation with imperial rule. The Roman Empire’s policy of minimal provincial government meant that they would happily help the local nobles maintain their power and control of city governance, as long as the Greek leaders accepted and advanced Rome’s rule over them.[22] The ready compliance of Hellenistic city magistrates meant that Asia Minor was one of the most peaceful areas of the Roman Empire, with a minimal military presence and relatively little imperial intervention into city life and politics.[23] The local elites seemed to accept and even promote the domination of Rome’s “peace” in order to preserve the stability of their political and economic system.[24] As a result, they would have been the face of power most directly seen, and therefore resented, by the non-elites, but they also would have been a group in position to extend patronage to any new social and religious movement if they so chose. This, then, is the world into which Luke was taking his message of a new savior inaugurating a new world order; little wonder that there was a need for Jesus-followers to exhibit both a degree of circumspection in declaring such a gospel and a cautious willingness to work within the system for at least a time.
Underneath the apparently peaceful, stable surface of the Greek East, though, things were, as always, more complicated than it would seem at first glance. Social hierarchy and its attendant status negotiation were constantly present in the daily lives of those under Roman rule, from the lowest peasant to the emperor himself,[25] and this competition flourished in the cities of Asia Minor. Pliny the Younger famously wrote of a banquet where the host divided his guests by status and served them food and wine of varying quality, as he deemed appropriate to each attendee’s place in the social hierarchy.[26] Pliny himself was scornful of this practice, but other contemporaneous writings would suggest that it was not uncommon (for example, Juvenal, Sat. 5.24-155; Martial, Epigr. 9.2). Valerie Hope writes that “by using both publicly acknowledged social and legal factors and his own more personal criteria the host was able to create his own social hierarchy which was given physical expression at the dinner table.”[27] Publicly, seats in the amphitheater were also distributed according to social status, and even certain types of clothing were restricted to the elites.[28]
Non-elites, with low status and few resources with which to increase it, competed mostly with one another for status and honor, finding some measure of satisfaction in at least having more than their neighbors. The acceptance of a “limited good society” in which one person’s gain or good fortune meant someone else’s loss or bad fortune likely motivated such a tensive environment. One mark of this competition is the prevalence of curses invoked upon one’s social competitors in an attempt to curb a run of a good luck that was deemed “more than their fair share.”[29] We also find evidence of people attempting to portray an image of higher status than they actually possessed. Martial writes of non-elites sitting in seats reserved for lower elites,[30] and Pliny the Elder notes that slaves and freedpersons sometimes wore gold-plated iron rings in an attempt to convey equestrian status.[31] Elites, meanwhile, fought amongst themselves for ruling power, government offices, imperial favor, and public honor. Rome effectively utilized this tensive system to cement its rule through the enthusiastic participation of local elites; they went to great lengths to outdo one another in proving their affinity for all things Roman and honoring this new overlord, and in the process they helped legitimize their own subordination.[32]
This phenomenon of status competition also moved beyond individuals to the cities themselves, which had a hierarchy of their own, with Rome and provincial capitals at the top, followed by Roman colonies, self-governing cities, and lower-ranked towns.[33] Citizens of Hellenistic cities in particular tended to exhibit great civic pride and a burning desire to present their city as superior to all others. The competition for preeminence among the Asian cities of Ephesus, Smyrna, and Pergamum is preserved in Dio Chysostom’s exhortations for them to view one another with goodwill rather than as competitors for superiority.[34] Ramsey MacMullen gives as a further example graffiti from a tavern in southern Italy proclaiming Pergamum as the “golden city,” with another “competitively patriotic hand” maintaining that Rome deserved that title instead.[35] In such an environment of constant competition and self-promotion, Luke’s teachings about humbling oneself (14:7-11; 18:9-14) and about giving and lending without reciprocation (6:27-36) become quite interesting to consider. To many in the audience, they likely seemed perplexing and even discordant. At the same time, however, some Hellenistic hearers might have welcomed or at least been intrigued by the prospect of a break from the constant struggle in which persons of all social levels were engaged, and a possible resolution to the constant ambivalence and instability of their position.
