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Communities That Write: Christ-Groups, Associations, and Gospel Communities*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 March 2012

Richard Last
Richard Last
Affiliation:
Department for the Study of Religion, University of Toronto, 170 St. George Street, floor 3, Toronto, Ontario M5R 2M8, Canada. email: richard.last@utoronto.ca
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Abstract

Critics who posit the ‘gospels for all Christians’ theory contend that gospels reflect neither the history nor the concerns of the communities within which they were produced. Despite advocacy for the theory from an increasing number of scholars, others continue to reconstruct diverse gospel communities. There is some common ground between the two sides of the debate: the majority of scholars from both perspectives agree that gospels were composed within communal settings. If we take this agreement as our starting point and investigate communal writing practices in antiquity, we might productively forge an agreeable method for determining the scope of intended gospel audiences. This study analyzes the collective process of writing in ancient associations, now regarded as analogous in many ways to early Christ-groups. In doing so, a framework is provided for understanding how and to whom gospels produced in Christ-groups might have been composed. The study finds the ‘all Christians’ theory inconsistent with communal practices of writing.

Keywords

Christ-groupsassociationsgospel communitieswriting
Type
Articles
Information
New Testament Studies , Volume 58 , Issue 2 , April 2012 , pp. 173 - 198
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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References

1 E.g. Sim, D. C., ‘The Gospels for All Christians: A Response to Richard Bauckham’, JSNT 84 (2001) 3–27Google Scholar; Marcus, J., Mark 1–8 (AB 27; New York: Doubleday, 2000) 25–8Google Scholar; Kazen, T., ‘Sectarian Gospels for Some Christians? Intention and Mirror Reading in the Light of Extra-canonical Texts’, NTS (2005) 561–78CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Esler, P. F., ‘Community and Gospel in Early Christianity: A Response to Richard Bauckham's Gospels for All Christians’, SJT 51 (1998) 235–48CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 E.g. Bauckham, R., ed., The Gospels for All Christians: Rethinking the Gospel Audiences (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998)Google Scholar; Peterson, D. N., The Origins of Mark: The Markan Community in Current Debate (BIS 48; Leiden: Brill, 2000)Google Scholar; Bird, M. F., ‘The Markan Community, Myth or Maze? Bauckham's The Gospels for All Christians Revisited’, JTS 37 (2006) 474–86CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bird, , ‘Bauckham's The Gospels for all Christians Revisited’, EJT 15 (2006) 5–13Google Scholar; Hengel, Four Gospels. M. Mitchell supports Bauckham's objections to the traditional consensus, but contests aspects of his thesis: ‘Patristic Counter-Evidence to the Claim that “The Gospels Were Written for All Christians”’, NTS 51 (2005) 36–79 (37-8, 78). See also Hägerland, T., ‘John's Gospel: A Two-Level Drama?’, JSNT 25 (2003) 209–22Google Scholar; Klink, E. W. III, ed., The Audience of the Gospels: The Origin and Function of the Gospels in Early Christianity (LNTS 353; London and New York: T&T Clark, 2010)Google Scholar. Bauckham's work heightened the profile of the debate, but prior to 1998 there were several critics who already questioned the ability to reconstruct gospel communities: e.g. Johnson, L. T., ‘On Finding Lukan Community: A Cautious Cautionary Essay’, SBLASP (1979) 87–100Google Scholar; Judge, E., ‘The Social Identity of the First Christians: A Question of Method in Religious History’, JRH 11 (1980) 201–17 (208)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Allison, D., ‘Was There a “Lukan Community”?’, IRB 10 (1988) 62–70Google Scholar.

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4 Bauckham, R., ‘For Whom Were Gospels Written?’, The Gospels for All Christians (ed. Bauckham, R.) 9–48Google Scholar; Ascough, R. S, Paul's Macedonian Associations: The Social Context of Philippians and 1 Thessalonians (WUNT 2/161. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003) 91–108Google Scholar; Ascough, , ‘Local and Translocal Relationships Among Voluntary Associations and Early Christianity’, JECS 5 (1997) 223–41Google Scholar; and Sim, ‘Gospels’.

