Matthew's Parables: Audience Oriented Perspectives

by Warren Carter

Carter, Warren, Heil, John Paul

Genres: Biblical Studies

Paperback

Published January 18, 1998

About the author

Warren Carter is Professor of New Testament at Brite Divinity School. He came to Brite in 2007 after teaching for 17 years at Saint Paul School of Theology in Kansas City. His scholarly work has focused on the gospels of Matthew and John, and he has focused on the issue of the ways in which early Christians negotiated the Roman empire. In addition to numerous scholarly articles, he is the author of ten books including Matthew and the Margins (Orbis Books), Matthew and Empire (Trinity Press International/Continuum), The Roman Empire and the New Testament (Abingdon), John and Empire (T&T Clark/Continuum), and What Does Revelation Reveal? (Abingdon). He has also contributed to numerous church resources and publications such as contributing 15 studies on Matthew in The Pastors Bible Study Vol 1 (Abingdon). He is a frequent speaker at scholarly and ecclesial conferences.

Degrees
Ph.D., Princeton Theological Seminary, 1991
Th.M., Melbourne College of Divinity, 1986
B.D., Melbourne College of Divinity, 1985
B.A., Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, 1976

Reviews

[Mike DePue, OFS · Rating 5 out of 5]

While not for the beginner, a reader with some background and both patience and persistence can follow where Carter and Heil lead. The authors divide all the parables found in Matthew’s gospel between them. They give careful consideration to each parable’s preceding narrative and to the audience’s presumably elevated level of awareness by the time that the parable appears. They call their aural-based approach an “experiment with hearing the parables in Matthew’s gospel,” focusing on “the interaction between the authorial audience and Matthew’s parables in their final form and context.” (p. 210) The book’s very important final chapter, “Conclusion,” (by Carter) takes you behind the scenes of where the authors are going and how they are getting there, paying close attention to locating a particular narrative within the gospel’s “big picture” plot.

Much turns on the authorial audience, “as much as we can reconstruct it.” (p. 211) A reconstruction of this sort necessarily involves deductions and assumptions; the reader may question how successfully such a reconstruction can be achieved for an audience long ago and socioculturally far away. Whatever your conclusion about that, you are likely to admire and be challenged by the authors’ ingenuity and effort.