This ambivalence sprang partly from the uneasy relationship between Greek and Roman culture; despite Rome’s obvious political ascendancy in the first century, there was still, as we shall see, a certain feeling of superiority among residents of the eastern Mediterranean. It existed, of course, alongside their general acceptance of Roman rule, as delineated above, but it existed nonetheless. The ancient and flourishing urban culture of Hellenism predated Rome by several centuries, and imperial government was, for the most part, simply inserted into the cities’ preexisting administrative and cultural systems.[36] However, subtle but important changes were made. The original Greek council, or βουλή, had a regularly rotating membership taken from the general assembly of citizens (ἐκκλησία), and thus there was always some potential for openness to change. The uncertainty of such a system was unacceptable, of course, to Roman government, and so they instituted property qualifications and lifetime membership, with the result that council positions became limited to a small group of Roman-approved local elites, and the power of both the βουλή and the ἐκκλησία was significantly decreased.[37] Additionally, a major portion of the economic surplus was now sent away to Rome, rather than circulating locally and retaining its benefits within the city and surrounding territory.[38] This impoverished the provinces and further centralized resources, power, and influence in the city of Rome.
Cultural relationships provided another type of paradox, less tangible but perhaps even more galling, for the Greek territories under Roman rule. It was widely held by Greek and Roman alike that Hellenistic art, culture, and paideia education had been adopted, adapted, and spread by Rome. Horace captures well the paradox of this situation in his oft-quoted line: “Captive Greece took her rough conqueror captive and introduced the arts to rustic Latium.”[39] The awkwardness was felt by both sides, judging from their reactions. Rome promoted Hellenism over almost all other local cultures, but at the same time it also denigrated the Greek people as extravagant, degenerate, and self-indulgent.[40] After his victory at Actium, for example, Augustus linked Mark Antony with the “indulgent” practices of Egypt and the Hellenistic East.[41] Cicero felt the need to defend preemptively his philosophical work De finibus bonorum et malorum from charges that such intellectual pursuits were beneath the dignity of a Roman elite and better left to the Greeks, but also from charges that philosophical works should be written only in Greek and not in Latin.[42] Naturally, the natives of Hellenistic cities, elite and non-elite alike, were conflicted about this attitude. They likely appreciated Rome’s embracing of their culture and because of it were more willing to submit to imperial rule and to support the promotion by local elites of certain Roman cultural practices like the imperial cult and gladiatorial games.[43] Yet they continued to assert their own cultural superiority, and developed a Greek identity separate from the Roman Empire—or, perhaps more accurately, a hybrid identity appropriate for Greek life in a world dominated by Rome.
Gary Gilbert has persuasively presented Luke as comparable in some respects to the Greek authors of the Second Sophistic, who worked toward this aim.[44] Plutarch acknowledged in his work the benefits of Roman rule, but he also evaluated Roman leaders on the basis of norms that were unmistakably Greek. For example, Plutarch followed Plato in regarding restraint and self-discipline as central to a man’s virtue. He therefore judged Theseus, the Greek founder of Athens, as slightly superior to his Roman parallel Romulus, who displayed “unreasonable anger [and] hasty and ill-advised wrath” that led to the death of his brother Remus.[45] Thus Plutarch was able to turn even his admiration for imperial accomplishments into an argument for Hellenistic superiority: Rome’s best actions and leaders are presented in his work as “inspiring examples of traditional Greek virtues in action.”[46] The Gospel of Luke can be profitably understood in a similar manner. Its Hellenistic audience faced the same ambivalence in their identity and status in the Roman world as Plutarch and his readers did; the message of the Third Gospel offered them a unique identity, distinct from all that dictated value and shame in the imperial order. For the residents of Asia Minor and Greece in particular, “being ruled by Rome was a complex experience that created ambiguity in the articulation of that experience,” and thus we should not be surprised when we find (as we often do) visions of destruction or social upheaval alongside messages of appeasement or collaboration.[47]
