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  • From: "Mark D. Nanos" <nanosmd AT comcast.net>
  • To: corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Once more, Paul and apo/dia anthropon/ou
  • Date: Mon, 13 Jan 2003 15:35:24 -0600

Matt,
Thanks for the interaction and clarification. You raise a few points for
comment.

> I just wanted to correct myself... re-reading my earlier post, I realized
> that
> I stated that representatives from Jerusalem had been in Galatia claiming
> that
> Paul was their subordinate. That is a possible reading of the text but may
> not
> be the most probable. I don't think Mark N. believes it was Jerusalem
> representatives in Galatia (or am I wrong, Mark?).

You are right, I do not find anything in Galatia indicating the situation in
Galatia has to do with representatives from Jerusalem, or anywhere else
outside of their local Galatian context, for that matter (I think they are
non-Jewish members of the Jewish community in subgroups of Christ-believers,
and it is "normal" pressure to comply with prevailing Jewish communal norms
at issue). Without this assumption, it opens up the language of the
narrative units such as fill much of Galatians to re-reading. Thus my
interest in what Paul may be understood by the Galatian addressees to make
of his comment about not from/through human/s.

>
> However, I think it is very probable, given the course of Paul's argument in
> Gal 1-2, that the "hoi tarrasontes humas" who bring the as-if "heteron
> euangelion" were undermining Paul's authority to teach by his own authority
> through making the charge that he was subordinate to the Jerusalem apostles.

I do not see how this is indicated in the language of 1:6-7, or anywhere
else in the letter (see argument in my Irony of Galatians), although that is
the consensus view. By the way, I translate the phrase as "the ones
unsettling," giving it a more neutral valence, and argue that Paul's letter
is likely even more "unsettling" than whatever these "influencers" have
done/taught to date.

> Who else would they have charged that he was subordinate to?

Why charged with subordination to anyone? Why would that be necessary?

> And if this
> wasn't the charge, why does Paul then go out of his way to emphasize the
> non-supervisory role which the Jerusalem Pillars have played in his career?

Does he? Or is that while he arrived at his understanding of the gospel for
the addressees (Christ apart from proselyte conversion for non-Jews)
relatively independently, it is not different from that of the Jerusalem
apostles, when compared; thus, that it is inter-dependent (see nice argument
of Koptak, "Rhetorical Identification...," now reprinted in Galatians
Debate).

Regards,
Mark
--
Mark D. Nanos, Ph.D.
313 NE Landings Dr.
Lee's Summit, MO 64064
USA
nanosmd AT comcast.net





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