Socio-Rhetorical Examples
Definition of argumentative texture.
Burton Mack's analysis of the Woman who Anointed Jesus is an especially interesting example of the manner in which rhetorical elaboration works in the context of a story in early Christian tradition (Mack and Robbins 1989: 85-106). From the perspective of narrational analysis, every account of the story in the gospels features someone introducing an initial topic which is the item to which Jesus responds. In each instance where disciples respond, the topic is the waste of expensive ointment. In the Lukan account where a Pharisee responds, he calls attention to the nature of the woman as a sinner. From a rhetorical perspective, it is noticeable that in the accounts where disciples set the agenda there is complete avoidance of topics that raise socially embarrassing issues like the sinfulness of the woman. The disciples raise conventional issues which Jesus turns into distinctive Christian discourse.
Using insights gleaned from discussions of the chreia in rhetorical treatises from Late Antiquity, Mack observes that the narrational strategy of the story is to feature Jesus responding in a manner that embodies a central topic of Christian belief. From a rhetorical perspective, this central topic comes in 'artificially'. The two most likely functions for anointing in a setting of dining would be either to 'cool the head' after drinking wine or for intimate purposes with sexual connotations. The Lukan version of the story addresses the sexual connotations, but puts them on the lips of an antagonist whom Jesus can teach a 'Christian' lesson of love and forgiveness. The other versions avoid the social functions altogether to address Jesus' burial, which is a central topic in early Christian discourse after the emergence of Pauline discourse.
From a rhetorical perspective, all of the versions of this story are setups to allow Jesus to argue basic topics of Christian discourse during the last quarter of the first century. The social settings do not evoke a 'realism' in a first century Mediterranean context. They evoke discourse that creates 'Christian culture'. The discourse features Jesus embodying topics that have become central to Christian identity. Instead of Jesus creating the discourse, then, the discourse is creating the image of Jesus in Christian tradition.
From: Robbins, Vernon K. (1996) The Tapestry of Early Christian Discourse: Rhetoric, Society and Ideology, London: Routledge: 62-63.
Back to inner texture index
Textures Index | Text Index | Discourse Index | Oppositional Rhetoric Index