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Weeping Over Jerusalem: Luke’s Response to the Destruction of the Temple

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 January 2026

Jason S. Wendel
Jason S. Wendel*
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge; jsw72@cantab.ac.uk
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Abstract

Scholars often find Luke’s depiction of the Temple conflicting and paradoxical, and various solutions have been proposed to account for this perceived tension. In this article, I attempt to elucidate Luke’s treatment of the Temple by considering it from a different angle: how is Luke, in light of the recent siege of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple, responding to those events, and what type of response does he hope to engender in his readers? Considering Luke’s treatment of the Temple as a “response” to its destruction clarifies the rhetorical goals of his narrative and accounts for the range of themes that have proved confounding for many interpreters.

Keywords

Luke-ActsTemplelamentLuke 19Luke 23Acts 7Judaism

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Harvard Theological Review , Volume 118 , Issue 4 , October 2025 , pp. 691 - 712
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This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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© The Author(s), 2026. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the President and Fellows of Harvard College

Introduction

Luke’s treatment of the Temple throughout his two-volume work appears divergent and conflicting.Footnote 1 On the one hand, much of Luke’s discussion of the Temple seems positive: the third gospel begins and ends in the Temple (Luke 1:8–9; 24:53); pious characters in the birth narrative worship in the Temple (Luke 1:8–24; 2:22–38); and Luke repeatedly reminds readers that the Temple is the site of Jesus’s Jerusalem ministry (Luke 19:47; 20:1; 21:37, 38). In Acts, the Christian community continues this trend of meeting in the Temple (Acts 2:46; 21:26). On the other hand, the Temple functions as a site of opposition against Jesus (Luke 19–20), his apostles (Acts 2–7), and Paul (Acts 21). Furthermore, Jesus appears to critique the Temple (Luke 19:45–46; 21:5–6), a critique echoed by Stephen in Acts (Acts 7:48–49). Most conspicuously, Luke records Jesus’s predictions that judgement will befall Jerusalem and the Temple (Luke 13:34–35; 19:41–44; 21:20–24). If Luke is aware of the Temple’s destruction, and takes special care to demonstrate that Jesus (and later his followers) critiqued certain activities in the Temple and predicted its destruction, why does he include so much material that appears to reflect positively on the Temple?Footnote 2

Reconciling these apparently divergent elements of Luke’s portrayal of the Temple has proved to be a perplexing task for scholars. Some argue that the critiques of the Temple by Jesus and Stephen, along with Jesus’s predictions of its imminent destruction, indicate Luke’s outright rejection of the Temple.Footnote 3 Others have argued that while Luke-Acts contains a critique of the activities going on in the Temple akin to (and indeed based upon) what one finds in Israel’s prophetic literature, this does not constitute an outright rejection of the Temple itself.Footnote 4 Still others simply assert that Luke’s portrayal of the Temple is inconsistent and paradoxical.Footnote 5 Finally, many have posited a shift in Luke’s depiction of the Temple: while Luke initially portrays the Temple positively, by the conclusion of his two-volume work, he demonstrates that the role of the Temple ceases to be important.Footnote 6 Of course, these various perspectives are not mutually exclusive, and for years interpreters have navigated their way through the subject by defending, combining, and elucidating one or more of the dominant views.

In this article, I attempt to elucidate Luke’s treatment of the Temple by considering it from a different angle: how is Luke, in light of the recent siege of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple, responding to those events, and what type of response does he hope to engender in his readers? Furthermore, how does Luke’s response compare with other texts reacting to the events of 70 CE? To explore answers to these questions, I will first consider three scenes in Luke-Acts that address the destruction of the Temple (Luke 19:41–44; 23:27–31; Acts 7) before turning to a brief comparison of these responses with other early Jewish and Christian literature. I contend that Luke’s narrative communicates a sense of grief and lament over the fate of the city and its TempleFootnote 7 which, while at home among Jewish responses to that calamity, offers a distinct perspective amidst Christian literature written in the wake of the events of 70 CE.Footnote 8

Luke’s Assessment of the Destruction of the Temple in Luke 19:41–44

Jesus’s lament over Jerusalem in Luke 19:41–44 provides an assessment of the events of 70 CE. According to Luke’s Jesus, judgement will come upon the city because of its failure to recognize him:

If you, even you, had recognized (εἰ ἔγνως) on this day the things that make for peace…. (19:42)

They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because you did not recognize (ἀνθ’ ὧν οὐκ ἔγνως) the time of your visitation (ἐπισκοπή). (19:44)Footnote 9

Mention of visitation (ἐπισκοπή) and peace (εἰρήνη) recalls the prophetic speech of Zechariah from the beginning of Luke’s narrative. There, under the influence of the Spirit, Zechariah declares that God has “visited” (ἐπεσκέψατο) his people and redeemed them (1:68), and that the people will be guided “into the way of peace” (εἰς ὁδòν εἰρήνης; 1:79). The frustration of these positive expectations in 19:41–44 fills the scene with tragic irony: Israel’s visitation—that is, the visitation of the divine king, Jesus (19:38)Footnote 10—should have resulted in peace and redemption, but on account of the city’s failure of recognition, it becomes a visitation of judgement (a theme in Isaiah and Jeremiah; cf. Isa 10:3; 24:22; 29:6; Jer 6:5; 10:15).Footnote 11 According to Luke, at this juncture Jerusalem has crossed a point of no return; judgement is sure.Footnote 12

The judgement Luke envisions is the siege and destruction of Jerusalem: “your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you” (19:43–44). As many commentators note, the language used to describe Jerusalem’s downfall (παρεμβάλλω, περικυκλόω, συνέχω, ἐδαφίζω) recalls “standard Roman military procedure” as well as indictments against Jerusalem and the first Temple from Israel’s prophetic literature.Footnote 13 As an echo of the prophets, or as a description of the Romans’ siege tactics, this statement clearly refers to the events of 70 CE. Thus, from Luke’s post-destruction perspective, “the retributive force of the oracle marks it as the most explicit ‘explanation’ of that calamity in the New Testament.”Footnote 14 The result will be the brutal destruction of Jerusalem, crowned with the demolition of the Temple.

This is, of course, the standard interpretation of the events of 70 CE within early Christian literature. Elsewhere in his writings, Luke paints rejection of Jesus as the climax in a long history of Israelite sin and rejection of God’s messengers (Luke 11:47–51; 13:33–34; 20:9–19; Acts 7). Christian writings often narrate an escalating pattern of sin within God’s people that ultimately climaxes with rejection of the Messiah and results in the destruction of the Temple (cf. Matt 23:16–24:2; Barnabas 12–14; Justin’s Dialogue 108).Footnote 15 But it is important to recognize that the early Christians are not unique in viewing the destruction of the Temple as God’s judgement on his people. In similar, Deuteronomistic fashion, many Jewish (and not Christian) authors describe the destruction of the Temple as the result of a downward spiral of sin and rebellion.Footnote 16 In 2 Baruch, the visionary provides a review of history, in which the story of Israel is narrated as a cycle between renewal/blessing/righteousness and sin/judgement/retribution, ending with the destruction of the Temple (2 Bar. 56–67).Footnote 17 Other Jewish apocalypses written in the wake of the events of 70 CE similarly assert a pattern of rebellion resulting in judgement (4 Ezra 7.129–131; Apocalypse of Abraham 24.1–27.8). Thus, Christians are not alone in viewing the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple as God’s judgement on his people. What is distinct about the Christian perspective, which Luke here espouses, is the assertion that rejection of Jesus marks the climax of that rebellion and the tipping point for God’s judgement.

In Luke 19, however, Jesus does not utter these horrific judgements with rage or even indifference. Instead, he laments: ὡς ἤγγισεν ἰδὼν τὴν πόλιν ἔκλαυσεν ἐπ’ αὐτήν (19:41). Such a display of emotion by Jesus should catch the reader’s attention because it is unique: just once Jesus rejoices in the gospel (10:21), and only here does he weep.Footnote 18 Furthermore, the syntax of Luke 19:42 heightens the sense of grief: “If you, even you had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace!” (19:42). Aposiopesis—the breaking off of a speech due to strong emotion—is created by the omission of the apodosis in this second-class conditional sentence (it is an “if” without a “then”).Footnote 19 This signals the depth of Jesus’s mourning: “Readers must supply their own apodosis or, better yet, allow Jesus’s voice to trail off. The sentence’s broken syntax mirrors the city’s dashed hopes.”Footnote 20 Jesus knows the terrible fate that awaits the city, and he laments this end.

