Corpus-Paul

["Jeffrey B. Gibson" <jgibson000 AT mailhost.chi.ameritech.net>]

Reactions, please, and forgiveness too for the rambling nature of some
remarks that are really not much more than thinking out loud..

I've been reading through 1 Thess and -- having just read Sam Williams'
_Jesus Death as Saving Event_ with all of its attention on the stories,
especially in 4 Macc, of the death of the Maccabean martyrs as somehow
stemming God's wrath against Israel by expiating from Israel that which
that which provoked it -- I have several questions.

It seems to me that both 1 Thess and 2/4Macc are not only (a) embedded
with the themes of  wrath,  national sinfulness, suffering/persecution,
martyrdom, resurrection, and expiation, but are (b)  concerned to draw
links between these themes in order to propound a theology of suffering
and covenantal faithfulness. Assuming this observation to be correct, I
wonder, then, whether anyone has ever explored in any depth the idea
that Paul's theology on these matters is not only (a) grounded in, but
(b) something which stands as a counter proposal to, that which
2/4Maccabees propounds. Both Paul and Maccabees seem to be concerned
that it is a particular type of faithfulness that God regards as
expiatory of the sinfulness or the effects of sinfulness which evoke his
wrath. But for the authors of Maccabees, it was those zealous  for the
Law, those who wished to see their Gentile enemies destroyed and who
often took up arms to defend their land and Law.. But for Paul it is one
who was not so violent or exclusionary.  So do we have in 1 Thess an
anti imperial counter proposal?

What leads me to say this is the fact that the Thessalonian Christians
have been persecuted by their fellow countrymen for their adoption of
the lifestyle which following the model of Jesus and the proclamation
that it was Jesus who died for them entailed  Paul describes this as
turning from idols. But would a mere renunciation of polytheism for
monotheism -- or even a refusal to acknowledge the city's gods bring on
persecution from fellow countrymen? Jews made such a refusal but were
not persecuted. Is there, then, something more political in the adoption
of the confession that Jesus died for them, that *he* or his lifestyle,
rather than than someone else or a different lifestyle is what averts
national calamity?

Yours,

Jeffrey
--
Jeffrey B. Gibson
7423 N. Sheridan Road #2A
Chicago, Illinois 60626
e-mail jgibson000 AT ameritech.net