Corpus-Paul

["Mark D. Nanos" <nanosmd AT comcast.net>]

on 2/19/05 2:03 AM, Richard Fellows at rfellows AT shaw.ca wrote:

"Communication between Paul and Galatia is more likely during the later
stages of his Aegean career, such as during his Ephesian period. However, as
I said before, such a late date makes it difficult to account for the
confusion in Galatia. Would anyone at that time have thought it plausible
that Paul taught circumcision?"

Mark responds:
This "interpretive" move from Gal 5:11 is the first logical requirement of
your hypothesis, but it is problematic. I initially found this suggested
reading of the implications of 5:11 attractive too, and I think it arose in
the 80's in the work of Howard, Crisis in Galatia, if I remember right.
Before that it was not the general reading of the implications, for what
that is worth. But that is not why I find it suspect. I simply want to point
out that this reading, which your argument requires here, is not self
evident.

I think that Paul's rhetorical point is not raised because someone now
states or accuses him of "still" proclaiming proselyte conversion (i.e.,
circumcision) in Gal 5:11. There are two other implications I think are
stronger. One, that he had proclaimed it before his vocational change to a
non-proselyte converter to the nations (see 1:13-16) (I am not inclined to
think he is referring to earlier in his Christ-proclaiming ministry, but
that too is an option for the interpreter to explore; see discussions in
Donaldson's Paul and the Gentiles). And two, that he is expressing the
policy of resistance in his own ministry to which he is calling his
addressees. For he could escape the pressure in his life if he observed the
conventional way to incorporate Gentiles as full-members by "still"
proclaiming circumcision, just as they are being influenced to believe they
could avoid the pressure in their life if they would but undertake the
conventional route of proselyte conversion (it is "still" available to them,
and appears to represent "good news" in this sense).

>From Paul's point of view, as expressed in ironic rebuking terms here, it is
no more "still" available to them to become proselytes than it is "still"
available to him to proclaim it--that option is gone with the coming of
Jesus Christ.

If this interpretation is accepted, since I believe it more probable than
the one that you cite, then you do not have the basis for the rest of the
hypothesis as expressed in the post to which I respond. Now what remains
available to ascertain how Paul learned of the situation, where, or when?

Dieter writes:
"Also, as I have mentioned before, I do not think we need outsiders to
understand the problem in Galatia."

But then later Dieter adds:
"And so the advice from Jerusalem may have been..."

Mark responds:
It looks like you have an outside influence in your second comment, and thus
outsiders involved in a way you had eschewed in arguments well-made before
that. 

I think your argument for why Paul expresses his initial independence is
probable. The point of the letter is to call the addressees to resistance to
common conventions that seem like good news to resolve their identity
problem, but the price of resistance is standing alone, all the more so
since Paul is not present but those who uphold the conventions they are
called to resist are. The Galatians, if they continue to resist, will feel
all alone (I hear the claim of teenagers denied by parents the action they
believe will make them feel accepted, fearing they will now be all alone,
not fit in, destroyed! which the parent [Paul], it is implied, has never
faced). Paul, their leader, had successfully faced similar social problems
for this policy, and even though he too stood alone for many years for this,
he did not capitulate. Now they must not either, but instead suffer, as has
the one in whom they believed, and the one from whom they have heard this
message.

Regards,
Mark
-- 
Mark D. Nanos, Ph.D.
Rockhurst University
Co-Moderator
http://home.comcast.net/~nanosmd/