Much of this power, identity, and status negotiation played out in the arena of the imperial cult, which was widespread in the provinces of Greece and Asia Minor, where we have situated the Gospel of Luke. Thus a brief consideration of its role in the lives of people and cities is in order. The imperial cult is often considered in biblical studies to have been worship of the emperor, and thus an essentially religious matter, but this is only partly true. It is better characterized as a multifaceted power negotiation that affected the interdependent areas of politics, economics, and social relations just as much as it did religion; one author calls it “a matter of hotly contested social prestige.”[48] Roman religion in general focused on the rituals of prayer and sacrifice to establish contact and a type of patron-client relationship between deities and mortals, in which the gods receive honor and their human clients receive divine favor in return.[49] It was a community affair as much as or more than an individual undertaking, at least as far as the imperial government was concerned: “Public religion was . . . the sum of the rituals employed by public representatives to maintain good relations between the community and its gods.”[50] The imperial cult, then, was not focused on personal worship of a particular living emperor, but rather on communal loyalty to the image of the emperor as symbolic of the whole concept of the Roman Empire and its divine right to rule. This perspective clarifies the enormity of a Christian’s decision on whether to participate in imperial religion, and the far-reaching consequences of such a decision.[51]
In Asia Minor, imperial worship was particularly widespread and well entrenched. Pergamum, apparently on its own initiative, established an imperial temple dedicated to Augustus as early as 29 bce, immediately after Octavian’s victory over Antony,[52] and it eventually became the center of Asia Minor’s provincial cult, to which all cities sent offerings and representatives. Such a level of cultic organization, higher than the standard municipal efforts, was unique to the Asian provinces, and illustrates the local elites’ interest in the imperial cult and the high level of social prestige it garnered in their value system.[53] The chief priest of this provincial cult served a year-long term, but carried the high honor associated with the office for the rest of his life.[54] After this early beginning in Pergamum, local elites made imperial worship a central part of their status competition and endowed temples, statues, offerings, and festivals at an impressive rate. The provincial assembly of Asia, for example, utilized the imperial cult as part of its negotiation with Rome; in 9 bce they changed the local calendar so that the year began on Augustus’s birthday.[55] More than eighty imperial sanctuaries and temples are archaeologically attested in over sixty cities of Asia Minor. Ephesus alone had four temples, imperial statues in multiple public buildings and in the streets, fountains and gates dedicated to imperial dynasties, and various other altars, porticos, and gymnasia associated with one imperial family member or another.[56] The priests of such sanctuaries were among the most prominent figures in the Hellenistic cities, and their presence and status brought honor to both themselves and the city as a whole.[57]
We must be cautious, however, in assuming that this enthusiastic endorsement of imperial worship meant a wholehearted acceptance of the emperor’s divinity and Rome’s god-given superiority. Recent, more nuanced study of the literary, sociological, and archaeological evidence indicates instead that imperial worship was one among many methods that the Hellenistic cities used to make sense of their subjugation to Rome. The worship of living emperors “could provide a language for comprehending absolute power. . . . To worship a god offered local grandees a way of recognizing their inferiority without any loss of face.”[58] It must also be remembered that the flourishing imperial cult did nothing to diminish worship of beloved local deities, such as Artemis of Ephesus. This goddess was central to the city’s identity, and its citizens claimed great honor and pride in how widely she was worshipped and how famous her temple was. An inscription from the second century ce states that “with the improvement of the honouring of the goddess, our city will remain more illustrious and more blessed for all time.”[59] Indeed, Roman rulers were often linked with traditional local deities, rulers, and legends, through festal processions, art, and architecture, in an attempt to soften the blow of Roman rule and also to assert some continued relevance and prestige for the subjugated city’s gods and therefore for the city itself.[60] Examples from first-century Ephesian architecture include a peristyle celebrating the cults of Artemis (the local patron goddess) and Augustus (the new representative of Roman order), and a Basilika Stoa dedicated to Artemis, Augustus, Tiberius, and the city of Ephesus itself.[61]
As is evident in the discussion above, much of our information about the Greek and Asian provinces, and about the empire as a whole, necessarily comes from an elite perspective. It is simply the nature of the field, due to the available literary and archaeological evidence. But the vast majority of the people in Ephesus, Philippi, or Aphrodisias were not elites; they were artisans, peasants, merchants, soldiers, and slaves. They were also not, as elite rhetoric often implied, an undifferentiated mass.[62] The “poor” (all non-elites) of the Greco-Roman world covered a wide range of occupations, economic levels, and political status and influence. For this reason, I make reference throughout the following chapters to the seven levels of the Roman-era Poverty Scale (PS) established by Steven J. Friesen,[63] and modified by Bruce W. Longenecker as an Economy Scale (ES).[64] Friesen first divided the superwealthy elites into three categories (PS1–3), and the much more numerous non-elites into four categories (PS4–7) ranging from the relatively rare level of one with moderate surplus resources (PS4) to the unfortunately large number of individuals living below subsistence level (PS7). He then attempted to estimate the percentage of each level in a typical Roman city (defined as ten thousand or more people).[65]
