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  • From: "Justin Dombrowski" <jedombrowski AT msn.com>
  • To: "Corpus-Paul" <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Audience of Romans/Symbolic Paul
  • Date: Sun, 1 May 2005 16:52:08 -0400

Question to Loren for clarification:

Are you saying either (a) the addressees in Rom 14f are non-believing Jews, or that (b) the subject of that discourse is non-believing Jews and the addressees are someone else.

If (a): What in the text makes you think so?

If (b): What in the text lends you to believe so? Why can't they, hypothetically, be unbelieving religious pagans, or perhaps nobody in particular, but anyone "weak in faith" in general?

Justin D
MA Student
The Jewish Theological Seminary


----- Original Message ----- From: "Loren Rosson" <rossoiii AT yahoo.com>
To: "Tim Gallant" <tim AT rabbisaul.com>; "Corpus-Paul" <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sunday, May 01, 2005 4:20 PM
Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Audience of Romans/Symbolic Paul


[Loren]
Mark would probably not care for the way I've
revised
his Roman scenario, but I can't help but think
unbelieving Israel is in view in chs 14-15 in a
similar way to Caesar in ch 13: believers do and
must
deal with the "outside". Rom 12-15 instructs
accordingly.

[Tim]
However... Paul never addresses Caesar
(or the civil authorities in general)
in ch 13; he does address the "weak"
directly in ch 14.

Paul doesn't need to address civil authorities on the
question of taxation. He needs to "address"
unbelieving Israel only in a counterpart rhetorical
strategy, with respect to judging the other in turn.
(See more below.)

I frankly find the view that the weak
in ch 14-15 are unbelieving Jews
to be quite implausible. In 14.4, he says
that the weak will be made to
stand, but that does not seem to fit
well with how he construes unbelieving
Jews in ch 9-11.

I see no obstacle here. That non-Christian Judeans
will be upheld is entirely compatible with Rom 11.

Even more damaging is 14.6ff, which speak
of living and dying to the Lord,

14:6ff is precisely what points to unbelieving Israel,
since "weakness" has nothing to do with the Torah's
works. "Let all be convinced in their minds what is
right [on the subject of works]..." 4:19-21 actually
explains what "weakness/strength" is about: belief in
God's ability to give life to death (Isaac~Jesus). (So
Nanos.)

which is quite explicitly Christ
(14.9). Would he speak of Jews who do
not believe upon Christ as "living and
dying to the Lord"?

The weak are addressed only as counterparts in Paul's
injunctions to the strong, as in 14:3-6 and 14:10-13.
The strong are the real targets -- 14:14-15:6 puts
this beyond doubt, I think -- and I don't see the weak
in view at all in 14:7-9.

Loren Rosson III
Nashua NH
rossoiii AT yahoo.com

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