VU Research Portal Representations of the Afterlife in Luke-Acts Somov, A. 2014 document version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Link to publication in VU Research Portal citation for published version (APA) Somov, A. (2014). Representations of the Afterlife in Luke-Acts. General rights Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ? Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. E-mail address: [email protected] Download date: 25. Sep. 2021 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This work could not have been completed without the help and support of several people whom I would like to thank here. First of all, I am very grateful to my supervisor Prof. Dr. Bert Jan Lietaert Peerbolte to whom I would like to express my deepest appreciation for his careful reading of my manuscript, generous and effective feedback, and advice as well as encouragement throughout the years of my research. Secondly, I would like to give my sincere thanks to my co-supervisors Dr. Arie W. Zwiep and Dr. Outi Lehtipuu for their supervision, feedback and advice, and the sharing of their academic experience. Furthermore, I wish to thank the members of the reading committee: Prof. Dr. Bart Koet, Prof. Dr. Annette Mertz, Dr. Caroline VanderStichele, Prof. Dr. Jan van der Watt, and Prof. Dr. Peter-Ben Smit for their careful reading of my thesis. My sincere thanks also go to Dr. David Clark, a former translation consultant with the United Bible Societies, who corrected the English of this book and gave me many important suggestions. Next, I would also like to thank Prof. Dr. Wim Janse, Vice-Rector of VU University Amsterdam and Dean of the Faculty of Theology for his support and encouragement. In addition, I am very grateful to other colleagues and staff of this faculty who have always been remarkably inspiring and friendly to me, among whom I would like to mention particularly Dr. Jan L.H. Krans, as well as to VU University library for the use of their resources and for their effective advice. In addition, I would like to express my gratitude to the Theologia Viatorum Foundation for their financial support without which this research could not have been completed, and to the Institute for Bible Translation, Russia/CIS, especially to Dr. Marianne Beerle-Moor and Dr. Marina Lomova- Oppokova for their help, enthusiastic support, and encouragement. Besides, I wish to thank Dr. Marijke de Lang, a global translation advisor with the United Bible Societies for her warm support of my project. Apart from my own efforts, the success of this research project has been made possible by the encouragement and interest of many others. I take this opportunity to express my gratitude to Prof. Dr. James H. Charlesworth, Prof. Dr. J. Ross Wagner, Prof. Dr. George L. Parsenios, Prof. Dr. Lee Martin McDonald, Dr. Andrei Desnitsky, Dr. Ilya Grits, Dr. Anna Shmaina-Velikanova, iv and the colleagues of the Faculty of Biblical Studies at St. Philaret Orthodox Christian Institute. Last but not least, I would like to thank my friends and my family: especially, my friend and colleague Ivan Miroshnikov for his genuine interest to my study and for his help, but most of all my wife Elena Somova and our daughter Anna for their patience, warm encouragement, and unceasing support during these years of my research. Moscow, December 2013 Alexey Somov v ABBREVIATIONS The titles of Ancient Near Eastern, classical, biblical, apocryphal and early Christian literature, the Dead Sea Scrolls, rabbinical texts, and secondary sources (journals, periodicals, reference works, and series) are abbreviated according to the guidelines of the Society of Biblical Literature described in the SBL Handbook of Style. See Patrick H. Alexander et al., eds., The SBL Handbook of Style: for Ancient Near Eastern, Biblical, and Early Christian Studies (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1999). Abbreviations for collections of pagan and Jewish inscriptions follow those found in Nahman Avigad, Beth She'arim volume III: Catacombs 12-23 (Jerusalem: Masada Press, 1976); Jean B. Frey, Corpus Inscriptionum Judaicarum (2 vols. Rome: Pontificio Istituto di Archeologia Cristiana, 1936-1952); William Horbury and David Noy, Jewish Inscriptions of Graeco-Roman Egypt (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992); G. H. R. Horsley and John A. L. Lee, “A Preliminary Checklist of Abbreviations of Greek Epigraphic Volumes,” Epigraphica: Periodico Internazionale di Epigrafia 56 (1994): 129–169; B. Mazar, Beth She'arim I: Catacombs 1-4 (Jerusalem: Massada Press. 