Corpus-Paul

[Ronald Troxel <rltroxel AT facstaff.wisc.edu>]

Stevan
>Gee. I just took it for granted that a person who thinks he has had
>some other person come to be living in him has had an experience
>that led him to reach that conclusion. Similarly (probably
>identically) I think people who come to think they have the spirit
>living in them have had an experience that led them to think this.
>This might be called "spirit possession" experience or perhaps
>"pentecostal" experience. I could go on and on about this (wrote
>a book about it in 1995 entitled "Jesus the Healer: Possession,
>Trance, and the Origins of Christianity") but instead could you
>tell me how it can be that a person claiming to have had Christ
>revealed in/to him, or having Christ living in him is likely devoid of
>some subjective experience to that effect?

I have no doubt Paul had subjective experiences, including "sprit
posession"; he confesses as much in 1 Cor 14, not to mention his notices of
ecstatic experience in the catalog of 2 Cor 12.  What I'm questioning is
whether zH{I} de en emoi Cristos in 2:20 denotes a subjective experience.
That cannot be assumed.

Indeed, the reason I raised the question about what v. 19 denotes is that
the contrast developed between death and life in vv. 19-20 shows the two
are in tight relationship.  While Paul's notion of being "crucified with
Christ" played itself out in terms of experience, judging from his
development of the theme in Romans 6, where he connects it with baptism,
this has to do with conducting life a different way than previously, as
alluded to here as "dying to the law."  The notion of Christ living in him
undoubtedly was connected with his concept of the Spirit and would not have
been cut off from ecstatic experiences, but would not necessarily have been
defined primarily that way.  That Christ lived in him seems, in the context
of Gal 2 - and especially in light of the {h}ina zW{i} QeW{i} zHsW of v. 19
- to refer to his life of obedience to God apart from obedience to the
(ethnically linked) particulars of the law.

This approaches something of his rhetoric in Romans 8, where he speaks in
terms of the role of the Spirit within (also, in parallel, Christ within)
freeing believers to live according to God's requirements.  In that case,
Christ living in him is not primarily a subjective description (even though
it has a subject dimension), but the mode of his life as a believer.

My point is that we cannot assume that v. 20 talks about a primarily
subjective experience and then interpret en emoi of 1:16 in that light.  En
emoi in 2:20 stands in a context with a different function.

Cordially,

Ron Troxel

Ronald L. Troxel, Ph.D.
Department of Hebrew and Semitic Studies
1340 Van Hise Hall
1220 Linden Dr.
Madison, WI 53706