The Significance of Emotional Appeal for Luke’s Rhetoric in Luke 19:41–44 and 23:28–31

Attention to this “emotional” aspect of Jesus’s proclamation is crucial for understanding Luke’s rhetorical aims. In recent decades, literary critics have increasingly acknowledged the rhetorical potential of narratives.Footnote 21 One significant way narratives convince readers to accept their presentation of events is through engaging their emotions. As Karl Kuhn notes, pathos (emotional appeal) was a well-recognized element of rhetoric for Greco-Roman writers, just as it is among modern literary critics.Footnote 22 Kuhn calls the study of this emotional aspect of rhetoric affective rhetorical exegesis: “If affective appeal signals an author’s rhetorical aims, emotively charged narration will lead us to the world view the author is urging readers to embrace.”Footnote 23 As we have seen, through Jesus’s indictment, Luke presents the events of 70 CE as divine punishment resulting from the city’s rejection of Jesus—an obviously value-laden interpretation of the invasion and destruction of the city by the Romans. But how might the emotional aspect of Jesus’s appraisal contribute to Luke’s rhetoric?

Robert Tannehill has suggested that Luke’s portrayal of Jesus in 19:41–44 is intended to commend a similar emotional response in his readers: Jesus’s tears serve as a “reliable guide to the appropriate attitude toward the destruction of Jerusalem.”Footnote 24 This conclusion relies on a basic principle of narrative rhetoric: certain characters in narratives are presented as reliable and trustworthy, which encourages the reader to esteem their opinions and judgements as well as emulate their actions (in effect, these characters act as “spokespersons” for the implied author).Footnote 25 Thus, Luke’s narrative not only encourages the reader to accept Jesus’s appraisal of the events of 70 CE (the destruction of the Temple is divine judgement); by drawing special attention to the emotional aspect of Jesus’s response, Luke also enjoins his readers to emulate Jesus’s lament.Footnote 26

Critiquing Tannehill’s interpretation, Shelly Matthews argues for a significantly different understanding of the rhetorical effect of Jesus’s weeping in Luke 19:41–44. For Matthews, Jesus weeps the “manly tears” of a masculine hero, as in various stories in Greco-Roman literature wherein military generals weep over the cities they destroy (Livy’s portrayal of Marcellus, Polybius’ report about Scipio, Virgil’s characterization of Aeneas, and Josephus’ depiction of Titus).Footnote 27 For Matthews, Jesus’s tears do not connote sympathy, but merely pity, and the rhetorical impact of this portrait of Jesus, similar to the scenes in Livy and Virgil (but not Josephus?), suggests “a finality: the end of Jewish culture and civilization in as much as that culture refuses to assent to the confession that Jesus is the messiah.”Footnote 28 Jesus’s response is not a lament to be imitated, but a symbol of the full defeat and end of Jewish civilization.

While I appreciate Matthews’ attempt to elucidate the rhetorical impact of emotive appeal in Luke’s writing, her conclusions have been met with significant critique.Footnote 29 Two narrative considerations cast further doubt on her proposal and support Tannehill’s proposition. First, her reconstruction of Luke’s rhetoric relies on a speculative problematization of Tannehill’s solution: “It is possible, however, that early readers and hearers of this passage were little concerned with the plight of Jerusalem and were not prompted to adjust their attitude toward Jerusalem in response.”Footnote 30 Since we do not know the precise social setting of the earliest readers of Luke’s gospel, however, the burden of proof lies on Matthews to demonstrate why the premise is plausible (not just “possible”) that readers and hearers of Luke’s gospel were not concerned with the plight of Jerusalem.Footnote 31 From a narratological perspective, that Luke emphasizes the fate of the city in his gospel and includes this lament (a distinctive feature of the third gospel, see below), suggests an implied reader who is invested in those events. Tannehill’s simpler conclusion—that Jesus, a reliable character, acts as an exemplar in this narrative—accords with standard rhetorical practice (especially ancient practice),Footnote 32 and thus more plausibly accounts for Luke’s purpose.

Second, and more significant for our purpose of elucidating Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple, Tannehill’s proposal that Luke intends to engender grief in his readers can be further developed by examining the narrative dynamics of a similar emotive scene in Luke’s passion narrative.Footnote 33 While Jesus is on his way from trial to cross, women among the crowd weep and wail for him (23:27). In response, Jesus stops and says,

Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me but weep for yourselves and for your children. For the days are surely coming when they will say, “Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed.” Then they will begin to say to the mountains, “Fall on us”; and to the hills, “Cover us.” For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry? (23:28–31)

Similar language between Jesus’s predictions of the destruction of Jerusalem in previous passages (19:41–44 and 21:20–24) and this prophetic oracle indicates that here too Jesus refers to the siege of Jerusalem.Footnote 34 Furthermore, by referring to the women as “daughters of Jerusalem,” Jesus alludes, in prophetic style, to the fate of the city and all its inhabitants, as Caryn A. Reeder observes:

The title “daughters of Jerusalem” in Luke 23.28 echoes the personification of Jerusalem in the biblical prophets (Daughter Jerusalem and Daughter Zion in, for instance, Isa 1.8, 37.22; Jer 4.31, 6.23). The particular phrase “daughters of Jerusalem” is found only in Song of Songs, but the “daughters of Israel” weep for the deaths of Saul and Jonathan in battle in 2 Sam 1.24, and the “daughters of Zion” mourn and lament destroyed Jerusalem in Isa 3.16–26…. In Jer 6.21–6, Jerusalem (personified as Daughter Zion and “daughter of my people”) mourns as if for her only child in response to the danger of an invading army. Warnings of divine judgment represented by the violence of war cause God and/or the prophet to mourn in 8.18–9. These tears are echoed in exhortations to weep and wail for Jerusalem and Judah (9.10–11), specifically directed to the women of Jerusalem in 9:17–22.Footnote 35

Jesus turns the attention of these women away from his own situation and, like Jeremiah, calls on them to weep over the impending fate of the city—a response that parallels his own weeping in 19:41.

What might Jesus’s command suggest about Luke’s rhetorical purposes? Michal Beth Dinkler has helpfully illustrated the way Luke’s narrative rhetoric can shape the emotions of the implied audience.Footnote 36 One important strategy for inviting an emotional response from the reader is narrative reflexivity:

[N]arrated scenes of characters interpreting narratives often function as active agents, generating affective responses and forming the emotional repertoires of those who interpret them…. Read as instances of narrative reflexivity, scenes of characters reading or interpreting narratives advance a kind of hermeneutical theory that applies not only to the texts in those scenes, but also to the Lukan narrative itself.Footnote 37

She argues that scenes like Jesus’s instruction of his disciples in Luke 24 and Philip’s interaction with the Ethiopian eunuch, which both include interpretation of scripture followed by joyful response, “can function as rhetorical appeals to Luke’s audience to emulate (certain) characters’ joyful hospitality as they receive the Lukan narrative.”Footnote 38

While Jesus’s instruction to the weeping women in Luke 23 does not constitute a perfect case of narrative reflexivity in the sense Dinkler outlines (the narrative does not refer to itself or to reading), the command still creates a “reflexive” effect. Luke’s key spokesperson, Jesus, instructs other characters about how they should respond to a particular event: the women are called to weep over the coming destruction of Jerusalem. For readers/hearers of Luke’s gospel, unlike the women in the story, the city has already been destroyed, so they understand these instructions with more clarity than the characters in the story—they know the terrible reality to which Jesus’s words refer. Anyone who reads Luke’s narrative, then, being aware of the destruction of the Temple, should hear Jesus’s command directed towards themselves. It is a command to respond to the destruction of the Temple with lament, to weep over the devastation of Jerusalem.Footnote 39

Matthews’s interpretation of Jesus’s lament in 19:41–44 and the weeping women in 23.28–31 fails to appreciate the way the latter scene reinforces Luke’s rhetorical appeal from the former. She sees a strong contrast between the scenes: the former depicts the manly weeping of a conqueror, whereas in the latter scene the women shed “typical feminine tears” as they are “exhorted to weep over the deserved destruction of the city they represent.”Footnote 40 This construal of Luke’s narrative misses how Jesus calls the women to emulate his own response, to take up the prophetic posture of mourning the disaster of God’s judgement. The two scenes are thus mutually reinforcing within Luke’s rhetoric: the appropriate response to God’s judgement of Jerusalem, based on both Jesus’s example and command, is lament.

In summary, Luke’s narrative is rhetorical—it leads the reader to accept a certain worldview and to understand events in a particular way. By recording Jesus’s indictments of the Temple, especially in 19:41–44, Luke presents the destruction of Jerusalem as the result of the city’s rejection of Jesus (the climax of a devolving pattern of sin; cf. Luke 11:47–51; 13:33–34; 20:9–19). But the emotional appeal in both 19:41–44 and 23:28–31 adds an important layer to Luke’s rhetoric. The narrative not only calls the reader to accept Jesus’s appraisal of Jerusalem’s fate, but also to imitate his protagonist’s mourning. Jesus’s “reflexive” command to the women reinforces this purpose. If Luke’s narrative urges a worldview on the reader (to use Kuhn’s language), that perspective includes both his interpretation of the events and the appropriate response to those events.

