Is the Lucan Jesus a "Martyr"? A Critical Assessment of a Scholarly Consensus

Scholars since Dibelius have commonly characterized the Lucan Jesus as a "martyr," an innocent man whose unjust death is exemplary but not atoning or salvific. This article first compares the Lucan passion narrative with selected Jewish texts that feature martyrdom or noble death, then considers parallels to the noble death of Socrates, the persecuted righteous person in Wisdom 2-3, and the violent death of the prophets. The study concludes that the Third Gospel's portrayal of Jesus' death shares more affinities with the violent deaths of the prophets and the persecution of the righteous than with Jewish martyrdoms or the death of Socrates.