Children in the New Testament

Abstract

This article situates recent scholarship related to children and metaphors of childhood within a global context. It attends to the importance of childist criticism, located primarily in Europe and the United States, in the growth of study of children in the New Testament in recent decades, while attending to parallel work on the role of children in the New Testament, particularly in relation to contextualized readings, in the global South. Specific attention is given to the use of language in defining children and childhood both within and outside the biblical context; overviews of biblical childhood; and the roles and representations of children in New Testament texts. The essay concludes by looking forward to future opportunities for research and collaboration.

Keywords

child children childist childism Greco-Roman household childhood studies childlikeness parent-child child(ren) of God infancy narratives infancy gospels nativity

Introduction

The world of the New Testament is replete with children. Due to higher infant mortality rates and shorter life expectancies, approximately one-third of the population in the first-century Mediterranean world was under the age of fifteen years (Parkin 2013: 14). Nevertheless, it was not until the latter half of the twentieth century that children themselves received sustained attention in New Testament studies; and even later that the study of children in biblical texts, the New Testament included, began to grow at an accelerated rate. Several recent review essays trace the field’s development with attention to this latter growth (Aasgaard 2006, 2019; Gallagher Elkins and Parker 2016; Lindeman Allen 2020c; see also Bunge, Fretheim, and Gaventa 2008: xiv-xxvi; Lindeman Allen 2019a: xiv-xix; Lim 2021: 8-26), linking increased attention to the characterization and metaphorization of children in the New Testament with parallel studies of children in the Hebrew Bible and, in particular, the recent emergence of childist criticism as a distinct methodological and perspectival approach (Gallagher Elkins 2013; Gallagher Elkins and Parker 2016; Betsworth and Parker 2019; Garroway and Martens 2019b; Garroway 2020; Parker 2023).

This essay will pay attention to childism as a primary methodological approach, while locating it within the larger context of the study of children within the Greco-Roman environs and early Christian and Jewish households. Since terms like child(ren) and childhood are widely used but variously understood, I begin by defining my use of these terms and locating them within the wider practice of childist or child-centric scholarship. Next, I survey language around children within the New Testament more broadly, including studies on specific vocabulary and relationships. This leads into discussion of the roles and characterization of children within New Testament and extra-canonical literature. And finally, potential areas both for further research and for more expansive collaboration in the field.

The Study of Children in the New Testament

K. Gallagher Elkins locates the emergence of childist criticism within feminist approaches to interpretation (2020). K. Garroway offers more specific methodological applications for the term childist (Garroway and Martens 2019a; Garroway 2019), while also advocating for a broader definition, quoting J.F. Parker’s paper to the Society of Biblical Literature, in which Parker defines ‘Childist biblical interpretation’ as that which ‘critically examines the construction of children in the Bible and reads the text with a focus on children to reassess their roles and importance’ (2014). Garroway argues, ‘Embracing a definition such as this that focuses on children and not the particular methods or steps used to find them allows the field to include a wider range of scholarship’ (2020: 6). It is this wide range of scholarship, distinct but related to readings of New Testament texts with and alongside children (Briggs 2017; Grobbelaar 2020) that this essay primarily seeks to explore.

Although scattered scholarship on this topic, particularly around Jesus’ blessing of the children, dates back to at least the nineteenth century, it was not until the advent of childhood and family studies that sustained and critical attention to children in the New Testament began to emerge. Broadly speaking, such study of children in the ancient world owes much of its momentum to Phillipe Ariès’ classic study of childhood (1960, 1962). Ariès’ thesis that childhood was an invention of seventeenth century European culture has rightly and widely been disputed (cf. Lim 2021: 10); however, his identification of childhood as a social construct paved the way for significant studies of children and childhood within cultural contexts. To this end, the systemic study of children and childhood has grown in earnest since its beginnings in 19^th century Euro-American discourse into a 21^st century global discourse (Grobbelaar 2016b).

The Contexts of the First Century Mediterranean World

The aspects of childhood studies most pertinent to the New Testament include scholarship on childhood in classical Greek (Golden 1990; Neils and Oakley 2003; Pache 2004; Cohen and Rutter 2007; Beaumont 2012; Golden 2015), Roman (Rawson 1986; Wiedemann 1989; Bradley 1991; Dixon 1992; Huskinson 1996; Rawson 1996; Lassen 1997; Rawson and Weaver 1997; Dixon 2001; Harlow and Laurence 2002; Laes 2003, 2011, 2019; Rawson 2003; Harlow and Laurence 2007; Harlow and Laurence 2010; Dolansky 2008; Bartchy 2013; Caldwell 2015; Laes et al. 2015; Aasgaard 2017; Laes and Vuolanto 2017; Carroll 2018), and Northern African contexts (Cribiore 1996; Cribiore 2001; Marshall 2022). Such scholarship reaches across historical and sociological disciplines and includes several volumes that span Mediterranean antiquity more broadly, with attention to two or more of these connected locales (Dasen 2004; Fass 2004; Lindemann 2011; Rawson 2011; Laurence and Strömberg 2012; Cohick 2013; Green and McDonald 2013; Grubbs et al. 2013; Witherington 2013; Aasgaard, Horn, and Cojocaru 2018; Crawford, Hadley, and Shepherd 2018). Although these studies are not directly related to Christianity, Rawson correctly observes that ‘in many respects Christians in the early centuries can be seen as a subset of the Roman population, not seeking to advertise themselves publicly as a sector apart’ (2003b: 296).