1973); David Noy, Jewish Inscriptions of Western Europe (2 vols. Cambridge: University Press, 1993- 1995); Μ. Schwabe and Β. Lifshitz, Beth She'arim volume II: The Greek Inscriptions (Jerusalem: Masada Press, 1974). The versions of the English translation of some biblical passages used in this dissertation are noted according to the above-mentioned guidelines of the Society of Biblical Literature. If no version is indicated, it is the translation of the author himself. The sources of translations of Classical texts and of Jewish sources are specified in the footnotes. If not otherwise indicated, the translations are the author’s. vi INTRODUCTION The Problem under Discussion Among the Synoptics Luke seems to provide more information about his views on the afterlife than Mark and Matthew. Apart from some passages mentioning this issue retained from Mark and Q with some significant elaborations (in the first place, Luke 8:41–42, 49–56, 13:22–30; 20:27–40; 22:30), he also gives more accounts in his own material (e.g., Luke 16:19–31; 23:39–43). In addition, Luke presents some important points in the Book of Acts (Acts 1:25; 7:55–60; 9:36–41; 20:7–12; 23:8; 24:15). Moreover, in some passages he uses such expressive, rare or even unique images as paradise (occurring elsewhere only in 2 Cor 12:4 and Rev 2:7 in the corpus of the texts that later was recognized as the canonical New Testament) or Abraham’s bosom (unique for this corpus). Therefore, the issue of the language used about the hereafter and particularly the afterlife reflect Luke’s heightened interest in this topic and its significance. Given Luke’s evident interest in the afterlife, it is remarkable that the gospel and the Book of Acts contain various episodes with seemingly incompatible ideas on it. For instance, in Luke 14:14 and 20:35 he speaks about the eschatological resurrection of the righteous only, but in Acts 24:15 he refers to the resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked. It seems that Luke 20:36 equates the risen ones with angels and then uses the notion of the immortality of the soul in Jesus’ argument about resurrection in 20:37–38. What is the reason for Luke to use the same resurrection language (e.g., the forms of the verbs ἀνίστημι and ἐγείρω) in the discourse about the eschatological or individual resurrection and the stories about the resuscitation of the dead to physical life?1 Furthermore, there is a superficial discrepancy between the postmortem existence in the Kingdom of God (Luke 13:28–29) or in paradise (23:42–43) and the destiny of Lazarus being taken by the angels into Abraham’s bosom (16:22). Furthermore, there is a difference between the episode of Stephen’s martyrdom (Acts 7:59), which focuses on the fate of Stephen’s spirit, and the episode of Eutychus (Acts 20:10), which describes the death and 1 However, this is not only Luke’s problem: for instance, Mark 5:22–24, 35–43 from which Luke derived his story about the resuscitation of Jairus’ daughter in Luke 8:41–42, 49– 56 uses similar language (Mark 5:41–42, cf. Luke 8:54–55). 1 resuscitation of the main character with an emphasis on his soul. In contrast to Luke 16:22, it is Jesus himself, not the angels (cf. Luke 12:8–9), who receives Stephen’s spirit in Acts 7:59. Although the author of Luke-Acts, whom we will call here “Luke” for convenience, tells us very little about himself, most modern scholars consider him to be a well-educated person, probably Greek by birth.2 He certainly had not been an eyewitness of Jesus, since he based himself on the traditions handed down by the earlier generation of followers of Jesus (Luke 1:3). He knows Greek better than the other evangelists and uses various literary styles.3 As is seen from Acts, he is familiar with Greek rhetoric as well as with Greek literature and thought (e.g. Acts 17:16–31). The remark that a ghost does not have flesh and bones in Luke 24:39 also points to his acquaintance with pagan traditions (cf. Homer, Od. 11. 205–222). On the other hand, he definitely knew the Septuagint (the LXX), as he not only quoted it but also used its style (e.g., Luke 1:5–25). He was familiar with the Jewish world and Scriptures as, for instance, the images of paradise and Abraham’s bosom demonstrate.