Matthew as marginal scribe in an advanced agrarian society

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Authors

Duling, Dennis C.

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Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria

Abstract

Analysis of 22 references to scribes in the Gospel of Matthew shows that a few of them are positive comments and that the author himself was a scribe. What type of scribe was he and how can we clarify his social context? By means of the models of Lenski and Kautsky, by recent research about scribes, literacy, and power, and by new marginality theory, this article extensively refines Saldarini’s hypothesis that the scribes were “retainers”. The thesis is that in “Matthew’s” Christ-believing group, his scribal profession and literacy meant power and socio-religious status. Yet, his voluntary association with Christ believers (“ideological marginality”), many of whom could not participate in social roles expected of them (“structural marginality”), led to his living between two historical traditions, languages, political loyalties, moral codes, social rankings, and ideological-religious sympathies (“cultural marginality”). The Matthean author’s cultural marginality will help to clarify certain well-known literary tensions in the Gospel of Matthew.

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Spine cut of Journal binding and pages scanned on flatbed EPSON Expression 10000 XL; 400dpi; text/lineart - black and white - stored to Tiff Derivation: Abbyy Fine Reader v.9 work with PNG-format (black and white); Photoshop CS3; Adobe Acrobat v.9 Web display format PDF

Keywords

Matthew, Agrarian society, Socio-religious status

Sustainable Development Goals

Citation

Duling, DC 2002, 'Matthew as marginal scribe in an advanced agrarian society', HTS Teologiese Studies/ Theological Studies, vol. 58, no. 2, pp. 520-575.[http://www.hts.org.za/index.php/HTS/issue/archive]