Moreover, these diverse geographies make clear that the population of the Roman Empire at the time of the New Testament was not monolithic. Early Jewish and Christian families were not contained to the regions of Judea and Galilee, but rather, lived across the geographical and cultural intersections of the empire due both to diaspora and conversion. As such, scholars of early Judaism and Christianity have sought to highlight the specific experiences of children and families within the wider Roman culture through scholarship dedicated to children and families in early Jewish (Kraemer 1989; Cohen 1993; Botha 1998; Bovon 2002; Marcus 2004; Tropper 2006; Dorff 2012; Sasson 2012; Yinger 2013; Murphy 2014; Garroway 2018; Sivan 2018) and Christian households and literature (Currie 1993; Osiek 1995; Strange 1996; Moxnes 1997; Osiek and Balch 1997; Bovon 1999; Bunge 2001; Bovon 2002; Balch and Osiek 2003; Bakke 2005; Balla 2005; Aasgaard 2006; Osiek, MacDonald, and Tulloch 2006; Horn and Martens 2009; Horn and Phenix 2009; Lindemann 2010; Lutterbach 2010; Miller-McLemore 2010; Punt 2010; Zwilling 2010; Leyerle 2013; MacDonald 2014; Solevåg 2017; Lietaert Peerbolte 2021), including a few studies combining the two (Hess and Carroll 2003; Koskenniemi 2009; King 2013; Tuor-Kurth 2010; Yamauchi and Wilson, 2014). At the same time, A.-J. Levine rightly calls for caution in characterizations of early Christian views of children (2003: 332; see also Miller-McLemore 2010), especially when compared with Jewish and Greco-Roman corollaries. Such characterizations run the risk of contrasts between Christian households and Jewish or Greco-Roman households that unduly favor the Christian perspective. As such, I argue for more nuanced readings that recognize both the mutual valuation of children across these cultures and continued vulnerability (2022), with recognition that children were perhaps especially vulnerable in early Christian contexts as A.J. Murphy observes (2013).

Taken together, this range of scholarship points to the diverse and intersectional experiences of children. Unfortunately, such studies of early Christianity still tend to lean heavily upon the European aspects of Greco-Roman environments with a lack of sustained attention to North African and Asian context and influences. Reminding readers that the regions of Judea and Galilee are Afro-Asiatic, R.S. Sadler Jr. highlights the importance of more equitable attention to the embeddedness of African geography and culture within the biblical texts for ‘countering the impact of Eurocentric scholarship, which tends either to equate biblical characters with proto-Europeans or to overlook contributions of African figures in the biblical story’ (2007: 24). Although Rome, at the center of the Roman Empire, is located in Europe, the majority of the New Testament documents take place in and were written in and to African and Asian locales. Recognizing the tendency to overlook both the diverse environs of the New Testament and the diverse scholars who study it, W. Park identifies whiteness as a methodological problem across the discipline and proposes a move from ‘monoracial to multiracial biblical studies’ that moves towards, among other things, equitable citation and engagement with non-white scholars (2021: 435). It is to such a project that this bibliography endeavors.

The Contexts of Twenty-First Century Scholarship

To this end, a review of the growth of scholarship around children in the New Testament would be incomplete without acknowledgment that concomitant with growth comes growing pains. Scholarship on children in the New Testament has come a long way both in attending to supersessionist bias and incorporating diverse voices; however, we still have far to go. In his assessment of the future potential for scholarship on children in the New Testament, R. Aasgaard notes the need for careful consideration of ‘continuation and changes over time, both in perceptions of childhood and in the living conditions of the children themselves’ (2019: 38). Such consideration is necessary both to avoid Christian supersessionist and Eurocentric biases. The latter of these, within the study of children and childhoods in the New Testament (and the application of this study through childist criticisms), shows up not only in the characterization of ancient children within Early Christian literature but also in the failure to keep up with and aware of all the work being now being done in this and related fields.