Stephen’s Speech: A Contradiction or Contribution?

Stephen’s speech in Acts 7 has provoked the most confusion and scholarly debate concerning Luke’s view of the Temple. Unfortunately, much of this debate has obfuscated how the speech contributes to Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple. Despite many excellent studies demonstrating the way Stephen’s speech addresses the charges against him (namely, that he speaks against the Law and Temple; cf. 6:11, 13, 14) and explaining the continuity of the speech within the wider rhetorical thrust of Luke-Acts,Footnote 41 some interpreters have continued to assert either that the speech does not address these charges,Footnote 42 that it indirectly confirms the accusations against Stephen,Footnote 43 or that it contradicts Luke’s presentation of the Temple elsewhere.Footnote 44 There is not space here to undertake another full exposition of the speech (nor is it necessary, as the contributions noted above effectively elucidate the passage). Instead, we will briefly survey four crucial interpretive keys for understanding the central rhetorical thrust of the speech, consider how failure to attend to these markers leads to misunderstanding Stephen’s portrayal of the Temple, and reflect on how Stephen’s speech contributes to Luke’s response to the Temple’s destruction.

The first important key for understanding Stephen’s speech, as Nils Dahl pointed out long ago,Footnote 45 is the thematic significance of God’s promise to Abraham: Stephen begins the speech by recounting God’s call of Abraham and the promise that he would inherit the land of Israel (Acts 7:1–5). But Stephen’s retelling focuses not only on inheriting the “land” as a whole, but specifically on worship in the Temple as the goal of the promise: “And after that [slavery in Egypt] they shall come out and worship me in this place” (7:7). In the charges against Stephen only a few lines earlier, the Temple is twice referred to as “this place” (οὗτος οὐ παύεται λαλῶν ῥήματα κατὰ τοῦ τόπου τοῦ ἁγίου [τούτου]Footnote 46 καὶ τοῦ νόμου … οὗτος καταλῦσει τὸν τόπον τοῦτον; 6.13, 14), making it the most likely referent of the phrase here in the speech.Footnote 47 Thus, Stephen begins answering the charges against him by presenting worship “in this place” (the Temple) as the end-goal of God’s promise to Abraham.Footnote 48

Second, within this framework, the speech outlines how God’s promise faces repeated frustration throughout the history of Israel. When the time draws near for fulfillment, God appoints Moses to deliver and lead the people into the realization of the promise he made to Abraham (7:17–30). But even though God delivered the people through Moses (7:36), the people rejected him and fell into idolatry by worshipping the golden calf (7:41)—a perversion of the promised worship.Footnote 49 Because of the people’s unwillingness to obey Moses and their turn to idolatry (7:39–40), God “handed them over to worship the host of heaven” (7:42). Stephen cites LXX Amos 5:27–29 in support of this claim: “Did you offer to me slain victims and sacrifices forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel? No; you took along the tent of Moloch, and the star of your god Rephan” (7:42–43). The controversial claim of the prophet Amos, here employed by Stephen, is that the lawlessness of the wilderness generation rendered their worship in the tabernacle idolatrous—the tent of testimony, which God directed Moses to make after the heavenly pattern (7:44), became instead the tent of Moloch. According to Stephen, then, rebellion against God (and his messengers) changes God’s place of worship into a place of idolatry, inhibiting the fulfillment of his promise for true worship.

Third, this bitter reflection on the state of the tabernacle during the wilderness generation is subsequently applied to the Temple. Despite the rebellion of the people, as they dispossess the nations from the land, bringing with them the Tabernacle (7:45), a permanent place of worship is found: “David found favor in God’s sight and asked to find a dwelling place for the house of God, and (δέ) Solomon built a house for him, but (ἀλλά) the Most High does not dwell in things made by hands (χειροποιήτοις)” (7:48; author’s translation).Footnote 50 This is not a negative development: since the desire to build the Temple is attributed explicitly to one “who found favor with God,” we can conclude that this was a righteous desire. Furthermore, the conjunction (δέ) connecting David’s desire with Solomon’s fulfillment of the plan, need not indicate a contrast.Footnote 51 Indeed, the construction of the Temple should have led to the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham: worship “in this place” (7:7).

The real contrast comes when Stephen finishes his historical overview by claiming that God does not dwell in an earthly, hand-built house (7:48–49). The Temple may be the special place God has provided for his people to worship him in the land, but he cannot be contained or limited to it. In light of the claim Stephen has just made about the Tabernacle becoming “the tent of Molech” for the wilderness generation, however, we can see that his speech carries more than this standard qualification of the Temple’s significance.Footnote 52 The full force of Stephen’s critique emerges in his suggestive use of the term χειροποιήτοις (hand-made things)—a term which unambiguously refers to idols/idolatry every time it appears in the LXX.Footnote 53 The Temple, vulnerable to the same misuse as the Tabernacle, has been profaned.

What is only implied by the end of Stephen’s story comes out directly in his accusation of his hearers, bringing us to our fourth major interpretive key for the speech. In a rhetorical move similar to some of Jesus’s parables,Footnote 54 Stephen identifies his opponents as the descendants of the line of rebellious Israel who rejected Moses and all the prophets. That they betrayed and murdered the “Righteous One” to whom the law and prophets point (7:52) reveals their place in this lawless legacy. As many critics observe, Luke’s use of pronouns signals the point: although Stephen uses the inclusive οἰ πατέρες ἡμῶν throughout the speech, in his final accusation he switches to οἱ πατέρες ὑμῶν, making it clear that his opponents are the sons of those who rebelled against Moses,Footnote 55 whereas he himself belongs to the faithful, prophetic line of God’s Spirit-inspired servants. In this way, Stephen divides Israel’s ancestors into two camps: God’s agents—Joseph, Moses, David, Solomon, Jesus, and Stephen himself—who advance God’s mission, and those who, continually resisting and rejecting them, frustrate God’s promise.Footnote 56

Considering these four central elements of Stephen’s speech clarifies how he addresses the charges against him. Stephen both demonstrates his own respect for the Temple (identifying its central position within God’s promises) and then reverses the charge, claiming his opponents oppose the Holy Spirit (7:51), murder Jesus (7:52), and break the Law (7:53). They accused him of speaking against the Law and Temple (6:13), but he turns the tables by claiming that through their hard-hearted lawbreaking and rebellion against God’s messengers, they have frustrated God’s promise of true worship in the land by profaning the Temple, just as their fathers made the Tabernacle a place of idolatry.

Failure to attend to these critical points has led critics to misinterpret the rhetorical thrust of the speech and consequently misevaluate its significance for Luke’s wider narrative. As an example, let us consider Mina Monier’s recent analysis of Stephen’s speech in his larger study of Luke and the Temple. While on a general level he agrees that Stephen turns the charges against him back on to his accusers, he still sees the speech as a “categorical rejection of the Temple” and concludes that the speech contradicts the rest of Luke’s narrative (the result of “not entirely successful editorial work”).Footnote 57 The confusion he attributes to Luke’s sloppy editing, however, arises from missing the way the speech frames worship in the Temple as the goal of God’s promise to Abraham (key 1), failing to comprehend the way rebellion among God’s people leads to profanation of places of worship (keys 2 and 4), and asserting a contrast between the Tabernacle and Temple, where Luke (Stephen) depicts them as sharing parallel fates (keys 3 and 4).

Contrary to the conclusion of Monier (and several other interpreters noted above), Stephen’s speech develops the same interpretation of the events of 70 CE as the rest of Luke-Acts. Once again, if we read Luke’s treatment of the subject as a response to the destruction of the Temple, his rhetorical purpose becomes clear. The speech pointedly rehearses Luke’s Deuteronomistic assessment of events, whereby repeated rebellion against God and rejection of his messengers leads to judgement (cf. Luke 11:47–51; 13:33–34; 20:9–19). Far from departing from this pattern, Stephen’s speech is the fullest exposition of the theme in Luke-Acts, as he develops and explains the cyclical patterns of sin in Israel’s history. Furthermore, Stephen’s speech, as with Jesus’s lament in Luke 19:41–44, emphasizes that rejection of Jesus is the climax of this history of rebellion—not only have his hearers rejected a long line of prophetic messengers, they now have also rejected God’s “Righteous One” to whom the prophets pointed (Acts 7:52). Through the characters of Jesus and Stephen, Luke asserts that those who rejected Jesus, most especially the Jewish Temple establishment,Footnote 58 are responsible for provoking divine judgement.Footnote 59

What is more, the claim that the Temple and Tabernacle can become places of idolatry, perhaps the most controversial aspect of the speech, aligns with Luke’s wider perspective. When Jesus himself enters the Temple in Luke’s narrative, he proclaims, “My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers” (Luke 19:46). Like Jeremiah before him, to whom he alludes here, Jesus claims the Temple is not the Temple in the hands of those who rebel against God—it becomes a den of robbers.Footnote 60 Thus, Luke blames those who rebel against God for corrupting the Temple. Each of these examples demonstrate the way Stephen’s speech develops, rather than contradicts, aspects of Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple.