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7 Almost all critics agree that the gospels were composed and used in communal settings. To give just a selection of examples, see Marcus, Mark 1–8, 28–9; Saldarini, A. J., Matthew's Christian-Jewish Community (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1994) 1Google Scholar; R. Bauckham, ‘For Whom’, 30; and Reinhartz, A., ‘Gospel Audiences: Variations on a Theme’, The Audience of the Gospels (ed. Klink , III) 134–52 (139–40)Google Scholar. M. Hengel suggests that the gospels might not have been written within particular churches, but does not provide substantive support for this assertion. See The Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Investigation of the Collection and Origin of the Canonical Gospels (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 2000) 77–8, 106–8Google Scholar. Hengel's suggestion fails to account for the ‘group-oriented’ nature of ancient Mediterranean society. See Esler, ‘Community and Gospel’.

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9 Kloppenborg, ‘Edwin Hatch’.

10 Harland, Associations.

11 Ascough, ‘Translocal Relationships’, 223–41.

12 Although Ebel emphasizes recruitment strategies used by the Corinthians that are not common among associations, see her Attraktivität.

13 Discussions of methodological procedures for performing comparisons of the available data can be found in Kloppenborg, ‘Edwin Hatch’; and Ascough, R. S., ‘Comparative Perspectives: Early Christianity and the Roman Empire’, Forschungsbericht Römische Religion (2006–2008) (ed. Bendlin, A. and Haase, M.; Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 2009) 382–90Google Scholar.

14 Burridge believes that ‘[t]hese four individual accounts [i.e. NT gospels], each concerned with the resolution of their particular themes, suggest that they have been composed, not by communities, but by four single writers each of whom wants to portray a particular view of Jesus in his gospel in the manner of ancient biography’. See ‘About People’, 130–1.

15 Waltzing, J. P., Étude historique sur les corporations professionnelles chez les Romains depuis les origines jusqu'à la chute de l'empire d'Occident (Mémoires couronnés et autres mémoires publiée par l'Académie Royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique 50; 4 vols., Bruxelles: Hayez, 1895–1900) 1.32–56Google Scholar; Kornemann, E., ‘Collegium’, PW 4 (1901) 380–480 (386–403)Google Scholar; and Piana, G. La, ‘Foreign Groups in Rome During the First Centuries of the Empire’, HTR 20 (1927) 183–403 (239–44)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Ausbüttel, F., Untersuchungen zu den Vereinen im Westen des römischen Reiches (Frankfurter althistorische Studien 11; Kallmünz: Lassleben, 1982)Google Scholar; and Kloppenborg, J. S., ‘Collegia and thiasoi: Issues in Function, Taxonomy and Membership’, Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World (ed. Kloppenborg, J. S. and Wilson, S. G.; London: Routledge, 1996) 16–30Google Scholar.

17 For an instructive discussion of each type, see Harland, Associations, 28–53.

18 Kloppenborg, J. S., ed., with Ascough, R. S., Attica, Central Greece, Macedonia, Thrace (vol. 1 of Associations in the Greco-Roman World; BZNW 181; Berlin and New York: W. de Gruyter, 2011) 1–13CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

19 Richardson, P. G., ‘Early Synagogues as Collegia in the Diaspora and Palestine’, Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World (ed. Kloppenborg, and Wilson, ) 90–109Google Scholar; Richardson, , ‘An Architectural Case for Synagogues as Associations’, The Ancient Synagogue from its Origins Until 200 C.E.: Papers Presented at an International Conference at Lund University October 14–17, 2001 (ed. Olson, B. and Zetterholm, M.; CBNT 39; Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2003) 90–117Google Scholar; Linghardt, M., ‘The Manual of Discipline in the Light of Statues of Hellenistic Associations’, Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects (ed. Collins, J. J., Wise, M., Golb, N., and Pardee, D.; Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 722; New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 1994) 251–70Google Scholar; Runesson, A., Origins of the Synagogue: A Socio-Historical Study (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2001)Google Scholar; and Kloppenborg and Ascough, Attica, 340–5.