| PS1 | Imperial elites | imperial dynasty, Roman senatorial families, a few retainers, local royalty, a few freedpersons |
| PS2 | Regional or provincial elites | equestrian families, provincial officials, some retainers, some decurial families, some freedpersons, some retired military officers |
| PS3 | Municipal elites | most decurial families, wealthy men and women who do not hold office, some freedpersons, some retainers, some veterans, some merchants |
| PS4 | Moderate surplus resources | some merchants, some traders, some freedpersons, some artisans (especially those who employ others), and military veterans |
| PS5 | Stable near-subsistence level (with reasonable hope of remaining above the minimum level to sustain life) | many merchants and traders, regular wage earners, artisans, large shop owners, freedpersons, some farm families |
| PS6 | At subsistence level (and often below minimum level to sustain life) | small farm families, laborers (skilled and unskilled), artisans (esp. those employed by others), wage earners, most merchants and traders, small shop/tavern owners |
| PS7 | Below subsistence level | some farm families, unattached widows, orphans, beggars, disabled, unskilled day laborers, prisoners |
Longenecker strongly supports Friesen’s gradated scale and its valuable nuancing work, but adjusts the proposed percentages for the non-elite groups of ES4–7. He argues convincingly that Friesen’s estimate of only 7 percent of the typical urban population belonging to the level 4 “middling” group is much too low, due to the erroneous binary understanding of the poor as a massive undifferentiated group.[66] Individuals with moderate resources would also have congregated in urban areas, providing even more reason to consider a higher rather than lower estimate of their numbers.[67] Thus I will follow here the 2010 revised percentages of Longenecker’s Economy Scale (cited with Friesen’s original Poverty Scale numbers for reference):[68]
| Friesen’s 2004 Urban Percentages | Longenecker’s 2010 Revised Urban Percentages |
| PS1-3: 3% | ES1-3: 3% |
| PS4: 7% | ES4: 15% |
| PS5: 22% | ES5: 27% |
| PS6: 40% | ES6: 30% |
| PS7: 28% | ES7: 25% |
Friesen and Longenecker are both working with the urban Pauline communities of Jesus-followers in view, as is Wayne A. Meeks in his book on a related topic, The First Urban Christians. Considering Luke’s very similar setting in the urban centers of Asia Minor and Greece, the Economy Scale will be invaluable in helping us identify with more precision the Lukan characters, author, readers, and hearers. Meeks has argued that the Pauline groups usually comprised “a fair cross-section of urban society,” with particular prominence given to members with some measure of status inconsistency.[69] Friesen and Longenecker both acknowledge the presence of some ES4 members in Pauline communities, based on the sparse information we have on named individuals in the letters such as Erastus (Rom. 16:23), Phoebe (Rom. 16:1-2), and Gaius (Rom. 16:23; 1 Cor. 1:14).[70] But they agree, against Meeks, that there is little indication of even lower elites in the Jesus-followers addressed by Paul. Paul himself was an itinerant artisan, no higher than ES5,[71] and Longenecker notes that Paul’s repeated instruction to his readers to work with their own hands (for example, 1 Cor. 4:11-13; 1 Thess. 4:11-12) indicates an audience of individuals mostly living near subsistence level (ES5–6).[72] First Corinthians 11:22, with its reference to the literal “have-nots” (τοὺς μὴ ἔχοντας), also indicates the clear presence of ES7 individuals among the Corinthian Jesus-followers.[73]
With regard to the Lukan groups of Jesus-followers, we can posit with relative confidence a comparable community makeup, characterized by a mixture, somewhat unusual for the time, of various ethnicities, occupations, religious backgrounds, levels of wealth, citizenship, and status. Asia Minor in particular, with its complex layering of cultures both Roman and Hellenistic, native and imported, elite and non-elite, provided a rich diversity in its communities,[74] and this is reflected in the work of Luke and its potential influence upon its audiences. In the second section of this chapter, I will first explore the pieces of information we can glean about the relationships and social connections of the third evangelist and the Gospel’s dedicatee Theophilus. Then I will widen the focus to consider a few salient characteristics of artisan culture and the relationships between elites and non-elites, as they relate to social, political, and religious negotiation of the imperial world.