By misconstruing Stephen’s speech and consequently overemphasizing the differences between the speech and others passages in Luke-Acts, interpreters find inconsistency (or “sloppy editing”) in Luke’s treatment of the Temple. But if we recognize that Stephen’s speech develops the same core interpretation of the events of 70 CE as elsewhere in Luke-Acts, then the differences in emphasis between passages can be seen as reflecting the specific rhetorical purposes of each scene rather than Luke’s ambivalence. The speech in Acts 7 is set up as a chance to address charges against Stephen (and presumably other Christians) that he speaks against the Law and Temple. That the speech focuses on addressing these charges and especially on assigning blame for the profanation of the Temple is unsurprising (indeed, blame-assignment is a central aspect of rhetoric in Greco-Roman historiography).Footnote 61 The lament scenes in Luke 19:41–44 and 23:28–31, as we have argued, have a different function: exhorting the reader to imitate Jesus’s lament over the fate of the city. There is no necessary contradiction between these two rhetorical goals. Indeed, Luke 19:41–44 contains Jesus’s lament alongside similar epideictical “blaming” that we find in Stephen’s speech. Different purposes (assigning blame, demonstrating an appropriate response to the calamity, or both) dictate the emphases in the three scenes. Luke might not highlight each theme equally at each part of his narrative (why would we expect him to?), but all of them—interpreting the destruction as divine judgement, blaming Jerusalem’s rejection of Jesus for invoking God’s wrath, and calling for lament over the Temple’s demise—fit together as part of Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple.

Other Responses to the Destruction of the Temple

Examining other Jewish literature from the late-first and early-second centuries CE illustrates that the blend of themes one finds in Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple is by no means irregular. We have already noted above that many of the Jewish sources which respond to the destruction of the Temple share Luke’s Deuteronomistic evaluation of events. These authors, of course, do not share Luke’s characteristically Christian assertion that rejection of Jesus marked the climactic tipping point for God’s judgement. Like Luke, however, they underline the tragedy and calamity of the destruction of the Temple using emotional appeal. In 2 Baruch, for example, when the Lord reveals to Baruch that the walls of the temple will be thrown down, and foreigners will enter the temple (2 Bar. 8.1–4), the scribe records that he and Jeremiah “rent our garments, and wept and mourned, and fasted for seven days” (9.2).Footnote 62 Following these seven days of mourning, Baruch raises a lamentation for Zion:

Blessed is he who was not born, or he who was born and died. But we, the living, woe to us, because we have seen those afflictions of Zion, and that which has befallen Jerusalem…. You farmers, sow not again. And you, O earth, why do you give the fruit of your harvest? Keep within you the sweetness of your sustenance. And you, vine, why do you still give your wine? For an offering will not be given again from you in Zion, and the first fruits will not again be offered…. And you, wives, do not pray to bear children, for the barren will rejoice more. And those who have no children will be glad, and those who have children will be sad. For why do they bear in pains only to bury in grief? Or why should men have children again? Or why should the generation of their kind be named again, where the mother is lonely, and her children have been carried away in captivity? (2 Bar. 10.6–7, 9–10, 13–15)Footnote 63

After this dirge, Baruch repeatedly returns to his lament over the fate of the city (11.2–3; 35.1–4). Later in the apocalypse, the angel Ramael relates that even the angels in heaven mourn on account of the disaster (67.1–2). Thus, even though 2 Baruch affirms that the destruction of the Temple was the result of divine retribution, his account of universal mourning emphasizes the tragedy of that event.

4 Ezra serves as another example of a post-70 CE Jewish text that exhibits similar, if not more intense, grief and sorrow over the fate of Jerusalem and its Temple. Ezra’s first three visions all begin with a statement of his grief and anguish over the state of Jerusalem (4 Ezra 3.1–2; 5.21; 6.35). These visions progress with Ezra mourning over his people and questioning God’s justice in allowing their downfall at the hands of evil nations. Of course, when pushed on the matter by his angelic guide, Ezra must concede that God loves the house of Jacob more than he himself does (5.33–34). Still, filled with grief, he cannot comprehend God’s justice (5.34). Far from being assuaged, Ezra’s agony and questioning continue to grow until he receives a fourth vision, in which he encounters a weeping woman. He inquires and finds that the woman mourns the loss of her newly married son (9.38–10.4). In frustration, Ezra scolds the woman, calling her attention to the fact that a far worse calamity has come upon the people than the loss of a single child:

For you see that our sanctuary has been laid waste, our altar thrown down, our temple destroyed; our harp has been laid low, our song has been silenced, and our rejoicing has been ended; the light of our lampstand put out, the ark of our covenant has been plundered, our holy things have been polluted, and the name by which we are called has been profaned. (4 Ezra 10.21–22)Footnote 64

For Ezra, the destruction of the Temple marks an utter devastation of the people. Other tragedies—even the loss of one’s child—cannot and should not elicit the same pain and mourning demanded by the fall of Jerusalem. To Ezra’s amazement, however, the woman transforms into Jerusalem, and he sees a vision of a city restored, complete with its Temple (10.25–28, 55–57).Footnote 65 Experiencing a vision of God’s eschatological purpose for renewal consoles Ezra, but the terrible agony expressed in the first half of 4 Ezra makes an indelible impression on the reader. That the author resists quick resolution, requiring a dramatic experience of renewal to relieve Ezra, demonstrates the depth of agony felt by the visionary, and conveys the gravity of the loss God’s people have suffered.

While the genre of an apocalypse serves as a useful vehicle for expressing anguish and bemoaning the fate of the Temple, lament over the events of 70 CE is by no means confined to this form of literature. Josephus, even though he knows he is breaking the rules of history by expressing emotions, contends in his introduction to Jewish War that it is impossible for him to avoid sharing grief:

I shall faithfully recount the actions of both combatants; but in my reflections on the events I cannot conceal my private sentiments, nor refuse to give my personal sympathies scope to bewail my country’s misfortunes. For, that it owed its ruin to civil strife, and that it was the Jewish tyrants who drew down upon the holy temple the unwilling hands of the Romans and the conflagration, is attested by Titus Caesar himself, who sacked the city; throughout the war he commiserated the populace who were at the mercy of the revolutionaries…. Should, however, any critic censure me for my strictures upon the tyrants or their bands of marauders or for my lamentations over my country’s misfortunes, I ask his indulgence for a compassion which falls outside an historian’s province. For of all the cities under Roman rule it was the lot of ours to attain to the highest felicity and to fall to the lowest depths of calamity. Indeed, in my opinion, the misfortunes of all nations since the world began fall short of those of the Jews; and, since the blame lay with no foreign nation, it was impossible to restrain one’s grief. Should, however, any critic be too austere for pity, let him credit the history with the facts, the historian with the lamentations. (J.W. 1.10, 11–12)Footnote 66

As with Luke, Josephus’s various expressions of emotion (see, for example, J.W. 5.19–20) have an important rhetorical affect: he apparently hopes to engender the same commiseration with the Jewish people that he claims Titus showed and to reinforce his contention that Jerusalem really fell prey to its own revolutionaries and tyrants. At the same time, he must justify his use of emotional appeal since he wants his work to be accepted as truthful and legitimate over against various spurious accounts of the war (J.W. 1.1–3).

In a manner similar to the Gospel of Luke, the apocalypses of 2 Baruch and 4 Ezra, along with Josephus, convey the common sentiment of grief in the wake of the events of 70 CE.Footnote 67 Although different authors express their lament in various ways, to different degrees, and for different rhetorical reasons, almost all Jewish authors writing around this time express lament over the destruction of the Temple.Footnote 68 Not only is the presence of such grief in Luke’s gospel akin to these Jewish texts, even some of the language is strikingly similar. Jesus’s words, “Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed” (Luke 23:39), bear a strong resemblance to the lament of 2 Baruch 10, where Baruch cries out that the barren will rejoice, because it is better to be barren than to bear children only to bury them or see them led away into captivity (2 Bar. 10.14–16). One might also detect similarities between Jesus’s remarks in Luke 23:27–31 and Ezra’s instruction to the woman, Zion (4 Ezra 10.21–22), who weeps over her son. Both Ezra and Jesus command a woman (or women) to change the direction of her (their) grief toward the terrible fate of Jerusalem and its Temple. While these parallels are not strong enough to suggest a direct literary relationship,Footnote 69 they do demonstrate how Luke’s response of grief closely resembles early Jewish sentiments.

