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In: David E. Aune (ed.), The Blackwell Companion to the New Testament (Chicester,
UK/Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) 192-219. [Accurate pagination through p. 208]
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Chapter 13. Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
Vernon K. Robbins
Emerging in the 1970s, socio-rhetorical interpretation received its name in 1984
with an integration of rhetorical, anthropological, and social-psychological insights in a
study of the Gospel of Mark. During the 1980s, ancient progymnasmata manuals guided
the development of rhetorical strategies to interpret elaborated argumentation in
Christian and Greco-Roman literature. During the 1990s, investigation of inner texture,
intertexture, social and cultural texture, ideological texture and sacred texture moved
the approach into an interpretive analytic. Currently, incorporation of conceptual
blending, cognitive theory, and cultural geography theory are guiding interpretation of
the blending in early Christian literature of six rhetorolects – prophetic, apocalyptic,
wisdom, precreation, priestly, and miracle – in the context of religious mantic (divine
communication), philosophical, and ritual discourse in the Mediterranean world.
Introduction
Socio-rhetorical interpretation is a multi-dimensional approach to texts (Robbins
1996a, 1996b, 2009a; Porter and Olbricht 1997: 24-52; Tate 2006) guided by a multidimensional hermeneutic (Robbins 1998a, 2004, 2005a; Detweiler and Robbins 1991;
Porter and Stamps 2002: 48-60). Rather than being one more method for interpreting
texts, socio-rhetorical interpretation is an interpretive analytic – an approach that
evaluates and reorients its strategies as it engages in multi-faceted dialogue with the
texts and other phenomena that come within its purview (Robbins 1996a: 11-13; Porter
and Olbricht 1997: 25-33). This means that it invites methods and methodological results
into the environment of its activities, but those methods and results are always under
scrutiny. Using insights from sociolinguistics, semiotics, rhetoric, ethnography, literary
studies, social sciences, cognitive science, and ideological studies, socio-rhetorical
interpretation enacts an interactive interpretive analytic that juxtaposes and interrelates
phenomena by drawing and redrawing boundaries of analysis and interpretation
(Lawson and McCauley 1990: 22-31). The approach uses a transmodern philosophical
position of relationism to interrelate ancient, modern
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
193
and post-modern systems of thought with one another (Robbins 2005a). Cognitive
theory concerning conceptual blending (Fauconnier and Turner 2002; Oakley 1998, 1999,
2009; Coulson and Oakley 2000; Robbins 2007, 2008) and culture geography theory
concerning places and spaces (Gunn and McNutt 2002) guide socio-rhetorical
interpretation of pictorial scenes (rhetography) and argumentation (rhetology) that
discourse evokes through the ears and eyes of hearers and readers.
Socio-rhetorical interpretation began to emerge after 1975, with a goal of
integrating rhetorical and anthropological modes of interpretation (Gowler 1994;
Robbins 1992a: xix-xliv). An additional, feature of socio-rhetorical interpretation is its
special interest in the orality of texts.1 Bernard Brandon Scott and Margaret E. Dean
have developed this aspect of the approach into a special area of investigation with its
own strategies of analysis and interpretation.2 During the 1990s, socio-rhetorical
criticism featured analysis and interpretation of multiple textures of texts (Robbins
1994c, 1996a, 1996b). Five textures have been central to the interpretive activity: inner
texture, intertexture, social and cultural texture, ideological texture, and sacred texture
(Robbins 1996b; Gowler 2000; Tate 2006). A wide range of socio-rhetorical studies using
textural strategies emerged during the 1990s. The seven ‚Pepperdine‛ rhetoric
conferences, initiated and nurtured by Thomas H. Olbricht, played an important role for
advances in rhetorical biblical study from 1992 to 2002 (Robbins 2005c),3 and sociorhetorical interpretation has benefited and grown in the context of these conferences and
the volumes that have emerged from them. The SBL section on Rhetoric and the New
Testament played a special role during the 1990s in nurturing socio-rhetorical
interpretation of apocalyptic (Carey and Bloomquist 1999; Watson 2002) and miracle
discourse (Watson 2010) in the New Testament. L. Gregory Bloomquist, Chair of the
SBL section from 2002 through 2008, published a series of essays developing various
aspects of socio-rhetorical interpretation.4 Duane F. Watson, a former Chair of the SBL
Section, and H. J. Bernard Combrink have written programmatic essays on the
challenges and benefits of writing socio-rhetorical commentary (Porter and Stamps 2002,
129-57; Combrink 2002). During 1999-2003, the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas
provided the context for a Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation Seminar that met at annual
meetings in South Africa (Pretoria), Israel (Tel Aviv), Canada (Montreal), Great Britain
(Durham), and Germany (Bonn). Since 2004, David A. deSilva has Chaired the SBL
Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity Seminar in the context of his own production of
integrated multi-textural applications of socio-rhetorical interpretation.5 Progress is
under way currently for production of socio-rhetorical commentaries in a series entitled
‚Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity.‛6
Initial Socio-Rhetorical Studies
Socio-rhetorical interpretation began with analysis and interpretation of social
and cultural dynamics in written works. The first sustained socio-rhetorical study was
an analysis of the relation of the we-passages in Acts to ancient Mediterranean sea
voyages.7
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
194
As Robbins observed in a later study: ‚This study in 1975 revealed that traveling in a
boat on the sea with other people created a social environment that made it natural for
some authors in antiquity to use first-person plural ‘we’ for literary accounts of sea
voyages‛ (Robbins 1992a: xix). This common social environment became a well-known
cultural phenomenon in Mediterranean literature. In 1999-2000, Dennis R. MacDonald
emphasized that the cultural intertexture of the sea voyages in Acts goes back to
Homer’s Odyssey and Marianne Palmer Bonz expanded the epic nature of Paul’s sailing
to Rome to include Virgil’s Aeneid.8 Other interpreters have focused so intently either on
the historical intertexture of the sea voyages in Acts or on literary coherence in Acts
itself that they have missed the broader social and cultural intertexture of the sea voyage
accounts (Robbins 2009b).9 Robbins’s 1975 study was an initial interpretation of social
and cultural intertexture among the sea voyages in Acts and other Mediterranean
accounts of sea voyages (Robbins 1996a: 108-18, 1996b: 58-63).
The second sustained socio-rhetorical analysis concerned the teaching-learning
cycle in the Gospel of Mark. The first steps of this analysis appeared in studies of Jesus’
calling of his disciples and of repetitive-progressive summoning in the Gospel of Mark
(Robbins 1981, 1982). The full-scale study of these phenomena in Mark, which appeared
in 1984, appealed to the works of Kenneth Burke and the ancient rhetorical treatises
entitled progymnasmata10 for analysis of rhetorical repetition and progression (Robbins
1984, 1992a). It also appealed to the works of Clifford Geertz, William Bascom, Roger D.
Abrahams, Roger M. Keesing, Theodore R. Sarbin and Vernon L. Allen for social,
cultural and social-psychological analysis. This study revealed evidence of a
Mediterranean teaching-learning cycle the Gospel of Mark reconfigures as it tells the
story of Jesus’ life and death. Subsequent studies have built on the analysis and
interpretation in this book.11
In the midst of various socio-rhetorical studies between 1981 and 1991,12 specific
discussions of rhetorical interpretation and specific strategies of analysis using insights
from classical rhetorical treatises on the chreia and its elaboration appeared.13 Willi
Braun completed a Ph.D. dissertation that included a substantive socio-rhetorical
analysis and interpretation of Luke 14, and it appeared in the SNTS monograph series in
1995 (Braun 1993, 1995). David B. Gowler, who had independently developed a socionarratological approach to New Testament literature,14 wrote a programmatic essay on
the development of socio-rhetorical interpretation showing the manner in which it
developed out of literary, rhetorical, social and cultural studies during the 1970s and
1980s (Gowler 1994). These studies were precursors to the organization of sociorhetorical interpretation on the basis of multiple textures of signification, meanings and
meaning effects in texts. David Hester Amador included a full-length critical
assessment of socio-rhetorical interpretation in this earlier form (Amador 1999).
Amador perceived the approach during this earlier phase to be driven by disciplinary
strategies and goals, rather than being truly interdisciplinary or multi-disciplinary in its
approach.
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
195
Expansion beyond Biblical Literature
A major feature of socio-rhetorical interpretation since its inception has been its
reach beyond biblical literature. Usually the literature outside the Bible was included
for the purpose of intertextural analysis of biblical texts.15 These interests led to analysis
and interpretation in Jesus the Teacher (1984, 1992a) of Dialogues of Plato, Xenophon’s
Memorabilia, sections of Flavius Josephus and Philo Judaeus, rabbinic literature,
Philostratus’s Life of Apollonius,16 and the Discourses of Dio Chrysostom.17 Half a decade
later, it led to the publication of over 1500 biblical, Greco-Roman, early Christian,
rabbinic, and Muslim pronouncement stories and a volume of essays on rhetorical
analysis of some of them (Robbins 1989b, 1993b).
