Acts’ Speech Component

This component’s importance is evident since Acts’ speeches consist of about 25% of Acts’ text443 _{increasing to 74% if the speeches’ narrative contexts are included.}444

This study focuses on the twenty-six major speeches,445 _{although scholars differ over}

the total number.446 _{Historical accuracy and literary artistry}447 _{are held together by}

the Graeco-Roman historiographical practice of designing speeches appropriate for the speaker (προσωποποία).448 _{The search for Acts’ literary shape focuses on the}

speeches’ micro-literary shape, narrative context, and pattern within the whole narrative including an exploration of their size and sequence. However, the focus on Acts’ big picture means that a detailed rhetorical analysis is not undertaken.449

The speeches’ micro-literary shape is considered by exploring their individual beginning, middle, and ending450 _{in order to discern significance.}451

443 _{Aune, Literary Environment, 125; Keener, Acts, 1:261–62.} 444 _{Aune, Literary Environment, 127.}

445 _{This study identifies twenty-six major speeches (see Diagram IX, p.106) by adding Paul’s}

speech to Festus (25:8b, 10–11) to an amalgamation of Witherington, Acts, 119, whose twenty-four also omits Paul’s final speech to the Roman Jews (28:17b–20); and Kennedy. Rhetorical Criticism, 114–39, whose twenty-five also omits Paul to the Jerusalem Jews (23:1b, 3b, 5b, 6b), Paul to Gentiles at Lystra (14:15b–17), and his first speech to the Roman Jews (28:25b–28, but adds the church’s prayer (4:24–30), splits Festus’s speech to Agrippa into two speeches (28:14b–21 and 24b–27), and Paul’s prophecy on shipboard (27:21–26).

446 _{Twenty-eight in Fitzmyer, Acts, 104; thirty-two in Aune, Literary Environment, 124, 125;}

thirty-six in Soards, Speeches in Acts, 1, 21; and thirty-seven in Holladay, Acts, 40–42.

447 _{Fred Veltman, “The Defence Speeches of Paul in Acts”, in Talbert, Perspectives, 243–56;}

Marion L. Soards, The Speeches in Acts: Their Content, Context and Concerns (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1994), 1–11; Gene L. Green, “Luke: Historian, Rhetor, and Theologian. Historiography and the Theology of the Speeches of Acts”, in New Testament Theology in the Light of the Church’s Mission: Essays in Honour of I. Howard Marshall, ed. Jon C. Laansma, Grant Osborne and Ray van Neste (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2011), 161–180; Sean A. Adams, “On Sources and Speeches: Methodological Discussions in Ancient Prose Works and Luke-Acts”, in Christian Origins and Greco-Roman Culture: Social and Literary Contexts for the New Testament, ed. Stanley E. Porter and Andrew W. Witts, TENTS 9 (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 389–411; Padilla, Acts, 123–149; Holladay, Acts, 42–46.

448 _{Lucian, How to Write History, 6.58. Cf. Kennedy, Rhetorical Criticism, 116; Aune,}

Literary Environment, 125–26; Keener, Acts, 1:259–261; Witherington, Acts, 115–16.

449 _{Ancient rhetoric categorises the speeches as forensic (legal about the past), deliberative}

(political about the future) and epideictic (ceremonial about the present) types of speeches. Aristotle, Rhet. 1.4–8; Mack, Rhetoric, 34–35; Witherington, New Testament Rhetoric, 13–14; Martin L. Clarke, Rhetoric at Rome: A Historical Survey, 3rd _{ed. (New York: Routledge, 1996).}

450 _{In ancient rhetoric the four parts of a speech are the proem (introduction), narratio (facts),}

probatio (arguments), and peroratio (epilogue). H. C. Lawson-Tancred, The Art of Rhetoric: Aristotle. Translation with an Introduction and Notes (London: Penguin, 2004), 44; Kennedy, Rhetorical Criticism, 23; Myres, Herodotus, 80; Duckworth, Structural Patterns, 23–24; Witherington, New Testament Rhetoric, 16 makes a case for five parts by dividing out propositio from narratio.

451 _{Dunn, Beginning, 87; Osvaldo Padilla, “The Speeches in Acts: Historicity, Theology and}

Although the speeches of Acts are shorter452 _{and more direct}453 _{than the normal}

Graeco-Roman speeches, they still reveal a literary shape. Often the speech is interrupted emphasising either a strategic point454 _{or giving opportunity for further}

remarks.455

The speeches’ context within the narrative is also relevant to literary shape.456

The symbiotic relationship between a speech and its surrounding narrative gives the possibilities that the word interprets the deed,457 _{the setting illustrates or gives a}

context for the word,458 _{or the word and setting have different significances.}459

The speeches’ overall pattern suggests that the whole Acts’ narrative is arranged as a framework for them.460 _{The speeches are located at climactic story}

turning points461 _{and show progressive development.}462 _{Diagram IX, on the next}

page, shows the speeches’ size and sequence.463

452 _{Padilla, Acts, 140–143, citing Diodorus Siculus, Bib. Hist. 20.1.1–4, who comments on}

Graeco-Roman long speeches.

