Response: Constructing and Deconstructing Empires

Roth, John K.

doi:10.1093/jaar/71.1.121

Cited by 3 publications

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“…Roth 2003), but point to the illusionary nature of sure categories (essentialism) and certain grounds (objectivity) (cf. Brown 2001:44), i.e.…”

Section: Empire As Negotiated Conceptmentioning

confidence: 99%

Empire and New Testament texts: Theorising the imperial, in subversion and attraction

Punt

2012

HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies

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Considering the overt or sublime connections biblical scholars increasingly indicate between biblical texts and empires, this contribution engages the need for the theorisation of empire beyond material depiction. It is suggested that empire is primarily of conceptual nature and a negotiated notion, a constantly constructed entity by both the powerful and the subjugated, to which the concomitant responses of subversion and attraction to empire attest. The discussion is primarily related to the first-century CE context, arguing also that postcolonial analysis provides a useful approach to deal with (at least, some of) the complexities of such research. Theorising Empire: Initial considerationsFirst-century CE Mediterranean life was largely determined by the omnipresent and ostensibly omnipotent Roman Empire in its various forms and guises. The material reality of imperial imposition was unavoidable for first-century people, constantly reinforced by visual images and verbal or written decrees, through military presence and social systems. The Empire made its presence felt in tangible and visible ways, 1 in step with imperial ideology. This dictated the continuous reinforcement in various ways of both the imperial presence and the required responses (including senses) of submissiveness to it. With an all pervasive Empire the consciousness and worldview of first-century people around the Mediterranean would not have remained oblivious of or unaffected by Roman imperial presence and practice, even if such influence is difficult to always plot historically accurately.Plotting its influence is from the outset complicated by the presence of material and discursive imperialism, as well as their interrelatedness. Material or historical imperialism already sculpted and determined the daily lives of first-century people in a myriad of ways, but so also did discursive imperialism at the level of consciousness or in terms of ideology. In other words, a territorial understanding of Empire maintained through military force (as one important material element) will always be important to make sense of the Roman Empire. But, at the same time, for the largest part the Empire was sustained through hegemony that was reliant upon a multivalent and complex paradigm of socio-political power to achieve and maintain its authority and control. More than only direct military action, the Romans sustained and wielded the imperium through a combination of recourse to force, social structures and systems as well as through ideological, imperial propaganda. Like other (earlier and later) empires, it propounded a sense of moral virtue and beneficence, claiming to exist and function with a vision of reordering the world's power relations for the sake and betterment of all.2 The totality of this socio-political framework (discursive imperialism) was more powerful and certainly more pervasive than its material enactment alone, even if accounting for its possible relation to the New Testament is not necessarily easier.The study of the possible influ...

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“…Roth 2003), but point to the illusionary nature of sure categories (essentialism) and certain grounds (objectivity) (cf. Brown 2001:44), i.e.…”

Section: Empire As Negotiated Conceptmentioning

confidence: 99%

Empire and New Testament texts: Theorising the imperial, in subversion and attraction

Punt

2012

HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies

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“…22.Choosing against essentialising empire does not imply a disavowal of real life, flesh and blood entities (e.g., Roth 2003), but points to the illusionary nature of sure categories (essentialism) and certain grounds (objectivity) (cf. Brown 2001:44); that is, to view social phenomena in terms of trans-historical essences, independent of conscious beings, disallowing the notion that society or people determine the categorical structure of reality (see Punt 2012a).…”

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Teaching Mark through a postcolonial optic

Punt

2015

HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies

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This contribution explores the potential value of a postcolonial approach for teaching Mark’s gospel. Investigating a number of texts from the gospel, it asks to what extent a postcolonial optic implies a different approach to the gospel, what it adds and where challenges exist. Teaching with a postcolonial optic entails framing the gospel in its 1st-century imperial context and focusing on the ambivalence and ambiguity of imperial rule, investigating texts with attention to hybridity and mimicry in particular. Teaching the Gospel of Mark through a postcolonial optic opens up new possibilities for interpretation and contextualisation, but at the same time poses certain challenges, pedagogically and otherwise.

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“…11 Opposition to essentialist understanding does not imply the rejection of flesh and blood entities (as propagated by some, cf. Roth 2003). It points to the illusionary nature of sure categories (essentialism) and certain grounds (objectivity), i.e.…”

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confidence: 99%

The interpretation of the New Testament as the study of texts and contexts: Hermeneutics, identities, communities

Punt¹

2014

Acta. Theol.

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Response: Constructing and Deconstructing Empires

Cited by 3 publications

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Empire and New Testament texts: Theorising the imperial, in subversion and attraction

Empire and New Testament texts: Theorising the imperial, in subversion and attraction

Teaching Mark through a postcolonial optic

The interpretation of the New Testament as the study of texts and contexts: Hermeneutics, identities, communities

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