Religious allegiance and the subordination of family ties

These words from the final verse of Luther's famous hymn are a rhetorically powerful reminder of an aspect of religious allegiance and devotion which has been characteristic of Christian belonging from the beginning: that loyalty to God and discipleship of Christ are commitments of a transcendent kind which take priority over the closest of mundane ties, even ties of natural kinship. The aim of this study is to demonstrate and explain the importance of this element in the teaching about discipleship of Jesus in the Gospels of Mark and Matthew.

The tensions illustrated against a wider historical background

That following Jesus or conversion to the Christian way commonly generated intra-familial tensions and competition for the allegiance of the believer cannot be doubted. A brief survey of evidence from the first two centuries of the Common Era will show both the pervasiveness and the persistence of supra-familial and (what could be seen as) even anti-familial tendencies in early Christianity. Significantly, it is a matter which attracted comment from both insiders and outsiders.

The response of outsiders

a. The hostile comment of the Roman historian Tacitus on proselytes to Judaism reflects quite accurately the fears of outsiders generally about the effect of religious conversion upon family ties.