Economic justice in Luke 19:1-10 : a post-apartheid imperial critical reading with reference to the land question in South Africa

Abstract

The primary thesis of this study is that Zacchaeus’ words in Luke 19:1-10 micronarrative are a radical futuristic resolve responding to Luke’s radical message of ‘good news to the poor’ and ‘wealth renunciation’. Met squarely with the Saviour, Zacchaeus repents of his economically fraudulent ways, and reconciles himself with his estranged community by performing economic restitution and wealth divestiture to the victims of his unjust economic practices. This penitential commitment by Zacchaeus is radical when analysed within the imperial values of Roman-Palestine specifically, and the Graeco-Roman world generally. In a world where the ruling elites amassed wealth through oppression, tyranny, and exploitation of the poor, Zacchaeus’ heed Luke’s radical message of ‘care and concern’ for the poor, and restores illegitimate wealth stolen from the poor. The study deduces that Luke’s economic message is radical and counter-cultural to the dominant values of the Roman-Palestinian world of the Lukan text, and the Graeco-Roman social-world of its readers. Luke’s economic message is viewed as representing God’s economy in contradistinction to the unjust Graeco-Roman economy, with Zacchaeus understood as epitomising the radical response required in heeding Luke’s radical call. Thus, Luke challenges the Palestinian-Roman native collaborators like Zacchaeus who benefits economically by colluding with Roman oppressors in extracting wealth from the poor agrarian peasants, and the Graeco-Roman elites who amasses wealth through heavy taxation, and expropriation of land through oppressive systems and institutions designed to benefit the elites. This radical economic message of Luke, and the attendant radical response by Zacchaeus, is viewed as a necessary paradigm required in bringing about justice and genuine reconciliation between Blacks and Whites in post-apartheid South Africa. The thesis argues that the CODESA negotiations, the TRC nation-building efforts, and the post-apartheid economic policy trajectory have not been effective in addressing the colonial apartheid economic and spatial injustices, which informs the poor race-relations between Blacks and Whites in South Africa today. A ‘Zacchaeus moment’ is thus proposed as a probable theological paradigm in addressing economic inequality and the land question in post-apartheid South Africa today. Thus, the prophetic role of theology is signified by this study.