20 For example, Kloppenborg, ‘Egalitarianism’; Ebel, Attraktivität; Schmeller, Hierarchie; Smith, From Symposium to Eucharist, 173–217; Cameron, R., ed., with Miller, M. P., Redescribing Paul and the Corinthians (vol. 2 of Redescribing Christian Origins; SBLSS; Atlanta: Scholars, 2011)Google Scholar; Ascough, R. S., ‘The Completion of a Religious Duty: The Background of 2 Cor 8.1–15’, NTS 42 (1996) 584–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 Ascough, R. S., ‘Forms of Commensality in Greco-Roman Associations’, CW 102 (2008) 33–45Google Scholar.

22 There is some evidence for Corinthian usage of written bylaws. See Hanges, J. C., ‘1 Corinthians 4:6 and the Possibility of Written Bylaws in the Corinthian Church’, JBL 117 (1998) 275–98Google Scholar.

23 Duling, D. C., ‘The Matthean Brotherhood and Marginal Scribal Leadership’, Modelling Early Christianity: Social-Scientific Studies of the New Testament in its Context (ed. Esler, P. F.; London: Routledge, 1995) 159–82 (178)Google Scholar.

24 Carter, Matthew, 49.

25 Saldarini, Matthew's, 194; Crosby, M. H., House of Disciples: Church, Economics, & Justice in Matthew (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1988) 104–10Google Scholar; and Ascough, ‘Matthew and Community Formation’, 96–126.

26 For more examples see Kloppenborg, , ‘Greco-Roman Thiasoi, the Ekklēsia at Corinth, and Conflict Management’, Redescribing Paul and the Corinthians (ed. Cameron, and Miller, ) 187–218 (195 n. 25Google Scholar).

27 O. M. van Nijf estimates that one-third of all association inscriptions are honorary decrees. See The Civic World of Professional Associations in the Roman East (Amsterdam: Gieben, 1997) 74Google Scholar.

28 This study focuses on associations not only because they represent the closest communal analogy to early Christ-groups, but also because other communal models are currently too problematic for a study of this nature. The problem with using philosophical schools is that our information regarding actual schools around the first century is lacking. Only two schools (Neopythagorians and Epicureans) during this time had established themselves into structured organizations whereas others were not ‘schools’ like these two. Access to the practices of these communities is complicated by the fact that information on the Pythagorean school is from two third-century writers, Iamblichus and Philostratus; and minimal data exists for the study of Epicurean schools during this period. The problem with using the so-called mystery cults is that they do not provide us with texts that have known provenance. Regarding the Orphic Hymns, for example, A. N. Athanassakis notes that ‘[t]he place in which the Hymns were composed and used is not known’. This comment holds true for most of the mystery texts collected by M. W. Meyer in his 1999 sourcebook. These documents are not ideal for a study of the writing practices of specific, extant, communities. See Ascough, R. S., What Are They Saying About The Formation of Pauline Churches? (New York: Paulist, 1998) 32–3Google Scholar; Usener, H. K., Epicurea (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1887) 135Google Scholar; Meeks, W. A., The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul (New Haven: Yale University, 1983) 81–4Google Scholar; Meyer, M. W., The Ancient Mysteries: A Sourcebook of Sacred Texts (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 1999)Google Scholar; and Athanassakis, A. N., The Orphic Hymns: Text, Translation, and Notes (SBLTT 12; Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1977)Google Scholar.

29 See Alexander, L. C. A., The Preface to Luke's Gospel: Literary Convention and Social Context in Luke 1.1-4 and Acts 1.1 (SNTSMS 78; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1993)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30 Our lack of dependable information regarding biographers' intended audiences is not the only reason to avoid genre-specific studies of gospel audiences. Arguments supporting broad intended audiences of biographies are unconvincing. R. Burridge's suggestion that the function of apologetic and polemic biographies speaks in favour of broad intended readership is perhaps one of the most convincing cases that can be made for the ‘all Christians’ theory using genre. However, even this argument is unconvincing due to its excessively hypothetical nature: the gospels were written for ‘all Christians’ if apologetic and polemic were functions of biographies and if these functions meant wider audiences and if the gospels were the kinds of biographies that had apologetic and polemic functions and if these biographies were analogous to gospels in terms of audience. A more straightforward line of investigation is to analyze the writings of analogous communities rather than to try to extend the biography analogy to questions of gospel audiences. See Burridge, ‘About People’, 134–7. A full review of R. Burridge's work would note, as others have, differences in content between gospel literature and biographies, which destabilize our understanding of the genre of the gospels—a further obstacle to reliance on genre for intended gospel audiences. Gospels as Hellenistic historiography: Collins, A. Yarbro, Mark (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007)Google Scholar; gospels as Jewish novels: Vines, M. E., The Problem of Markan Genre: The Gospel of Mark and the Jewish Novel (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2002)Google Scholar.

