The politics of heaven : women, gender, and empire in the study of Paul / Joseph A. Marchal.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Marchal, Joseph A.

Series:

Paul in critical contexts

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Bible. Epistles of Paul--Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Bible.

Bible. Epistles of Paul.

Sex role--Biblical teaching.

Sex role.

Feminist theology.

Postcolonialism.

Christianity and politics--Biblical teaching.

Christianity and politics.

Physical Description:

xiii, 213 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Minneapolis, MN : Fortress Press, [2008]

Summary:

Issues of empire and gender remain of vital interest among Paul's interpreters, as in wider publics, today. Joseph A. Marchal offers an accessible engagement with some of the more complicated theory put to use in Pauline studies, addressing feminist and postcolonial interpretation as well as recent scholarship on Paul and empire. Giving particular attention to aspects of Philippians as a case study, Marchal argues that only a sophisticated interpretation that combines analysis on all these axes can prove adequate to the complexity of Paul's context.

Contents:

Introduction: Interpretation at the intersection of approaches

Starting points and parameters : feminist and postcolonial analysis

Paul, Philippians, and the plan of this book

Histories of interpretation and "people's history" in Pauline studies

Initial inquiries and imperial intersections in interpretation

Gaps, erasures, and conflicts

Procedure and precedent

People's possibilities : subaltern history and problems of perspective

People's history and Pauline studies

Genealogies, genders, gaps, and geopolitics in people's history

Back to the biblical : antiquity and feminist, postcolonial approaches

A hymn within and a heavenly politeuma

A heavenly politeuma and a hymn within

Rhetorical interactions and Pauline interpretation : a postcolonial Paul?

Initial connections and conclusions

The rhetorics of imitation and postcolonial theories of mimicry

Imitation rhetorics in Paul and in Pauline scholarship

The promise and perils of postcolonial mimicry

Post-poning any undue celebrations : criticisms, cautions, and calibrations of postcolonial mimicry

Resistance, risks, and replications : on the limits of mimicry for a feminist postcolonial analysis

Women in the contact zone

Contact zone and transcultural interactions

Pauline travels and the Philippian contact zone

Euodia and syntyche : reconstructing co-workers in the contact zone

Concluding reflections and connections

Reviewing the present project

Elaborating further possibilities.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 127-204) and index.

ISBN:

9780800663001

0800663004

OCLC:

226212735