By way of contrast, neither grief nor sorrow appear in early Christian responses to the destruction of the Temple. Much of the Christian literature written in the late-first and early-second centuries hardly addresses the event. Where these writings do discuss the topic, they, along with Luke, tend to interpret it as punishment for Jerusalem’s rejection of Jesus (cf. Matt 23:29–39; 27:25; Barnabas 14.5; Justin’s Dialogue 16). But the tone of these reflections is far from tearful; George Nickelsburg has even labelled them “vindictive” and “self-righteous.”Footnote 70 In the Epistle of Barnabas, for example, when the author turns to discussion of the Temple, he comments, “I will also speak to you about the Temple, since those wretches were misguided in hoping in the building rather than in their God who made them, as if the Temple were actually the house of God. For they consecrated him in the Temple almost like the Gentiles do” (16.1–2).Footnote 71 The tone of this response could scarcely differ more from the grief observed among Jewish authors. While not all Christian authors share the extreme harshness of Barnabas, they neither mourn nor call for lament over this event. To my knowledge, no extant Christian texts from this period, except for the third gospel, respond to the destruction of the Temple with lament.

One possible exception to this pattern may be present in the Gospel of Matthew. Some have labelled Jesus’s words in Matt 23.37–39 as a “Lament over Jerusalem” (this is the heading in most modern English Bibles). Jesus says,

Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you, desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” (Matt 23:37–39)

Nevertheless, the passage contains no explicit language of weeping, lament, or grief. Luke, of course, includes the same saying of Jesus (Luke 13:34–35). But, unlike Matthew, within Luke’s narrative it is the first of several reflections on the fate of the Temple, which, as we have observed, develop the theme of lament and mourning. Read on its own, in either Luke or Matthew, the saying strongly emphasizes Jerusalem’s culpability for killing God’s messengers (“the city that kills prophets”), unwillingness to accept divine protection (“I have desired to gather … and you were not willing), and deserved punishment (“your house is left to you”). While there may be a hint of regret and hope for future renewal in the scene,Footnote 72 the language does not rise to level of “lament,” especially compared with the clear and intense language of mourning we observed in the third gospel and various Jewish sources. Harmonizing interference for readers familiar with both the first and third gospels, perhaps, accounts for why this text has so often been considered a “Lament over Jerusalem” in Matthew. But since there is no mention of mourning over the Temple or Jerusalem elsewhere in the first gospel, and the scene itself does not strongly convey such grief, the label “Lament” probably colors the scene too strongly. Beyond this one doubtful exception, I have been unable to find a trace of grief in Christian reflection on the destruction of the Temple.

Conclusion

Considering Luke’s treatment of the Temple as a “response” to its destruction clarifies the rhetorical goals of his narrative and accounts for the range of themes that have proved confounding for many interpreters. Moreover, our comparison of Luke with other Jewish/Christian texts casts into sharp relief the distinct quality of Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple. From one vantage point, Luke advances a thoroughly Christian interpretation of the events of 70 CE. He presents Jerusalem’s rejection of Jesus as the climax in a history of rebellion among God’s people which ultimately led to the city’s destruction. From another vantage point, however, Luke sounds very much like his Jewish contemporaries: he takes care to demonstrate Jesus’s grief over the destruction of the Temple and invites his readers to share in this grief. This “fit” with his Jewish contemporaries makes Luke distinct among early Christian texts, which do not convey the same sorrow over the destruction of the Temple.

It is perhaps this distinguishing characteristic that has made it difficult for scholars to explain Luke’s perspective on the Temple. Our confusion as interpreters is often caused by upset expectations: we would not expect (or, at least, we have not expected) a Christian author who preserves these devastating indictments of Jerusalem and the Temple to also portray the Temple positively and call for grief over its demise. To modern ears, this may seem like a strange, conflicting combination of themes, evidenced by the history of scholarship outlined above.Footnote 73 This conclusion is unsurprising, given that most Christian texts written in wake of the destruction of the Temple take an unambiguously negative view of the institution. Luke’s more polyvalent treatment of the Temple, then, seems to indicate ambivalence or inconsistency. But comparing Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple to a wider range of Jewish literature changes our expectations. We see that veneration of the Temple, predictions of its destruction, interpretation of that destruction as judgement, and lament over its demise are all common features of Jewish reflection on the events of 70 CE. We would not say of any of these Jewish texts that they are “anti-Temple,” that they “reject the Temple,” or that they are “ambivalent towards the Temple,” even though they too interpret the calamity as divine punishment. These authors are responding to a world-shaping event with lament and theological reflection. So too is Luke.

References

1 I refer to the implied author of the Gospel of Luke and Acts of the Apostles with the conventional title, “Luke,” throughout this article. On “implied author” and “authorial intention,” see n. 26 below.

2 In this article, I assume the majority view that Luke wrote after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. While it is outside the scope of this project to argue for a specific date of composition for Luke-Acts, my findings indirectly support a post–70 CE date by demonstrating how Luke engages with a discourse represented in other texts responding to the destruction of the Temple (see conclusion).

3 Hans Conzelmann argued that Stephen’s speech in Acts is “a clear rejection of the Temple” that “goes beyond the original prophetic critique of Solomon’s Temple” (Hans Conzelmann, Acts of the Apostles [Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988] 56). The influence of his argument can be felt on subsequent interpreters. Cf. Ernst Haenchen, The Acts of the Apostles: A Commentary (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1971) 290; C. K. Barrett, Acts 1–14: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles (ICC; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1992) 337–38; Nicholas Taylor, “Stephen, the Temple, and Early Christian Eschatology,” RB 110 (2003) 62–85, at 73–77; Thomas A. Golding, “Pagan Worship in Jerusalem?,” BSac 170 (2013) 304–16, at 311.

4 C. van der Waal, “The Temple in the Gospel According to Luke,” Neot 7 (1973) 49–59; Francis D. Weinert, “The Meaning of the Temple in Luke-Acts,” BTB 11 (1981) 85–89; Charles Giblin, The Destruction of Jerusalem According to Luke’s Gospel: A Historical-Typological Moral (Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1985); Bradley Chance, Jerusalem, the Temple, and the New Age in Luke-Acts (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1988); Peter W. Walker, Jesus and the Holy City: New Testament Perspectives on Jerusalem (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996) 66; Ben Witherington III, The Acts of the Apostles: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998) 273; James P. Sweeney, “Stephen’s Speech (Acts 7.2–53): Is It ‘Anti-Temple’ as Is Frequently Alleged?,” TJ 23 (2002) 185–210; Beverly Roberts Gaventa, The Acts of the Apostles (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 2003) 129; William S. Kurz, Peter Williamson, and Mary Healy, Acts of the Apostles (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2014) 129; Steve Smith, The Fate of the Jerusalem Temple in Luke-Acts: An Intertextual Approach to Jesus’ Laments Over Jerusalem and Stephen’s Speech (LNTS 553; London: T&T Clark, 2016) 194. While these authors emphasize different aspects of the prophetic critique of the Temple in Luke-Acts (injustice, attempts to confine God to the Temple, or rejection of Jesus and his followers), all of them reject the notion that Jesus is attacking the Temple in and of itself. Some (such as Weinert and Chance) are even willing to attribute a positive view of the Temple to Luke.

5 C. K. Barrett, “Attitudes to the Temple in the Acts of the Apostles,” in Templum Amicitiae: Essays on the Second Temple Presented to Ernst Bammel (ed. William Horbury; JSNTSup 48; Sheffield: T&T Clark, 1991) 345–67; Shelly Matthews, Perfect Martyr: The Stoning of Stephen and the Construction of Christian Identity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010) 69–71.