31 Burridge, ‘About People’, 126.

32 Burridge, ‘About People’, 130–1.

33 Burridge, R. A., What are the Gospels? A Comparison with Graeco-Roman Biography (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1992)Google Scholar.

34 Burridge, ‘About People’, 133.

35 Burridge, R. A., What are the Gospels? A Comparison with Graeco-Roman Biography (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2nd ed. 2004) 179Google Scholar. All subsequent references to this book refer to the second edition.

36 Burridge admits this much himself. The biographies that he studies most closely ‘reveal a setting within the educated and ruling classes’ (Gospels, 145; cf. 179–80). He cites W. Meeks as providing support for the notion that Christ-believers enjoyed relatively high status. However, recent work by J. Meggitt and S. Friesen has challenged the so-called ‘new consensus’ that Meeks represents. Esler critiques the application of the biography analogy for insights into gospel audiences on the basis of the different statuses of their authors. He argues, ‘When they [i.e. the biographers studied by Burridge] wrote they no doubt had in mind reaching wide stretches of this primary reference group [i.e. “the upper level of Greek or Roman society”] or at least particular sections within it. Their position was, in short, utterly different from that of the small groups of people who acknowledged a human being known as Jesus Christ as their saviour… Anyone writing for people like this would inevitably be affected by the extent to which they were alienated from surrounding culture as much as part of it. They would primarily write for their reference group, the communities of which they were members’. See ‘Community and Gospel’, 244; cf. Meggitt, J. J., Paul, Poverty and Survival (Studies of the New Testament and its World; Edinburgh: T.&T. Clark, 1998)Google Scholar; Friesen, S., ‘Poverty in Pauline Studies: Beyond the So-Called New Consensus’, JSNT 26 (2004) 323–61Google Scholar; Friesen, S. and Scheidel, W., ‘The Size of the Economy and the Distribution of Income in the Roman Empire,’ JRS 99 (2009) 61–91Google Scholar; and Burridge, Gospels, 145, 154–5, 179–80.

37 This translation is partially adapted from B.H. McLean, ‘The Place of Cult in Voluntary Associations and Christian Churches in Delos,’ in Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World (ed. Kloppenborg and Wilson) 186–225 (206).

38 Other examples include IPriene 139 no. 196 (350 BCE), IEphesos 24 (162/3 or 163/4 CE), and SIG 3 1044 (111 BCE). Strabo (Geogr. 17.1.17) states that records of divine acts, or aretalogies (ἀρεταί), were kept at a Sarapis temple near Alexandria.

39 However, Ascough has noted that a decree from a Bendis association at Piraeus was found with another Bendis association at Salamis (IG II2 1317 [272/71 BCE]; 1317b [246/45 BCE]; and SEG II 10 [248/47 BCE]). See Macedonian, 94.

40 This building was constructed during the third century BCE and eventually housed at least 36 inscriptions. See Edson, C., ‘Cults of Thessalonica (Macedonia III)’, HTR 41 (1948) 105–204 (181)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; cf. Donfried, K. P., ‘The Cults of Thessalonica and the Thessalonian Correspondence’, NTS 31 (1985) 336–50 (337)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

41 This is a methodological point also suggested by T. Kazen in an article that draws insights into the gospel audience question from four non-canonical gospels. See ‘Sectarian Gospels’.

42 Kloppenborg and Ascough, Attica.

43 For evidence of other inscriptions being copied, see IMagnMai 215 and ISardh 4. Cf. Kloppenborg and Ascough, Attica, 360–1.

44 Sellew, P., ‘Religious Propaganda in Antiquity: A Case from the Sarapeum at Thessalonica’, Numina Aegaea 3 (1980) 17–19Google Scholar.

45 Najman, H., Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism (JSJSup 77; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 41–2Google Scholar.