The prefaces to Luke (1:1-4) and Acts (1:1-2) provide a starting point for our discussion of the Lukan communities, as they identify at least two members of them: the dedicatee Theophilus and the anonymous author. Loveday Alexander’s 1993 work The Preface to Luke’s Gospel argues that Luke 1:1-4 finds its closest parallels in Greco-Roman scientific and technical writings (like those of the physician Galen, among others), not classical historiography or biography (the usual comparisons). The evangelist’s style, she concludes, is “literate but not literary” and establishes a connection between Luke’s Gospel and rabbinic schools, medical instruction, and the artisans’ apprenticeship system.[75] He was educated, to be sure, in the standard written Greek of official and technical documents,[76] and evidently had leisure to undertake an extensive two-volume writing project. But his main heroes, the carpenter Jesus and the leather-worker Paul, are certainly not elite and would hardly have interested most aristocratic readers.[77] Also, it would be inaccurate to picture Luke as a professional author similar to Virgil or Plutarch, who were both members of the middle or lower elite (ES2–3). As a member of a new socioreligious movement with at least some values counter to the prevailing Roman propaganda, Luke’s sociopolitical situation was far messier and more uncertain than any faced by the aristocratic writers even of the Second Sophistic.[78] Thus we can cautiously posit that Luke had status similar to that of a relatively well-off artisan (mostly likely ES5, perhaps the lowest end of ES4): a non-elite with a measure of wealth, social connection, and education, and likely considered by himself and others to be a peer and full community member alongside the mostly non-elite audience of Jesus-followers.[79] Incidentally, this conclusion fits well with the traditional identification of Luke as a physician, although it certainly does not provide conclusive proof.[80]
Theophilus, of course, is the other mysterious character in the preface, the one to whom the Third Gospel was dedicated and also perhaps its patron. The meaning of his name, “lover of God,” has symbolic significance, and thus could be posited as “represent[ing] a wider Gentile-Christian readership.”[81] It seems most likely, however, that he was indeed a real person of at least some acquaintance with Luke. Publication of written works in the first century was accomplished almost entirely through social networks: elite circles; patron-client relationships; technical schools; and family, friends, and business associates.[82] The main purpose of dedication within a preface seems to have been the opportunity to reach a wider audience through various means. It was “linked very often with a desire to ‘fix’ a fluid tradition by depositing a definite form of the text in the care (and probably in the library) of a patron.”[83] Not only would a work in this way be preserved for future reference and copying, but the patron could also provide a space for public performance and discussion of the work and introduce the author into his or her various networks of acquaintance. There is no indication that the dedicatee was ever assumed to be the only intended reader.[84]
The κράτιστος (most excellent) title given to Theophilus (1:3) was commonly used for Roman and local elites, but it could also be honorary, particularly in dedications of this type; such a writing might be dedicated to a son, a peer, a colleague, a courtier, or even the emperor.[85] Thus we are rightly cautioned against easy assumptions. But considering the above information, I would argue that Theophilus was of a different and probably higher social status than Luke, at the upper end of ES4 or the lower end of ES3. As a local elite or an ES4 individual with relatively high status and an economic surplus, his knowledge, promotion, and recommendation of the Gospel would be most effective in reaching many circles that the artisan Luke alone could not. I am also in agreement with Alexander that he was already a follower of Jesus, likely a member and benefactor of a house church who could offer Luke both a library in which to deposit his book and a venue for further oral teaching about the Way.[86] If Theophilus was acting in this way as a patron for Luke’s work, there is some irony in employing a hierarchical patron-client relationship, standard practice in the imperial social system, in order to preserve and publicize a writing in which subversive status reversals play such a central role. As Longenecker notes, the upper echelons of ES4 almost certainly shared with the elites “a commitment to the enhancement of the civic environment that the Roman imperial order cultivated . . . [and] play[ed] a critical role in oiling the civic mechanisms of the Greco-Roman world.”[87] Thus Theophilus, in supporting Luke’s work, was making a significant break with the commonly held views of his status and economic group.
