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  • From: Jim West <jwest AT highland.net>
  • To: Corpus-Paul <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Did Paul break the Law?
  • Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2005 14:57:30 -0500



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







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