Conclusion
In the course of this paper we have traced the theme of familial abandonment in the early Christian martyr acts. It is clear that the rejection motif is more widespread than the scholarly focus on Perpetua might lead us to believe.
The recognition that the deconstruction and reconstruction of family ties in the martyr acts is more than simply an issue in the history of women in antiquity is significant. The rejection of family motif becomes a topos in the acts of the martyrs that is used in the depiction of both male and female martyrs. While this topos serves to masculinize female martyrs and may well reflect the realities of the social world of early Christian women, it is framed by the broader construction of the Christian family. Set within this context, Perpetua and Felicity do not so much abandon their infants as they entrust them to their families. To portray the martyr acts as advocating an absolute “rejection of family,” of husbands, wives, children, and parents, is to present only part of the picture. Perpetua’s disengagement from her family is a narration of the passage of the catechumen into the Christian family. It is not that the account rejects all family; it reconfigures the family to accentuate the spiritual bond of Christianity and the blood ties of martyrdom.In many ways the reconfiguration of a particular aspect of the Christian’s identity - nationality, ethnicity, race, gender, social status - is the hallmark of martyrological writing. The martyr acts serve not only to construct an ideal martyr but also an ideal Christian. In these accounts traditional structures of power are subverted and obligations to particular groups are severed or reinforced. The deconstruction and reconstruction of “the family” in the martyr acts serves a larger rhetorical purpose: to focus the Christian’s gaze on their obligation to Christ.
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