So even considering only the evangelist Luke and the dedicatee Theophilus, we have represented already two different statuses and social groups. The community itself was probably an expanded version of this small sample of diversity. I have argued above that Luke was likely someone with the status and resources of a stable, moderately successful artisan, and his heroes Jesus and Paul were craftspeople as well. No doubt many members of the early Christian gatherings in Asia Minor would have easily identified with such characters, developed as they were using a popular novelistic style, by an author who experienced that life alongside his fellow artisans. Luke, along with many other New Testament authors, showed a higher than usual respect for manual labor and the pride many craftspeople took in their work.[88] Elites generally looked down on the need to work physically for a living, and thus would not understand such pride in an artisanal craft.[89] Cicero’s writings indicate that he regarded physical labor as coarsening to the body and the mind.[90] In another example, the honor and credit from a sculpture donated to the city went to the patron who paid for the work, rather than the individual artist, who was seldom even mentioned.[91] But archaeological evidence has revealed that the opposite was true for those who actually did work with their hands, as mention of the deceased’s trade or occupation is a frequent feature on non-elite grave markers. Inscriptions from Rome, for example, reveal localized clusters of different craftspeople such as engravers, goldsmiths, tailors, and clothing sellers. MacMullen writes of these graves, “City-dwellers in surprising number specify on their tombstones both their occupation and the place where they pursue it, in the form ‘So-and-so, butcher on the Viminal.’”[92]
This pride in one’s workmanship is likely another indicator of the artisan-level status of both the author and audience of the Third Gospel. Vernon Robbins, in fact, argues that Luke-Acts presents Christian activity as a type of artisanal work that is “embedded in a way of life in the eastern Roman empire,” emphasizing the setting of holy work not in the temple alone, but in the common household and its mundane everyday life.[93] This can be seen, for example, in John the Baptist, the priest’s son who performs the redemptive work of the temple in the middle of the wilderness (Luke 3:1-20), and in Jesus’ teaching and healing work, which takes place from its earliest days in synagogues (4:16-30, 31-37, 42-44) and in the humble homes of non-elites (4:38-41).[94] Thus it seems clear that Luke would have been a document that resonated with the many in Christian gatherings who were part of ES5–6, what was sometimes called the “good” or “honest” poor,[95] those able to survive at or just above subsistence level through a trade or steady employment—an existence that avoided the immediate threat of destitution, but one immensely far away from the extravagant wealth of the elite.