During the 1990s, socio-rhetorical interpretation moved into a wider and wider
range of sacred texts. One of the reasons is that socio-rhetorical interpretation features a
constellation of interests that naturally moves an interpreter into programmatic analysis
and interpretation of literatures of various kinds in various cultures, both on their own
terms and in their own contexts. Another reason, however, was that interpreters from
various areas of specialty began to apply socio-rhetorical analysis and interpretation in
their own fields of study. Jack N. Lightstone published a socio-rhetorical investigation
of portions of the Babylonian Talmud (Lightstone 1994), followed by portions of the
Mishnah, Tosefta, and Semahot (Lightstone 2002). Martin Oosthuizen produced a
multiple texture socio-rhetorical interpretation of Deuteronomy 15:1-18 (Oosthuizen
1997). Gordon D. Newby began to use socio-rhetorical strategies of interpretation on
portions of the Qur’an (Newby 1998). Thomas J. Bell produced a full-scale sociorhetorical study of two medieval ‚sequences‛ attributed to Peter Abelard (Bell 1999). H.
J. Bernard Combrink wrote socio-rhetorical essays interpreting religious traditions and
biblical interpretation in South Africa (Combrink 1998, 1999, 2007), and Robbins wrote
an essay on participation in African biblical interpretation (Robbins 2001). Patrick Gray
analyzed the social rhetoric of sinfulness and punishment in the Apocalypse of Peter
(Gray 2001). In turn, Robbins extended his socio-rhetorical studies into the Coptic
Gospel of Thomas (Robbins 1987b, 1997, 1998b, 2006), portions of the Book of Mormon
(Robbins 1995), the Mishnah (Lightstone 2002: 201-16), and the Apocalypse of Paul
(Robbins 2003). During the 1990s, Robbins and Newby teamed with Laurie L. Patton in
Emory College and Graduate School courses in ‚interactive‛ socio-rhetorical
interpretation of Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist sacred texts (Patton,
Robbins, Newby 2009). At the beginning of the 21st century, R. Kevin Jaques used sociorhetorical strategies of interpretation in his Ph.D. dissertation on Islamic Law (Jaques
2001) and Stuart Young produced as a senior honors thesis a socio-rhetorical study of
African-American slave songs (Young 2002). During the early 2000s, Robbins and
Newby worked as a team on socio-rhetorical interpretation of the relation of the Qur’an
and the Bible (Robbins and Newby 2003; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 333-54),
and Robbins started a special investigation of Gospel traditions in the Qur’an (Robbins
2005b). Socio-rhetorical interpretation has continually moved beyond biblical studies
into other disciplines and traditions. This is a natural result of its interdisciplinary and
intercultural base and focus, and one can expect an even greater extension of this
approach into other fields in the coming years.
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196
Discerning Multiple Textures in Sacred Texts
The paperback edition of Robbins’s Jesus the Teacher contained an introduction
that launched the organization of socio-rhetorical strategies of analysis and
interpretation according to inner texture, intertexture, social and cultural texture, and
ideological texture (Robbins 1992a: xix-xliv). Robbins’s initial display of a multi-textural
approach occurred in an essay on the Woman who Anointed Jesus, written for the
purpose of inviting multiple authors into interpretation and discussion of the multiple
versions of the story in the Gospels (Robbins 1992c). Robbins published his first
programmatic multi-textural study in an essay on Mary, Elizabeth and the Magnificat in
Luke (Robbins 1994c). Wesley H. Wachob produced the first full-length Ph.D.
dissertation containing multi-textural socio-rhetorical analysis, working in detail on
James 2:1-13, and this study appeared in the SNTS monograph series (Wachob 1993,
1999; also Watson 2002: 165-85; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson: 264-80).
Subsequently, many insights in this work were incorporated into Luke Timothy
Johnson’s commentary on the epistle of James,18 and Wachob and Johnson co-authored a
socio-rhetorical essay on sayings of Jesus in James (Wachob and Johnson 1999). Russell
B. Sisson produced the second multi-textural Ph.D. dissertation on a New Testament
text, working on 1 Corinthians 9, and subsequently he has produced socio-rhetorical
essays on the Sermon on the Mount and Philippians (Sisson 1994, 1997; Gowler,
Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 242-63). To display a full textural approach to New
Testament texts, Robbins produced The Tapestry of Early Christian Discourse, exploring 1
Corinthians 9 from the perspective of inner texture, intertexture, social and cultural
texture, and ideological texture (Robbins 1996a).19 Then Mark 15 served as the sample
text throughout Exploring the Texture of Texts, in which Robbins added a chapter on
sacred texture (Robbins 1996b: 120-31).20
The entire textural mode of interpretation, as it exists at present, is available in an
interactive mode on the web.21 H. J. B. Combrink wrote essays probing the Gospel of
Matthew from a rhetorical perspective that was moving toward social-rhetorical analysis
and interpretation (Combrink 1992, 1993). During this period of time, Robbins produced
additional socio-rhetorical studies of various kinds.22 In addition to the Ph.D.
dissertations of Braun, Wachob and Sisson, four additional socio-rhetorical dissertations
were produced by 1997.23 Then two more full-scale multi-textural dissertations were
written by H. Stephen Brown on two second-century Christian martyr texts and by
Thomas J. Bell on two medieval musical sequences attributed to Peter Abelard.24 Also,
Jon Ma. Asgeirsson produced a series of studies on the Gospel of Thomas that contain
significant socio-rhetorical dimensions.25 During the 1990s, other people also produced
studies that contained significant use of socio-rhetorical strategies of analysis and
interpretation.26 The beginning of the 21st century exhibits an increasing rate of sociorhetorical studies appearing on multiple continents.27
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
197
The Emergence of Multiple Rhetorolects in Early Christianity
By 1996, socio-rhetorical analysis and interpretation began to exhibit significantly
different textures for different kinds of early Christian discourse. For example, early
Christian miracle discourse has a different texture than wisdom or apocalyptic
discourse. In addition, early Christian prophetic discourse is different from precreation
discourse. In this context, Robbins defined and described six kinds of discourse in the
New Testament as ‚rhetorolects‛ (Robbins 1996c). According to the essay, ‚A
rhetorolect is a form of language variety or discourse identifiable on the basis of a
distinctive configuration of themes, topics, reasonings, and argumentations‛ (Robbins
1996c: 356). Each rhetorolect blends with the other rhetorolects during the first seven
decades of the emergence of early Christian discourse. This raises a challenge for
interpreters to describe the texture of each rhetorolect and to explain and display the
manner in which each rhetorolect blends with the other rhetorolects during the
emergence of Christian discourse as an identifiable phenomenon in the Mediterranean
world.
Robbins’s move to analysis of rhetorolects had actually started with his papers at
the 1992 Heidelberg conference and the 1993 annual Exegetiska dagen at the University of
Uppsala, where he investigated different kinds of culture in relation to different kinds of
discourse (Porter and Olbricht 1993: 443-63; Robbins 1994d). This means that attention
to multiple textures in early Christian discourse began to emerge prior to the publication
of the books that presented the multi-textural approach in 1996. However, Robbins
actually launched the multiple discourse approach in a paper on the dialectical nature of
six kinds of early Christian rhetorolects at the second annual South African Rhetorical
Conference in 1996 at the University of Stellenbosch (Robbins 1996c). The names that
have gradually evolved for these six rhetorolects are: prophetic, apocalyptic, wisdom,
precreation, priestly, and miracle.28 In 1996, Robbins also published an article on the
game-like nature of the wisdom discourse in the Epistle of James, using insights from
the anthropologist Bradd Shore (Robbins 1996d; Shore 1996). As Robbins began to
analyze different modes of early Christian discourse more intensively, socio-rhetorical
analysis of enthymemes became a more prominent feature of the approach (Porter and
Olbricht 1997: 33-40). The result was a conclusion that enthymemes work with social,
cultural, ideological and theological topics and values, using some topics and values as a
context for reconfiguring others.
Beginning in 1998, Robbins’s analysis and interpretation of enthymemes began to
display rule, case, and result, rather than simply major premise, minor premise, and
conclusion (Robbins 1998b, 1998c, 2006). The purpose was to invite a discussion
concerning the relation of deductive, inductive, and abductive reasoning in early
Christian argumentation. Robbins argued that the unusual sequence of argumentation
in Luke 11:4 and 11:13 is abductive in a context where enthymematic networks about
praying to God to be forgiven merge with a context where one forgives others, and
where God’s giving of the Holy Spirit appears in a context where God is being presented
as a Father who gives food and other basic needs to people (Robbins 1998c: 210-14). In
addition, Robbins proposed that there were a series of instances of abductive reasoning
in the Gospel of Thomas (Robbins 1998b: 346-47, 356-86, 2006). L. G. Bloomquist, in a
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198
context of careful exploration of C. S. Peirce’s statements about abduction, has
concluded that only in a few instances might one be able to detect abductive reasoning
in New Testament texts (Porter and Stamps 2002: 61-96). Rather, he suggests, ‚What
Peirce calls deduction, as the tracing out of necessary and probable consequences of
certain original hypotheses that were held, seems widely present in the New Testament
argumentation and, in fact, appears to be the primary argumentative form‛ (Porter and
Stamps 2002: 85). D. E. Aune has objected to any discussion of abduction in relation to
enthymemes in the New Testament, asserting that ‚Enthymemes, like syllogisms, are
always deductive<‛ (Aune 2003: 315). Aune does not discuss Bloomquist’s essay, nor
does he cite Robbins’s essay on the Gospel of Thomas nor Richard L. Lanigan’s
discussion of abduction and the enthymeme in his 1995 essay (Lanigan 1995), on which
Robbins’s analysis was initially based. Socio-rhetorical analysis and interpretation of
enthymemes is still in its early stages, and it appears that it may be the center of some
considerable debate. Jeffrey Walker has published an important analysis and
interpretation of the ‚lyric enthymeme‛ in the writings of Pindar, Alcaeus, Sappho, and
Solon (Walker 2000). This study promises to contribute substantively to the discussion,
since it contains enthymematic interpretation of quite lengthy sections of text that people
have not regularly considered to be rhetorically argumentative (Walker 2000: 154-273).
