Compassion - the essence of life : a social-scientific study of the religious symbolic universe reflected in the ideology/theology of Luke

Abstract

In this book Pieter van Staden considers the view that in the Lukan narrative world \nthe protagonist, Jesus, advocated an ideology/theology that was reflective in nature \nwith regard to a concept of God who is typified as having compassion with the socially \ndestitude. This ideological perspective on the part of the narrator is interpreted \nsocial-scientifically by making use of a conflict theory, since it can be \ncontrasted with the perspective of the Pharisees as the antagonists in the story. The \nconflict with regard to ideology/theology is understood in terms of core values: \ninclusivity as against exclusivity; sympathy as a result of boundless compassion, as \nagainst narrow-minded purifying ceremonies and discriminatory perfectionistic \nlegalities, causing social (i e familial, political, economic and religious) ostracism of \npeople, things and places that could not be categorised as 'whole' or 'without blemish'. \nThe three mealtime pericopes in Luke 14 have been selected as illustrative \nmaterial because they suggest exclusion based on purity lines, occur in a framework \nof dispute, and communicate the opposing ideologies of Jesus and the Pharisees \nrespectively. The author considers that there was an elite group of people in the Lucan \ncommunity, who thought and acted like the Pharisees at the time of the historical \nJesus. The narrator does not call on these elite people to abandon their social \npositions, but they should use their positions of authority to fulfil a paradoxical role, \nlike Jesus himself, showing compassion towards the non-elites; this would have particular \nreference to the socially ostracised both inside and outside Judaism.

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