The local non-elite artisans, merchants, and craftspeople were not alone in the communities that read Luke’s text. It is possible that the Gospel’s audiences also included at least a few ES4 and lower ES3 members who could provide meeting places, food, money, and other resources for worship, and could assist the lowest status members who lacked even the bare necessities (ES7). Certainly Luke includes in his narratives various reflections on the proper use of wealth and status (Luke 12:13-21; 14:7-24; 16:1-31; 18:18-30; see also Acts 2:43-47; 4:32-37) and several stories of Jesus’ and the disciples’ relationships with the wealthy and powerful (Luke 7:1-10; 8:1-3, 40-56; 19:1-10; see also Acts 8:26-40; 10:1-48; 16:11-15; 17:4, 12). Paul Bemile concludes from the diverse Lukan material on poverty and wealth “that Luke is addressing a very complex audience with different social and political conditions.”[96] F. Gerald Downing pictures, imaginatively but not without some historical basis, a dinner setting for the reading of Luke-Acts, with a mixed audience of men, women, children, slaves, citizens, and freedpersons: people of varying status, social location, and life experience.[97] Halvor Moxnes draws a similar conclusion: “Within the city culture of the Eastern Mediterranean, we can envisage Luke’s community as a group of nonelite persons who are culturally and ethnically mixed but who also include among them some who come from the elite periphery.”[98]
And the diversity did not stop there. In the first-century Roman Empire, including the cities of Asia Minor, there was a significant increase in social dislocation from trading, slavery, and military resettlement, leading people of various ethnicities to seek new social groups to replace those left behind in their homeland.[99] Undoubtedly some found their new “families” in the urban communities of Jesus-followers, as did Jesus’ disciples who left their families and occupations behind (Luke 5:1-11; cf. 11:27-28; 14:25-33). And even though these communities were urban, there was likely some rural presence as well, both from the displacement already mentioned and from regular interaction between city and country. Many rural villages and areas in the Greek East were connected to a particular city and considered to be a part of its economic, political, and religious life.[100] The exchange of food between rural providers and urban consumers meant that the residents of cities, villages, and towns likely interacted on a more frequent basis than is usually posited.[101] Dealing with such a pluralistic context was no doubt a significant challenge for the early Christian communities, and one that the Gospel of Luke was well situated to address.[102]
When we consider how the Gospel would be read in this pluralistic context, one of its most striking characteristics is the many challenges that it presents to a variety of social groups and their closely held assumptions. In imperial agrarian economies, little of the elite affluence that increased so dramatically under Roman rule trickled down to the non-elites. The elites learned the correct level of taxation that allowed peasant survival and maximum production, but also maximum profit for themselves.[103] This state of affairs led to a steady undercurrent, and occasional eruption, of resentment toward the local elites. Pliny the Younger and Emperor Trajan, for example, exchanged letters about the tendency of non-elite associations and collegia to become politically active, and about the unrest caused by such groups in the Bithynian cities of Nicea and Nicomedeia (Ep. 42–43).[104] Yet Luke encouraged all followers of Jesus to live in community with one another, regardless of their status (for example, 7:36-50; 10:25-37; 15:1-32; 19:1-10; cf. Acts 2:42-47; 4:32-37).
The evangelist also questioned prevailing elite and non-elite notions about benefaction (for example, Luke 6:27-36; 14:7-24; 22:24-27). Although some biblical scholars claim that Lukan charity is really nothing more than conventional Greco-Roman euergetism and patron-client relationships,[105] what the Gospel and Acts actually undertake is a comprehensive redefinition of the concept. The benefactors in civic euergetism were generally individuals from ES4 and above, and the recipients at ES5 and above. The proposed Christian charity practices, conversely, call for those from ES4–5 to share with beneficiaries from ES6–7 (people ignored by typical Greco-Roman benefaction).[106] A Hellenistic elite would not have seen his or her gifts to the city and its residents as philanthropic or charitable in our modern understanding of the concepts; the benefaction was utilitarian, yet another way to use one’s wealth to gain honor, prestige, and the power of political office.[107] It was also generally given more often and more liberally to the “good” poor who were thought to be deserving, certainly not to the destitute members of ES7 like widows, beggars, foreigners, orphans, and those with physical disabilities.[108] But Jesus, as portrayed by Luke, acted to help representatives of these very groups and restore them to community as part of his ongoing mission and that of his followers (Luke 6:6-11; 7:11-17; 8:26-39, 40-56; 13:10-17; 14:1-6; 21:1-4). He also advocated a sharing of possessions that seeks the good of those less fortunate rather than the advancement of one’s reputation, and that purposefully avoids public recognition and honor as much as possible (for example, 14:12-24).
