Roman Self-Representation and the Lukan Kingdom of God

This book is a literary analysis of selections from Luke and Acts concerned with: (1) exploring what Luke communicates about God’s kingdom by using language and imagery related to the Roman Empire; and (2) evaluating what this communication tells us about Luke’s dispositions toward Rome.

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Framed within a discussion on the propriety of using biblical texts for reasoning about social, cultural, and political realities, Roman Self-Representation and the Lukan Kingdom of God explores the construction of the kingdom of God in Luke and Acts through the lens of well-known examples of Rome’s presentation of its own empire. By evoking the audience’s lived experience of Roman rule—its stories and works of literature, its monuments and graphic programs—the Lukan narrative establishes categories within which it can communicate about the kingdom of God in a culturally meaningful way. It does so by mirroring, diverging from, or subverting the logic of these expressions of Roman rule. This study thus touches on a wide range of issues—including status disparities, strategies for religious and ethnic representation, economic and military imperialism, violence, and the relation of gender to imperial power—and is suggestive regarding both the Lukan vision of the kingdom of God and Lukan dispositions toward aspects of Roman rule.