Rubén Muñoz Larrondo, A Postcolonial Reading Of The Acts Of The Apostles, Studies In Biblical Literature 147 (New York Peter Lang, 2012). Xiv + 249 Pp., $80.95 Hardback.

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Book Reviews / Pneuma 35 (2013) 87-156

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Rubén Muñoz-Larrondo, A Postcolonial Reading of the Acts of the Apostles, Studies in Biblical Literature 147(New York: Peter Lang, 2012). xiv + 249 pp., $80.95 hardback.

According to F. F. Bruce, the author of Acts deserves the title “the first Christian apologist.” In a view that has gained traction in North American contexts, Bruce suggests that Luke wrote, at least in part, to demonstrate that Christianity did not pose a threat to the Roman Empire. To the contrary, Rubén Muñoz-Larrondo argues that Acts describes Christians “resisting two centers of power: the Roman Empire and the institutions that define Juda- ism” (1). Indeed, far from legitimizing the Christians in relation to Rome, Luke’s second vol- ume forms “a literature of resistance” designed to show that both imperial and Jewish authorities and structures exist in opposition to God’s divine plan (116).

As the work’s title indicates, Muñoz-Larrondo’s methodology consists of postcolonial criticism. Amid a proliferation of reading strategies in the past two decades, postcolonial criticism aims for a contrapuntal approach that questions colonialism’s thought and prac- tices. Muñoz-Larrondo desires to highlight textual features that traditional historical-critical approaches miss, such as the existence of power structures and those outside the hegemony. The book’s first chapter offers a helpful introduction to this way of reading through defini- tions of significant terms and categories.

A key feature of Muñoz-Larrondo’s postcolonial reading involves the “openness to a mul- tiplicity of meaning” (7). Thus, like other postcolonial readers, Muñoz-Larrondo interprets from a specific social location. He carefully identifies himself as a member of a diaspora. He writes as “a dark mestizo” Chilean now living as a nortemaraucano. Chileans view him as “contaminated”; North Americans see him as “only an alien” (12-13).

After defining his method and identifying his social location, Muñoz-Larrondo chooses a brief and seemingly isolated text as the starting point for his inquiry into Acts. While some critics suggest that Acts 12 functions as a dividing point, Muñoz-Larrondo contends that Acts 12:20-24 and its story of “liberation and divine punishment” comprises the turning point in Luke’s narrative. Modeled after the Exodus, the scene of Peter’s prison deliverance followed by Herod’s gruesome death functions as type-scene highlighting Luke’s theme of self-exalta- tion and reversal. Thus, Muñoz-Larrondo avows that Herod’s demise demonstrates that “God is in control of the affairs of the world and any cooptation of the divine prerogatives will be punished” (45).

According to Muñoz-Larrondo, the Herod type-scene indicts both the Empire and the institutions of Judaism. In their opposition to Jesus as the Messiah and their development of alternative allegiances, these systems have assured their fate. The Lukan community with its “other king” stands in opposition to the imperial cult (Acts 17:7). The Christians in Acts teach “unlawful customs for Romans to adopt” and behave “contrary to the decrees of the emperor” (17:6). Muñoz-Larrondo contends that Acts calls Christians to “counter-cultural challenge” and rejection of “the dominant ideology and culture” (73).

Muñoz-Larrondo’s reading of Acts will challenge Pentecostal/Charismatic readers and interpreters on at least two fronts. For one, Western readers must ask themselves, in what ways do we uphold imperialism in our day? Is it any wonder that readers would be attracted to an interpretation of Acts as apology for the harmlessness of the early Christians when we

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Book Reviews / Pneuma 35 (2013) 87-156

ourselves seek to be assimilated to empire with it economics, military, and expansion in our time?

Secondly, Western believers must recognize an “ironic reversal.” For the first century of the movement, Pentecostal/Charismatic Christians in the West have focused on sending missionaries to rest of the world. Muñoz-Larrondo points out that the “rest of the world” (i.e., Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Oceania) now includes more than sixty percent of Christians (8). His reading of Acts suggests the need for the Christian West to heed the voice of the so-called Third World. Therein lays the challenge for Pentecostal/Charismatic inter- preters in the Global South. In the words of Muñoz-Larrondo, “third-world theologies have an obligation and responsibility to represent those flesh-and-blood believers in their daily struggles.” (8)

In that vein, Pneuma readers will find Muñoz-Larrondo’s reading of the Pentecost narra- tive insightful. Following the lead of his teacher Fernando Segovia, Muñoz-Larrondo sug- gests that people from all social locations in the world began to speak to the world at large in Acts 2. In something Amos Yong might write, Muñoz-Larrondo equates the plurality of voices at Pentecost with the plurality of readings in biblical criticism. He observes that this plurality “does not result from one single reading down from the ‘center’ . . .; the reading comes from people of many places outside the center.” Thus, “Acts 2 demonstrates this plu- rality that ‘all the people from under heaven’ now are those who are experiencing the power of the proclamation of the established kingdom of ‘the last days’ (2:17), where ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved’ (2:21)” (132-133).

A plurality of biblical readings may make those engrained in the historical-critical method uncomfortable. A concern for safeguarding the authenticity of the text’s meaning and guarding against subjectivism makes sense. But postcolonial criticism in general and Muñoz-Larrondo’s reading in particular serve as a reminder that any interpretation of a bib- lical text must have as its point of departure a real live community of faith. For Pentecostals seeking the Spirit’s guidance within diverse communities at a particular time and place, this emphasis proves relevant.

In the final analysis, Muñoz-Larrondo offers an engaging reading of the quintessential Pentecostal biblical text. As a revision of the author’s doctoral dissertation at Vanderbilt University, the work might not prove beneficial as a primary text, but it should be included in bibliographies for courses on Luke-Acts or hermeneutics. In whatever context it is read, the book reminds Christians that they, like the diasporic Muñoz-Larrondo himself live between two worlds, between the empires and the eschatological kingdom of God.

Reviewed by Matthew Paugh

Pastor, Elk Garden Charge of the United Methodist Church Kitzmiller, Maryland

[email protected]

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