Several recent annotated bibliographies, both spanning the whole biblical corpus (Aasgaard 2018; Lindeman Allen 2020c) and specific to the New Testament and its environs (Lindemann 2011; Vuolanto 2015; Aasgaard 2021; Lindeman Allen 2021a, 2021b) seek to address this diffusion of scholarship. Unfortunately, such work has frequently fallen short, especially with attention to research written in languages other than English and originating from scholars of the global South. Regarding the former, W. Grünstäudl’s assessment of the emergence of childist criticism notes the ‘strong Anglophone character of the discourse…which sometimes makes itself felt negatively in a decoupling of non-English language research’ (2021: 113). At the same time, in his critique Grünstäudl limits his own primary corpus of non-English research to scholarship emerging from the global North, especially that written in German. Meanwhile, excellent scholarship in multiple languages has been and continues to be produced on the topics of children and childhood pertaining to the New Testament by scholars of the global South (cf. Abay; Ayelotan; Bartolomé; Botha; Bravo Aguirre; Breed; Carbrido; Chirstine; Feder; Draper; Dube; Gabaitse; Gabra; Grobbelaar; Ibita; Jeyaraj; Knoetze; Loader; Lopes; Madzokere; Martínez; Mayagoitia; Mayor Tamayo; Mbuvi; Montemayor; Mothoagae; Ndlovu; Nkwoka; Okure; Petallar; Punt; Ramírez; Reyes Archila; Ruele; Sanchez; Segura; Togarasei; van Rensburg; Villalobos Mendoza; Villota Herrero; Wanamaker) as well as scholars from nations often marginalized within New Testament scholarship, but economically classified within the global North (cf. Asano; Bulkeley; Constanineau; Fenik; S.U. Lim [with Lindeman Allen]; Liu; Pridmore; Watson) and scholars from racially minoritized groups within the United States (cf. Aymer; Buckhanon Crowder; Callahan; Chen; Dickerson; Green; Jasper; Kirk-Duggan; Lettsome; Liew; E. Lim; A. Parker; Pasmiño; Pippin; M.J. Smith; S.T.J. Smith; Wallace). This article seeks to contribute to the growing scholarship around children and childhood in the New Testament by providing an updated overview that brings together a multiplicity of voices that have done and are doing research in this area, with specific attention to scholarship on children in the New Testament being done by scholars from the global South and otherwise minoritized scholars.

Defining and Locating Children in the New Testament

As Ariès and many after him have demonstrated, childhood is a social construct, tied to cultures through time and place. Childhood as narrated in the New Testament or as experienced by those living in its sitz im leben is therefore distinct from childhood as experienced in contemporary contexts today. Nevertheless, with reference to the child characters contained within the New Testament texts and the historical children the same texts variously repress and represent, it is possible to offer more in the way of definition by what is meant by the term child(ren).

The term child variously entails a relational and/or developmental component. J.W. Martens helpfully delineates this in terms of ‘intersection[s] of biology and culture’ (2019c). Thus, Jesus is the child of Mary, whether the gospels situate him as an infant in a manger (Luke 2:16) or as a grown man hanging from a cross (John 19:25–26). At the same time, the children whom Jesus beckons unto him are assumed to not yet be adults (Matthew 19:13–14) based both upon context and the vocabulary used. Words translated as ‘child’ or ‘children’ can therefore designate a person in the phase before adulthood known as childhood, but can also refer to cultural relationships that extend into adulthood. Likewise, at times relational terms like ‘son’ or ‘daughter’, while applicable throughout a person’s life, may contextually indicate a non-adult child. When discussing the study of non-adult children in the New Testament, therefore, it is necessary to acknowledge these overlapping semantic categories.

While some attention is given to the former relational characteristic, especially where the two overlap, the focus of this essay and the majority of childist and child-oriented scholarship on the New Testament is on the latter, developmental, understanding of a child as a minor, or non-adult. Even still, ambiguity remains as to what ages or stages of life delineate a child from an adult and other stages of life. For example, is the infant Jesus already a child or is infancy itself a separate stage (cf. Luke 18:15)? And should the twelve-year-old Jesus at the Temple be considered a child or an adult (Luke 2:41–52)? (van Aarde 2019). To this end, scholars employ a variety of philological and cultural analysis.

Vocabulary for Children

Philological approaches identify and define the Greek terms variously translated as child or used to designate the corollary relational or developmental state (Légasse 1969; Tehan 1988; Weren 1996; Aasgaard 2007; Ibita and Bieringer 2010b; Lindeman Allen 2019a: 9-16; Abay 2021; E. Lim 2021: 41–44).

The primary terms used to refer to young people in the New Testament are either interpersonal, attributive, or fluctuate between each. Interpersonal terms, which primarily signify relationship and are used interchangeably for both young and grown people within the household, include: υἱός (son), θυγάτηρ (daughter), ἀδελφός (sibling; brother), ἀδελφή (sister), and δοῦλος (slave). Other terms indicate specific attributes, such as development, stature, or character, including: βρέφος (fetus; newborn: B.A. Green 2016); νήπιος (infant: Van Rensburg 1986; Fowl 1990), θηλάζων (nursling), παρθένος (young woman of marriageable age; virgin); μικρός (little one; youth; unimportant person: Feder 2014), and νέος (new one; youth; novice). Finally, a third set of terms overlaps between these two, sometimes used to refer only to youth, sometimes only to indicate relationship, and other times an ambiguous combination of the two. These terms include: τέκνον (child; descendant), παιδίον (little child; slave: Carbido 2009; Feder 2014), παῖς (child; slave), νεανίσκος (youth; young man; servant), νεανίας (youth; young man; servant), and νεᾶνις (young woman; maidservant).

