Corpus-Paul

["Mark D. Nanos" <nanos AT gvi.net>]

> Moon concludes:
> This interpretation makes Paul say:
>
> Oh, do you want to become a Jew by being circumcised?
> But don't you know that the Jewish people is under curse?
> Why do you want to identify with those under curse?
>
> But it does not seem to match the fact that
> Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law (Gal 3:10),
> which seems to indicate that the curse of the law
> is a reality whether they are identified with
> the Jewish people or not.
I am not sure that the suggestion of Scott as I construed his meaning 
works, but it offered a different view, and I thought it might have 
some promise. I have not worked this through myself in any detail, 
and it is not my present project, but I am game to keep the 
conversation open in the effort to understand it.

I do not come to the same summary conclusions as Moon, at least not 
initially. I would think keeping a distinction between Israelites and 
non-Israelites provides a different outcome and more rhetorical 
clarity.

Paul seems to view the Jewish people as having been under a curse in 
some sense (also under an irrevocable promise of blessing), a view he 
may share with some if not many other Jewish people of this period 
suffering under the Roman regime and living in the Greek (previous 
regime) world of the Diaspora (being displaced from or oppressed in 
the Land appointed to the people of Israel which is idealized to be 
under the rule of God).

Now this would "not" directly apply to non-Jewish people, as are the 
Galatian addressees; they are not under the curse resulting from the 
covenant entered into by the Jewish people, even if all of humankind 
and creation may be suffering until the awaited promised time of 
restoration of all things/people.

If so, then it is only the Jewish people whom he directly considers 
as freed in this manner from a curse, although gentiles enter into 
this blessing of the dawning of the promise to Abraham through Israel 
for all of the nations. It is the irony of these gentiles not 
previously confined in the same way, and having already received the 
advantages of the promised age, but now seeking to turn back the 
clock, so to speak, by becoming Israelite proselytes, that seems to 
be the rhetorical point of this entire passage. In this way he seeks 
to explain the point he made in 3:1-5 not to complete proselyte 
conversion after they have already partaken of the fruit of the 
awaited age, i.e., the Spirit, even if still "waiting for the hope of 
righteousness."

The importance of this time element is throughout the passage and the 
letter: the gospel proclaimed beforehand to Abraham concerning 
gentiles; before what? 3:17-18 indicates that he has the 
Covenant/Torah with Israel in view, which came with a promise of 
blessing and curse, but does not annul the covenant with Abraham on 
behalf of all humankind (the nations as well as Israel) that had come 
earlier, by which the Galatian gentiles have already benefited. And 
by their benefit so too have "we," that is the Jewish people, 
according to Paul's view.

This is similar in some ways to the way I see Paul arguing in Romans 
11 for the inclusion of gentiles as part of Israel's story. And there 
seems to be a similarity with the way Luke's James understands the 
assessment of the empirical evidence of a gentile phenomenon expected 
to accompany the promised time of Israel's restoration and return of 
the nations: if the later is evident then the former is indicated 
(Acts 15:13-18).

Does this take make any sense to anyone else. Like Moon, I wonder 
what others make of this language in Gal. 3 when approached from less 
Reformation-driven perspectives on Paul and first-century Judaisms.

Regards,
Mark Nanos
Kansas City