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  • From: "Mark D. Nanos" <nanos AT gvi.net>
  • To: "Corpus-paul" <corpus-paul AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: RE: [corpus-Paul] Re: Gal 3:10-13
  • Date: Wed, 27 Oct 1999 09:56:56 -0500


Jerry Sumney wrote:
I think we agree that Paul thinks these other teachers subvert the
Galatian Christians' standing in Christ, but I do not think the Galatians
are precisely in a liminal state. They have experienced the initiation in
baptism and are admitted to the rites of the community (particularly the
Lord's Supper) on that basis. While their experience may be still catching
up to this transfer into the community, they have fulfilled the ritual
requirements presented them and are enjoying the promised benefits (as Paul
reminds them), including the presence of the Spirit.


Dear Jerry,
Thanks for your response. I would like to clarify one point that can have an impact upon what an interpreter supposes is going on in Galatia. You are right that Paul believes they are not liminal but fully initiated, and his argument is to convince them of this. But what this implies is that the influencers do not respond to them in the same way. They have responded rather to them as liminals, as proselyte candidates in need of completion of the ritual process of conversion in order to gain that which Paul's position maintains them to have already gained. (That is, if circumcision signifies proselyte conversion, which is what I believe you questioned in the earlier post that led to my questions of you). Whether they are liminals or aggregates is precisely the issue, and the two points of view differ on this. The question is how they are identified, how the group boundaries are constructed.

Or, Why is circumcision an consideration for themselves that Paul believes will be altered by this particular argument, i.e., that their identity as children of Abraham/full children of God/those known by God/full heirs/recipients of the Spirit/etc. is already accomplished for themselves apart from circumcision?

Jerry also wrote:
Now to the questions-
you wrote:

First, what do you think that circumcision represents for those who
would influence the Galatian addressees toward it, if not
"completion" of the ritual process of proselyte conversion? Which
leads to the second question(s).


Jerry responds:
I think the proposed benefit may be quite simple, more relaxed fellowship
with Christian Jews, for example. Paul's example of the Antioch incident
shows what sorts of problems might develop in a mixed community. It is not
clear that "those from James" in that story have a theological agenda with
respect to Gentiles. Perhaps circumcision of Gentiles might have helped
Jewish Christians in their relations with non-Christian Jews (see Paul's
polemical remark about their avoiding persecution). No matter what we claim
the goal of their encouraging the Gentiles to be circumcised we have gone
beyond the evidence of the text. Paul gives no clear idea about what the
other teachers claim is gained by it, only his rejection of it because of
what it means they lose.


Whether this is the case or not, what it still implies is that circumcision has meaning for the ones with whom they wish to mix. And that meaning is driven, for them even if not for the addressees, by an understanding of reality that, if proselyte conversion anyway, is theological, even if the issue in view is in the realm of social interaction.


Mark also asks:
do you not think
that either the influencers or the addressees gave the matter "any"
theological consideration? If not theologically, then how did they
consider it? What does it represent; symbolize? For the influencers
or the addressees, What do you suppose circumcision meant?

I respond:

Actually I think it is quite possible that this matter got very little
theological consideration. If Paul preaches that circumcision and
uncircumcision do not matter, the other teachers and the Galatians could
take that to mean it is OK for Gentiles to be circumcised if it makes for
better relations within the Christian community. After all, these Gentiles
had cut themselves off more radically from their previous lives and
relationships than Jews had. Their circumcision would probably not have had
as much impact on their relations with the broader world because they had
already cut themselves off from it by becoming Christians. Jewish
Christians, on the other hand, may have been able to maintain more of their
relationship with the Jewish community. So if their associations with
non-Christian Jews are complicated by their life with uncircumcised people,
they may have advocated this practice as an act which meant nothing
theologically but would be a help to them. Perhaps, since we are in the
realm of speculation, even a help to their own consciences as they ate with
and associated with Gentile Christians.

Regardless of whether the speculative stuff rings true, the basic point I
want to make is that I do not think there must be a big theological agenda
for these other teachers. They may have had a complex theological agenda,
but the text of Galatians gives, I think, no clear indication of this. We
should not mirror read and read between the lines in ways that assume that
Paul must at every turn be responding directly to their theological claims.

Jerry,
I do not mean to suggest that we should consider everything theological. Quite the contrary, I think that the exigence in Galatia is really very social, from the view of the addressees. They just want the full acceptance they have been led to expect that they already had. It is Paul who brings to bear the theological interests of themselves that would be subverted by taking the course they are considering, since he brings up the undermining of the meaning of the death of Christ for themselves. It is unlikely that the addressees or those influencing them have been seeking to subvert this, and I doubt that the influencers are even in any way concerned with such things.

Perhaps you are arguing against other readings of Galatians that might tend to abstract and theologize everything. That is not what I am trying to do. I am trying to understand what circumcision, which has proven to be so important to the addressees because it is important to those influencing them, signifies for each of the interested parties (Paul, the addressees, the influencers, even others with whose interests they may be concerned, such as their pagan kinship groups, or the pagan locations' governing agents).

What I am pressing is that circumcision has meaning, or at least this is implied by the interests of both Paul and the influencers; otherwise it would not be important enough to make the central issue of identity. For the influencers that meaning seems to be driven by maintenance of the traditional norms for full inclusion of gentiles (whether that is a "complex theological agenda" or not). This position is based upon, e.g., an interpretation of Scripture, and even if the situation is a pressing social issue of entitlement to full membership by way of this mark or not, that is not the same as trivializing this identity marker, as though it is not a theological concern. Whether it is theological depends upon how one defines this term of course. I am taking a concern with whether they are children of the Abrahamic or Mosaic covenants as theological, although obviously measured socially (by circumcision or not, i.e., completed in the flesh or not, to use Paul's term as I understand it).

I would like to comment upon a couple of methodological matters you raise. I am not sure why you raise the concern with mirror-reading. As you state, mirror-reading is taking Paul's comments to directly mirror those of others. That is not the same thing as trying to work backwards from Paul's rhetoric to the implied situation, which all interpretations of Galatians are based upon, whether the interpreters recognize this or not. I actually think that much of Paul's rhetoric is ironic in nature, and anticipatory. He is bringing to light arguments and implications that are not realized by the addressees in order to challenge the altering of their present course as set by himself at an earlier time. He thinks these arguments will carry the day, regardless of what arguments others have run.

As to reading between the lines, or speculating, of those I stand accused (implied) and unrepentant. As I see things, unfortunately all reading of the lines, to accept the metaphor, involves such reading (speculating, if you prefer) between them. To put it differently within the metaphor, what is "reading the lines"? What do they say? To oversimplify a complex issue, as you well know Jerry, words are used in context, and that context is always supplied (speculated) by the interpreter of Galatians. I am seeking to challenge what has been taken (speculated) to be said there, that is, I am working on an hypothesis for the situation which has provoked this particular rhetoric/letter, which must be constructed from the rhetoric/letter itself, and will in turn lead to a re-reading of its message. Until we "know" how the lines "read," is there some other way?


Regards,
Mark Nanos
Kansas City





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