453 _{Aune, Literary Environment, 127, notes some ancient historians slide from indirect to}

direct discourse including Josephus, J.W. 4.40–48, 238–269, 272–282; Herodotus, Hist. 1.118, 125, 153; 3.156.2–3; 5:31, 39; 6:1; 9.2; Thucydides, Peloponnesian War. 1.137.4; 3.113; 8:53.

454 _{Daniel Lynwood Smith, The Rhetoric of Interruption: Speech-Making, Turn-Taking, and}

Rule-Breaking in Luke-Acts and Ancient Greek Narrative, BZNW 193 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2012), 8– 9, defines an interruption as a “breaking in upon” rather than merely a “breaking the continuity of” and as a result, 218–43, lists Acts 2:37; 4:1; 7:54–57; 10:44; 13:48; 17:32; 19:28; 22:22; 23:7; 24:25; 26. Cf. G. H. R Horsley, “Speeches and Dialogues in Acts”, NTS 32 (1986): 609–614, citing 610–11.

455 _{Acts 2:37, followed by 2:38–39; 7:54, followed by 7:55–56; 10:44–46, followed by 10:47;}

23:2, followed by 23:3; 24:4 followed by 24:5; 26:24, followed by 26:25–27; and 26:28, followed by 26:29.

456 _{Myres, Herodotus, 80; Duckworth, Structural Patterns, 23–24.}

457 _{Keener, Acts, 1:265; Marguerat, Christian Historian, 91; Brian A. Rosner, “Acts and}

Biblical History”, in Winter and Clarke, Ancient Literary Setting, 65–82, citing 76.

458 _{Todd Penner, “Civilizing Discourse: Acts, Declamation and the Rhetoric of the Polis”, in}

Penner and Stichele, Contextualizing Acts, 65–104, citing 84; Robert C. Tannehill, “The Functions of Peter’s Mission Speeches in the Narrative of Acts”, NTS 37 (1991): 400–414; Padilla, “Speeches in Acts”, 189.

459 _{Shipp, Reluctant Witness, 69.}

460 _{Cook, “Traveller’s Tales”, 447; Dibelius, Acts, 145; Witherington, Acts, 119; Padilla,}

“Speeches in Acts”, 189.

461 _{Martin Dibelius, “The Speeches in Acts and Ancient Historiography”, in Studies in the}

Acts of the Apostles, ed. Heinrich Greeven (New York: Scribner’s Sons, 1958), 138–185, citing 164. Cf. Myres, Herodotus, 80; Duckworth, Structural Patterns, 23–24; Miesner, “Missionary Journeys”, 212; Fitzmyer, Acts, 108; Witherington, Acts, 119; Eckhard Plümacher, “The Mission Speeches in Acts and Dionysius of Halicarnassus”, in Moessner, Heritage of Israel, 251–66, citing 255; Luke Timothy Johnson, Septuagintal Midrash in the Speeches of Acts (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2002), 10.

462 _{Dennis J. Hamm, Acts of the Apostles (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2005), 8;}

Miesner, “Missionary Journeys”, 212; Dibelius, “Speeches in Acts”, 145; Stevens, Acts, 174–75.

463 _{The statistical calculations underlying Diagram IX are shown for the larger literary size}

speeches represented by boxes on scale of one sq. mm. per word as Peter/Jews (2:14b–36, 38b, 39, 40b), 481; Peter/Jews (3:12b–26), 296; Stephen/Jewish leaders (7:2b–53, 56b), 1,014; Peter/Cornelius (10:28b, 29, 34b–43, 47), 232; Peter/Jewish believers (11:5–17), 241; Paul’s first speech/Jews (13:16b–41, 46b, 47), 425 + 45 = 470; Paul/Ephesian leaders (20:18b–35), 320; Paul/Jews (22:1, 3– 21), 372; Festus/Agrippa (25:14b–21, 24b–27), 224; Paul/Agrippa (26:2–23, 25b–27, 29b), 496. The other speeches are not in boxes since they have less than 200 words.

The top six speeches in literary size by word count464 _{are: (1) Stephen to the}

Jerusalem Jewish leaders (1,014);465 _{(2) Paul to King Agrippa at Caesarea (496); (3)}

Peter at Pentecost to Jerusalem Jews (481); (4) Paul to Pisidian Antioch Jews (470); (5) Paul to Jerusalem Jews (372); and (6) Paul to Ephesian leaders at Miletus (320).

The literary sequence includes: (1) an even spread of speeches throughout Acts; (2) eight speeches by Peter, one by James, one by Stephen, eleven by Paul, one by the Jerusalem elders and four by non-Christians; (3) the target audiences include ten speeches to Jews;466 _{six to believers;}467 _{and six to Gentiles;}468 _{and (4) a}

preponderance of longer speeches in Acts’ Beginning and Ending.469

A speech’s intertextual material is also important.470