Some of Luke’s sharpest challenges, however, are reserved for the evangelist’s own peers, non-elites of ES5–6 such as artisans and farmers. For one thing, they are called upon to participate in this new form of benefaction, or communal charity, as much as the elites are (Luke 6:27-36). Such mutual participation in Christian “benefaction” might have seemed unduly taxing to a group that was fiercely protective of what little wealth or status they had gathered for themselves. Non-elites under Roman domination would likely have been inclined to face their world and its complex problems with a trust in their own individual cunning over community aid, as exhibited in non-elites seeking magical solutions in the form of both blessings on themselves and curses on their neighbors and in their general view of all resources as limited goods, and therefore something for which they must compete.[109] Another possible negotiation technique for peasants and artisans was to turn responsibility and blame over to those with more status and resources available to address the issue (that is, their ruling elites). In times of hardship, non-elites commonly expressed their clear dissatisfaction with elite patrons’ failure to provide grain, olive oil, and even entertainment, through urban riots.[110]
Luke, however, as indicated above and as will be demonstrated further in the following chapters, encouraged all members of the Christian communities, no matter their status, to take an active role in improving their own quality of life, and that of their peers and of anyone with fewer resources than themselves. Some of the ES5–6 artisans who made up the bulk of the early urban churches would possibly have been resistant to Luke’s vision of an upside-down social order. The poorest of the poor, on the other hand, were often willing to take risks, for they had nothing to lose and everything to gain; the richest were also willing, as they could lose much and still have plenty. Tacitus noted this tendency to recklessness in a letter from Tiberius to the Senate, wherein the emperor urges caution and self-control on both the very poor and the very rich, for the good of the whole empire.[111] The “good” poor, though, might have been more hesitant to embrace unorthodox leanings, as the status quo gave them at least a few patronage benefits and limited financial security.[112]
Perhaps some of the best examples of this non-elite dedication to and mimicry of the status quo are the collegia, trade guilds, and other associations that provided those who could afford to join them with an imitation of elite honor and power. The poorest were kept out by membership fees, thereby creating hierarchy among the dominated. The individuals with more resources who could and did join received elite patronage, reserved seats in the city amphitheater, and festival days on the official municipal calendar: all markers of elite-approved “worth.”[113] In some respects, these collegia had certain similarities to early Christian gatherings, such as a strong sense of kinship often symbolized by a sacred ritual of table fellowship.[114] But in their primary values, the vast differences between associations and early Christian groups assert themselves most clearly. Ramsay MacMullen identifies the major aims of collegia thus:
What is interesting about crafts associations . . . is the focusing of their energies on the pursuit of honor rather than of economic advantage. . . . They cared a lot more about prestige, which the members as individuals could not ordinarily hope to gain but which, within a subdivision of their city, competing with their peers, they could deal out according to a more modest scale of attainments.[115]
The members of these collegia clearly showed a strong desire to imitate elite culture and values in miniature, requiring monetary fees to join, seeking public status through monuments and elite patronage, and arranging the guild membership in a strict hierarchy of offices and rankings.[116] The challenge regarding benefaction and honor-seeking addressed by Jesus and Luke to such non-elite groups would actually be quite similar to that posed to the elites: the replacement of public honor and status competition as one’s primary value and motivator. Along with the poorest of the poor and the richest of the elite, Luke, as we shall see in chapters 3–5, entreats his fellows in the artisan group, through visions of status reversal and acts of justice and mercy, to transform their priorities and participate in the formation of communities that adhere to God’s values rather than to those of Rome.
In this chapter, I have argued that the historical and social context of the earliest audiences of the Gospel of Luke is critical to achieving a deep and nuanced understanding of the narrative’s effect upon these reading communities. I surveyed the complexities and ambiguities of life in the Hellenistic cities of Greece and Asia Minor, and the social diversity that seems to have been present specifically in the gatherings of Jesus-followers. This latter fact is particularly significant in the following chapters of this project, which study the three focal pericopes and their images of status reversal. In the diverse communities that Luke was addressing, the ramifications of these subversive texts must have been complex and multivalent, depending upon the particular ethnic, social, religious, or economic group (or groups) with which one identified. Thus with this foundational and contextual work in mind, let us proceed to consider our first text of status reversal, the Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55).