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  • From: "Mark D. Nanos" <nanos AT gvi.net>
  • To: "Corpus-paul" <corpus-paul AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: THi ELEUQERIAi in Gal 5:1
  • Date: Wed, 9 Jun 1999 22:16:14 -0500 (CDT)


>Dear Mark, I am glad to see your name on the screen. While I was
>following the discussion on Gal 5:1 on the B-Greek list, I thought
>how you would interpret the verse. My expectation was right. I am
>excited at this new perspective on Paul. Let me take this opportunity
>to repost my question of June 1 on this new perspective, which enables
>your interpretation of Gal 5:1 ( It seems you have not read my post of
>June
>1).

Dear Moon,
I appreciate your comments. I will delete much of your message as it is on
the June 1 post, but leave a few words to address. I did see it, but felt I
had already written to these points in the previous posts to which your
were responding. There are no doubt many ways to say something or even the
same thing, but I thought the point was covered.

You wrote:
>What do you mean by "what God has now done in covenant with his
>righteous ones of Israel"? (a) Is it the coming of Messiah whom Jewish
>people should have believed in and called upon to be saved (but many Jews
>did not) ?
>Or (b) does it refer to the arrival of the end time where Gentiles can
>be the people of God by faith in Israel's Messiah, without becoming
>Jewish,
>the people of the Law?

These two concepts are intertwined, but you have pulled them apart for
discussion. I take Paul to mean a) that the restoration of Israel has
begun, and b) also the reconciliation of the nations has begun predicated
on that prior yet mysteriously still ongoing act. The process is in action
for Paul, and the current state of some Jewish people an anomaly he begins
to figure out (the mystery of Rom. 11): not their fall, but some of them
stumbling so that strangely enough gentiles become part of the process
instead of only being gathered after the process for Israel is complete (at
end of ch. 11 it is clear that he has not figured it out entirely!).

I do not think personal salvation of later Platonic/Western philosophical
style is in view, but the restoration of the whole people. The "remnant"
part like Paul is living on behalf of the rest, a remnant to help, not
judge. The incoming of the gentiles is thus a clue for those other
Israelites that the awaited time has come, as is Paul's successful
ministry, one which Israelites expect to participate in. Thus they will be
provoked to ask, is this the time and have we mis-stepped? That is the
jealousy motif lesson I think. That those who have disagreed with Paul
about the time will consider Paul's success one that they wish to emulate,
and thus wonder if he might be right. So Paul turns to these gentiles to
live righteously as expected, and thus play a role in the restoration of
Israel previously unforeseen. He can then hold them up as empirical proof
to his fellow Israelites to corroborate his exegetical arguments to the
same effect.
>
>As you said, these two aspects are closely related. In Galatians, the
>point (b) may be more visible. But in Romans, the point (a) seems
>more visible. I feel that you think the point (b) is more visible both
>in Galatians and Romans, in fact that the point (b) is the issue of
>both letters. Am I right?

Put in these terms you are probably right, but that is because point b, as
you put it, is a more visible phenomenon. I would need to work this through
to be sure it is the case in each letter or how they might differ on this
point. But I would say that this is the premise of his appeal to his fellow
Israelites--although that is not what either letter is actually about, or
to whom they are written: look at these gentiles turning to worship the One
Lord, is this not the awaited time of Israel's restoration, and thus the
promises for all humankind.
>
>If the point (a) was the issue of Romans, I would understand why Paul said
>[Rom 10:1] "Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that
>they may be SAVED." But if the point (b) was the issue, I would not
>understand why Paul said it.

Saved here need not take on the kind of personal salvation of the Western
or Greek soul, but of the whole of Israel, the place where Paul goes more
clearly in chapter 11 as he brings this argument to its conclusion. Why
would he not await with great anguish the completion of this period of a
divided Israel, many suffering vicariously by some mysterious design so
that gentiles may participate? His willingness here is of a piece with that
of Moses on the mount; was that about personal salvation, or the fate of
the whole people in the presence of what God was seeking to do for them? I
think rendering this "restored" instead of "saved" might help you stay with
the perspective of the whole that I am trying to articulate.
>
I did not understand your final point/question, but I think that it might
be answered in the above comments.

Regards,
Mark Nanos
Kansas City






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