6 F. F. Bruce, The Book of the Acts (NICNT; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1988) 410; Joel B. Green, “The Demise of the Temple as ‘Culture Center’ in Luke-Acts: An Exploration of the Rending of the Temple Veil (Luke 23.44–49),” RB 101 (1994) 495–515; G. K. Beale, “The Descent of the Eschatological Temple in the Form of the Spirit at Pentecost Part 1: The Clearest Evidence,” TB 56 (2005) 73–102; Steve Walton, “A Tale of Two Perspectives?: The Place of the Temple in Acts,” in Heaven on Earth: The Temple in Biblical Theology (ed. T. Desmond Alexander and Simon Gathercole; Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 2004) 135–49; Smith, The Fate of the Jerusalem Temple, 178–89. This view often appears in tandem with one or more of the other interpretations. Attempts to postulate such a shift in Luke’s narrative, however, have produced varying results: Does the role/function of the Temple end with the tearing of the curtain? Does it end with the descent of the Spirit? Is it finished after Stephen’s speech? Or is it a gradual process demonstrated throughout the narrative in Acts? Or is the final “end” of the Temple the shutting of the Temple doors in Acts 21:30? Even after the last of these proposed “ends,” Paul still speaks positively of the Temple (24:17–18; 25:8). The difficulty interpreters have had in identifying a shift in Luke’s portrayal of the Temple invites us to consider whether positing a shift/development is the best way to read Luke’s treatment of the Temple.

7 In texts written in the wake of 70 CE, the plight of Jerusalem is described in terms of the loss of its Temple (cf. Josephus, Jewish War 5.19–20; 4 Ezra 10.19–21; 2 Baruch 10–12; 35; Luke 13:34). I concur with Frederick James Murphy that these authors often do not distinguish between the fate of Jerusalem and the Temple (“The Temple in the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch,” JBL 106 (1987) 671–83, at 671). Cf. Bruce N. Fisk, “See My Tears: A Lament for Jerusalem,” in The Word Leaps the Gap: Essays on Scripture and Theology in Honor of Richard B. Hays (ed. J. Ross Wagner, C. Kavin Rowe, and A. Katherine Grieb; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008) 147–78, at 164; Smith, The Fate of the Jerusalem Temple, 45. The two entities are identified/conflated with each other to such a degree that maintaining a strong distinction between them is moot and does not reflect the view of the texts themselves.

8 I do not mean to imply (anachronistically) a break between “Jewish” literature, on the one hand, and “Christian” literature on the other. I use the “Christian” label to specify texts written by members of the nascent Jesus movement (who may or may not be Jewish or consider themselves Jewish), and “Jewish” to denote the wider category of Jewish authors who are not necessarily a part of the early Jesus movement. On terminological issues in the history of scholarship, see Matt Jackson-McCabe, Jewish Christianity: The Making of Christianity-Judaism Divide (ABRL; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2020).

9 All NT translations are taken from the NRSV, unless otherwise indicated. References to the Greek text of the New Testament are based on the Nestle-Aland 28th edition.

10 That Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a new colt, alluding to LXX Zech 9:9 and LXX 2 Kings 9, and that the crowd of disciples insert the word “king” into LXX Psalm 117:26 as they sing out, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord” (19:38, emph. added), illustrates that this event must be understood as a royal entry. Furthermore, as N. T. Wright and Mark Kinzer have argued, the evangelists (and especially Luke) portray this scene as the return of YHWH to Zion (a divine ἐπισκοπή). See N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God (Christian Origins and Question of God 2; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1996) 653. See also Kinzer’s critical reconfiguration of Wright’s thesis: Mark Kinzer, Jerusalem Crucified, Jerusalem Risen: The Resurrected Messiah, the Jewish People, and the Land of Promise (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2018) 59–61.

11 On Luke-Acts as tragedy, see Robert C. Tannehill, “Israel in Luke-Acts: A Tragic Story,” JBL 104 (1985) 69–85.

12 This does not mean, however, that the judgement of Jerusalem and her Temple must be final. In another prediction of the coming destruction, Jesus appears to suggest that the punishment is temporally limited (Luke 20:24). Determining whether Luke expects the restoration of the Temple is difficult, however, and falls beyond the scope of this study. For explorations of the question, see Kinzer, Jerusalem Crucified, 60–61; Chance, Jerusalem, 133–34; Isaac W. Oliver, Luke’s Jewish Eschatology: The National Restoration of Israel in Luke-Acts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021) 71–102. Oliver similarly locates Luke-Acts in a post-destruction socio-rhetorical setting.

13 Bock, Luke, 1562; cf. C. H. Dodd, “The Fall of Jerusalem and the ‘Abomination of Desolation,’ ” JRS 37 (1947) 47–54.

14 David L. Tiede, Prophecy & History in Luke-Acts (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1980) 81.

15 While Justin refers to the sufferings experienced as a result of the Bar Kokhba revolt, Justin includes Jerusalem’s fate in the picture: “your city has been seized and your whole country ravaged,” Dialogue 108.3 (St. Justin Martyr: Dialogue with Trypho [trans. Thomas B. Falls; rev. and ed. Thomas P. Halton; Fathers of the Church 6; Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2003] 162).

16 On the Deuteronomistic perspective in late Second Temple Judaism(s), see Odil Hannes Steck, Israel und das gewaltsame Geschick der Propheten. Untersuchungen zur Überlieferung des deuteronomistischen Geschichtsbildes im Alten Testament, Spätjudentum und Urchristentum (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1967). On the use of the Deuteronomistic Principle in Luke-Acts, see David P. Moessner, Lord of the Banquet: The Literary and Theological Significance of the Lukan Travel Narrative (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1989).

17 The visionary is identified as the prophet Jeremiah’s scribe, Baruch, who takes part in a dialogue with God and receives revelations concerning the destruction of the Temple and punishment of the people. In this way, the destruction of the first Temple becomes a foil for explaining the events of 70 CE. Cf. John J. Collins, The Apocalyptic Imagination: An Introduction to Jewish Apocalyptic Literature (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016) 137–38.

18 Furthermore, as Tannehill observes, Luke normally removes references to Jesus’s emotions in Mark, but here he adds a pericope in which Jesus weeps (Tannehill, “Israel in Luke-Acts,” 75).

19 While this construction could simply mark an interjection (“If only!”), the combination of the broken syntax with Jesus’s weeping signals that it is more likely an instance of aposiopesis. Cf. Fisk, “See My Tears,” 174; Tiede, Prophecy as History, 79; Scott Spencer, Passions of the Christ: The Emotional Life of Jesus in the Gospels (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2021) 88. Fisk cites BDF § 482: “Aposiopesis in the strict sense, i.e. a breaking-off of speech due to strong emotion or to modesty, is unknown to the NT … On the other hand, aposiopesis takes the form of the omission of the apodosis to a conditional subordinate clause (protasis), which is also classical.” BDF supplies Luke 19:42 as an example of this type of aposiopesis.

20 Fisk, “See My Tears,” 174.

21 I fully endorse Dinkler’s assertion that the traditional “gulf between ‘rhetoric’ and ‘narrative’ is both arbitrary and unnecessary” (Michal Beth Dinkler, “New Testament Rhetorical Narratology: An Invitation Toward Integration,” BibInt 24 (2016) 203–28, at 228). Cf. Wayne C. Booth, The Rhetoric of Fiction (2nd ed; Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1983); Robert C. Tannehill, The Narrative Unity of Luke-Acts: Volume One: The Gospel According to Luke (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1986) 8–9; James Phelan, “Rhetoric/Ethics,” in The Cambridge Companion to Narrative (ed. David Herman; CCL; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007) 203–16. See also Rebekah Eklund, Jesus Wept: The Significance of Jesus’ Laments in the New Testament (LNTS 515; London: T&T Clark, 2015). Unfortunately, Eklund does not discuss either Luke 19:41–44 or 23:28–31 at length.

22 “The wedding of narrative, rhetoric, and emotion is not only a proclivity of modern literature and modern literary theory. As is commonly known, Greco-Roman handbooks on rhetoric, beginning with Aristotle and continuing on into the first century with Quintilian [cf. Quintilian, Institutes, 4.2.11], commonly identified pathos (emotional appeal) alongside ethos (appeal to the character of the speaker) and logos (use of reason) as the three main forms of rhetorical persuasion” (Karl Allen Kuhn, The Heart of Biblical Narrative: Rediscovering Biblical Appeal to the Emotions [Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2009] 6). For a review of a broad range of modern scholarly literature about the affective nature of narrative, see Kuhn, Biblical Narrative, 1–5. For a review of ancient theorists on the subject, see Caryn A. Reeder, “Women’s Emotion, Community, and Politics: Interpreting Tears in Luke 23.27–31,” NTS 69 (2023) 400–413, at 402–6. Reeder notes that while much of the theoretical reflection on the importance of pathos concerns speech-making, the same methods were commonly used in historiography (e.g., Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Ant. Rom. 6.66.3, 10.29.1; Livy, Ab urbe cond. 8.37.9–10, 35.34.7–8).

23 Kuhn, Appeal to Emotions, 59.

24 Tannehill, “Israel in Luke-Acts,” 75.

25 Ibid., 70. Jesus is certainly the most reliable character in the narrative. He has been supernaturally affirmed by God (Luke 3:21–22; 9:35), he has demonstrated that he knows what others are thinking (11:16), and he correctly predicts the type of reception he will receive in Jerusalem (9:21–22, 43–45; 18:31–34).

