Interpreters of Matthew's Parable of the Wedding Feast (22.1-14) typically associate the 'king' with God and then justify his violent attacks against city and guests; interpreters of the Parable of the Ten Virgins (25.1-13) typically associate the 'bridegroom' with Jesus and then justify his extreme rejection of the 'foolish virgins.' Questioning such allegorical interpretations, this study first details how Hebrew, Greek, and Roman texts depict - without requiring allegorical understandings - numerous bridegrooms associated not only with joy but also with violence and death....

The ninth volume in this series deals with the second part of Luke's narrative: the Acts of the Apostles. In this diverse collection, Janice Capel Anderson, James Arlandson, Virginia Burrus, Karen Torjesen, Beverly Gavanta, Musimbi Kanyoro, Dennis MacDonald, Shelly Matthews, Todd Penner, Caroline Vander Stichele, Robert Price, Barbara Reid, Scott Spencer, Jeffrey Staley, and Kathy Chambers utilize a variety of approaches to address issues of ethnicity and class, economic and social status, speech and silence, comedy and tragedy, construction of masculinity, mission and post-colonial...