46 See VanderKam, J. C., Textual and Historical Studies in the Book of Jubilees (HSM 14; Missoula, MT: Scholars, 1977) 214–85Google Scholar. For an updated and abridged version of this influential interpretation, see VanderKam, J. C., The Book of Jubilees (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2001) 17–20, 141–3Google Scholar.

47 See Najman, Mosaic, 63–6; Kugel, J. L., ‘The Jubilees Apocalypse’, DSD 1 (1994) 322–47Google Scholar. Another example of Mosaic Discourse, according to Najman, is Philo's Life of Moses, though not written within an association. This text has very different concerns from those of Jubilees. Some evidence suggests an intended audience of primarily Alexandrians: S. Sandmel posits that one of Philo's concerns was to prevent Judeans from leaving the Alexandrian Judean community as did Tiberius Julius Alexander, Philo's nephew (Sandmel, S., Philo of Alexandria: An Introduction [Oxford: Oxford University, 1979] 47Google Scholar; cf. Jos. Ant. 20.100); source-critical work indicates that Philo incorporated specifically Alexandrian material regarding Moses (Borgen, P., Philo of Alexandria, an Exegete for his Time [Leiden: Brill, 1997] 21Google Scholar; cf. Mos. 1.4); and Najman situates De Vita Mosis as a participant in an Alexandrian cultural debate: ‘Philo's lives of Moses were…written to dispel false images of the hero—notably those disseminated by authors such as Manetho (third century B.C.E.) and Apion (a contemporary of Philo), who had contributed to anti-Judaism in Egypt’ (Najman, Mosaic, 92). Philo does engage with Alexandrian traditions elsewhere, which speaks to the regionally specific content of some of his work. See Najman, Mosaic, 73; and Dillon, J. M., The Middle Platonists: 80 B.C. to A.D. 220 (Ithaca: Cornell University, 1996) 114–83Google Scholar.

48 Bohak, G., Joseph and Aseneth and the Jewish Temple in Heliopolis (SBLEJL 10; Atlanta: Scholars, 1996)Google Scholar.

49 Last, R., ‘Onias IV and the ἀδέσποτος ἱερός: Placing Antiquities 13.62-73 into the Context of Ptolemaic Land Tenure’, JSJ 41 (2010) 494–516Google Scholar.

50 There are several other Judean texts composed within specific communities for specific communities. For example, critics (e.g. Marcus, Mark 1–8, 27; and Charles, R., ‘Hybridity and the Letter of Aristeas’, JSJ 40 [2009] 242–59Google Scholar) commonly argue that the Letter of Aristeas was intended for a specifically Alexandrian audience, perhaps written in response to issues of cultural convergence in that city. However, the audience of the text is a much-debated issue: see Friedländer, M., Geschichte der jüdischen Apologetik als Vorgeschichte des Christentums (Zürick: Schmidt, 1903) 83–104Google Scholar; Dalbert, P., Die Theologie der hellenistisch-jüdischen Missionsliteratur unter Ausschluss von Philo und Josephus (Hamburg-Volksdorf: Reich, 1954) 92–102Google Scholar; Tcherikover, V., ‘The Ideology of the Letter of Aristeas’, HTR 51 (1958) 59–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Barclay, J. M. G., Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora: From Alexander to Trajan (323 BCE–117 CE) (Edinburgh: T.&T. Clark, 1996) 148–9Google Scholar. The sectarian scrolls of Qumran (e.g. Damascus Document, Serek, Hodayot, Pesharim) were also primarily intended for the communities in which they were written. There is debate whether there existed one or several sectarian settlements represented by the sectarian scrolls. For critics who argue that there existed several yahad settlements, the existence of copies of the Serek and the Community Rule that contradict one another is explained by their composition within different communities. See Collins, J. J., ‘Tradition and Innovation in the Dead Sea Scrolls’, The Dead Sea Scrolls: Transmission of Traditions and Production of Texts (ed. Metso, S., Najman, H., and Schuller, E.; Leiden: Brill, 2010) 1–23 (4–5)Google Scholar; and Collins, J. J., Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010)Google Scholar. In contrast, see Vermes, G., The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (New York: Allan Lane, 1997) 26–48Google Scholar.

