Corpus-Paul

[Anders Eriksson <aeriks2 AT emory.edu>]

Dear Mark Nanos

I like your retelling the story about how you had to fire one of your
employees.  There are situations in life when one cannot be nice, when one
has to draw the line, pronounce an authoritative verdict and expect to be
obeyed. I believe that many of the situations we encounter in Paul's
letters are of that nature. Paul had to draw a line, pronounce verdicts
that would not be gladly accepted by everyone.  In that sense I have come
to see many of Paul's decisions and attacs on others as  "not nice."

I also agree with you when you stress that it is very difficult to render
judgments about Paul's behavior.  "We only have a very small slice of his
life to evaluate, and we must be very careful to put as much "flesh" on it
as possible before we do."

On the other hand I don't think I have made so many judgments on Paul. I
have raised the issue, asked questions and invited others to come with the
answers.  I have never said that our modern conceptions of what is "nice"
are legitimate in evaluating Paul. I have tried to question those modern
conceptions, being well aware that the standards that are priviliged in a
modern Western university setting, like fair presentation of opposing
viewpoints and tolerance, are hardly applicable for evaluating the
agonistic culture and the difficult rhetorical circumstances Paul finds
himself in.

I am not out here to paint Paul as negatively as possible.  Others are
doing that. As I said in my first post, I still regard Paul as a good guy.
I want to be symphathetic to what he was trying to achieve. As I have been
analysing his rhetoric the last few years I have however come to see him as
manipulative at times and have become increasingly symphatetic to those
people he tries to quench.  Feminist scholarship and others inspired by
ideological criticism call these the silent voices in the text. It is also
one of the emphasises of  socio-rhetorical criticism, which I am here at
Emory to learn more about.

As to the three texts I mentioned, it might have been necessary to draw the
lines between the various alternatives on the issue of circumscision in the
Galatian crisis as clearly as he does, justification by faith versus
justification by grace. His conversation partners certainly would have
objected to his description.  Were they by the way the heretics the
exegetical tradition have made them out to be?  My question about Paul's
"niceness" is more about the way he uses the rhetorical dissociation.  He
for example associates his interpretation of the Gospel with the Spirit and
the alternative interpretation with the flesh. (On this see Steve
Kraftchicks unpublished dissertation.)  I have been attuned to  such
rhetorical moves through my research the last few years, but am well aware
that the majority of Pauline scholars have not been used to see Paul as a
rhetorical debater.

The two examples from 1 Corinthians, 14:38 and 15:34, stem directly from my
own research on Paul's argumentation in that letter. Paul here makes
similar rhetorical dissociations between the good guys and the bad guys.
In the first case the positive side of the dissociation consists of Paul
and those who recognize his regulation for women to be silent as a
prophetic word from God, they will be recognized by God.  The negative side
of the dissociation consists of those who do not recognize Paul's
regulation as a word from the Lord, they will not be recognized by God, (I
take that to imply that they are eternally damned). In short Paul claims
that if you obey me you will be saved, but if you do not you will be
damned.

In 15:34 Paul describes those who share his interpretation of the
resurrection events as those who have knowledge of God. In contrast those
who do not share his interpretation of the resurrection events are
described as people who do not have knowledge about God, an obvious pun on
the claim by some in the Corinthian church to have knowledge, gnosis.  He
also implies that they are sinning and are  drunk.  He also shames them.
(On this see the article I have just finished which will be published in
next issue of Svensk Exegetisk Årsbok - Yes, the article is in English).

I am pleased that our conversation does not seem to develop into mutual
vilification.  That is otherwise a common development even in academic
environments.  We are not degrading into some of those bad rhetorical
practises we see in Paul.  Maybe we are nice and good guys.


Anders Eriksson, Th. D.

Research Scholar at Lund University
Visiting Scholar at Emory University
Director of the Aphthonius project
sponsored by the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation.