45 RURAL GALILEE AND RAPID CHANGES he/she works deductively instead of inductively from evidence”. Still, he maintains that ignorance of macro-sociology is an open invitation to “ethnocentrism and anachronism” 7. One may add that if the risk of a too positivistic approach is “social flatness”, the risk of a too deductive approach is “social greyishness”, where the model produces the same conclusion no matter which time or region it is applied to. While a model makes us aware of certain characteristics of ancient socio-economic realities, simply “checking” to see if kings, retainers, cities etc. were present will not reveal the profoundness and impact in the particular case under discussion 8. In order to avoid both extremes, the approach taken here will give preference to the study of actual sources, while at the same time adopt the assumption that rapid change was bad news for the rural population as asserted in a typical model of conflict. Specifically, I intend to pursue an approach presented in a number of studies by M. Moreland, who applies the work of the sociologist James C. Scott on peasant ideology to the Galilean world 9. Scott’s model is a conflict model based on studies of village contexts and peasant revolts in Southeast Asia in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries 10. It rests on the assumption that the core value of peasant ideology was one of risk- aversion with a strong desire for safety and risk-sharing, preferring above anything else “a stable economic and social environment …” 11. Rapid change, especially in the form of colonial interference, and negative consequences from agrarian administrative centers would 7 Cf. D.A. FIENSY, “The Nature of the Galilean Economy in the Late Sec- ond Temple Period: The Sociological-Archaeological Debate” (paper pre- sented at the annual meeting of the SBL, Boston 2008). 8 For a similar concern about to overt use of sociological models, see the recent discussion in S. LEE MATTILA, “Jesus and the “Middle Peasants”? Prob- lematizing a Social-Scientific Concept”, CBQ 72 (2010) 291-313. 9 Cf. J.C. SCOTT, The Moral Economy of the Peasant. Rebellion and Sub- sistence in Southeast Asia (New Haven – London 1976) and M. MORELAND, “The Jesus Movement in the Villages of Roman Galilee: Archaeology, Q, and Modern Anthropological Theory”, Oral Performance, Popular Tradition, and Hidden Transcript in Q (ed. R.L. HORSLEY) (Atlanta, GA 2006) 159-180. 10 Cf. R.A. HORSLEY, “Moral Economy and Renewal Movement in Q”, Oral Performance, Popular Tradition, and Hidden Transcript in Q (ed. RICHARD A. HORSLEY) (Atlanta, GA 2006) 143, and MORELAND, “Galilean Response”, 38. 11 MORELAND, “Galilean Response”, 39.