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kritikon) chreia.6 An intriguing part of the disciple's statement is his comparison of Jesus with John the Baptist who, according to this disciple, taught his disciples to pray (11:1; cf. 5:33). However, no extant text reveals any prayer attributed to John the Baptist.7 Comparison is a standard rhetorical feature of biographical literature in antiquity,8 and one feature of Lukan discourse is to highlight the character of Jesus through comparison with John the Baptist.9 An additional feature in the opening sentence is the unnamed disciple's address of Jesus as kyrie (lord or master). This mode of address is an implicit act of praising Jesus, which also is present in the preceding episode, both in the narration (10:39, 41) and in the speech of Martha (10:40) as she provides hospitality for him in her home. Thus, Luke 11:1 communicates a high esteem for Jesus that it exhibits an intriguing relation to the first step in the elaboration of a chreia. Hermogenes asserts that an elaboration should begin with "encomium in a few words for the one who spoke or acted."10 Luke 11:1-13 begins with honorific address to Jesus and comparison that evokes a tone of authority for Jesus' speech. Jesus responds to the disciple by reciting the Lord's Prayer in abbreviated form. An ability to expand and abbreviate traditional stories and sayings with respectable grammatical and syntactical skill is fundamental to progymnastic rhetorical composition, which is the mode of writing the Gospel of Luke exhibits.11 Luke may have found this abbreviated version in "Q,"12 but, if he did not, he has abbreviated the prayer for this con- 6Ronald F. Hock and Edward N. O'Neil, the Chreia in Ancient Rhetoric, vol. 1, The Progymnasmata (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986) 87 Back 7 See Joseph A. Fitzmeyer, The Gospel according to Luke, 2 vols., Anchor Bible 28, 28A (New York: Doubleday, 1981, 1985) 2:902, for references to Essene forms of prayer some scholars have thought might be relevant to a discussion of prayer-forms John the Baptist might have used. Back 8Comparison (synkrisis) is a primary dynamic underlying Plutarch's Parallel Lives. Most of the fifty lives highlight the characteristics of either a Greek or Roman leader through comparison with one or more other leaders with whom they are compared. Back 9Cf. Luke 3:18-20; 5:33; 7:18-35; 9:7-9, 18-19; 16:16; 20:1-8; see ron Cameron, "'What Have You Come Out To See?' Characterizations of John and Jesus in the Gospels," Semeia 49 (1990): 35-69. See also the essay by Philip L. Schuler in this volume. Back 10Hock and O'Neil, The Progymnasmata, 177. Back 11For the meaning of "progymnastic" rather that fully developed "oratorical" rhetorical skills, see Vernon K. Robbins, "Progymnastic Rhetorical Composition and Pre-Gospel Traditions: A New Approach," in The Synoptic Gospels: Source Criticism and the New Literary Criticism, ed. Camille Focant, BETL 110 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1993) 111-47. Back 12John S. Kloppenborg, Q Paralles: Synopsis, Critical Notes and Concordance Back. Rest of fn. 12. |