Feasting and Social Rhetoric in Luke 14 by Willi BraunReview by: Steven C. MuirNovum Testamentum, Vol. 38, Fasc. 4 (Oct., 1996), pp. 408-409Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1560903 .

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BOOK REVIEWS

Wnui BRAUN, Feasting and Social Rhetoric in Luke 14 (Society for New Testa- ment Studies Monograph Series 85). Cambridge: University Press, 1995. Pp. xii + 221.

Willi Braun is Assistant Professor in the Department of Religion at Bishop's University, Lennoxville, Quebec, Canada. This book is a revised version of his 1993 Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Toronto, entitled "The Use of Mediter- ranean Banquet Traditions in Luke 14.1-24." In his book, Braun examines Luke 14:1-24. It is his thesis that this passage is a coherent unit, with elements bound together not only by a common setting (the dinner party hosted by the rich Pharisee) and topical material ("table-talk," Jesus' pronouncements concerning proper behaviour at a banquet) but also a single rhetorical purpose. Braun identifies this purpose as a critique of traditional Greco-Roman social values and an attempt to inculcate new values in the Lukan community, and he finds that all of the narrative's ele- ments have been chosen and redacted or written to serve this aim.

Braun first reviews previous scholarship on the text. He points to the parable of the Great Banquet (Lk 14:15-24) as the center of the passage, and notes that most exegetes interpret it figuratively and allegorically in one of two ways. The first categorizes it as an eschatological story that refers to those in the coming age who will be admitted to or excluded from the Kingdom of God (symbolized in the messianic meal). The second sees it as a retrospective allegory on the change in early Christianity as it moved from aJewish to Gentile-based group. Braun crit- icizes these explanations because they do not account for the larger narrative con- text of the parable (Jesus' actions and discourse during a banquet), nor do they take seriously the parable's very obvious negative stance towards Greco-Roman socio-economic values. Braun sides with scholars (including Halvor Moxnes and Richard Rohrbaugh) who suggest a third interpretation: that the story was a fic- tional model or template for the Lukan community's attitude towards wealth and prestige.

Braun then sets out his methodology. He uses socio-rhetorical analysis, a term coined by Vernon Robbins. Braun notes (p. 6) that this approach "... links the reconstruction of the cultural norms and pattern implied in and presumed by a text and the analysis of how these cultural items come to literary expression which, too, is governed by conventions." In other words, it is necessary to identify and understand those unvoiced social values and traditions which have contributed to the text's form and content. Braun identifies a core Mediterranean cultural value- honour and shame within social interactions-as a key to interpreting the issues addressed in the text. Braun states (pp. 5-6): "Luke not only relied upon a great deal of traditional and social knowledge on the part of his first-century readers; he also took a critical stance towards conventional values and social patterns that were reflected in and symbolically celebrated in the ancient elite symposia."

On the basis of this methodological approach, Braun divides his book into two sections. The first section examines the three sub-units of the text: the healing of the man with dropsy (14:1-6), Jesus' sayings concerning a marriage feast (14:7-14), and Jesus' story of the great banquet (14:15-24). Each sub-unit is examined accord- ing to form-critical analysis, source-redaction analysis, and milieu or comparative tradition analysis. The latter draws out the implied cultural values in the text. Having established the context and details of each sub-unit, Braun in the second section reviews the entire narrative to determine its rhetorical strategy. He finds that Lk 14:1-24 contains a patter of argumentation, drawn from Greek rhetoric, known as the epyatia (or "working out") of a brief attributed saying or action (Xpeia). Here, the ergasia is a large narrative episode in which individual sub-units are variations on a theme, each commenting thematically and argumentatively on an overarching issue.

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BOOK REVIEWS BOOK REVIEWS

Braun draws out many interesting points in his analysis. He provides new infor- mation on the rhetorical purpose behind the healing story in 14:1-6 by demon- strating that dropsy was a metaphor in Hellenistic (particularly Cynic) discourse for consuming desire. The implication is that Jesus here is portrayed as the wise person capable of "healing" or converting people from their quests to gain the wealth and prestige prized in Greco-Roman culture. Jesus' healing of this condi- tion is a symbolic societal critique, and it is subsequently reinforced by his dis- courses on appropriate banquet behaviour for guests (14:7-11) and hosts (14:12-14; 15-24). In each of these speeches, Jesus urges the elite audience to reject the con- ventional first-century Mediterranean customs and values encapsulated in dining behaviour and to enact a new ethos. By acting humbly the guest abandons his claim to personal honor and instead identifies with the lowly and marginal mem- bers of society. By inviting non-equals and those who cannot repay him to the feast the host renounces the traditional affiliations and mutual rewards inherent in conventional Greco-Roman commensality. In both cases the person is directed towards seeking the benefit of God's favor rather than that achieved by following social norms. Meals serve as a concrete focal-point for this new attitude.

Braun is adept in the various analytical methodologies, both traditional and mod- em. Social-scientific insights are a comparatively recent addition to the exegetical toolbox for early Christian texts, and Braun uses them deftly. He draws upon a solid store of European and English-language secondary scholarship. His analysis is per- suasive, detailed and substantial, but not ponderous. The fact that his prose is vigourous and at times leavened with humour is a bonus in a field that often lacks such stylistic features. This book is highly recommended, particularly for New Testa- ment scholars and researchers into the social history and rhetoric of early Christianity.

