Socio-Rhetorical Examples
Definition of action set.
A notable action set, namely a group of women who co-ordinated their actions to achieve a particular goal, produced a one-volume commentary on the Bible in 1992 entitled The Women's Bible Commentary. The women editors chose Mary Ann Tolbert to enact the goals of this action set with the Gospel of Mark. In contrast to the ideology guiding the Society of Biblical Literature volume, the ideology guiding the women's commentary encourages Tolbert to entertain creative possibilities rather than simply to balance current "credible" scholarly debate. Adopting this mode, Tolbert suggests that "it is not impossible that the author [of the Gospel of Mark] was female," since the portrayal of Peter is very negative and "literacy among women had risen slightly during the period when the Gospel was written." Emphasizing that the place for final composition is unknown, she mentions Rome and Egypt as cities discussed in church tradition and moves immediately to people who lived in "large, multi-national urban areas around the Mediterranean basin" as the natural audience for the Gospel (Tolbert 1992: 264). In these areas, women of various status--of the Roman aristocracy, female slaves, prostitutes, mothers, daughters, etc.--dwelled. The Gospel of Mark depicts all the women characters positively with the exception of Herodias and her daughter (6:17-28) and possibly Jesus' mother (3:31-34). This is, she indicates, "the basis for the claims of many feminist scholars that the Christian community reflected by Mark's Gospel must have contained strong women leaders and role models" (Tolbert 1992: 263).
In the commentary on the passion narrative, Tolbert turns her attention first to the maid of the high priest who, through question-and-answer, creates the context for Peter's repeated denial of Jesus (14:66-72). Though not called a slave, this young girl has lowly status, "for no woman or girl of honorable rank would be permitted access" to the bystanders in the courtyard or would speak to Peter in public or draw public attention to herself as she does. The action and speech of this woman creates a context where Jesus is speaking the truth to the High priest about his identity while Peter tells repeated lies about his. Thus, "[i]n typical Markan fashion, the anonymous, lowly, and marginal character stands for truth while the high status, powerful character rejects the truth or tells lies" (Tolbert 1992: 273). Second, Tolbert turns to the women at the cross and the tomb (15:40-16:8). These women, who have not appeared previously in the story, suddenly appear on the scene as disciples superior to the twelve who have fled, betrayed, and denied Jesus. With the presence of these women, "the audience might have reason to hope that Jesus will finally be well served by some of his human followers" (Tolbert 1992: 273). The narrative, however, identifies each woman by name, depicting all three "as conventional women of some status." When these women hear about the resurrection, they, in the mode of the twelve disciples, flee and tell no one anything out of their fear. Thus, the women fail "to act boldly and courageously on their divine commission." Either behaving conventionally or concerning themselves with "social status, power, or customary roles," they do not become fruitful disciples. The Gospel of Mark "demands followers who are willing to act outside the constraints of society, religiously and socially." Even these women do not do this. The reader is left to fulfill this task. "At the end and indeed by means of the end itself, the audience of the Gospel of Mark, both women and men, are challenged to become themselves faithful disciples, carrying the message to the world, doing what some characters in the Gospel have not proved worthy to do because of their subservience to social conventions or their desires for status, wealth, fame, or power" (Tolbert 1992: 274).
Surely a fascinating aspect of this commentary is its sensitive reading of the text within the ideological guidelines of an "action set" within current scholarly circles. The reader of Tolbert's commentary is able to see significantly common insights into the inner texture and intertexture of the Gospel of Mark in the context of allegiance to significantly different goals within the commentary. A different ideology, then, has not taken the commentator away from careful, systematic reading of the text. The ideology of the action set has, however, more openly identified areas where we do not have certain knowledge, focused on aspects of the narrative that do not regularly attract attention in commentary, and entertained possibilities that would be considered too adventurous or speculative within the ideology of the larger corporately sanctioned group for which Donahue wrote.
From V. K. Robbins, Exploring the Texture of Texts, (Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press International, 1996), p. 102-4.
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