Title: Ekklesia
Description: This dissertation investigates and reconstructs a vital discourse centered on the democratic, civic ekklesia in the early Roman Empire, demonstrating this discourse's place in the rhetorical construction of the early Christian letter 1 Corinthians. Scholars of ancient history and the New Testament have widely dismissed the civic ekkl esia , the assembly, as a functioning institution or source of social knowledge in the first century. By contrast, this dissertation argues that this period knew a widespread ekklesia discourse that originated with the civic assembly, but expanded into numerous other sites to constitute logic and topoi associated with constructions of ancient democracy. With a fresh examination of first-century Greek texts, the dissertation maps the contours of ekkl esia discourse in various sites including education, civic government and the reinterpretation of biblical narrative by the Jewish writer Josephus. While this examination draws out key topoi of ekklesia discourse including communal discernment, citizen speech and freedom, it also explores the role of the discourse in critical debates over citizen participation and leadership. Mapping this wider ekklesia discourse in the first century facilitates a new consideration of the struggles and debates visible in the first letter to the Corinthians.

A rhetorical analysis of 1 Corinthians indicates that both Paul and the Corinthians deploy ekklesia discourse towards a construction of this community as a democratic assembly. This construction features the authority of the assembly as a decision-making body and the exercise of leadership through persuasive speech. However, the rhetoric of 1 Corinthians also shows that Paul and the Corinthians alternately mobilize ekkl esia discourse in struggles over leadership, participation and communal identity. While Paul's rhetoric engages an ekkl esia discourse designed to promote hierarchy and his own position as an apostolic leader, the Corinthians mobilize a competing discourse towards an egalitarian vision of community that emphasizes the open participation of free "citizens." While providing significant insight into one early Christian community and its relationship with the apostle Paul, a focus on ekklesia discourse in first-century literature also suggests new possibilities for the way we interpret community dynamics and debates over leadership, freedom and equality in the early Roman Empire.