The Arrival of Jesus as a Politically Subversive Event According to Luke 1–2

Abstract

Today we use Luke 1–2, especially the story of Jesus’ birth, as the basis for our worship during Advent and Christmastide. However, when this gospel was written Christians were not yet celebrating Christ’s birth in late December. For Luke’s original auditors, terms like “gospel,†“savior,†“son of god,†“lord,†“messiah,†and “peace on earth†all had social and political implications. In that context, these stories would have sounded like subversive propaganda, using familiar rhetoric to undermine the imperial standards of that day. Read in this light, the Lukan stories can also impact our social and political agendas today.

The opening chapters of the Gospel of Luke have served the church well as an inspiring resource for worship during the seasons of Advent and Christmas. But Christian communities did not begin to celebrate the birth of Jesus in late December near the time of the winter solstice for two or three centuries after his time. The third gospel, however, was written around 80–90 CE, or perhaps as late as 110–115 CE.

How would Luke’s original auditors have understood these stories? If we consider the artistic way in which these stories are shaped and structured, and if we consider how their themes and motifs would have sounded to people living in the Roman Empire near the end of the first century in the Common Era, we may conclude that the message of Luke 1–2 is political in nature, with a decidedly subversive bent!