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‘Teaching You in Public and from House to House’ (Acts 20.20): Unpacking a Cultural Stereotype

Modern scholarship has difficulty interpreting Paul’s claim to ‘teach in public and from house to house’ because it lacks scientific understanding of ‘space’. The anthropological model of ‘territoriality’ is presented to guide our reading in terms of: (1) the classification of space, (2) communication of this and (3) control based upon it. The primary classifications of space in the New Testament world and specifically the book of Acts are: (1) public/private, (2) male/female and (3) honorable/mean. Each of these classifications helps us to interpret Paul in public-civic space (agora, governor’s residences), in private-non-kinship space (synagogue, Tyrannus’s aule), and in private-household space. The payoff comes when we observe that Paul has voice in public-political forums and in private-household contexts, but not in private-non-kinship synagogues. Paul, who hails from a ‘no-low status city’, visits other honorable cities and speaks in their most noble parts. Thus ‘territorality’ serves as an index of Paul’s social status, both in terms of where he goes and before whom he has voice.