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Subject: Corpus-Paul

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  • From: "David C. Hindley" <dhindley AT compuserve.com>
  • To: "Corpus-paul" <corpus-paul AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: RE: voluntary associations
  • Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2000 23:35:34 -0400


Mark Nanos said:

>>As you note, this is a helpful direction to explore for research on
Paul. For one thing, it is useful to imagine the social constraints of
life for alternative communities (such as Jewish ones, and subgroups
such as Paul's) in the Graeco-Roman world, and thus for those pagans
who were seeking community around the meaning of the death of a Judean
martyr of the Roman regime. <<

What would be even more fundamental, in my view, is to imagine what
kinds of motivations drew some Gentiles into associations with Jews in
the first place, in spite of the drawbacks you mentioned. It would
seem that some Jewish synagogues manumitted pagan slaves on condition
that they convert to some degree (Schurer's revised _Jewish People_,
pp. 105-6, etc), and I would imagine they had some prior association
with the synagogue. There surely must have been attempts by some Jews
and their synagogues to gain influence with, or at least get grudging
respect from, their pagan neighbors, through acts of benevolence or
community programs. These could be the things that drew Gentiles to
their synagogues.

>>but still constrained to continue participation in Graeco-Roman
religious life (such as observing days, months, seasons, years), to
which Paul accuses these former idolaters of returning in 4:8-11.<<

That is interesting, as I have always assumed that this passage was a
reference to Jewish holidays. Of course Pagans had their holidays as
well, and we should look in that direction as well. Still, I took Gal
4:8-10 to be describing a contrast between Gentiles slaving for those
who are not gods when they did not know God, and Gentiles observing
days and months and seasons and years now that they do know God. The
common element being that both these practices are "weak and poor
elementary things." I took it to mean that, for Gentiles surely,
following Jewish law was the same, in principal, as slaving to idols.
If he was steadfastly holding his position that Gentiles did not have
to convert to be heirs to the promises made to Abraham along with his
formal descendants, he may have meant that while it was obligatory for
Jews to follow Jewish law (here relating to Jewish holiday
observances), it was not obligatory for Gentiles, and possibly even
wrong for them to do so. But that's just me...

Regards,

Dave Hindley
Cleveland, Ohio, USA






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