Corpus-Paul

[Jim West <jwest AT highland.net>]

John Brand wrote:

> John Brand responds:
> You could answer your own question by considering the number of 
> contenders that there were in the Greek mystery religions for 'Lord' 
> of the cult (Dionysos, Mithras, Athene, etc.).
Mine was a rhetorical question [so far as myself is concerned] intended 
to spur the person to whom it was directed to pursue an avenue he may 
not have considered.

> Jim West wrote: 
>  
>
> John Brand asks:
> Why the Mysteries only, Jim? 
The mysteries are one simple, well enough known example.

> Why wouldn't language Paul used resonate 
> from philosophical thought represented in Cicero or Lucretius 
> (Epicurean) or (later) Marcus Aurelius (Stoic)? 
Paul wasn't writing to Stoics.  Epictetus postdates Paul. It's therefore 
anachronistic to project Paul in dialogue with Stoicism.

> Wouldn't it be more 
> accurate to say that some of his audiences would resonate with 
> language from the Mysteries (i.e. Ephesus) while others would 
> resonate with more sophisticated language of philosophy (i.e. 
> Romans)?
>  
Or any other number of examples.  The point is not diminished, but it 
might have been overlooked, that Paul would have been heard differently 
by greeks than by jews.

Jim

--
Jim West, ThD
http://web.infoave.net/~jwest
http://biblical-studies.blogspot.com