The Colonization of Land in Matthew's Gospel: A Land Promised
Ebook
In The Colonization of Land in Matthew's Gospel, Maziel Barreto Dani proposes that land is constructed as a colonized and subjugated entitl. Traditional scholarship claims that the Gospel of Matthew is detached from spatial-territorial discussions and that geographical land concerns are displaced with Christology. Dani, however, reinterprets multiple implicit and explicit references to land in the Gospel to show continuity, rather than discontinuity, with the Hebrew Bible’s concerns with material land promises. She does so by engaging the Gospel within its broader Roman, Hellenistic, and Jewish contexts where the theme of land possession is pervasive. Central to the Gospel and the imperial contexts from which it emerges are contestations over the land and proclamations to whom the land belongs. Dani argues that while Judea and neighboring lands are under the firm control of Roman imperial power during the first century CE, Matthew’s Gospel envisions Rome’s demise and the control of land being transferred to an alternative empire governed by the sovereign rule of God. Though God liberates the land from Rome’s oppressive grasp and restores land promises to the righteous poor at Jesus’ return, the land fails to escape colonial control. That is, the world, while relinquished from Roman hegemony, is reasserted under God’s power and domination. In arguing that Matthew’s Gospel employs an imperializing agenda involving land reclamation, the Gospel may be a source for validating and justifying the modern colonization of foreign and occupied land under the guise of God’s purposes. The Colonization of Land in Matthew's Gospel challenges colonial ideologies which oppress not only peoples but the lands which they inhabit.
Chapter One: Roman Control and Land Domination in the First Century CE
Chapter Two: The Women in Matthew’s Genealogy as Personified Land
Chapter Three: Jesus Emmanuel and God’s Colonizing Presence over the Land
Chapter Four: Righteousness as Divine Saving Presence in the Land
Chapter Five: Matthew’s Eschatological Material and the Culmination of Land Promises
Maziel Dani’s insightful attention to land in Matthew’s Gospel is – so to speak- groundbreaking. She takes seriously her own spatial locations as well as the Gospel’s emergence in the context of Roman dominating power to recognize land as a contested colonized entity. Redressing previous scholarly neglect and spiritualized-symbolic readings, she traces the importance of physical land from the genealogy through Jesus’ righteous actions to the eschatological establishment of the empire of God. This impressive study is an important contribution to the Gospel’s interpretation.
- Title: The Colonization of Land in Matthew's Gospel: A Land Promised
- Author: Maziel Barreto Dani
- Publisher: Fortress Academic
- Print Publication Date: 2024
- Logos Release Date: 2024
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Ebook
- ISBNs: 9781978710337, 9781978710320, 1978710321, 197871033X
- Resource ID: LLS:9781978710337
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-08-16T03:43:59Z
Maziel Barreto Dani, PhD in New Testament and Early Christian Literature from Brite Divinity School at Texas Christian University, is an independent scholar.