As the 20th century was drawing to a close, Robbins turned to apocalyptic
discourse and produced an essay on Mark 13 that contains a significant amount of sociorhetorical analysis of its enthymematic texture in a context that interprets the passage as
transferring holiness from the Jerusalem temple to the bodies of Jesus’ disciples (Carey
and Bloomquist 1999: 95-121). Bloomquist also has produced socio-rhetorical studies of
apocalyptic discourse.29 Newby, who began socio-rhetorical analysis in the Quran in
1997, also has produced essays on apocalyptic discourse in Surahs 2, 10, and 18 of the
Quran (Newby 1998; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 333-54). Thus apocalyptic
rhetorolect, which blends extended sequences of vivid, graphic images with emphatic
assertions about God’s actions, became the testing ground for rhetorical analysis and
interpretation that moved beyond semi-philosophically oriented wisdom rhetorolect
grounded in God’s created order to a rhetorolect grounded in God’s ability to act as an
omnipotent emperor who can destroy all evil in the universe and transport all holy souls
to an environment of well-being.
By the time of the Lund Rhetoric Conference in 2000, it was becoming evident
that different ways of ‚elaborating‛ topoi held the key for describing each rhetorolect on
its own terms and in relation to the other rhetorolects in early Christian discourse.
Robbins’s socio-rhetorical essay for the Lund conference worked programmatically with
enthymematic argumentative elaboration in the six rhetorolects that are perceived to be
central to first century Christian discourse (Eriksson, Olbricht, and Übelacker 2002: 2765). In the context of writing a socio-rhetorical study of the intertexture of apocalyptic
discourse in Mark for the 1999 SBL NT Rhetoric session, Robbins began to distinguish
between narrative-descriptive and argumentative-enthymematic elaboration,30 and to
work with their relation to one another in each rhetorolect. Since 2000, Robbins
considers narrative description to be ‚rhetography‛ which is picturesque or pictorial
expression (Robbins 2008; Jeal 2008; deSilva 2008). In turn, Robbins considers
argumentative enthymeme to be ‚rhetology,‛ which is argumentative
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
199
expression. Narrative begins by creating a verbal picture or pictograph (Oakley 1999:
110-111). Elaboration of one verbal picture by means of additional pictures in a
sequence (rhetography) creates a graphic story. Argumentation, in contrast, begins by
asserting a thesis (logos). Elaboration of a thesis through some combination of rationale,
opposite, contrary, analogy, example, citation of authoritative testimony, and/or
conclusion creates an argument (rhetology). Each early Christian rhetorolect has its own
way of blending rhetography (pictorial narration) and rhetology (argumentation).
The essay on the intertexture of apocalyptic discourse in Mark, mentioned above,
focused primarily on enthymematic argumentation. Virtually every instance identified
as a ‚Case‛ features pictorial narration. In addition, it is characteristic of apocalyptic
discourse to create both ‚Rules‛ and ‚Results‛ through pictorial narration. This means
that the enthymematic argumentation (rhetology) of apocalyptic discourse unfolds
through pictorial narration (rhetography). The essay states many of these things only
implicitly, however, as it attempts to exhibit the sequential rhetology (enthymematic
argumentation) of Markan apocalyptic discourse through different sequences of Rule,
Case, and Result, and through different manifestations of Rule, Case, and Result.31 Both
the 1999 SBL essay and the 2000 Lund essay explicitly attempt to negotiate multiple
early Christian rhetorolects in a context of analysis and interpretation of enthymematic
argumentation. H. J. B. Combrink contributed to this subsequently in an investigation of
the enthymematic nature of prophetic rhetorolect in Matthew 23 (Gowler, Bloomquist,
and Watson 2003: 1-35).
Cultural Geography and Conceptual Blending in Rhetorolects
In the context of analysis and interpretation of the different modes of
argumentation in the six major early Christian rhetorolects, reasoning associated with
particular social, cultural, and religious locations began to emerge as highly significant.
This has led more and more to analysis of social, cultural, and ideological places in
socio-rhetorical interpretation. It became obvious, first of all, that a major characteristic
of early Christian discourse emerges from the patterns with which it creates
enthymematic argumentation out of pictorial narration and reasoning related to people’s
bodies, households, villages, synagogues, cities, temples, kingdoms, empires,
geophysical world, and cosmos. In other words, the cognitions and reasonings were
emerging from ‚lived experiences‛ in specific places in the first century Mediterranean
world. This has led to the use of ‚critical spatiality theory‛ in socio-rhetorical
interpretation (Berquist 2002, 2007). This area of study, located in the field of cultural
geography studies, builds in particular on writings by Henri Lefebvre,32 Robert D.
Sack,33 Pierre Bourdieu,34 Edward W. Soja,35 and Stephen Toulmin.36 James W. Flanagan
was especially instrumental in bringing critical spatiality theory into biblical study
(Flanagan 1999; Gunn and McNutt 2002). In 1991, Robbins used Robert D. Sack’s Human
Territoriality for socio-rhetorical analysis of ‚images of empire‛ in Acts (Robbins 1991b)
and T. F. Carney’s The Shape of the Past37 for the social location of the implied author of
Luke-Acts (Robbins 1991a). Jerome H. Neyrey has applied strategies for interpreting the
social location of the implied
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
200
author to Jude and 2 Peter,38 Luke’s social location of Paul,39 the Gospel of John,40 and to
Paul’s writings.41 Since 2000, Roland Boer has written an important study on ‚the
production of space‛ in 1 Samuel 1-2,42 Claudia V. Camp an important essay on ‚storied
space‛ in Sirach (Gunn and McNutt 2002: 64-80), Victor H. Matthews an important
discussion of physical, imagined, and ‚lived‛ space in ancient Israel,43 Thomas B.
Dozeman an essay on Ezra-Nehemiah,44 and Bart B. Bruehler a study of social-spatial
functions in Luke 18:35—19:48 (Bruehler 2007).
Socio-rhetorical interpretation is using critical spatiality theory together with
cognitive theory about conceptual blending to analyze and interpret the nature of early
Christian discourse (Robbins 2007). Here the foundational work is Gilles Fauconnier
and Mark Turner’s The Way We Think: Conceptual Blending and the Mind’s Hidden
Complexities.45 Robert von Thaden has produced the first full socio-rhetorical study of a
New Testament text using conceptual blending theory (von Thaden 2007). The merger of
conceptual blending theory with critical spatiality theory is clarifying the relation of
social places to cultural, ideological and religious spaces in the six major early Christian
rhetorolects. According to Fauconnier and Turner: ‚Conceptual integration always
involves a blended space and at least two inputs and a generic space‛ (Fauconnier and
Turner 2002: xv, 279). Socio-rhetorical analysis and interpretation of rhetorolects begins,
therefore, with a perception that places and spaces are related to conceptual blending in
multiple ways. Sensory-aesthetic experiences of the body in various places create the
contexts in which people interpret the places they experience as cultural, ideological and
religious spaces. In New Testament discourse, the most prominent places for
‚remembered‛ and ‚imagined‛ experiences of the body are: household, village, city,
synagogue, kingdom, temple, geophysical world, and cosmos. Desert, road, sea, and
mountain are four of the most prominent geophysical places in early Christian memory.
People’s interpretations in the ongoing context of their sensory-aesthetic experiences are
the ‚spaces of blending‛ in which they lead their daily lives. In this context, sociorhetorical analysis is revealing that different blends of ‚cultural geography‛ distinguish
early Christian rhetorolects from one another.
In the context of the three major streams of mythical, philosophical, and ritual
Mediterranean religious discourse described by the Roman writer Varro ca. 45 BCE
(Rives 2007: 21-23), first century Christianity produced localized versions of mantic
(divine communication); philosophical; and ritual religious discourse. First century
emerging Christian rhetorolects were ‚localizations‛ within these three major streams of
Mediterranean religious discourse. Emerging Christian prophetic and apocalyptic
rhetorolects were localizations of Mediterranean mantic (divine communication)
discourse (Beech 2007), with an emphasis on the oracular in prophetic and the visual in
apocalyptic rhetorolect. Emerging Christian wisdom and precreation rhetorolects were
localizations of Mediterranean philosophical discourse, with an emphasis on moral
philosophy based on the visible world in wisdom and speculative philosophy based on
the invisible in precreation rhetorolect. Emerging Christian priestly and miracle
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
201
rhetorolects were localizations of Mediterranean ritual discourse, with an emphasis on
sacrifice and mystery in priestly and on healing in miracle rhetorolect.
