Corpus-Paul

["Dieter Mitternacht" <dieter.mitternacht AT teol.lu.se>]

Since the discussion (as ever so often) has come to the core question, I would like to include Gal 3 in the discussion (if anyone is interested), especially the part about the Nomos having a beginning and an end(?) with the coming of Christ. In sum, the nomos was given 430 years after the promise, which was given to Abraham. The purpose of the nomos was to be OUR (Paul says) peadagog until the Seed would come, who(sic!) is the Messiah (vv.19, 24). With the coming of the faithfulness of Christ (pistis christou), the old pedagog is no longer required (v 25).

 

There are a number of issues here one could discuss. I would like to invite you to probe the following with me:

Many take the preposition UNTIL (eis) in Gal 3:24 as temporal, assuming the idea of a nomos-period that comes to an end with Christ. Since Paul is referring to those who were held prisoners under the nomos before pistis came, and uses the pronoun "we", I suppose we should assume that he has those in mind that were under the law during the timespan from Sinai to Golgatha, i.e. Jews.

 

The temporal view of "until" was introduced in reaction to the Lutheran position that the law was and always is a promoter of Christ (pedagogos hemon eis Christon, "unser Zuchtmeister auf Christum"), in terms of showing the failure of worksrighteousness and encouraging "pure" trust in the grace of God.

 

I would like to hear your comments on the following. Accepting the subjective genitive for pistis Christou, one could argue that the faithfulness of Christ in his submission to the will of God even unto death on a cross, in Paul's view, was the ultimate realisation of the purpose of the nomos. If the nomos taught submission to the will of God, Christ both taught and lived it. Now if the nomos and the Christ in fact have the same purpose, the nomos may be superceded by the Christ but not in contrary but in complementary fashion. The purpose of both the nomos and of Christ is to teach submission to the will of the God with whom "we" have entered into a covenantal relationship, some earlier, some later. The Messianic age of course brings with it new blessings, e.g. Jer 31:33), but again the difference is not law contra grace or works contra faith, but the nomos and Christ accomplishing the same purpose (with Christ being superior to the nomos, in Paul's view). Once  this reading of the schema of Gal 3 is entertained, doesn't that make the discussion of whether "until" is temporary or timeless almost superfluous?

 

Dieter Mitternacht

Lund University, Sweden