Acts of the Apostles

Linda M. Maloney received her PhD in American studies from St. Louis University (1968) and her ThD in New Testament from the Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen (1990), with Prof. Dr. Gerhard Lohfink as her Doktorvater. She is the first woman in the history of the Roman Catholic faculty at Tübingen to earn the ThD in Scripture. Having taught American history at several universities in the 1970s (and cofounded the Women’s Studies Program at the University of South Carolina), she joined the faculty of the Franciscan School of Theology at the Graduate Theological Union from 1989 to 1995. Thereafter, until 2007, she was academic editor at Liturgical Press. She was ordained to the Episcopal priesthood in 2003. Since 2005 she has served churches in the Diocese of Vermont and in the Anglican Church of Canada, Diocese of Montreal. She has been active since 1986 as a translator of books on Scripture, theology, and liturgy, mainly from German to English, including four volumes in the Hermeneia series from Fortress Press.  Ivoni Richter Reimer is a native of Brazil. She earned her ThD at the University of Kassel in Germany in 1990, working with Luise Schottroff. Her dissertation, translated into English (1995) as Women in the Acts of the Apostles: A Feminist Liberation Perspective, has been published in four languages. Since 1991 she has been a professor of theology and religious studies in Rio de Janeiro at the Universidade Metodista and Faculdade Teológica Batista do Sul do Brasil and then in Goiânia/Goiás at the Pontificia Universidade de Goiás, influencing three generations of students of feminist liberation theology and exegesis. She is also a Lutheran pastor, active in community building and developing leadership.  Willie James Jennings is associate professor of systematic theology and Africana studies at Yale University Divinity School. His specializations also include postcolonial and race theory. He received his BA from Calvin College, his MDiv from Fuller Theological Seminary, and his PhD in systematic theology from Duke University. He is the author of prize-winning works, including The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race (Yale University Press); After Whiteness: An Education in Belonging (Eerdmans), the 2020 Publishers Weekly book of the year; and Acts in the Belief series (Westminster John Knox). In 2015 he received the Grawemeyer Award in Religion for his groundbreaking work on race and Christianity.

• ContentsList of Abbreviations   xiList of Contributors   xvForeword: “Come Eat of My Bread . . . and Walk in the Ways ofWisdom”   xixElisabeth Schüssler FiorenzaEditor’s Introduction to Wisdom Commentary:“She Is a Breath of the Power of God” (Wis 7:25)   xxiiiBarbara E. Reid, OPAuthors’ Acknowledgments   xliiiAuthor’s Introduction: Translating Worlds   xlvActs 1:1-4a   Preface   1Acts 1:4b-14   Ascension   7Acts 1:15-26   Making Up the Twelve (Male) Apostles   19Acts 2:1-13   Pentecost: The Spirit Falls on the Whole Companyof Women and Men   25Acts 2:14-40   Peter’s Pentecost Speech   31Acts 2:41-47   The Jerusalem Community: First Summary   39Acts 3:1–4:4   Peter and John in the Temple with a ManWho Cannot Walk   43 Acts 4:5-22   The Apostles on Trial   51Acts 4:23-37   The Movement Gathered in Harmony   57Acts 5:1-11   A Counter-Example: Ananias and Sapphira   61Acts 5:12-42   Peter and the Apostles Confront the Authoritiesfor the Last Time   67Acts 6:1-7   The Widows’ Crisis and the Choosing of the Seven   73Acts 6:8-15   Stephen’s Ministry   83Acts 7:1–8:1a   Stephen’s Defense and Martyrdom   91Acts 8:1b-25    The Mission Begins   103Acts 8:26-40   The Ethiopian   111Acts 9:1-31   The Calling of Saul   123Acts 9:32-43   Peter on Mission: Tabitha Is Raised   133Acts 10:1–11:18   God Shows No Partiality  143Acts 11:19-30   Peace and Growth   155Acts 12:1-25   Exit Peter, and Also Agrippa; Rhoda Remains   163Acts 13:1–14:28   Barnabas and Paul on Mission   175Acts 15:1-35   The Great Council   189Acts 15:36–16:5   Paul on His Own; Eunice and Timothy   203Acts 16:6-34   A Drama in Three Acts Featuring Lydia and a Woman Prophet   215Acts 16:35-40   Denouement   235Acts 17:1-34   Ascending through Macedonia to the Areopagus   241Acts 18:1-28   Prisca and Aquila, Corinth and Ephesus   255Acts 19:1-20   Paul’s Work in Ephesus   265Acts 19:21-41   Artemis of the Ephesians   271Acts 20:1-38   Paul Completes His Mission   279Acts 21:1-17   Going up to Jerusalem   289 Acts 21:18-36   “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the City That Killsthe Prophets . . .”   295Acts 21:37–23:11   Jerusalem Attempts to Kill Another Prophet   299Acts 23:12-35  The Plot against Paul   307Acts 24:1-27   Paul before Felix   311Acts 25:1–26:32   Paul before Festus, Agrippa, and Berenice   319Acts 27:1–28:10   Paul at Sea   331Acts 28:11-31   “And So We Came to Rome”   341Afterword: Liquid God   355Willie James JenningsWorks Cited   363Index of Scripture References and Other Ancient Writings   385Index of Names and Subjects   393

"Linda Maloney writes on Acts with energy, accessibility, and a wonderfully wide horizon for the scholarship of the past and of the twenty-first century. She asks: 'What if it did not happen as we thought it did?' Then she brings conventional, feminist, post-colonial, queer, and Jewish perspectives to a lively, contemporary reading of Acts."The Reverend Dr. Elizabeth J Smith AM, Mission Priest, Anglican Parish of The Goldfields, Diocese of Perth, Australia