Early Christian prophetic rhetorolect was a localization of Mediterranean
oracular mantic discourse that blends the speech and action of a prophet’s body with the
concept of a ‚kingdom of God‛ that has political boundaries on the earth. The reasoning
in the rhetorolect presupposes that the prophet has received a divine message about
God’s will. The prophet speaks and acts on the basis of this message in a context of
significant resistance, and often explicit rejection and persecution. In the space of
blending, God functions as heavenly King over his righteous kingdom on earth. The
goal of prophetic rhetorolect is to confront religious and political leaders who act on the
basis of human greed, pride, and power rather than God’s justice, righteousness, and
mercy for all people in God’s kingdom on the earth.
Early Christian apocalyptic rhetorolect was a localization of Mediterranean
visual mantic discourse that blends human experiences of the emperor and his imperial
army with God’s heavenly temple city, which can only be occupied by holy, undefiled
people. In the space of blending, God functions as a heavenly emperor who gives
commands to emissaries to destroy all the evil in the universe and to create a cosmic
environment where holy bodies experience perfect well-being in the presence of God.
Apocalyptic rhetorolect, then, features destruction of evil and construction of a cosmic
environment of perfect well-being. The goal of this blending is to call people into action
and thought guided by perfect holiness. The presupposition of the rhetorolect is that
only perfect holiness and righteousness can bring a person into the presence of God,
who destroys all evil and gathers all holiness together in His presence. Apocalyptic
redemption, therefore, means the presence of all of God’s holy beings in a realm where
God’s holiness and righteousness are completely and eternally present.
Early Christian wisdom rhetorolect was a localization of Mediterranean moral
philosophical discourse based on the visible world that blends human experiences of the
household, one’s interpersonal body, and the geophysical world with God’s cosmos. In
this conceptual blending, God functions as heavenly Father over God’s children in the
world, whose bodies are to produce goodness and righteousness through the medium of
God’s wisdom, which is understood as God’s light in the world. In this context, wisdom
rhetorolect emphasizes ‚fruitfulness‛ (productivity and reproductivity). The goal of
wisdom rhetorolect is to create people who produce good, righteous action, thought,
will, and speech with the aid of God’s wisdom.
Early Christian precreation rhetorolect was a localization of Mediterranean
speculative philosophical discourse based on the invisible that blends human
experiences of an emperor (like the Roman emperor) and his household with the
cosmos, with the presupposition that God has an eternal status as a loving heavenly
emperor with a household populated by loving people. The result of this blending is the
presence of the loving Emperor Father God in God’s heavenly household before all time
and continually throughout God’s ‚non-time.‛ God’s Son existed with God during
‚non-time‛ before time began with the creation of the world. This ‚eternal‛ Son does
what His Father asks him to do, and heirs and friends of the eternal emperor and his
eternal son receive eternal benefits from their relation to this eternal household. In the
space of blending, God functions as heavenly Emperor Father who possesses eternal
blessings He will give
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
202
to people as a result of his love for the world and the people in it. People may enter into
this love by believing, honoring and worshipping not only God but also his eternal Son
and members and friends whom God sends out with a message of eternal blessings.
Precreation rhetorolect, then, features love that is the source of all things in the world
and the means by which people may enter into God’s eternal love. In this rhetorolect,
God’s light is love that provides the possibility for entering into eternal love, rather than
being limited to light that is the basis for the production and reproduction of goodness
and righteousness. The goal of the blending in precreation rhetorolect is to guide people
towards community that is formed through God’s love, which reflects the eternal
intimacy present in God’s precreation household.
Early Christian priestly rhetorolect was a localization of Mediterranean sacrificial
and mystery ritual discourse that blends human experiences in a temple with a concept
of temple city and God’s cosmos. Reasoning in priestly rhetorolect presupposes that
ritual actions benefit God in a manner that activates divine benefits for humans on earth.
In the space of blending, people make sacrifices by giving up things that give them well
being in the form of giving them to God. Things like food, possessions and money but
also things like comfort and honor may be given up to God. Some of these things may
be given to God by giving them to other people on earth, or by allowing other people to
take things like honor or fame away without protest. The greatest sacrifice people can
offer to God, of course, is their entire life. Usually, in contrast, a person gives up only
certain highly valued things in life. Much, though not all, early Christian priestly
rhetorolect somehow relates to Jesus’ death on the cross and mystery that accompanies
its benefits to humans and the world. Priestly rhetorolect features beneficial exchange
between God and humans in a context of human sacrificial action that regularly is
ritualized. The goal of the conceptual blending is to create people who are willing to
give up things they highly value in exchange for special divine benefits that come to
them, because these sacrifices are perceived to benefit God as well as humans. In other
words, sacrificial actions by humans create an environment in which God acts
redemptively among humans in the world.
Early Christian miracle rhetorolect was a localization of Mediterranean healing
ritual discourse with a primary focus on human bodies afflicted with paralysis,
malfunction, or disease. In this context, a malfunctioning body becomes a site of social
geography. Miracle rhetorolect features a bodily agent of God’s power who renews and
restores life, producing forms of new creation that oppose powers of affliction,
disruption, and death. The location of importance for early Christian miracle
rhetorolect, therefore, is a ritualized space of relation between an afflicted body and a
bodily agent of God’s power. In this rhetorolect, there is no focus on any particular
social, cultural, political, or religious ‚places‛ on earth. A bodily agent of God’s power,
wherever it may be, is a ‚location‛ where God can function as a miraculous renewer of
life. A major goal of miracle rhetorolect is to effect renewal within people that moves
them toward speech and action that produces communities that care for the well-being
of one another.
The inclusion of conceptual blending theory and cultural geography theory in
socio-rhetorical interpretation allows an interpreter to construct a topology of spaces in
early Christian rhetorolects and to interpret the rhetorical power of the blending of
spaces in these rhetorolects. Since each of the rhetorolects presents social, cultural and
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
203
ideological language, story-telling and argumentation that evoke specific pictures,
emotions, cognitions and reasonings, each rhetorolect made vital contributions to an
emerging culture of Christian discourse during the first century. Since many of the
social places present in early Christian discourse (like household, village, places of
sacred ritual, city, etc.) continue to exist to the present day in some kind of reconfigured
form, early Christian discourse continually functions anew in places believers perceive
to be similar in social, cultural and religious function. Some believers locate their
thinking primarily in one rhetorolect at a time, blending aspects of other rhetorolects
into this one rhetorolect for very specific purposes. Other believers locate their thinking
in a particular blend of multiple rhetorolects, inviting specific aspects of other
rhetorolects in implicit, subtle and nuanced ways. These variations produce a dynamic
conceptual, cognitive and verbal system of Christian discourse that is highly adaptive to
multiple contexts and cultures.
Dynamic blending of the six early Christian rhetorolects created a richly
variegated culture of early Christian discourse by the end of the first century. Believers
blended each rhetorolect dynamically with the other rhetorolects either by blending
multiple rhetorolects into one dominant rhetorolect or by blending particular
rhetorolects together in a particularly forceful manner. The dynamics of these blendings
throughout the verbal culture of early Christianity produced a continually increasing
combination of cognitions, reasonings, picturings, and argumentations. This interactive
process continued in Christian discourse throughout the centuries, and it continues in
our present day.
Socio-Rhetorical Commentary in Six Steps
At present, interpreters have developed six steps for writing socio-rhetorical
commentary that incorporates insights concerning rhetography and rhetology, textures
of discourse, modes of elaboration, and multiple rhetorolects in biblical discourse.
Step 1: Describe the rhetography (visual imagery, scene construction) in the discourse
Interpreters begin socio-rhetorical commentary with a description of the
blending of rhetorolects that occurs through the sequence of pictures the discourse
evokes. This beginning point is motivated by insights both from conceptual blending
theory and from rhetorical interpretation of early Christian discourse. Todd Oakley, a
conceptual blending theorist working with rhetorical interpretation asserts that: ‚At the
most basic levels of intelligent behavior, scene construction is fundamental‛ (Oakley
1999: 110). For this reason, spoken or written discourse begins its persuasive work by
creating a sequence of pictures in the mind. Averil Cameron, after discussing the
multiple rhetorics in early Christian discourse in a chapter entitled ‚How Many
Rhetorics?‛, discussed the pictorial nature of early Christian discourse in two
succeeding chapters entitled ‚Showing and Telling‛ and ‚Stories People Want‛
(Cameron 1991: 15-119). Currently, socio-rhetorical interpreters focus especially on the
rhetography in prophetic, apocalyptic, wisdom, precreation, priestly, and miracle
rhetorolects to present an initial interpretation
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
204
of the blending of rhetorolects in biblical tradition during the first Christian century. As
an aid to this first step in socio-rhetorical commentary, interpreters produce an initial
‚blending outline,‛ like this outline for 2 Peter 1:1-11:
Introductory Blending of Prophetic, Priestly, Wisdom, Miracle, and Apocalyptic
Christian Rhetorolects
Step 1: Prophetic
Peter adopts a Prophetic Role with his Hearers
1:1 Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a
faith of equal standing with ours in the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus
Christ:
Step 2:
Blended Priestly
Rhetorolect
Wisdom
A Priestly Blessing based on Wisdom from
God
1:2 May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our
Lord.