Vocabulary of Relationship

The heavily communal nature of first-century Mediterranean culture meant that people were frequently identified by their relationships with others, for example, Paul a slave (δοῦλος) of Jesus Christ (Romans 1:1) or Jesus the son (υἱός) of Joseph (John 1:45; 6:42). While this means of identification is not exclusive to the experience of childhood, discussions of these household relationships applicable to children can be helpful in understanding the use and definition of terms related to children, as well as the roles of children in the New Testament narratives and the communities that produced and used these texts.

Such kinship language is widespread across the New Testament, beginning with the genealogies recorded in Matthew and Luke (Sigismund 2009; Draper 2013; Punt 2013b) and continuing through the household codes of later epistles (Van Rensburg 2006; MacDonald 2008; MacDonald 2011a; MacDonald 2012; MacDonald 2014; Lindeman Allen 2020a). Both Jesus and Paul use of family terms to describe those who follow the gospel (Burke 2004; Aasgaard 2007, 2008; Burke 2012; Finlan 2013), often at the expense of continued commitments to one’s own family, leading to what A.J. Murphy points out could potentially have had disastrous effects upon the children of early followers of Jesus (Murphy 2013; Murphy 2019). Within both the narrative and historical contexts of the texts, child characters and the shadows of children and their places (or lack thereof) within New Testament households can be found in discussion of these household relationships, both narrative and metaphorical.

Perhaps the first relationship one thinks of when considering children and their place within a family is the parent–child relationship. Parenthood is not a major theme in any of the New Testament texts, however, reading between the lines of these texts can offer glimpses into the relationships between parents and their children (Collins 1972; Balla 2002; Balla 2005; Lindemann 2010; S.U. Lim and Lindeman Allen 2022), including the desire of some adults, in the face of infertility, to parent children (Moss and Baden 2015) and the practice and metaphor of adoption (Burke 1998; Burke 2001; Burke 2006; Bartlett 2008). Because of the gendered roles within the first-century household, it is often helpful to focus such readings specifically upon a child’s distinct relationship with their mother or father, respectively.

Feminist and womanist scholars have been particularly prolific in this area, highlighting the unique role of daughters in New Testament households (Betsworth 2010b; Betsworth and J.F. Parker 2022) and emphasizing not only the nurturing side of motherhood but also the degree of industry involved in assuming a maternal role and, at times, the radical courage and subversion necessary for a woman to protect and nurture a child (Fischer 1997; Buckhanon Crowder 2009; Jasper 2009; Kirk-Duggan and Pippin 2009; Liew 2009; Wallace 2009; Buckhanon Crowder 2013; Dickerson 2013; Joynes 2013; Liu 2013; Buckhanon Crowder 2016; A. Parker 2017). This need for protection has also been highlighted as a cause for considering protecting all of God’s children of any age (B.A. Green 2016). Overlapping with this concept of protection, most of what has been written regarding fathers and their children relates to power and social positioning within the household, with clear distinctions between the relations between fathers and sons (Destro and Pesce 2003; Punt 2007; Ramírez 2016a; Ramírez 2016b) and fathers and daughters (Martens 2019b).

Images of power and protection carry over into the metaphorical use of the father–child relationship in the New Testament, specifically with the imagery of father–son, applied both to God–Jesus (Thompson 2000; Chen 2006; Pattarumadathil 2008; Villota Herrero 2013; Callahan 2022) and Paul-church(es) (Wanamaker 1995; Burke 2000; Aasgaard 2007, 2008). In contrast, metaphorical renderings of the mother–child relationship, even when applied to Paul, tend to emphasize the more stereotypical nurturing and interdependent nature of this bond (Gaventa 1990; Gaventa 1996; Gaventa 2007; Aasgaard 2008; Aymer 2009; Pippin 2009; Bulkeley 2014; Asano 2020). Attention to such metaphors is helpful not only in understanding literary portraits of children in these texts but because metaphorical frames rely upon some sense of reality, in piecing together cultural norms of expectations around such relationships as well.

The language of parent-child(ren) is also applied to the relation to God and the people of God, including both the Jewish people of Israel and those—both Jews and Gentiles—who follow Jesus and/or profess him as Lord, with the common phrase ‘children of God’ (W.W. Müller 1995; P. Müller 2001; Müller 2002; Watson 2001; Rhoads 2004; Towner 2008; Friesen 2017). Although the masculine υἱός is used, linguistically this word covers both genders in the plural form and thus it is possible to speak of this relationship either in terms of sonship or descent more generally. The phrase ‘child[ren] of God’ is particularly prevalent in the gospel according to John (Howard-Brook 1994; Kirchhevel 1996; Watt 2000; Kügler 2002; Brown 2017; Draper 2017), where the emphasis on inheritance may (but need not necessarily) suggest a conception of sonship, even when applied to mixed gender groupings.

Related to the parent–child pairing is the relationship between children of the same parent(s). Although frequently focused upon later adult interactions, New Testament scholars have written about the relationships of siblings Early Christian households (Aasgaard 1997; Fatum 1997; Sandness 1997; Aasgaard 2004; Zwilling 2010; Punt 2013a). Such attention to these relationships, even when not explicitly named as such, can help in building a full picture of non-adult children among their kin.