26 “Authorial intention” is, of course, a fraught concept in literary studies, making it necessary to delineate my use of terms. I fully concur with Oda Wischmeyer (“Author – Text – Intention: A Case Study on the Letter of James,” in Biblical Exegesis without Authorial Intention?: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Authorship and Meaning (ed. Clarissa Breu; BibInt 172; Boston: Brill, 2019) 24–42, at 12–13) that “ ‘author’ and ‘authorial intention’ are useful interpretative categories in literary studies, as long as they are understood as mental representations inferred by readers on the basis of textual and extratextual information available to them.” Wischmeyer builds off Wayne Booth’s popular concept of using the term “implied author” as a way of signalling that we are not talking about the “intentions” of a real, historical person when we speak of “intent” (I am not conducting a “psychoanalysis” of Luke’s work). Rather, we are talking about “communicative intention” (what is this text trying to tell me, and why?) which a reader reconstructs on the basis of the literary features and structures of the text itself. Used in this way, “the author has proved to be a ‘useful’ category of interpretation, precisely because it provides a means of limiting the potential meanings of a text by giving more plausibility to some interpretations than to others” (Wischmeyer, “Author – Text – Intention,” 13). The “truth” or “meaning” of a text is not fixed and cannot be absolutely determined, but if one marshals enough evidence based on the literary features of a text(s), we can conclude with confidence that an observed phenomenon reveals “communicative intention,” or, in other words, there is a high probability that it is a genuine rhetorical feature of the text. This is the assertion I am making when I speak of the rhetorical strategy or intention of “Luke,” the implied author.

27 Shelly Matthews, “The Weeping Jesus and the Daughters of Jerusalem: Gender and Conquest in Lukan Lament,” in Doing Gender - Doing Religion (ed. Ute E. Eisen, Christine Gerber, and Angela Standhartinger; WUNT 302; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013) 381–403, at 389–93. She defends her case again in Barbara E. Reid and Shelly Matthews, Luke 10–24 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2021) 517–21.

28 Matthews, “The Weeping Jesus,” 393.

29 Spencer (Passions of the Christ, 88) argues that the broken syntax of Luke 19:41–44 (which we analyzed above) suggests a “palpably weak, broken state,” which would not fit a triumphal hero. Spencer’s critique, however, relies too heavily on determining the precise sense of Jesus’s grief—Matthews argues that the scene is indeed a vivid display of emotion, and the aposiopesis could support that claim, even if she contextualizes the emotion in a different manner. Isaac Oliver advances a superior critique of Matthews by noting that in the Jewish tradition (from biblical literature, Second Temple sources, and rabbinic material) God and his prophets often mourn for those whom God has also punished, undermining Matthews’s claim that sympathy and pity should not be conflated (I. Oliver, “ ‘For His Face Was Setting toward Jerusalem’ (Lk 9:53b): Divine Lamentation and Yearning for Jerusalem in Luke-Acts” [The Fourteenth Nangeroni Meeting; Pontificia Università della Santa Croce, Italy, June 27, 2022], https://www.academia.edu/91470520/_For_His_Face_Was_Setting_toward_Jerusalem_Lk_9_53b_Divine_Lamentation_and_Yearning_for_Jerusalem_in_Luke_Acts_Public_Lecture_on_The_Jewish_Dimension_of_Luke_Acts_). Cf. Reeder, “Interpreting Tears in Luke 23.27–31,” 400–413. My own critique of Matthews (above) focuses specifically on the narrative dynamics of Luke 19:41–44 and 23:28–31.

30 Matthews, “The Weeping Jesus,” 393.

31 Her examples of early readers are Irenaeus and Origen. Concluding that these authors are representative of the expected attitudes of the earliest readers ignores the complex demographic, cultural, and ideological shifts taking place within the Christian movement(s) in the first three centuries. We should not assume the Church fathers are representative of the original audience.

32 Generally speaking, ancient Greek literature configured character along more ethical/moral lines than the psychological depictions of characters in modern literature. This “moral” depiction of character is especially effective for setting out certain characters as “models” to be imitated and others as examples of “bad character” to be avoided. For discussion, see Koen De Temmerman and Evert van Emde Boas, “Introduction,” in Characterization in Ancient Greek Literature: Studies in Ancient Greek Narrative Volume Four (Mnemosyne Supplements 411; Leiden: Brill, 2018) 7–8. Cf. Todd Penner, In Praise of Christian Origins: Stephen and the Hellenists in Lukan Apologetic Historiography (ESEC 10; London: T&T Clark, 2004) 176; Sean A. Adams, “The Characterization of Disciples in Acts: Genre, Method, and Quality,” in Characters and Characterization in Luke-Acts (ed. Frank Dicken and Julia A. Snyder; LNTS 548; London: Bloomsbury, 2016) 155–68, at 156. This pattern cannot be universalized and has been challenged. For example, see chapter one in Richard Sorabji, Self: Ancient and Modern Insights about Individuality, Life, and Death (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2008).

33 Tannehill (“Israel in Luke-Acts,” 75) mentions this scene briefly: “Here we have the time-tested device of producing tragic pathos by presenting the suffering of helpless women and children.” More can be said about the contribution of this scene to Luke’s rhetoric.

34 Compare Luke 21:23: “Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing in those days!” // 23:29: “Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed.” Compare 19:43: “Indeed, the days will come upon you…. they will crush you to the ground, you and your children….” // 23:29: “weep for yourselves and for your children. For the days are surely coming when….” The key word, κλαίω, which characterized Jesus’s lament (19:41) is repeated twice here: στραφεὶς δὲ πρὸς αὐτὰς [ὁ] Ἰησοῦς εἶπεν· θυγατέρες Ἰερουσαλήμ, μὴ κλαίετε ἐπ᾽ ἐμέ· πλὴν ἐφ᾽ ἑαυτὰς κλαίετε καὶ ἐπὶ τὰ τέκνα ὑμῶν (Luke 23:28).

35 Reeder, “Interpreting Tears in Luke 23.27–31,” 408.

36 Michal Beth Dinkler, “Reflexivity and Emotion in Narratological Perspective: Reading Joy in the Lukan Narrative,” in Mixed Feelings and Vexed Passions: Exploring Emotions in Biblical Literature (ed. F. Scott Spencer; Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2017) 273.

37 Ibid., 280, 281.

38 Ibid., 284.

39 By observing this instance of narrative reflexivity, I am developing Reeder’s contention that “the women’s tears model the appropriate response to Jerusalem’s destruction for the Gospel’s audience” (Reeder, “Interpreting Tears in Luke 23.27–31,” 409; cf. 411). She arrives at the same conclusion by considering the dynamics of public displays of distress in biblical and Greco-Roman tradition.

40 Matthews, “The Weeping Jesus,” 398, 400.

41 See especially Nils A. Dahl, “Story of Abraham in Luke Acts,” in Studies in Luke-Acts: Essays Presented in Honor of Paul Schubert (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1966); Graham N. Stanton, “Stephen in Lucan Perspective,” in Studia Biblica 1978. III: Papers on Paul and Other New Testament Authors (ed. E. A. Livingston; LNTS 3; Sheffield: T&T Clark, 1980) 345–60; John J. Kilgallen, “The Function of Stephen’s Speech (Acts 7:2–53),” Biblica 70 (1989) 173–93; Todd Penner, “Narrative as Persuasion: Epideictic Rhetoric and Scribal Amplification in the Stephen Episode in Acts,” SBLSP 35 (1996) 352–67; Sweeney, “Stephen’s Speech,” 185–210; Brian K. Peterson, “Stephen’s Speech as a Modified Prophetic Rîḇ Formula,” JETS 57 (2014) 351–69; Steve Smith, The Fate of the Jerusalem Temple, 140–88; Joel B. Green, Luke as Narrative Theologian: Texts and Topics (WUNT 446; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020) 161–69; Michal Beth Dinkler, “The Politics of Stephen’s Storytelling: Narrative Rhetoric and Reflexivity in Acts 7:2–53,” ZNW 111 (2020) 33–64. Each of these authors brings a different approach and nuance, but they are all able to demonstrate the intelligibility of the speech, the way it addresses the charges made against Stephen, and the speeches’ continuity with Luke’s wider narrative purposes.

42 Ernst Haenchen, Acts of the Apostles, 286; S. G. Wilson, Luke and the Law (SNTSMS 50; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983) 62–63; F. Gerald Downing, “Law and Custom: Luke-Acts and Late Hellenism,” in Law and Religion: Essays on the Place of the Law in Israel and Early Christianity (ed. Barnabas Lindars; Cambridge: James Clarke & Co, 1988) 148–58.