Step 3:
Blended
Miracle
Rhetorolect
Wisdom
Prophetic
God’s Miraculous Power through God’s Wisdom calls the Speaker
and Hearers to Prophetic Responsiblity
1:3 His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness,
through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence,
Step 4:
Blended Prophetic
Rhetorolect
Apocalyptic
Prophetic Speech guides the Hearers to
Escape from Corruption at the End of Time
1:4 by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, that through
these you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of passion, and
become partakers of the divine nature.
II. Blending Wisdom with Priestly, Prophetic, and Apocalyptic
Step 1: Wisdom
Wisdom Paraenesis
1:5 For this very reason make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and
virtue with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with
steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, 7 and godliness with brotherly affection,
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
205
and brotherly affection with love. 8 For if these things are yours and abound, they keep
you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Step 2:
Blended Wisdom
Rhetorolect
Priestly
Wisdom Rationale grounded in Priestly Reasoning
1:9 For whoever lacks these things is blind and shortsighted and has forgotten that he
was cleansed from his old sins.
Step 3:
Blended
Wisdom
Rhetorolect
Prophetic
Apocalyptic
Paraenetic Wisdom Conclusion directed toward Prophetic Life that leads
to Entrance into God’s Eternal Kingdom
1:10 Therefore, brethren, be the more zealous to confirm your call and election, for if you
do this you will never fall; 11 so there will be richly provided for you an entrance into
the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
This blending outline reveals a sequence of pictures in which Peter functions as
prophet, priest, sage, agent of God’s power, and apocalyptic seer. In turn, his hearers
are members of God’s kingdom on earth, recipients of priestly holiness, possessors of
wisdom from God, benefactors of God’s miraculous powers, and visionaries of God’s
eternal kingdom.
After Step 1, socio-rhetorical commentators exercise the freedom to present Steps
2-5 in whatever order they wish and blended in whatever manner they wish. The
essential feature is explicit analysis and interpretation of all four textures of the text.
Step 2: Analyze and Interpret the Inner Texture of the Rhetography and Rhetology in the
Discourse
Using guidelines from Robbins 1996a: 44-95 and Robbins 1996b: 7-39 as an initial
frame of reference, socio-rhetorical commentators analyze and interpret the relation of
rhetography and rhetology in the elaboration of the discourse. The initial frame of
reference calls attention to repetitive, progressive, narrational, opening-middle-closing,
argumentative, and sensory-aesthetic rhetorical strategies in discourse (Gowler,
Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 1-28, 97-102, 246-48, 282-96). These strategies activate and
correlate two traditions of inquiry that often are separated: the ‚image tradition of
inquiry‛ and the ‚logic tradition of inquiry‛ (2000: 193, based on Galison 1997: 19-31).
The goal of this ‚double-mode‛ of ‚inner texture‛ inquiry is to locate patterns that
integrate and correlate rhetography and rhetology in the discourse. This is a double
mode of inquiry, since patterns are likely to call attention both to images and to logical
assertions in the discourse. Underlying the strategies of analysis and interpretation is a
presupposition that humans ‚elaborate blends by treating them as simulations and
running them imaginatively according to the principles that have been established for
the blend< Part of the power of blending is that there
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
206
are always many different possible lines of elaboration, and elaboration can go on
indefinitely‛ (Fauconnier and Turner 2002: 48-49).
Step 3: Analyze and Interpret the Intertexture of the Rhetography and Rhetology in the
Discourse
Using guidelines from Robbins 1996a: 96-143 and 1996b: 40-70 as an initial frame
or reference, socio-rhetorical commentators analyze and interpret various aspects of
oral-scribal, cultural, social, and historical intertexture from the perspective of both
rhetography and rhetology (Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 28-30, 103-05, 24851, 264-80, 296-302, 333-54). These procedures of analysis and interpretation presuppose
that humans blend images and reasonings by recruiting great ranges of ‚background
meaning‛ to create richer patterns through processes of ‚pattern completion‛
(Fauconnier and Turner 2002: 48). In this context, memory functions as ‚a complex and
dynamic process of constructing a complex scene and marshaling our learned capacity
to order successive changes‛ (Oakley 1999: 109).
Step 4: Analyze and Interpret the Social and Cultural Texture of the Rhetography and Rhetology
in the Discourse
Using guidelines from Robbins 1996a: 144-91 and Robbins 1996b: 71-94 as an
initial frame of reference, socio-rhetorical commentators analyze and interpret various
aspects of social and cultural texture (specific topics, common social and cultural topics,
and final cultural categories) from the perspective of both rhetography and rhetology
(Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 30-34, 36-63, 126-64, 252-61, 277-78). Using
insights from cultural geography studies that have been refined through critical
spatiality theory, socio-rhetorical commentators identify and interpret the relation of
socially experienced places (firstspace) to socially and culturally imagined spaces
(secondspace) and spaces of daily living and blending (Gunn and McNutt 2002: 14-50,
64-80; Dozeman 2003: 455). At present, this analysis and interpretation keeps prophetic,
apocalyptic, wisdom, precreation, priestly, and miracle rhetorolect in Mediterranean
discourse in the forefront as an overall frame of reference.
Step 5: Analyze and Interpret the Ideological Texture of the Rhetography and Rhetology in the
Discourse
Using guidelines from Robbins 1996a: 192-236 and Robbins 1996b: 95-119, sociorhetorical commentators analyze and interpret various aspects of ideology (individual
locations, relation to groups, modes of intellectual discourse, and spheres of ideology)
from the perspective of both rhetography and rhetology (Gowler, Bloomquist, and
Watson 2003: 34-35, 64-125, 165-241, 252-63, 279-80, 317-32). In this context, places and
spaces are understood to be politically charged as places of domination, marginalization,
and/or resistance (Gunn and McNutt 2002: 30-80).
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
207
Step 6: Analyze and Interpret the Rhetorical Force of the Rhetography and Rhetology as
Emergent Christian Discourse
After presenting analysis and interpretation on the basis of Steps 2-5, sociorhetorical commentators explain the rhetorical force of the emerging Christian discourse
in the Mediterranean world. Using insights into the reconfiguration of concepts of deity,
holy person, spirit being, human redemption, human commitment, religious
community, and ethics (Robbins 1996b: 120-131), socio-rhetorical commentators analyze
and interpret how rhetorolects blend rhetography and rhetology into newly configured
Mediterranean discourse. This step in socio-rhetorical commentary emerges from the
observation that ‚if ever there was a case of the construction of reality through text, such
a case is provided by early Christianity. Out of the framework of Judaism, and living as
they did in the Roman Empire and in the context of Greek philosophy, pagan practice,
and contemporary social ideas, Christians built themselves a new world‛ (Cameron
1991: 21). Socio-rhetorical commentary further presupposes that ‚the very multiplicity
of Christian discourse, what one might call its elasticity, while of course from the
Church’s point of view needing to be restrained and delimited, in fact constituted an
enormous advantage in practical terms, especially in the early stages. No account of
Christian development can work if it fails to take this sufficiently into account‛
(Cameron 1991: 9).
Conclusion
Socio-rhetorical interpretation began in the 1970s with an attempt to explain special
characteristics of language in the accounts of voyaging on the sea in Acts and Jesus’
calling, gathering, teaching and sending out of disciples in the Gospels. In both
instances, the goal was to understand the language of New Testament literature in the
context of Mediterranean literature, both religious and non-religious. Also, the goal was
to understand the use of language in relation to social, cultural, ideological and religious
environments and relationships in the Mediterranean world. During the 1980s, the
rhetorical treatises entitled Progymnasmata (Preliminary Exercises) played a major role in
the interpretation of abbreviation, expansion, addition, rebuttal, commendation and
elaboration in biblical and Mediterranean literature before and during the time of the
emergence of early Christianity. During the 1990s, socio-rhetorical interpretation
identified multiple textures of texts for the purpose of reading and re-reading them in
ways that activated a wide range of literary, rhetorical, historical, social, cultural,
ideological and religions ‚webs of signification‛ in texts. This led to a display of
strategies of interpretation for five textures of texts: inner texture, intertexture, social and
cultural texture, ideological texture and sacred texture. During the last half of the 1990s,
socio-rhetorical interpretation gradually moved toward analysis of different rhetorolects
in early Christian discourse. Gradually, six early Christian rhetorolects have appeared:
prophetic, apocalyptic, wisdom, precreation, priestly, and miracle. Having initially
gravitated toward wisdom rhetorolect during the 1980s and early 1990s, socio-rhetorical
interpreters focused specifically on apocalyptic and
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
208
miracle rhetorolect during the last half of the 1990s. A Festschrift appeared in 2003 that
reviewed many of the developments in socio-rhetorical interpretation and featured
contributions to the approach from various angles (Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson
2003). Socio-rhetorical interpreters still face major challenges of analyzing and
interpreting precreation, priestly and prophetic rhetorolect in early Christian writings.
