Awards

• Winner of Winner, Beare Award, Canadian Society of Biblical Studies.

Overview

No extant text gives so vivid a glimpse into the experience of an ancient prisoner as Paul's letter to the Philippians. As a letter from prison, however, it is not what one would expect. For although it is true that Paul, like some other ancient prisoners, speaks in Philippians of his yearning for death, what he expresses most conspicuously is contentment and even joy. Setting aside pious banalities that contrast true joy with happiness, and leaving behind too heroic depictions that take their cue from Acts, Abject Joy offers a reading of Paul's letter as both a means and an artifact of his provisional attempt to make do. By outlining the uses of punitive custody in the administration of Rome's eastern provinces and describing the prison's complex place in the social and moral imagination of the Greek and Roman world, Ryan Schellenberg provides a richly drawn account of Paul's nonelite social context, where bodies and their affects were shaped by acute contingency and habitual susceptibility to violent subjugation. Informed by recent work in the history of emotions, and with comparison to modern prison writing and ethnography provoking new questions and insights, Schellenberg describes Paul's letter as an affective technology, wielded at once on Paul himself and on his addressees, that works to strengthen his grasp on the very joy he names. Abject Joy: Paul, Prison, and the Art of Making Do by Ryan S. Schellenberg is a social history of prison in the Greek and Roman world that takes Paul's letter to the Philippians as its focal instance--or, to put it the other way around, a study of Paul's letter to the Philippians that takes the reality of prison as its starting point. Examining ancient perceptions of confinement, and placing this ancient evidence in dialogue with modern prison writing and ethnography, it describes Paul's urgent and unexpectedly joyful letter as a witness to the perplexing art of survival under constraint.

Full Product Details

9780190065515

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Reviews

This book challenges readers to reassess pious framings of earthly suffering and imprisonment. Whether in reference to the historical Paul, the modern martyr, or the imprisoned neighbor, Schellenberg helps readers reconceptualize their understanding of imprisonment. * Matthew R. Peterson, PhD candidate and Adjunct Instructor of Greek at Asbury Theological Seminary , Abject Joy * Schellenberg's argument is overall persuasive and well argued. * Jeremy L. Williams, Brite Divinity School, Review of Biblical Literature * detailed yet accessible * Sarah Jobe, Christian Century * Page after page, Abject Joy is an insightful, thought-provoking book. * Zachariah S. Motts, The Asbury Journal - Asbury Theological Seminary * After Schellenberg's book, the US church can no longer comfortably distance the incarcerated Paul from incarcerated people today, or the conditions of ancient prisons from the reality of prisons today. An honest assessment shows that the economic and racial biases behind who gets repeatedly locked up today look a lot like what happened to Paul - and this challenges Christians to engage in the same sort of resourcing, re - narration, and risk that marked the church at Philippi. * Sarah Jobe, Christian Century *

After Schellenberg's book, the US church can no longer comfortably distance the incarcerated Paul from incarcerated people today, or the conditions of ancient prisons from the reality of prisons today. An honest assessment shows that the economic and racial biases behind who gets repeatedly locked up today look a lot like what happened to Paul - and this challenges Christians to engage in the same sort of resourcing, re - narration, and risk that marked the church at Philippi. * Sarah Jobe, Christian Century *

Author Information

Ryan S. Schellenberg is Associate Professor of New Testament at Methodist Theological School in Ohio. His research seeks to ground reconstructions of early Christ groups in lived human experience by placing the ancient evidence in dialogue with contemporary ethnography. Schellenberg's previous book, Rethinking Paul's Rhetorical Education, was awarded the 2015 F. W. Beare Award for an outstanding book in New Testament and Christian Origins by the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies.

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