43 R. Pesch, Die Apostelgeschichte (EKK VI; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986) 238; C. K. Barrett, “Attitudes to the Temple,” 345–67; Jack T. Sanders, The Jews in Luke-Acts (London: SCM, 1987) 246; Craig L Blomberg, “The Law in Luke-Acts,” JSNT (1984) 53–80, at 63; J.H. Neyrey, “The Symbolic universe of Luke-Acts: ‘They turn the World Upside Down,’ ” in The Social World of Luke-Acts. Models for Interpretation (ed. J. H. Neyrey; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1991) 271–304; Nicholas Taylor, “Stephen,” 76; Shelly Matthews, Perfect Martyr, 69.

44 James D. G. Dunn claims, “Suffice it to say that the speech is so distinctive within Acts and chapters 6–8 contain such distinctive features that the most plausible view is that Luke here is drawing on a source which has preserved quite accurately the views of the Hellenists or even Stephen in particular with regard to the temple” (Unity and Diversity in the New Testament: An Inquiry Into the Character of Earliest Christianity (3rd ed; London: SCM Press, 2005) 128). Cf. Mina Monier, Temple and Empire: The Context of the Temple Piety of Luke-Acts (Lanham: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2021) 111–14.

45 See Dahl, “Story of Abraham in Luke Acts,” 144.

46 If τού του is not original here, the connection is still confirmed in the next line where the Temple is referred to as “this place.”

47 While some interpreters argue that “this place” refers only to the land here (e.g., Luke Timothy Johnson, The Acts of the Apostles [SP 5; Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1992] 116), the reader is aware that “this place” refers more specifically to the Temple because of the close proximity of the charges against Stephen (Acts 6:13–14). Scott Spencer comes to the opposite conclusion: “Stephen draws on Exod. 3:12 to stress the goal and destination of the exodus—‘they shall come out and worship me in this place’. What was ‘this place’? The original Exodus context leaves no room for doubt: ‘this place’ was ‘this mountain’, namely, Mt Sinai. Before the temple on Mt Zion came into existence and began to be venerated as the fixed holy place of Israel, the wandering children of Abraham found God perfectly well and re-established their covenant with him at a remote desert outpost” (F. Scott Spencer, Journeying through Acts: A Literary-Cultural Reading [Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2004] 81 [emphases in original]). I agree that Stephen draws on Exodus 3 here, but Spencer fails to recognize that Luke’s substitution of “this place” for “this mountain” changes the referent. The term “this place,” as I argue above, clearly refers to the Temple within the context of Luke’s narrative. Thus, Luke emphasizes the Temple, not Sinai, as the place where God will be worshiped, which serves the rhetorical goals of Stephen’s speech.

48 Cf. Kinzer, Jerusalem Crucified, 58, who helpfully discusses the relationship of land, city, and Temple in Luke’s narrative.

49 Susan Wendel, Scriptural Interpretation and Community Self-Definition in Luke-Acts and the Writings of Justin Martyr (NovTSup 139; Leiden: Brill, 2011) 221.

50 The NRSV renders δέ in Acts 7.47 as contrastive, but strangely translates ἀλλά with the rarer concessive sense (“yet”). Furthermore, the NRSV’s rendering of verse 48—“the Most High does not dwell in houses made with human hands”—inserts “house” into the line, apparently to create a contrast between the hand-made house (i.e., the Temple) and the Tabernacle. As Kinzer notes, however, the designation, χειροποίητος, “applies as much to the ‘tent of testimony’ (which Moses was commanded to build) as to the temple of Solomon. Indeed, Stephen sees the infidelity of his fellow-Jews as following the pattern set by the Israelites in the wilderness, who had the tent of testimony yet consistently fell into idolatry (vv. 39–43). God is as accessible at the temple as he was in the tent of testimony, but the presence of God may not be confined to either place” (Kinzer, Jerusalem Crucified, 58); cf. Steve Walton, “A Tale of Two Perspectives,” 140.

51 Witherington, The Acts of the Apostles, 273; cf. Beverly R. Gaventa, Acts, 129.

52 Taken on its own, this qualification (an allusion to Isa 66:1–2) is conventional in Jewish literature. It does not even go beyond what Solomon himself said upon completion of the first Temple: “For will God indeed dwell with people on the earth? If heaven and the heaven of the heaven will not suffice for you, how much less even this house that I built for your name?” (LXX 1 Kings 8:28, NETS).

53 See LXX Lev 26:1, 30; Isa 2:18; 10:11; 16:12; 19:1; 21:9; 31:7; 46:6; Dan 5:4; 5:23; 6:28; Judith 8:18; Wis. 14:8. While the term can refer more generally to something “made by hands” like a trench (e.g., Plato, Critias 118C) or road (e.g. Xenophon, Anabasis 4.3.5), the consistency of its use in the LXX to refer to idols/idolatry is surely not lost on Luke.

54 Dinkler notes, “Stephen’s story functions similarly to Jesus’ parables, which often shift their referents for the purpose of (surprise) indictment” (“The Politics of Stephen’s Storytelling,” 61).

55 Stanton was one of the earlier exegetes to make this observation, which is now commonplace (Stanton, “Stephen in Lucan Perspective,” 353–54).

56 Dahl, “Story of Abraham in Luke Acts,” 147–48.

57 Monier, Temple and Empire, 111–14.

58 Consider, for example, the parable of the wicked tenants in Luke 20:9–19, wherein Jesus similarly narrates the repeated rejection of God’s messengers and then turns to an accusation of the chief priests and scribes (the same audience that Stephen addresses). As these leaders realize (Luke 20:19), Jesus’s story identifies them as the wicked tenants who are responsible for inciting God’s wrath.

59 Cf. Kinzer, Jerusalem Crucified, 58.

60 Those interpreters who see Stephen’s speech as a prophetic critique of the activities going on in the Temple are surely correct (see n. 4 above).

61 Cf. Penner, In Praise of Christian Origins, 104–222.

62 “2 (Syriac Apocalypse of) Baruch,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (trans. F. J. Klijn; ed. James H. Charlesworth; 2 vols.; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1983) 1:615–53, at 623.

63 Ibid., 1:624.

64 “The Fourth Book of Ezra,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (trans. B. M. Metzger; ed. Charlesworth), 1:517–60, at 546.

65 That Uriel invites Ezra to “go in and see the splendor and vastness of the building as far as it is possible for you eyes to see it” (4 Ezra 10.55; ibid., 548; emphasis added), suggests that the centerpiece of the new city is a building. Surely this description brings an image of the Temple to mind for a 1st cent. reader.

66 Josephus, The Jewish War, Volume I: Books 1-2 (trans. H. St. J. Thackeray; LCL 203; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1927) 7–8.

67 Oliver has also noted this similarity (see “Divine Lamentation”).

68 Other examples could be added, such as the Apocalypse of Abraham. In this apocalypse, Abraham receives a vision of the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. This disturbs Abraham, causing him to protest, “Eternal, Mighty One! If this is so, why now have you afflicted my heart and why will it be so?” (Apoc. Ab. 27:6 [“The Apocalpyse of Abraham,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (trans. R. Rubinkiewicz; ed. Charlesworth], 1:681–706, at 702).

69 It is more likely that both authors are drawing from Jer 9–10. See the lengthy comment from Caryn A. Reeder quoted above.

70 George W. E. Nickelsburg, “A New Testament Reader’s Guide to 2 Baruch: Or a 2 Baruch Reader’s Guide to the New Testament,” in Fourth Ezra and Second Baruch: Reconstruction After the Fall (JSJsup 164; Leiden: Brill, 2013) 274. Nickelsburg, however, incorrectly assumes that Luke’s gospel fits this mold.

71 The Apostolic Fathers, Volume II: Epistle of Barnabas. Papias and Quadratus. Epistle to Diognetus. The Shepherd of Hermas (ed. and trans. Bart D. Ehrman; LCL 25; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003) 71.

72 Cf. Dale C. Allison Jr., “Matt 23:39 = Luke 13:35b as a Conditional Prophecy,” JSNT 5 (1983) 77–81.

73 This trend continues in a recent article: W. Gil Shin, “The Ambivalence of Jerusalem in Luke–Acts: The Limitations of Dyadic Approaches, and a Test of a Sojan Model of Thirdspace for Acts 7,” BBR 32 (2022) 41–66. Shin employs a complex methodological model to resolve Luke’s perceived ambivalence toward the Temple. In my opinion, however, Shin creates a solution to a “problem” (or “inconsistency”) that only exists in the history of scholarship, not in the narrative of Luke-Acts. The features of Luke’s response to the destruction of the Temple are standard among the Jewish literature responding to that event.