In addition, they face the challenge of writing programmatic commentary that displays
the manifold ways in which early Christian writings blend early Christian rhetorolects
together. Work is under way to display this kind of socio-rhetorical commentary in a
forthcoming series entitled Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity.46
NB: The pagination from 208 to the end is different from the published version.
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Huie-Jolly, M. R. 1994: The Son Enthroned in Conflict: A Socio-Rhetorical Analysis of
John 5.17-23. Ph.D. diss., University of Otago, New Zealand.
Huie-Jolly, M. R. 1997: Like Father, Like Son, Absolute Case, Mythic Authority:
Constructing Ideology in John 5:17-23, SBLSP 36, 567-95.
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Lightstone, J. N. 2002: Mishnah and the Social Formation of the Early Rabbinic Guild: A SocioRhetorical Approach. Studies in Christianity and Judaism/Études sur le
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Persuasion in 1 Thessalonians. In Olbricht and Eriksson 2005:179-95.
Mack, B. L. and Robbins, V. K. 1989: Patterns of Persuasion in the Gospels. Sonoma:
Polebridge. Repr. 2008: Eugene, Ore.: Wipf & Stock.
Megbelayin, O. J. 2002: A Socio-Rhetorical Analysis of the Lukan Narrative of the Last
Supper. Ph.D. diss., St. Paul University, Ottawa, Canada.
Nel, M. J. 2002: Vergifnis en versoening in Matteus (Forgiveness and Reconciliation in
Matthew). D.Th. diss., University of Stellenbosch.
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Christian Discourse and Exploring the Texture of Texts, JSNT 70, 93-100.
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Cognitive Linguistics 9.4, 321-60.
Oakley, Todd V. 1999: The Human Rhetorical Potential, Written Communication 16.1, 93128.
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Peter Lang.
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Park, J-S. 1999: The Shepherd Discourse in John 10: A Rhetorical Interpretation. D.Th.
diss., University of Stellenbosch.
Patton, L. L., Robbins, V. K. and Newby, G. D. 2009: Comparative Sacred Texts and
Interactive Reading: Another Alternative to the ‚World Religions‛ Class,
Teaching Theology and Religion 12.1, 37-49.
Penner, T. C. 1996: Narrative as Persuasion: Epideictic Rhetoric and Scribal
Amplification in the Stephen Episode in Acts, SBLSP 35, 352-67.
Penner, T. C. 1999: James in Contemporary Research, Currents in Research: Biblical Studies
7, 257-308.
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Apologetic Historiography. Emory Studies in Early Christianity 10, New
York/London: T. & T. Clark International.
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Heidelberg Conference. JSNTSup 90, Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
Porter, S. E. and Olbricht, T. H. 1996: Rhetoric, Scripture & Theology: Essays from the 1994
Pretoria Conference. JSNTSup 131, Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
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the 1995 London Conference. JSNTSup 146, Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
Porter, S. E. and Stamps, D. L. (eds.) 1999: The Rhetorical Interpretation of Scripture: Essays
from the 1996 Malibu Conference. JSNTSup 180, Sheffield: Sheffield Academic
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Porter, S. E. and Stamps, D. L. (eds.) 2002: Rhetorical Criticism and the Bible. JSNTSup 195,
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Robbins, V. K. 1975: The We-Passages in Acts and Ancient Sea Voyages, BR 20, 5-18.
Robbins, V. K. 1976: By Land and By Sea: A Study in Acts 13-28, SBLSP 15, 381-96.
Robbins, V. K. 1978: By Land and By Sea: The We-Passages and Ancient Sea Voyages. In
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Special Studies Series, No. 5, Macon, Ga: Mercer University Press and
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Robbins, V. K. 1981: Summons and Outline in Mark: The Three-Step Progression, Novum
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Composition of Mark’s Gospel: Selected Studies from Novum Testamentum. Brill’s
Readers in Biblical Studies 3, Leiden: Brill, 103-20.
Robbins, V. K. 1982: Mark I.14-20: An Interpretation at the Intersection of Jewish and
Graeco-Roman Traditions, NTS 28, 220-36 = Robbins 1994a: 137-54.
Robbins, V. K. 1984: Jesus the Teacher: A Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation of Mark,
Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
Robbins, V. K. 1985a: Pragmatic Relations as a Criterion for Authentic Sayings, Forum
1.3, 35-63.
Robbins, V. K. 1985b: Picking Up the Fragments: From Crossan`s Analysis to Rhetorical
Analysis, Forum 1.2, 31-64.
Robbins, V. K. 1987a: The Woman who Touched Jesus’ Garment: Socio-Rhetorical
Analysis of the Synoptic Accounts, New Testament Studies 33, 502-15 = Robbins
1994a: 185-200.
Robbins, V. K. 1987b: Rhetorical argument about lamps and light in early Christian
gospels. In P. W. Böckman and R. E. Kristiansen (eds.) 1987: Context, Festskrift til
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Robbins, V. K. 1988a: The Chreia. In D. E. Aune (ed.), Greco-Roman Literature and the New
Testament. Atlanta: Scholars, 1-23.
Robbins, V. K. 1988b: The Crucifixion and the Speech of Jesus, Forum 4.1, 33-46.
Robbins, V. K. 1989a: Foxes, Birds, Burials & Furrows. In Mack and Robbins 1989: 70-74.
Robbins, V. K. (ed.) 1989b: Ancient Quotes & Anecdotes: From Crib to Crypt. Sonoma, Calif.:
Polebridge.
Robbins, V. K. 1990a: Interpreting the Gospel of Mark as a Jewish Document in a GraecoRoman World. P. V. M. Flesher (ed.), New Perspectives on Ancient Judaism.
Lanham, New York/ London: University Press of America, 47-72 = Robbins
1994a: 219-42.
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Robbins, V. K. 1990b: A Socio-Rhetorical Response: Contexts of Interaction and Forms of
Exhortation, Semeia 50, 261-71.
Robbins, V. K. 1991a: The Social Location of the Implied Author of Luke-Acts. J. H.
Neyrey (ed.) 1991: The Social World of Luke-Acts: Models for Interpretation. Peabody,
MA: Hendrickson, 305-32.
Robbins, V. K. 1991b: Luke-Acts: A Mixed Population Seeks a Home in the Roman
Empire. In L. Alexander (ed.) 1991: Images of Empire. Sheffield: JSOT Press 20221.
Robbins, V. K. 1991c: Beelzebul Controversy in Mark and Luke: Rhetorical and Social
Analysis, Forum 7.3-4 (1991) 261-77.
Robbins, V. K. 1991d: Writing as a Rhetorical Act in Plutarch and the Gospels. D. F.
Watson (ed.), Persuasive Artistry: Studies in New Testament Rhetoric in Honor of
George A. Kennedy. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 157-86.
Robbins, V. K. 1992a: Jesus the Teacher: A Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation of Mark, pbk. ed.,
Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Repr. 2009: Fortress Press ex libris.
Robbins, V. K. 1992b: The Reversed Contextualization of Psalm 22 in the Markan
Crucifixion: A Socio-Rhetorical Analysis. In F. van Segbroeck, C.M. Tuckett, G.
Van Belle, J. Verheyden (eds.), The Four Gospels 1992. Festschrift Frans Neirynck.
Volume 2, BETL 100, Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1161-83.
Robbins, V. K. 1992c: Using a Socio-Rhetorical Poetics to Develop a Unified Method: The
Woman who Anointed Jesus as a Test Case, SBLSP 31, 302-19.
Robbins, V. K. 1993a: Progymnastic Rhetorical Composition and Pre-Gospel Traditions:
A New Approach. In C. Focant (ed.), The Synoptic Gospels: Source Criticism and the
New Literary Criticism, BETL 110, Leuven: Leuven University Press, 116-31.
Robbins, V. K. (ed.) 1993b: The Rhetoric of Pronouncement. Semeia 64, Atlanta: Scholars
Press.
Robbins, V. K. 1994a: New Boundaries in Old Territory: Forms and Social Rhetoric in Mark,
ed. D. B. Gowler, Emory Studies in Early Christianity 3, New York: Peter Lang
Publishing.
Robbins, V. K. 1994b: Oral, Rhetorical, and Literary Cultures: A Response, Semeia 65, 7591.
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Robbins, V. K. 1994c: Socio-Rhetorical Criticism: Mary, Elizabeth, and the Magnificat as
a Test Case. In E. S. Malbon and E. V. McKnight (eds.), The New Literary Criticism
and the New Testament. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 164-209.
Robbins, V. K. 1994d: Interpreting Miracle Culture and Parable Culture in Mark 4-11,
SEÅ 59, 59-81.
Robbins, V. K. 1995: Divine Dialogue and the Lord’s Prayer: Socio-Rhetorical
Interpretation of Sacred Texts, Dialogue 28, 117-46.
Robbins, V. K. 1996a: The Tapestry of Early Christian Discourse: Rhetoric, Society and
Ideology. London: Routledge.
Robbins, V. K. 1996b: Exploring the Texture of Texts: A Guide to Socio-Rhetorical
Interpretation. Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press International.
