Thursday, October 13, 2022

Simon S. Lee on Stephen's Speech in light of the Transfiguration

  

Stephen’s speech and vision in Acts 6-7 show many interesting parallel ideas to the Transfiguration incident with Jesus’ teaching of the martyrdom and Parousia in Lk 9. Immediately before the Transfiguration, replying to Peter’s answer, Jesus reveals and teaches his martyrdom, resurrection and return as the Son of Man with glory (Lk 9:22-26). Moreover, Jesus expects his disciples to be willing to sacrifice their lives for his sake as an expression of genuine discipleship. In his speech, Stephen mentions how the Jews, and their ancestors not only rejected Moses and Jesus, the Prophet-like-Moses, but also the prophets who prophesied the coming of “the Righteous One Jesus” (Acts 7:52). He also mentions the tent in the wilderness (σκηνη in Acts 7:43) and announces that God does not dwell in the Temple made by human hands. In my reading of Luke-Acts, this part of Stephen’s speech resonates with Peter’s proposal to erect the tents (σκηνη in Lk 9:33) at the Transfiguration and God’s implicit rejection of it.

 

In his vision, Stephen sees the heavens opened up and Jesus as the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God with divine glory (Acts 7:55-56). While the opened heavens, along with Stephen’s being filled with the Spirit, recalls the scene of Jesus’ baptism, the Son of Man with glory reminds readers of the Transfiguration incident. Since the three disciples’ experience of Jesus’ Transfiguration is a proleptic revelation of the Son of Man’s glory at the Parousia, Stephen’s vision of the Son of Man with glory is identical to their experience. In Stephen’s vision we find that Jesus’ promise of his return as the Son of Man, to vindicate his righteous followers, is fulfilled for Stephen on an individual level. Moreover, Luke describes Stephen’s transformation into someone with an angelic face, while confronting his martyrdom (Acts 6:15). By this transformation, Luke claims that the Son of Man’s vindication of his righteous martyrs, which is promised to take place in the future in Lk 9, is actualized in Stephen’s present experience of martyrdom and his personal vindication and transformation. Regarding Stephen’s vision, C. K. Barrett maintains, “It is an actual but personal and individual Parousia taking place for the benefit of Stephen himself” (C. K. Barrett, “Stephen and the Son of Man,” in Apophoreta: Festschrift für Ernst Haenchen zu Seinem Siebzigsten Geburtstag [Berlin: Töpelmann, 1964], 35-36). According to Barrett, this individual Parousia is distinct from the universal Parousia of the last days and in this way,, Luke offers to his community a solution to the delay of the Parousia. In my opinion, for the Lukan readers, “the individual Parousia” still functions as strong evidence for “the universal Parousia.”

 

It is significant that Luke presents Stephen the Hellenist as the first martyr who experiences, even prior to Peter, James and John, Jesus’ prediction of his coming as the Son of Man with glory. Also, since Stephen’s announcement of the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God corresponds to Peter’s witness to the exalted Lord at God’s right hand (Acts 2:33-35; 5:31), in Luke’s mind, Stephen is well qualified to become a witness of Jesus’ resurrection like Peter and the twelve (See Tannehill, The Narrative Unity of Luke-Acts: A literary Interpretation, vol. 2, 80-101). (Simon S. Lee, Jesus’ Transfiguration and the Believers’ Transformation [Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament 2.Reihe 265; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009], 124-25)