Corpus-Paul

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

Title: RE: [Corpus-Paul] Did Paul break the Law?

Dear Harold

 

I wrote:

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?

You replied:

"It is not superfluous but a doctrinal issue important to the way people live their lives. Believers are not under the law, as Galatians itself says:..." Then you list a number of passages.

 

My response:

Every passage you list demands detailed treatment and by just listing them you will not convince me, since I also have read them before.  Especially the allegory in ch 4 demands very careful attention. Let me also emphasize that I am not concerned with doctrinal issues or "revealed truths" but with plausible readings of texts in their original communication situations, which are 2000 years apart from us. If what appears to be the most plausible reading should prove conflicting with reformation (or whatever else) doctrine, so be it. On the other hand I welcome criticism of my readings and will consider it on the basis of the same principle.

 

Let me pick 2:19 and 3:10 from your list for some comments. I agree that these passages seem to complement each other and also tie in with 3:19-20a. And I would like to make two points. First, having written these things Paul still asserts that the law is not opposed to the promises of God. Whatever else that may mean I think it does mean that for Paul there is no opposition between promise and law. Rather the resurrection of Christ marks the beginning of the Messianic age with a new level of Spirit distribution, from which both Jews (in their submission to the law and Christ) and Gentiles (in their submission to Christ) may benefit. 3:23 I think shows that Paul considers the distribution of the Spirit to be a positive event for both Jews and Gentiles. The battle between sarx and law has turned, Paul would argue I think, on a broad scale in favor of compliance through the Spirit (ch 5:13ff). It is also the initial Spirit experiences that he refers to in 3:1-5.

 

Second. your quote of Gal 2:19 continues with Paul's assertion that he had been crucified with Christ, which I think is an assertion that includes experiences of bodily suffering. If you allow me to include Phil 2 and 3, I think we can see that, for Paul, participation in Christ's death and resurrection is very real. It is a matter of being prepared and even desiring (Phil 3:10) the bodily sufferings of Christ for themselves, and thus of sharing the faithfulness of Christ (Phil 2:5ff).

 

Maybe the point I am trying to make becomes clearer if I add what I believe to be the core issue in Galatia. The desire for circumcision among Gentile disciples of Christ in Galatia is not based on a sense of incomplete soteriology, i.e. wanting to secure a righteous standing before God with the addition of works of the law. Rather, the wish for circumcision originates from the fact that - in an Anatolian environment -being a Gentile follower of Christ had turned out to be much more complicated than being a Jewish follower of Christ. What Paul is opposing is the desire to compromise the calling to follow in the footsteps of the crucified Christ.

 

 

Dieter Mitternacht

Centre for Theology and Religious Studies
LUND UNIVERSITY
Allhelgona Kyrkogata 8
223 62 LUND
SWEDEN
Dieter.Mitternacht AT teol.lu.se
http://www.teol.lu.se/nt/forskning/mitternacht.html





_______________________________________________
Corpus-Paul mailing list
Corpus-Paul AT lists.ibiblio.org
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/corpus-paul