Framing Social Criticism in the Jesus Movement

Although it has become increasingly popular to understand the earliest rural Jesus movement as emerging from a peasant milieu, proponents of this model have not yet taken the time to explore the ramifications for a highly stylized written document being the earliest evidence for this movement. On the contrary, the Sayings Gospel Q, a sophisticated literary text having affinities with other ancient literature and even documentary papyri, does not seem to be a product of a peasant milieu. Even so, Q does not appear to be the product of elites either, for the text is rife with tropes of social and economic marginality. In order to access the elusive "middling stratum" from which Q's authors may stem, Sarah E. Rollens looks cross-culturally at middling figures to understand the ideological project in Q.