Robbins, V. K. 1996c: The Dialectical Nature of Early Christian Discourse, Scriptura 59,
353-362. Online:
http://www.religion.emory.edu/faculty/robbins/dialect/dialect353.html.
Robbins, V. K. 1996d: Making Christian Culture in the Epistle of James, Scriptura 59, 34151; http://www.religion.emory.edu/faculty/robbins/James/James341.html.
Robbins, V. K. 1997: Rhetorical Composition and Sources in the Gospel of Thomas.
SBLSP, Atlanta: Scholars Press, 86-114.
Robbins, V. K. 1998a: Socio-Rhetorical Hermeneutics and Commentary. In J. Mrazek, S.
Brodsky, and R. Dvorakova (eds.), EΠI TO AYTO. Essays in honour of Petr
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ml
Robbins, V. K. 1998b: Enthymemic Texture in the Gospel of Thomas. SBLSP, Atlanta:
Scholars Press, 343-66.
Robbins, V. K. 1998c: From Enthymeme to Theology in Luke 11:1-13. In R. P. Thompson
and T. E. Phillips (ed.), Literary Studies in Luke-Acts: A Collection of Essays in Honor
of Joseph B. Tyson. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 191-214.
Robbins, V. K. 2001: Why Participate in African Biblical Interpretation? In M. N. Getui,
T. S. Maluleke, and J. Ukpong (eds.), Interpreting the New Testament in Africa.
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Nairobi, Kenya: Acton Publishers, 275-91;
http://www.religion.emory.edu/faculty/robbins/Africa/africa10.htm
Robbins, V. K. 2003: The Legacy of 2 Corinthians 12:2-4 in the Apocalypse of Paul. In T. J.
Burke and J. K. Elliott (eds.), Paul and the Corinthians: Studies on a Community in
Conflict. SupNovT 109, Leiden/Boston: Brill, 25-339.
Robbins, V. K. 2004: Where is Wuellner’s Anti-Hermeneutical Hermeneutic Taking Us?:
From Scheiermacher to Thistleton and Beyond. In J. D. Hester and D. Hester
(eds.), Rhetorics and Hermeneutics: Wilhelm Wuellner and His Influence. Emory
Studies in Early Christianity 9, New York/London: T. & T. Clark International,
105-25.
Robbins, V. K. 2005a: ‚The Rhetorical Full-Turn in Biblical Interpretation and Its
Relevance for Feminist Hermeneutics.‛ In C. Vander Stichele and T. Penner
(eds.), Her Master’s Tools? Feminist and Postcolonial Engagements of HistoricalCritical Discourse, Global Perspectives on Biblical Scholarship 9, Atlanta: SBL,
109-27.
Robbins, V. K. 2005b: Lukan and Johannine Tradition in the Qur’an: A Story of (and
Program for) Auslegungsgeschichte and Wirkungsgeschichte. In T. Penner and C.
Vander Stichele (eds.), Moving Beyond New Testament Theology? Essays in
Conversation with Heikki Räisänen. Helsinki: Finnish Exegetical Society and
Göttingen:Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 336-68.
Robbins, V. K. 2005c: From Heidelberg to Heidelberg: Rhetorical Interpretation of the
Bible at the Seven ‚Pepperdine‛ Conferences from 1992-2002. In Olbricht and
Eriksson: 335-77.
Robbins, V. K. 2006: Enthymeme and Picture in the Gospel of Thomas. In J. Ma.
Asgeirson, A. DeConick, and R. Uro (eds.), Thomasine Traditions in Antiquity: The
Social and Cultural World of the Gospel of Thomas. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean
Studies 59; Leiden/Boston: Brill, 175-207.
Robbins, V. K. 2007: Conceptual Blending and Early Christian Imagination. In P.
Luomanen, I. Pyysiäinen and R. Uro (eds.), Explaining Christian Origins and Early
Judaism: Contributions from Cognitive and Social Science. Biblical Interpretation
Series 89, Leiden/Boston: Brill, 161-95.
Robbins, V. K. 2008: Rhetography: A New Way of Seeing the Familiar Text. In C. C.
Black and D. F. Watson (eds.), Words Well Spoken: George Kennedy’s Rhetoric of the
New Testament. Studies in Rhetoric and Religion 8; Waco, Tex.: Baylor University
Press, 81-106.
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Robbins, V. K. 2009a: The Invention of Christian Discourse. Volume 1. Rhetoric of Religious
Antiquity 1, Blandford Forum, UK: Deo Publishing.
Robbins, V. K. 2009b: Sea Voyages and Beyond. Emory Studies in Early Christianity 14,
Blandford Forum, UK: Deo Publishing.
Robbins V. K. and Newby, G. D. 2003: A Prolegomenon to the Relation of the Qur’an
and the Bible. In J. Reeves (ed.), Bible and Qur’an: Essays in Scriptural
Intertextuality. Symposium Series, Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 23-42.
Robbins, V. K. and Patton J. H. 1980: Rhetoric and Biblical Criticism, Quarterly Journal of
Speech 66, 327-37.
Shore, B. 1996: Culture in Mind: Cognition, Culture, and the Problem of Meaning. New
York: Oxford University Press.
Sisson, R. B. 1994: The Apostle as Athlete: A Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation of 1
Corinthians 9. Ph.D. diss., Emory University.
Sisson, R. B. 1997: Voices of Authority in the Sermon on the Mount, SBLSP 36, 551-66.
Tate, W. R. 2006: Socio-Rhetorical Criticism. In W. R. Tate, Interpreting the Bible: A
Handbook of Terms and Methods. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 342-46.
Theissen, G. 2001: Gospel Writing and Church Politics: A Socio-rhetorical Approach. Chuen
King Lecture Series 3, Hong Kong: Theology Division, Chung Chi College,
Chinese University of Hong Kong.
van den Heever, G. A. 1998: Finding Data in Unexpected Places (Or: From Text
Linguistics to Socio-Rhetoric). A Socio-Rhetorical Reading of John’s Gospel,
SBLSP 37, 2:649-76.
von Thaden, R. 2007: Fleeing Porneia: 1 Corinthians 6:12—7:7 and the Reconfiguration of
Traditions. Ph.D. diss., Emory University.
Wachob, W. H. 1993: ‚The Rich in Faith‛ and ‚The Poor in Spirit‛: The Socio-Rhetorical
Function of a Saying of Jesus in the Epistle of James. Ph.D. diss., Emory
University.
Wachob, W. H. 1999: The Voice of Jesus and the Social Rhetoric of James. SNTSMS 106,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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Wachob, W. H. and Johnson, L. T. 1999: The Sayings of Jesus in the Epistle of James. In
B. Chilton and C. A. Evans (eds.), Authenticating the Words of Jesus. NTTS 28,
Leiden: Brill, 430-50.
Walker, J. 2000: Rhetoric and Poetics in Antiquity. New York: Oxford University Press.
Watson, D. F. (ed.) 2002: The Intertexture of Apocalyptic Discourse in the New Testament.
Symposium Series 14, Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature.
Watson, D. F. 2010: The Role of Miracle Discourse in the Argumentation of the New Testament.
Symposium Series, Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature.
Wuellner, W. H. 1978: Toposforschung und Torahinterpretation bei Paulus und Jesus,
NTS 24, 463-83.
Young, S. 2002: ‚My Lord’s Coming Again‛: Biblical Interpretation through Slave Songs.
B.A. Senior Honors Thesis, Emory University;
http://www.religion.emory.edu/faculty/robbins/Pdfs/YoungThesis.pdf.
1
Robbins 1989a, 1993a, 1996a: 106-08, 121-24, 1996b: 40-62, 1994b, 2009a: 9-14, 60-61, 283-86.
2
B. B. Scott and M. E. Dean 1993: A Sound Map of the Sermon on the Mount, SBLSP 32, 672-725 =
idem 1995: In D. Bauer and M. A. Powell (eds.), Treasures Old and New: Recent Contributions to
Matthean Studies, Atlanta: Scholars Press; idem 1994: A Sound Map of Mark 7:1-23, unpublished
paper presented for the Rhetoric and New Testament Section, SBL Annual meeting; M. E. Dean
1996: The Grammar of Sound in Greek Texts: Toward a Method for Mapping the Echoes of
Speech in Writing, Australian Biblical Review 44, 53-70; idem 1996: Elements of a Sound Map,
unpublished paper presented to the Bible in Ancient and Modern Media Group, SBL, November
1996; idem 1998: Textured Criticism, JSNT 70, 95-115.
3
Porter and Olbricht 1993, 1996, 1997; Porter and Stamps 1999, 2002; Eriksson, Übelacker, and
Olbricht 2002; Olbricht and Eriksson 2005.
4
Porter and Olbricht 1997: 200-31; Carey and Bloomquist 1999: 181-203; Porter and Stamps 1999:
173-209; Porter and Stamps 2002: 61-96; Eriksson and Olbricht 2002: 157-73; Bloomquist 1999,
2002; Watson 2002: 45-68; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 165-93.