51 See the works in n. 2.

52 Esler, ‘Community and Gospel’, 243.

53 There is evidence that the interaction between Christ-groups and associations was so strong that some Pauline groups (the Thessalonians and Corinthians) already existed as associations before Paul entered the scene. As this theory goes, upon arrival in these cities the apostle convinced the associations to change their patron deity to Christ. See Ascough, R. S., ‘The Thessalonian Christian Community as a Professional Voluntary Association’, JBL 119 (2000) 311–28Google Scholar; and Mack, B. L., ‘Rereading the Christ Myth: Paul's Gospel and the Christ Cult Question’, Redescribing Paul and the Corinthians (ed. Cameron, and Miller, ) 35–73 (51–2)Google Scholar. R. Cameron and M. P. Miller speak more broadly about this phenomenon in the Jesus movement: ‘If people are always already socially constituted by family, status, gender, city and region, ethnicity, a wide range of networks and associations, and the like, it is more plausible to imagine social formation in the name of Jesus or Christ as various kinds of interventions in other already existing groups, than to imagine these formations as arising de novo…’ See ‘Introducing Paul and the Corinthians’, Redescribing Paul and the Corinthians (ed. Cameron, and Miller, ) 1–15 (8–9)Google Scholar.

54 See Kloppenborg, ‘Greco-Roman’, 209–13.

55 Kloppenborg and Ascough, Attica, 229–34.

56 On the light drachma: ‘Since the denarius was by weight the effective equivalent of an Attic silver drachm, it is apparent that the Roman-era hemidrachm and drachm, called a “light” drachma, λεπτοῦ δρ(αχμή) in IG II2 1368…represented the traditional silver values of the hemiobol and obol and that at some point the bronze coins that would have ordinarily represented the hemiobol and obol were renamed hemidrachm and drachm’. Kroll, J. H., The Greek Coins (vol. 26 of The Athenian Agora; Athens: American School of Classical Studies at Athens, 1993) 84Google Scholar. Quoted from Kloppenborg and Ascough, Attica, 252. Kloppenborg and Harland (who co-wrote and co-edited §51 in Attica) note that the term is often used in Carian epigraphy.

57 There are many examples such as these. To cite just one more, compare the 1,500 denarii fine enforced by a Macedonian association for disrupting a tomb (Philippi II 133/G441; II/III CE) and the 75,000 denarii fine enforced by a Judean association for a tomb violation (IJO I Mac 15; III CE).

58 See van Nijf, Professional, 131–243.

59 See Harland, Dynamics, 148–53.

60 Some were not as direct with their intentions. For example, a Judean association at Delos honoured their benefactor, Serapion, without explicitly referencing their concern for how this honorary act would make them look to other potential benefactors. On the other hand, the gift that they record to have been given to Serapion, a golden crown, is extravagant and probably caught the attention of others (IJO I, Ach67; 150–50 BCE). See Runesson, A., ed. with Binder, D. D. and Olsson, B., The Ancient Synagogue from its Origins to 200 C.E.: A Source Book (AJEC 72; Leiden: Brill, 2008) 130–1Google Scholar.

61 Kloppenborg and Ascough note: ‘The fact that the most prominent activities of associations—at least as far as the epigraphical record is concerned—were the voting of honors for their members and the inscribing of membership lists suggests that beyond cultic engagements and the pleasures of drinking and dining, associations afforded their members with a sense of belonging, honor, and achievement’. See Attica, 6.

62 See SEG 31.122 (early II CE) for an exception.

63 J. S. Kloppenborg and P. A. Harland wrote and edited §51.

64 Burridge, ‘About People’, 125–30.

65 Downing, F. G., ‘Word-Processing in the Ancient World: The Social Production and Performance of Q’, JSNT 64 (1996) 29–48 (32)Google Scholar; cf. Aristotle Rhet. 1.5.1–6, 2; Cicero De or. 14.47.

66 Downing, ‘Word-Processing’, 33.

67 Downing, ‘Word-Processing’, 33.

68 Rajak, T., Josephus (London: Duckworth, 1983) 63Google Scholar.

69 Thanks to J. S. Kloppenborg for drawing my attention to the first of these.

70 Downing, ‘Word-Processing’, 34.

71 Downing, ‘Word-Processing’, 34.

72 In addition to the literature on NT gospel communities, much scholarship has also been produced on the community behind Q. For an interesting recent review of, and methodological contribution to, reconstructions of the Q people, see Rollens, S. E., ‘Does “Q” Have Any Representative Potential?’, MTSR 23 (2011) 64–79Google Scholar.

