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  • From: Tony Costa <tmcos AT rogers.com>
  • To: Corpus-Paul <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: RE: [Corpus-Paul] Approaches to the question of divine-Christolog
  • Date: Thu, 16 Jun 2005 13:49:32 -0400 (EDT)

Jerry Sumney wrote:

"Would Paul distinguish the God of Israel from other
gods? Yes. He would say that the God of Israel is over
and the source of all things. Would he feel a
contradiction between this and acknowledging that
there
are indeed many gods? I doubt it. The tortured
discussion of 1 Cor 8-10 shows that he acknowledges
the existence of many beings that can be given the
rank
of god. These beings are real and may cause harm or
give blessing. Still Paul says you must not worship
them."

Jerry, what did Paul mean when he spoke of the many
"gods" and many "lords" in 1 Cor.8:5? In 8:4 he
asserts there is no other God but one, and then in 8:5
acknowledges those who are "called" gods and lords in
the Empire. Is this a polemical rebuttal of those
"so-called" gods and lords (1 Cor.8:5,RSV,NRSV,NASB,
NKJV) who for Paul in reality have no right to those
titles. In 8:6 the Christian 'shema' assigns the
divine titles of God and Lord to the Father and Christ
respectively. Another important passage that I think
may shed some light on this whole question is Paul's
letter to the Galatians:


"Formerly, when you did not know God, you were
enslaved to beings that by nature are not gods. Now,
however, that you have come to know God, or rather to
be known by God, how can you turn back again to the
weak and beggarly elemental spirits?" (Gal.4:8-9;
NRSV)

It seems that by nature these beings, "beggarly
elemental spirits", were not gods at all. If these
beings are not gods "by nature", would it not be
conversely true that for Paul there was therefore only
one God "by nature"?


Tony Costa, M.A., ThD(cand)




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