The Drama of Diakonía

“Drawing on the scholarship of John N. Collins and some of the leading thinkers in the field, I would like to challenge the consensus by exploring whether the Greek experience of diakonía originally had something to do with charitable social work. I propose the argument that diakonía instead refers to spiritual experiences of “a go-between,” echoing Plato’s “in-between” of the metaxy. This type of spirituality of divine-human activity, of seeking and searching (zetesis), can arguably be best described as a mediation of meaning. It is carried out by order or on behalf of another (human) person and/or (divine) Person(s). For Collins, a deacon (or more universal) the person is debatably not merely a ‘humble servant’ or ‘assistant’ but rather something like a “messenger,” “a-go-betweener,” or “prophetic intermediary” in the existential and divine-human quest for meaning. Taking up Collins argument, I would like to advance this type of agency in terms of the go-between: that is, with a spirituality of meaning, of leadership and teaching, of communication between people, and interaction between communities, churches, and the world.”

— MEINS G.S. COETSIER (Trinity College Dublin, 2022)

See John N. Collins, Diakonia: Re-interpreting the Ancient Sources (New York, NY and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009 [1990]). Dieter Georgi, The Opponents of Paul in Second Corinthians: A Study on Religious Propaganda in Late Antiquity (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986). Bart J. Koet, Edwina Murphy, Esko Ryokas, eds, Deacons and Diakonia in Early Christianity: The First Two Centuries. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament, 2. Reihe (Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2018).

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