Less spoken of, but just as common in New Testament households were enslaved children. Some enslaved children lived within a household together with members of their birth families, with many similar parent–child and sibling relationships, albeit modified due to changed power dynamics (Laes 2003). Other enslaved children were separated from their biological families either through abandonment, captivity, sale, or death and required fictive or (non-legal) adoptive kinship relationships to meet similar needs. Early New Testament scholarship tends to ignore or too quickly metaphorize enslaved people in the texts, a task made easier in the case of children due to the overlapping vocabulary for children and the enslaved, and so fails to consider the distinct experience of children who were enslaved, or often, even the possibility. As S. Feder clearly names, however, such linguistic overlap is not accidental; it is the result of the colonial move to associate ‘the colonial subject as child’, which helped ‘to legitimize the domination of another group of people’ (2014: 171). The uncomfortable truth is that children were enslaved by followers of Jesus and the later church (and this practice is witnessed to and accepted by New Testament texts) and enslaved adults were referred to as children in this cultural context as a form of derision and control (a practice adopted, without critique, by New Testament authors). In light of these truths, scholars of children, alongside others across the discipline, have begun to recover the identities of enslaved children in the New Testament (Frilingos 2000; D. Martin 2003; Villalobos Mendoza 2012; Bartchy 2013; Punt 2013a; MacDonald 2014: 33–66; Kartzow 2017; Martens 2020; Lopes 2021; Montemayor 2022), including Mary’s self-ascription as enslaved in Luke’s gospel account and the implications of this on Jesus himself (Pope 2018; Lettsome 2021; M.J. Smith 2022a).

Vocabulary of Development

Developmentally, a variety of philosophers, lawyers, and doctors in the Hellenistic world attempted to systematize the human life cycle into distinct developmental phases, assigning distinct ages and proficiencies to various terminology (Parkin 2010). While there is no universal agreement on the developmental stages associated with particular words, Parkin notes that ‘the basic seven ages remain the same’ as a distinction between early and late childhood (2010: 98). Likewise, the onset of puberty, generally between 12 and 14, is universally acknowledged as the end of childhood, though the source texts do not agree upon the existence or cultural experience of an intermediary stage of youth or adolescence or when that stage may end (Parkin 2010: 99).

Adding to this ambiguity among sources, there is no way to know which sources, if any, may have influenced New Testament authors in their understanding of these terms. Most basically, New Testament authors were likely aware of developmental stages at or around the ages of 7 and 14 years old, though terminology across these stages continues to overlap, such that, no specific words are employed by New Testament authors to designate between early and late childhood. As a result, little has been written on the developmental distinctions between words such as παῖς and παιδίον referring to these middle stages of childhood.

In contrast, more attention has focused on the rapidly shifting early stages of life. Studies of children include explorations of New Testament and Early Christian conceptions of when life begins (Playoust and Aiken 2008; M.J. Smith 2022a); the place and role of infants in New Testament and early Christian households (Achtemeir 1989; Kügler 2014); and the metaphorical role of infants, especially in 1 Peter (Francis 1980; Achtemeir 1989; Tite 2009; T.W. Martin 2014; Lindeman Allen 2020a) and the letters of Paul (van Rensburg 1986; Fowl 1990; Gaventa 1991; Aasgaard 2007; McNeel 2013, 2014). Some work has also been done on the liminal ground of youth and young adulthood represented by terms such as νεανίσκος (Lindeman Allen 2022b; Lindeman Allen 2023: 147–174) and παρθένος (De Sousa 2008).

Reading Children in the New Testament

The most well-known child in the New Testament is Jesus himself. Portions of Jesus’ childhood are recorded in the canonical gospels of Matthew and Luke and expanded upon in non-canonical literature. Even with this special attention common to biographies of ‘great men’ in Greco-Roman culture (Bond 2020), it is noteworthy that only two of the twenty-seven canonical books of the New Testament directly address the childhood of Jesus. Given this paucity of information regarding the childhood of Jesus himself, then, it should not be surprising that other children, when they occur in New Testament texts, often do so in supporting (unnamed) roles, unspecified as such, or must be recovered from the background altogether. Attending to this task is the primary work of childist and child-centered New Testament criticism today.

Overviews of Children and Childhood in the New Testament

As the study of children and childhood in the New Testament has grown, multiple overviews have served to introduce the subject both from a predominantly biblical perspective and as it overlaps with the related fields of practical and systematic theology. Practical applications point towards the possibilities of contextual readings of the biblical text to influence contemporary youth and children’s ministry and, in some cases, even social and political policy (Stockton 1983; Bedouelle 1985; Crüsemann 2002; Dube 2002; Lutterbach 2002; Pasmiño 2003; Thatcher 2010; Campagnola 2004; Brueggemann 2008; Bunge 2008; Collier 2009; Drane, Richards, and Privett 2009; Jeyaraj 2009a, 2009c; Bunge 2012b; Harkness 2012; Coltvet 2013; Constantinueanu 2014; Dixon 2014; Gabaitse 2014; Ndlovu 2014; Prevette et al. 2014; Hayes Greener 2016; Petallar 2017; Lindeman Allen 2023; Stollar 2023). More systematic theological approaches, often connected with the Child Theology Movement, also engage in contextual readings of biblical texts, but with an emphasis on meaning making in a religious context (Pridmore 1977; Bunge 2001; Francis 2001; Segura 2006; Jeyaraj 2009b; Dillen and Pollefeyt 2010; White 2010; Bunge 2012a; Grobbelaar 2016b; Grobbelaar and Breed 2016; Knoetze 2016).

