Corpus-Paul

["Stevan Davies" <miser17 AT epix.net>]

> Do you have a response to my discussion of Gal 2:20 (post of 4/4) where I
> answer this question?  To echo Robert Kraft, discussing the particulars of
> specific texts would put us on a firmer footing.
> 
> Ron

Fair enough.

> 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."  

Romans 6 is certainly similar to the end of Gal 2. In Romans 6 the
event of being "crucified with Christ" does indeed seem to have been
an experience, an event rather than a figure of speech. The 
consequence of the event appears to be an ongoing state where
it is not I who live (I having died at that time) but Christ who 
lives in me (although Romans 6:8 implies is this is in the future). 

> 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.

I suspect Christ living in him and Spirit living in him are two ways of 
saying 
the same thing. 
 
> 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.

OK. Perhaps we are in agreement. There seem to be three
aspects to this. There was a ritual experience of baptism equated 
to being crucified with Christ. At that time came the spirit of the 
Son saying Abba which I presume to be an experience of a different
sort, "ecstatic" if you will. Henceforth it was expected or at least
possible for ecstatic experiences occasionally to occur. This could 
have been thought to indicate that the Spirit came and went... but it
was not thought to indicate that but, rather, that the Spirit 
continually existed within the person. During the time when the
Spirit existed within the person without manifesting itself through
ecstatic experiences I agree that it is not proper to say that the
Spirit is a form of experience. Rather, I agree that Paul expected
the Spirit or the Christ living within to assist in living the mode 
of  life proper to a believer and this appears to be the thrust of v. 
20.

> 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.

v. 20 does not talk about a primarily subjective experience. It does,
however, seem to presuppose an ecstatic experience that will have
confirmed the arrival and subsequent indwelling of the Christ. I assume
that generally speaking people believed themselves to have had
such an experience conjoined with the ritual of baptism (Gal 3:26-
4:6) when the spirit of the Son entered and spoke glossolalia. 
Paul, however, was never baptized. 

It seems to me that his experience of receiving the Son
is described in 1:16 where the inception of the permanent state
alluded to in 2:20 occurs. Hence 1:16 as I understand it is the
ecstatic experience that brought about the state mentioned in 2:20,
which state is only sporadically ecstatic, and its ecstatic potential
is not what Paul is talking about in 2:20.

Steve Davies
College Misericordia