Janette H. Ok. <i>Constructing Ethnic Identity in 1 Peter: Who You Are No Longer</i>

As an African American, I hear 1 Peter’s resonance with my diaspora identity because the letter does not merely recognize the marginal reality of the addressees but also affirms their uniqueness within a society hostile toward them. Rather than succumbing to the shame American society assigned to Blackness, many of my people flipped the script to assert “Black Lives Matter,” that “Black is beautiful,” and to adopt a variety of perspectives and practices that affirmed our racial identity. We turned words that were designed to shame us into badges of honor in the way that 1 Pet 4:16 turns the epithet “Christian” into a positive identity marker. Perhaps because I read 1 Peter through the lens of my African American identity, I appreciate how Janette Ok acknowledges her social location and considers how the letter might influence Asian American studies (pp. 92–93). But before she addresses “implications for the ways in which ethnic minority groups participate in American civic society” (p. 92), Ok explores how the author of 1 Peter offers Gentile converts to Christianity in Anatolia a way to negotiate their disfavored status among the broader society. She explains how Peter (Ok understands 1 Peter to be pseudonymous, but for convenience refers to the author as “Peter”) constructs for his readers an ethnic identity modeled after ancient Israel’s (pp. 60, 67). 1 Peter 2:9–10 and 4:16 are key passages that Ok relies on to speak to group identity.Ok introduces her study by defining the terms identity, ethnic (especially in contrast to race), and ethnic group, explaining that individual and group identification is not an inherent possession but a process that requires social interaction for people to categorize themselves as well as others. In “Introduction: What Do Ethnicity and Identity Have to Do with 1 Peter?” Ok builds on Denise K. Buell’s study of “ethnic reasoning,” asserting that “Peter constructs identity as an ethnic identity” so as to build a stronger sense of “social cohesion” among the Christian converts (p. 9). This constructed ethnic identity does not emphasize a Jew/Gentile contrast but “broadens the identification of Israel” to highlight the distinction between “the people of God and the people not of God” (p. 11).Ok’s second chapter, “Defining and Defying Ethnicity in the Ancient World,” details Greek and Roman ethnic identity. Herodotus understood ethnos, according to Ok, in four ways: common blood, common language, shared religious practice, and shared customs (p. 13), enabling Greeks to designate all others as barbarians. By contrast, “Roman identity was not an ethnic identity as it was for the Greeks” but was a fluid cultural identity defined in terms of loyalty to the empire (pp. 32–33). Here, Ok sets that stage for presenting Peter as making a Greek-like appeal for identity by arguing that his readers share a common history as well as common family ties.“Common Blood: Establishing a New Patrilineage through the Blood of Christ” is Ok’s third chapter and focuses most directly on specific passages within 1 Peter. Ok exegetes a number of passages that emphasize God’s fatherhood and the community’s position as God’s obedient children (e.g., 1:3, 14, 23) as well as those that present the image of redemption through Christ’s blood (e.g., 1:18–19; 2:4, 6). Most attention is given to 2:9–10, and Ok avers that Peter, rather than claiming that these gentile converts are “neither Jew nor Greek” (cf. Gal 3:28) or that they have become Jews, he “argues instead that they are no longer Gentiles” (p. 55). By constructing an ethnic identity for the Christians, Peter offers a home for the otherwise homeless converts who suffer, not from God’s punishment but from harassment because of their faith. Peter uses ethnic reasoning in appealing to the believers’ common parentage, common blood, and shared practices, offering a new identity for alienated people.Ok’s fourth chapter, “Constructing Boundaries and Contesting Stigma in the Making of Ethnic Identity in 1 Peter,” deftly interweaves the work of cultural anthropologist Fredrik Barth and sociologist Ervin Goffman with exegesis of passages in 1 Peter. Barth informs Ok’s analysis of boundary construction, providing clarity on the role of stereotypes to “delimit rather than delineate culture” (p. 70). Ok argues that “Peter sets up exaggerated binaries between what the Gentiles and the people of God do” (p. 70), noting that there may be some shared definitions of good in order for the Christians to be a witness to the broader society (p. 69). Boundaries pave the way for negative stereotyping and labeling. Ok examines Goffman’s work on stigma, noting the way dominant cultures exercise the power to stigmatize. “Difference itself does not stigmatize a person, but rather ‘undesired difference’ from what is anticipated stigmatizes a person” (p. 76). When the dominant culture sets the expectations of what is desirable, the marginalized get stigmatized by failing to measure up. Ok delves into a study of whiteness and faith in Norway to explain how marginalized Muslims may be easily stigmatized because of their dark skin and religiosity, while white Christians can conceal their faith and “pass” in their society, dodging the stigma associated with dark skin and religious devotion. Stigma, however, can be reversed, and Ok’s exploration of Somalis in Toronto demonstrates how a marginalized group may develop a separate system of honor in contrast to that erected by the dominant culture (p. 86). This is, in some ways, what Peter does in 4:16 when he honors those enduring the epithet “Christian.”“Conclusion: Reinforcing Christian Distinctiveness through Bonds of Blood” is Ok’s final chapter, which not only summarizes the arguments of the previous chapters but offers at least two stimulating topics for future study: (1) the aforementioned implications for Asian American studies and (2) the role of ethnic reasoning in the development of the NT canon. Ok confronts the perpetual foreigner label that Asian Americans face and raises questions regarding how Asian American Christians might find exhortation as well as consolation from 1 Peter. Ok raises other intriguing questions regarding how our current canon may have developed based on how well the writings contributed to “the social cohesion and sense of new identity of the Christ followers” (p. 95).Janette H. Ok’s densely packed, multidisciplinary study provides critical insight into the importance of ethnic identity for early Christians in Anatolia. I continue to wonder, however, if there was any way that recognition of a new ethnic identity benefited enslaved people (2:18–21) and women (3:1–6). Women and enslaved people are told to conform in ways their hierarchical society expected. How might the new sense of group cohesion that Peter envisioned serve the lowest of the low? Even though Ok sees 1 Peter as reflecting a late rather than mid-first-century reality, her study is nevertheless significant for our understanding of Christian community formation within the Roman Empire, as she raises questions for how the formation of ethnic identity may have shaped early Christian communities.

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