Those more biblically oriented overviews can be sorted into several more specific groups. Reference works provide both historical and methodological background for much of the work of childist interpreters today, grounding this study with attention to the presence and contexts of children in the Bible (Lockyer 1970; Weber 1979; McKenna 1994; Zuck 1996; J.T. Carroll 2001; Ebner et al. 2002; Francis 2006; Bunge, Fretheim, and Gaventa 2008; Ibita and Bieringer 2010b; Larsson and Stenstrøm 2012; J.F. Parker et al 2012; Togarasei and Kügler 2014; Betsworth and Parker 2019; Flynn 2019; Garroway and Martens 2019a; Gallagher Elkins 2020; Mayor Tamayo 2022), with The Child in the Bible (Bunge, Fretheim, and Gaventa 2008) marking a significant shift in sustained attention to children in biblical studies for this generation. The 2009 monograph by C.B. Horn and J.W. Martens, Let the Little Children Come to Me, forged this path for New Testament studies the following year, alongside numerous additional overviews of children in the New Testament previous to and following (van Aarde 1991; P. Müller 1992; Francis 1996; Eltrop 2002; Botha 1999a; Botha 2000; Gundry-Volf 2001; Horn and Martens 2009; Oegema and Merz 2021 [includes rabbinic literature]).

Additionally, introductions and in-depth studies of specific corpuses of literature have helped to narrow and hone the field. Children in the gospels, especially the synoptic accounts, have received the greatest attention, oftentimes dominating the focus of general overviews and receiving particular notice in essays and volumes dedicated to children in the gospels (Krause 1973; Gieschen 2013; Murphy 2013; Betsworth 2015; Admirand 2019; Bravo Aguirre 2022; Lindeman Allen 2022a; Lindeman Allen 2023). Moreover, recent scholarship has begun to investigate the nuances of portrayals of children within each of the canonical gospel accounts, including: Matthew (Eltrop 1996; Cvillier 2007; Grobbelaar 2016a; Weaver 2019; Mayagoitia 2022); Mark (Ebner 2002; Maclean 2007; Gundry 2008; Okure 2011; Murphy 2020); Luke (Carroll 2008; Fenik 2019; Lindeman Allen 2019a; Abay 2021); and John (Thompson 2008). General overviews have also been dedicated to the role and presence of children in Paul (Yarbrough 1995; Gerber 2005; Horn 2006; Aasgaard 2007, 2008; Gaventa 2008; Togarasei 2014; Punt 2017) and Acts (Green 2008). These overviews not only outline the scope of the field but in many cases outline new or expanded interpretations of the passages related to children within their respective domains. Scholarship on the role of children (hidden and present) in the general letters, Hebrews, and Revelation has lagged behind, but is not lacking; however, most that has been written on these texts to date fits more in the more detailed analysis of particular pericopes and characterizations than in the category of general overview.

Childhood of Jesus

While there is some debate within New Testament scholarship around the exact relation of the gospel accounts to the Greco-Roman genre of biography, it cannot be denied that there are significant correlations. Both canonical and non-canonical portraits of Jesus’ (and his mother, Mary’s) childhood fall within the standards of this genre. H.K. Bond explains, ancient biographies tend to aim at a seamless characterization of the subject, ‘with subjects [at the beginning of the life cycle] largely reflecting only those traits that will manifest themselves later in life’ (53). Thus, Jesus is not presented as a typical child, but rather as an ideal, and it is impossible to disentangle narrative characterization, historical detail, and theological metaphor from one another within the gospel accounts.

At the same time, in these accounts, Jesus is portrayed in infancy and childhood, dependent upon his parents, growing and maturing, and occasionally interacting with other children. Consequently, attention to these depictions can yield perhaps the most sustained view of a single child and his development available in the New Testament. Scholarship around the infancy narratives in general is too vast to include comprehensively here, however, several excellent overviews (R.E. Brown 1977; R.E. Brown 1993; Rodger 1997; Horsley 2006; Clivaz, et. al 2011; Frilingos 2017; Callahan 2022) are worth mentioning alongside those works that attend most specifically to the childhood of Jesus in these texts.