73 Ascough, ‘Matthew’, 102–7.

74 Marcus, Mark, 28.

75 For example, prophecies of betrayal (13.12) and hatred ‘by all’ (13.13). See Marcus, Mark, 28–9.

76 Following F. Watson, Marcus notes that secrecy motifs, language of insiders and outsiders, and emphases on predestination (all found in Mark) ‘are typical of groups that view themselves as persecuted’. Marcus, Mark, 29; cf. Watson, F., ‘The Social Function of Mark's Secrecy Theme’, JSNT 24 (1984) 49–69Google Scholar.

77 Brown, R. E., The Community of the Beloved Disciple: The Life, Loves, and Hates of an Individual Church in New Testament Times (New York: Paulist, 1979) 23Google Scholar.

78 Some others include: Saldarini, Christian-Jewish, 1; Kingsbury, J. D., ‘The Verb Akolouthein (“To Follow”) as an Index of Matthew's View of his Community’, JBL 97 (1978) 56–73Google Scholar; Riches, J., ‘The Sociology of Matthew: Some Basic Questions Concerning its Relation to the Theology of the New Testament’, SBL 1983 Seminar Papers (Chico, CA: Scholars, 1983) 259–71Google Scholar; and Meeks, W. A., ‘The Son of Man in Johannine Sectarianism’, The Interpretation of John (ed. Ashton, J.; Philadelphia: Fortress; London: SPCK, 1986) 173Google Scholar.

79 The unanimity of the decision is affirmed in 15.25.

80 Morris, L., The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1959) 46Google Scholar; and Wanamaker, C. A., The Epistle to the Thessalonians: A Commentary on the Greek Text (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990) 68Google Scholar.

81 See Richards, E. R., Paul and First-Century Letter Writing: Secretaries, Composition and Collection (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2004) 34Google Scholar.

82 None of the letters written by Seneca, Pliny, or Cicero were co-authored. There are only six examples from the private letters from Tebtunis, Zenon, and Oxyrhynchus: P. Oxy. 118, 1158, 3064, 3094, 3313 and 1167. See Richards, Paul, 34.

83 Richards, Paul, 59–93.

84 Richards, Paul, 93.

85 Derrenbacker, R. A. Jr, Ancient Compositional Practices and the Synoptic Problem (BETL 186; Leuven: Leuven University, 2005), 40Google Scholar.

86 For details regarding pre-publication and publication standards, see Derrenbacker, Ancient Compositional Practices, 39–44.

87 Sim, D. C., ‘Matthew's Use of Mark: Did Matthew Intend to Supplement or to Replace his Primary Source?’, NTS 57 (2011) 176–92 (178)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

88 Sim, ‘Matthew's Use of Mark’, 178.

89 Sim, ‘Matthew's Use of Mark’, 178.

90 For Sim (‘Matthew's Use of Mark’, 189), ‘Mark had no role at all to play in the Lucan community once Luke had composed and circulated his two-volume work. The earlier Gospel had been made redundant.’ Regarding John's use of Mark (191): ‘Why would he have been eager for them [i.e. the Johannine community] to consult the earliest Gospel after he himself had used it so sparingly, omitted much of it and replaced those traditions with very different material from independent sources?… John's transformation of Mark was so drastic and so complete in almost every respect that it is nigh on inconceivable that he believed that Mark could have made any meaningful contribution to his readers alongside his own Gospel narrative.’

91 If Sim's argument is deemed convincing—I think that it should be—then it further suggests a competitive element to the early Jesus movement. Some of the best evidence for an ideal of trans-local Christ-groups getting along with each other, working in unison, and sharing regular communication is seriously challenged by Sim's conclusions.

92 Bauckham, R., ‘Introduction’, The Gospels for All Christians (ed. Bauckham, ) 1–7 (1)Google Scholar.

93 Smith, J. Z., Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1990)Google Scholar.

94 Esler, ‘Community and Gospel’, 240.