Ottawa STEVEN C. MUIR

KLAUS WACHTEL, Der Byzantinische Text der Katholischen Briefe. Eine Untersuchung zur Entstehung der Koine des Neuen Testaments (Berlin and New York: de Gruyter, 1995), viii + 463 pp. 248 DM. (= Arbeiten zur neutestamentlichen Textfor- schung 24) ISBN 3-11-014691-6.

The series Text und Textwert der griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testaments, also published in the ANTF monograph series, has so far covered the Catholic Epistles, the Pauline Corpus and the Acts of the Apostles. Reviews of these volumes have appeared in NovT 30 (1988) pp. 187-9, Theologische Revue 88 (1992) cols. 372-6 and NovT 37 (1995) pp. 101-4, with due praise for the pioneering research and for the results exhibited in this series. But Text und Textwert is as it were raw data. We are beginning to see the benefits that that material now has for other enterprises. The inevitable collecting and reading of manuscripts, the collating of the texts and the display in the apparatus and accompanying tables were necessary albeit tiresome chores. Now the analysis and significance of that preliminary work has already been seen and borne fruit in the successful attempt to locate the Greek Vorlage of the Harclensis of the Catholic Epistles (as described in full detail by Barbara Aland in Das Neue Testament in Syrischer Uberlieferung I pp. 41-90). Now, still concentrating on the Catholics we have the publication of Klaus Wachtel's Munster doctoral dis- sertation on the Byzantine text-type.

Wachtel's thesis is that the old theory that the Koine text was a 4th century creation is an oversimplification. He argues that this Koine or Byzantine text-type arose over a long period, antedating the 4th century and extending into the 9th-only then did it achieve a relative fixity of form. In some ways the extensive discussion by Barbara Aland on the uncial manuscripts of the Paulines from the

Braun draws out many interesting points in his analysis. He provides new infor- mation on the rhetorical purpose behind the healing story in 14:1-6 by demon- strating that dropsy was a metaphor in Hellenistic (particularly Cynic) discourse for consuming desire. The implication is that Jesus here is portrayed as the wise person capable of "healing" or converting people from their quests to gain the wealth and prestige prized in Greco-Roman culture. Jesus' healing of this condi- tion is a symbolic societal critique, and it is subsequently reinforced by his dis- courses on appropriate banquet behaviour for guests (14:7-11) and hosts (14:12-14; 15-24). In each of these speeches, Jesus urges the elite audience to reject the con- ventional first-century Mediterranean customs and values encapsulated in dining behaviour and to enact a new ethos. By acting humbly the guest abandons his claim to personal honor and instead identifies with the lowly and marginal mem- bers of society. By inviting non-equals and those who cannot repay him to the feast the host renounces the traditional affiliations and mutual rewards inherent in conventional Greco-Roman commensality. In both cases the person is directed towards seeking the benefit of God's favor rather than that achieved by following social norms. Meals serve as a concrete focal-point for this new attitude.

Braun is adept in the various analytical methodologies, both traditional and mod- em. Social-scientific insights are a comparatively recent addition to the exegetical toolbox for early Christian texts, and Braun uses them deftly. He draws upon a solid store of European and English-language secondary scholarship. His analysis is per- suasive, detailed and substantial, but not ponderous. The fact that his prose is vigourous and at times leavened with humour is a bonus in a field that often lacks such stylistic features. This book is highly recommended, particularly for New Testa- ment scholars and researchers into the social history and rhetoric of early Christianity.

Ottawa STEVEN C. MUIR

KLAUS WACHTEL, Der Byzantinische Text der Katholischen Briefe. Eine Untersuchung zur Entstehung der Koine des Neuen Testaments (Berlin and New York: de Gruyter, 1995), viii + 463 pp. 248 DM. (= Arbeiten zur neutestamentlichen Textfor- schung 24) ISBN 3-11-014691-6.

The series Text und Textwert der griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testaments, also published in the ANTF monograph series, has so far covered the Catholic Epistles, the Pauline Corpus and the Acts of the Apostles. Reviews of these volumes have appeared in NovT 30 (1988) pp. 187-9, Theologische Revue 88 (1992) cols. 372-6 and NovT 37 (1995) pp. 101-4, with due praise for the pioneering research and for the results exhibited in this series. But Text und Textwert is as it were raw data. We are beginning to see the benefits that that material now has for other enterprises. The inevitable collecting and reading of manuscripts, the collating of the texts and the display in the apparatus and accompanying tables were necessary albeit tiresome chores. Now the analysis and significance of that preliminary work has already been seen and borne fruit in the successful attempt to locate the Greek Vorlage of the Harclensis of the Catholic Epistles (as described in full detail by Barbara Aland in Das Neue Testament in Syrischer Uberlieferung I pp. 41-90). Now, still concentrating on the Catholics we have the publication of Klaus Wachtel's Munster doctoral dis- sertation on the Byzantine text-type.

Wachtel's thesis is that the old theory that the Koine text was a 4th century creation is an oversimplification. He argues that this Koine or Byzantine text-type arose over a long period, antedating the 4th century and extending into the 9th-only then did it achieve a relative fixity of form. In some ways the extensive discussion by Barbara Aland on the uncial manuscripts of the Paulines from the

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