5
deSilva 1995a, 1995b, 1996, 1997, 1998a, 1998b, 1999a, 1999b, 1999c, 2000, 2004, 2006; Carey and
Bloomquist 1999: 123-39; Watson 2002: 215-41; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 303-16.
6
See online: http://www.deopublishing.com/rhetoricofreligiousantiquity.htm.
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
7
Robbins 1975, 1976, 1978.
8
D. R. MacDonald (1999): The Shipwrecks of Odysseus and Paul, NTS 45, 88-107; M. P. Bonz
222
2000: The Past as Legacy: Luke-Acts as Ancient Epic, Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Cf. C. H. Talbert
and J. H. Hayes (1995): A Theology of Sea Storms in Luke-Acts, SBLSP 34, 321-36; L. C. Alexander
(1995): ‚In Journeyings Often‛: Voyaging in the Acts of the Apostles and in Greek Romance, in C.
M. Tuckett (ed.), Luke’s Literary Achievement: Collected Essays, JSNTSup 116; Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 17-49.
9
E.g., H. J. Cadbury 1956: We and I Passages in Luke-Acts, NTS 3, 128-32; J. A. Fitzmyer 1985: The
Gospel According to Luke X-XXIV, AB 28A, New York: Doubleday, 35-53; idem 1989: Luke the
Theologian: Aspects of His Teaching, New York: Paulist, 16-22; M. Hengel 1980: Acts and the History
of Earliest Christianity, Philadelphia: Fortress, 66-67; C. J. Hemer 1985: First Person Narrative in
Acts 27-28, TB 36, 79-109; S. E. Porter 1994: The ‚We‛ Passages, in D. W. J. Gill and C. Gempf
(eds.), The Book of Acts in Its First Century Setting, vol. 2, The Book of Acts in Its Graeco-Roman
Setting, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 545-74; J. M. Gilchrist 1996: The Historicity of Paul’s
Shipwreck, JSNT 61, 29-51; and C. K. Barrett 1998: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Acts
of the Apostles, vol. 2, ICCONT, Edinburgh: T & T Clark.
10
G. A. Kennedy 2003: Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric, Atlanta:
SBL; R. F. Hock and E. N. O’Neil 1986: The Chreia in Ancient Rhetoric: Volume I. The Progymnasmata,
Atlanta: Scholars Press; R. F. Hock and E. N. O’Neil 2002: The Chreia and Ancient Rhetoric:
Classroom Exercises, Atlanta: SBL.
11
M. Sawicki 1988: The Gospel in History: Portrait of a Teaching Church, Mahwah, NJ: Paulist; idem
1994: Seeing the Lord: Resurrection and Early Christian Practices, Minneapolis: Fortress, 51-76; B. L.
Melbourne 1988: Slow to Understand: The Disciples in Synoptic Perspective, Lanham/New
York/London: University Press of America; M. N. Beavis 1989: Mark’s Audience: The Literary and
Social Setting of Mark 4.11-12, JSNTSup 33, Sheffield: JSOT Press; Robbins 1990a = Robbins 1994a:
219-42; J. T. Dillon 1995: Jesus As a Teacher: A Multidisciplinary Case Study, Lanham, MD:
International Scholars Publications.
12
Robbins 1981, 1982, 1985a, 1987a, 1987b, 1991a, 1991b, 1991c.
13
Robbins and Patton 1980; Robbins 1985b, 1988a, 1990b, 1991b, 1993b: vii-xvii, 3-31, 95-115; Mack
and Robbins 1989.
14
Gowler 1989, 1991, 1993; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 89-125.
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
223
15
Robbins 1975, 1978, 1982, 1991d.
16
Robbins 1984 and 1992a: Plato, 87-94, 136-47; Xenophon, 54, 60-68, 86, 126-28, 172-73, 206-09;
Josephus and Philo, 94-101, 134-35; Rabbinic literature, 101-05; Philostratus, 105-08, 147-55, 20809.
17
Robbins 1984 and 1992a: 189-91, 1992b.
18
L. T. Johnson 1995: The Letter of James, AB 37A, New York: Doubleday.
19
Sisson 1994 was an important resource for the socio-rhetorical interpretation of 1 Corinthians 9
in Robbins 1996a.
20
Raymond E. Brown 1994: The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave, New York:
Doubleday, 1:873-77, 1461-62, in which Brown used and expanded earlier work by Robbins
(Robbins 1988b, 1992b), contributed to the socio-rhetorical interpretation of Mark 15 throughout
Robbins 1996b.
21
Online: http://www.religion.emory.edu/faculty/robbins/SRI/defns/index.
22
Porter and Olbricht 1993: 443-63; Robbins 1994a, 1995.
23
Huie-Jolly 1994; Adams 1994; Hendricks 1995: Ascough 1997.
24
Brown 1999; Bell 1999.
25
J. M. Asgeirsson 1997: Arguments and Audience(s) in the Gospel of Thomas (Part I), SBLSP 36,
47-85; idem 1998: Arguments and Audience(s) in the Gospel of Thomas (Part II), SBLSP 37, 325-42;
idem 1998: Doublets and Strata: Towards a Rhetorical Approach to the Gospel of Thomas. Ph.D.
diss., Claremont Graduate University; idem 2002: The Chria as Principle and Source for Learning
Literary Composition, in J. M. Asgeirsson and N. van Deusen (eds.), Alexander’s Revenge:
Hellenistic Culture through the Centuries, Rekjavik: University of Iceland Press.
26
Blount 1993; Czachesz 1995; Hester 1992; Huie-Jolly 1997; Jensen 1992; Penner 1996, 1999; 2004;
Arnal 1997; Braun 1997; Batten 1998; van den Heever 1998; Porter and Stamps 2002: 297-334;
Cottril 1999; Kloppenborg 1999, 2000: 166-213, 409-44; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 6488; Park 1999.
27
Theissen 2001; Lee 2001; Nel 2002; Megbelayin 2002; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003; Jeal
2005a, 2005b, 2008; Long 2005.
28
The names ‚oppositional, suffering-death-resurrection and cosmic‛ in the 1996 essay gradually
have changed to ‚prophetic, priestly and precreation respectively.‛
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
29
224
Carey and Bloomquist 1999: 181-203; Porter and Stamps 1999: 173-209. Also see deSilva 1998b,
1999c; Watson 2002: 215-41; Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 303-16.
30
Watson 2002: 11-44. The origin of Robbins’s awareness of this distinction lies in Wuellner 1978:
467.
31
In Watson 2002: 11-44: contrary Rule (25), contrary Case (29, 32, 33, 39), contrary Result (29),
exhortative Result (20. 31), petitionary Result (39).
32
H. Lefebvre 1991 [1974]: The Production of Space. Oxford, UK: Blackwell.
33
R. D. Sack 1986: Human Territoriality: Its Theory and History, Cambridge: Cambridge University;
idem 1997: Homo Geographicus: A Framework for Action, Awareness, and Moral Concern, Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins.
34
P. Bourdieu 1989: Social Space and Symbolic Power, Sociological Theory 7, 14-25.
35
E. W. Soja 1989: Postmodern Geography: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory, New
York: Verso; idem 1993: Postmodern Geographies and the Critique of Historicism, in J. P. Jones III,
W. Natter, and T. R. Schatzki (eds.), Postmodern Contentions: Epochs, Politics, Space, New York:
Guildford, 113-36; idem 1996: Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places,
Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell.
36
S. Toulmin 1990: Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity, Chicago: University of Chicago
Press.
37
T. F. Carney 1975: The Shape of the Past: Models and Antiquity, Lawrence, Kans.: Coronado Press.
38
J. H. Neyrey 1993: 2 Peter, Jude, AB 37C, New York: Doubleday, 32-42, 128-42.
39
J. H. Neyrey 1996: Luke’s Social Location of Paul: Cultural Anthropology and the Status of Paul
in Acts, in B. Witherington III (ed.), History, Literature, and Society in the Book of Acts, Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 251-79.
40
J. H. Neyrey 2002: Spaces and Places, Whence and Whither, Homes and Rooms: ‚Territoriality‛
in the Fourth Gospel, BTB 32, 60-74; idem 2002: Spaced Out in John: Territoriality in the Fourth
Gospel, HervTeoStud 58, 633-63.
41
Gowler, Bloomquist, and Watson 2003: 126-64.
42
R. Boer 2009: Henri Lefebvre: the Production of Space in 1 Samuel, in C. V. Camp and J. L.
Berquist (eds.), Constructions of Space II: The Biblical City and Other Imagined Spaces, London: T. & T.
Clark, 1-24.
Robbins: Socio-Rhetorical Interpretation
43
225
V. H. Matthews 2003: Physical Space, Imagined Space, and ‚Lived Space‛ in Ancient Israel,
BTB 33, 12-20.
44
Dozeman 2003.
45
The use of Fauconnier and Turner 2002 for socio-rhetorical commentary is the result of an e-
mail by L. G. Bloomquist on Dec. 4, 2002, which called attention to the relation of conceptual
blending theory to early Christian blending of rhetorolects, which was a topic of discussion at the
Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity meetings prior to the AAR/SBL sessions at Toronto in November,
2002.
46
Online: http://www.deopublishing.com/rhetoricofreligiousantiquity.htm.