ABSTRACT
The people of Palestine at the time of Jesus formed a traditional peasant society (see Carney 1973:100-3). Such societies invariably have extremely wealthy landowners who provide the landless with land (and other items, such as tools and seed) to work in return for a specified share of the harvest (and other items, such as labor). This relationship and its obligations, called tenancy, is established by contract, written or unwritten, in conformity with custom, and more unusually, with law. In practice, such institutional arrangements often fall short of what they are intended to realize. Tenants may face emergencies ranging from family illness to drought. They may have to make provisions for the following year, yet lack certainty of tenure. The landowner can see to such needs of his or her tenant, but he or she is not obliged to do so under the tenancy agreement. Any help afforded beyond the bare bones of the contract is favor (benefaction, grace). The tenant, in turn, is under no obligation to show respect, affection or friendly feelings to the owner of the land he works. Yet in peasant societies, landowners look for respect since what counts to them as well as to their tenants is honor; landowners need the “status support” that only their tenants can give them. “The establishment of special relationship between a landowner and some of his tenants, and an assurance of conspicuous deference and loyalty to the landlord, constitutes the patron-client addendum to the institutionalized landlord-tenant relationship” (Landé 1977:xxi).