While both infancy narratives begin with Jesus’ birth, they trace Jesus’ development differently. Matthew attends to Jesus’ toddlerhood and early childhood, albeit briefly, with reference to the visit of the magi and the flight of Jesus’ family into Egypt (Reyes 1997; Gabra 2001; Martínez 2006; Betsworth 2010a; Verheyden 2011b; Betsworth 2013, 2015; S.T.J. Smith 2016; M.J. Smith 2022b). Luke, on the other hand, lingers on Jesus’ infancy, describing Jesus’ early gestation and the days surrounding Jesus’ birth at greater length, followed by his circumcision and a visit to the Temple at eight-days-old (Martínez 2001; Davis 2004; Robbins 2015; Spoelstra 2015; Mothoagae 2017; Betsworth 2015, 2018; Lincoln 2013; Lindeman Allen 2021c; Lindeman Allen 2021d), followed by a subsequent visit to the temple at the age of twelve (Heininger 2005; Billings 2009; van Aarde 2019). This breadth of material, although uneven in attention, allows scholars the opportunity, not present with other child characters, to follow Jesus across various stages of his development and in relationship with others (Berquist 2009; Mbuvi 2009; Ibita and Bieringer 2010a; Betsworth 2013).

Study of non-canonical texts that portray Jesus in various stages childhood further adds to this view of Jesus who, even when his character remains relatively static, grows in stature and ability. The Protoevangelium of James records extra-canonical events from the infancies and childhoods of Jesus and his maternal family (Hock 1996; Foster 2008a, 2008b; Davies 2009; Betsworth 2015; Bremmer et. al. 2020), the Gospel of the Infancy provides additional materials about Jesus’ infancy and childhood including alternate tellings of events recorded in Matthew and Luke (Davies 2009), and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas is the longest account of Jesus’ childhood (Hock 1996; Chatrand-Burke 2008, 2017; Aasgaard 2009; Chatrand-Burke 2009; Davies 2009; Davis 2014; Betsworth 2015), expanding in depth upon this period not covered in the canonical gospels. Scholars of early Christianity who have written on the portraits of childhood in these accounts provide helpful commentary not only upon these extra-canonical sources themselves but also on early Christian experiences and understandings of childhood as they are mediated through these texts.

Child Characters in New Testament Texts

After Jesus, the next most mentioned children in New Testament texts are those associated directly with Jesus. Often the first to come to mind among this group are the unidentified group of children whom the synoptic gospels record Jesus as blessing (Matthew 19:13–15; Mark 10:13–16; Luke 18:15–17), and the individual child, often linked with the former group, whom Jesus places in the midst of his other followers as an example of greatness (Matthew 18:1–15; Mark 9:33–37; Luke 9:46–48). New Testament Scholarship has treated these stories, at length, often with attention to what can be learned from these children either metaphorically or as moral exemplars for adults who seek to enter God’s realm, though increasingly recognizing the possibilities for reading this text with reference to the actual children whom Jesus blesses as well (Best 1976; Hull 1980; Crossan 1983; Derrett 1983; Robbins 1983; Nkwoka 1985; Ringshausen 1986; Kodell 1987; Taylor-Wingender 1988; Balthaser 1991; Fowl 1993; van Aarde 1994; Bailey 1996; Faber Van der Meulen 1996; Gundry-Volf 2000; Wright 2002; Clark 2002; Oyen 2003; Ostmeyer 2004a; Ostmeyer 2004b; van Aarde 2004; Tuor-Kurth 2005; White 2008; Spitaler 2009; Wilmer and White 2013; Chirstine 2014; Feder 2014; Madzokere 2014; Ruele 2014; Bartolomé 2015; B.A. Green 2016; Lindeman Allen 2019b; Sánchez 2019; E. Lim 2021; Timpte 2023). At the same time, R.H. Von Thaden Jr. relativizes this idealization of childhood, pointing to problematic children in the scripture texts (2008) and A.J. Murphy notes the ambivalence with which Jesus and his disciples treat children in contrast to the positivity of the above, oft cited scriptures (2013, 2019).

When one begins to look for children within the pages of the New Testament, however, they can be seen engaging in far more activities than simply receiving blessings or suffering abandonment at the hands of adults. The synoptic gospels record Jesus not only blessing but healing and exorcising several children (Matthew 8:5–13; 15:21–28; 17:9–20; Mark 7:24–30; 9:14–29; Luke 7:1–10; 9:37–43; John 4:46–54), in two cases even raising them from the dead (Matthew 9:18–26; Mark 5:21–43; Luke 7:11–17; 8:40–56). While the children for whom Jesus performs these deeds all remain unnamed and several never even directly interact with Jesus, they remain at the center of the narratives, motivating adult action. The two children with whom Jesus interacts most directly are those whom he raises from the dead: the daughter of Jairus (Dube 1999; Dube 2009; Lindeman Allen 2017; Zwiep 2019; S.U. Lim and Lindeman Allen 2022) and the son of the widow of Nain (Brodie 1986).

Jesus and his disciples also interact directly with the boy from whom Jesus casts out a demon, ending his epilepsy (Spencer 2010; Walters 2012; Howard 2013; Ramírez 2016a; Ayelotan 2022). In contrast, the daughter of the Syrophoenician/Canaanite woman (Buckhanon Crowder 2016; M.J. Smith 2016; Betsworth 2020b) and the son and enslaved person of officials are all healed from a distance (Marsh 2023). As a result, most scholarship on these latter two stories focus around the interaction between Jesus and the parents with little to no attention paid to the children. Indeed, even in the latter cases, more attention is often paid to the adults than the children at the center of their actions. Moreover, interdisciplinary collaboration between scholars of disability and children within the New Testament highlights similar themes of agency and empowerment related to how one reads dis/ability in New Testament texts (Howard 2013; Solevåg 2020).

The gestation of John the Baptizer (Verheyden 2011a; Robbins 2015; Dillon 2018; Wenkel 2023), Moses in Hebrews (Loader 2011), and the unnamed infant in the apocalypse of Revelation (Bovon 1999; Häfner 2005; Betsworth 2020a) add to the birth narrative of Jesus himself in conveying the beginnings of life. Stretching into the toddler years, M.J. Smith reflects upon the murder of the children who did not escape Herod’s sword in Matthew 2 (2022b). The shared Q material of Matthew and Luke records Jesus speaking about children playing in the marketplace (Matthew 11:17; Luke 7:32; Staubli 2001; Betsworth 2019a; Betsworth 2019b). The daughter of Herodias dances at Herod’s banquet (Matthew 14:3–12; Mark 16:14–29; Glancy 1994; Bach 1996; Vander Stichele 2001; Janes 2006; Kramer 2006; Apostolos-Cappadona 2009; A. Parker 2017; Weren 2019; Betsworth and Parker 2022). Children, both free and enslaved, perform work within their households (Frilingos 2000; Villalobos Mendoza 2012; Aymer 2016; Kartzow 2017; Lopes 2021; Lindeman Allen 2021c; Montemayor 2022). The education of children, both formal and informal, features in both the gospels and epistles (Voeltzel 1973; Botha 1999b; MacDonald 2014, 67–148; Lietaert Peerbolte 2021). And this education continues into religious spaces, where children can be seen participating in religious devotion, including praising and worshiping God (Gundry 2009; MacDonald 2011b; Breed 2016; Martens 2019a; Bruner 2022; Lindeman Allen 2022b). Elsewhere I have suggested that it is possible to imagine children among the followers of Jesus (Lindeman Allen 2019a: 123–202; 2023, 83–102). Moreover, the baptism of households in Acts leaves open scholarly speculation as to if and when infants and children may have been baptized into such communities as well (Jeremias 1960; Aland 1963; Green 2002; Wright 2002; Lindeman Allen 2020b).

Future Directions

The study of children in the New Testament has not only grown within the methodological field of childist criticism in the past decades but has proliferated across a variety of methodological and contextual approaches. The presence of children among early Christian circles has thus been well established. Moreover, in contrast to some early readings of children in New Testament texts, the roles and participation of children among the first followers of Jesus have been complicated. It is now clear that the earliest followers of Jesus tended to think about and treat children similarly to their surrounding cultures, for better and worse. At the same time, who is included in the definition of children and what their treatment looked like within specific early Christian communities and households and how this applied to growing understandings of God’s realm—a realm Jesus declared belongs to children and the disenfranchised poor—continues to need to be unpacked.

Within first-century cultural contexts, significantly more comparative work has been done in relation to the New Testament’s Greek and Roman environments than its connections with the North African and Asian cultures contained within and adjacent to the Mediterranean basin. There is significant potential here, especially with relation to Jesus’ childhood spent in Egypt according to Matthew’s gospel account; Alexander and Rufus, the sons of Simon of Cyrene; and the Asian communities connected with the disputed Pauline and general epistles. Indeed, these epistles, alongside of Hebrews and Revelation, all represent fertile ground for further study of children in early Christian environments, although in many cases such study may require more retrieval than the narrative contexts of the gospels provide.

From a relational perspective, there remains much room to consider mother–daughter relationships, as well as relationships between siblings; however, the ground is particularly ripe for scholars of masculinity in the New Testament to attend to the specific experiences of sonship in New Testament texts and the relationships between fathers and their children. Additionally, increased awareness of the presence of enslaved children within New Testament households, including the possibilities that Mary and/or Jesus were born into slavery themselves highlights the need for further scholarship on the roles and relationships of enslaved children in New Testament texts and households, both as they relate to one another and to other members—free born adult and children—within the same homes. The implication of household baptism on enslaved children in terms of agency and oppression serves as just one example.

Much of this research has already begun, however, there is ample room both for continued study and, perhaps most importantly, continued dialog between those engaged in this field of research. In the course of compiling this bibliography, I have become both heartened by the extent to which this work has already reached (well beyond what I might have imagined!) and concerned by what at times seems to be a lack of awareness of one another’s work by scholars writing across disciplines, in other languages, or in separate parts of the world. In our increasingly glocalized contemporary environment, it is crucial that scholars reach across both geographical and disciplinary boundaries to learn from and with one another. I am thankful for my many colleagues engaged in this work together and hopeful that collaboration in this way will help to grow and expand our awareness of possible readings of and implications for understanding children in the New Testament.

ORCID iD

Amy L. Allen https://orcid.org/0009-0005-0069-9389

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