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  • From: Loren Rosson <rossoiii AT yahoo.com>
  • To: corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Corpus-Paul] Paul the Deceiver
  • Date: Wed, 30 Nov 2005 05:18:12 -0800 (PST)

Listers --

I wrote a blog-review for Mark Given's _Paul's True
Rhetoric_, and, especially since Mark is a
list-member, I thought I'd share with everyone. It's a
very good book, and I hope to see the question of
Paul's deceptions explored more by others.

Loren Rosson III

_____________________________________


In _Paul's True Rhetoric: Ambiguity, Cunning, and
Deception in Greece and Rome_, Mark Given argues that
the apostle was deceptively sophistic, saying things
he really didn't mean, insulting people "politely",
making rules and breaking them, patronizing the Jewish
people, and masquerading like a chameleon according to
the company he was in. This is an important work, if
at times one-sided, offering new ways to understand
the various tensions and contradictions in Paul's
letters. It also forces interesting questions about
the nature of one's "gospel truth".

Given examines Paul's rhetoric in three places,
cleverly calling his chapters, "Ambiguity in Athens",
"Cunning in Corinth", and "Deception in Rome". I'll
briefly sketch his findings.

Athens

Given calls Acts 17:16-34 "the most sophisticated
speech composed by the most accomplished narrator and
speech writer in the New Testament" (p 68), for Luke
presents Paul as using double-entendres left and right
when addressing the Athenians. Paul continually
insults the crowd but in a way that can be construed
as either positive (or at least neutral) for purposes
of saving face. He tells the Athenians that they are
"in every way *daimon*-fearing” (17:22), which can
mean that they are either "thoroughly religious" or
"thoroughly superstitious" (p 69). Paul may be saying
the former, in effect, while obviously meaning the
latter since (in Luke's eyes) the Athenians are
idolaters. Paul then calls attention to the fact they
"worship a god as unknown" (17:23), which can mean
that they either "worship unknowingly" or "worship
improperly/shamefully" (p 71), again perhaps saying
the former but really meaning the latter. When he says
that "God has overlooked their ignorance" (17:30), the
Greek word for "overlook" can also mean "despise".
Paul may be saying, face-value, that God has
overlooked their misconception, while really meaning
that God has despised their errors for which they will
pay (p 73). Given persuasively argues that the
Areopagus speech shows Paul insulting his pagan
audience, but ambiguously enough so that he can get
away with it. How genteel to insult one's audience so
"politely".

I have serious doubts, however, about how historical
this is. Luke has the tendency to tone down (or make
ambiguous) insults in general. We see this by
comparing his gospel to the two he used. Jesus' rivals
are "malicious hypocrites" in Mt 22:18/Mk 12:15, but
they are "crafty" in Lk 20:23, a more ambiguous term.
The Jesus of Mark and Matthew tells the Sadducees,
point blank, that they are wrong (Mk 12:18-27/Mt
22:23-33), but the Jesus of Luke is more circumspect
(Lk 20:27-40). Luke tones (way) down Matthew's catalog
of insults (Mt 23:1-36) against the Pharisees
(assuming, as I do, that Luke knew Matthew); vicious
insults like "brood of vipers" (Mt 23:33) are censored
in Lk 20:45-47.

Given declares that "although Luke's portrait of a
sophistic Paul may be fanciful, it is not necessarily
fantastic" (p 82), based on what he then proceeds to
demonstrate from the letters themselves. But the
deceptions we are about to see in Corinth and Rome
don't involve the rhetoric of insulting -- about which
Paul was usually anything *but* ambiguous. The sophist
Paul of Acts 17, while fascinating, is probably more a
product of Luke than Given wants him to be.

Corinth

Turning to I Corinthians, Given finds Paul to be
cunning in two particular places, I Cor 1-4 and
9:19-23. In the former, he tells his addressees that
the only wisdom that matters is God's wisdom rather
than human wisdom (I Cor 1:18-25), only then to
present himself as the conduit of true spiritual
wisdom which they can't hope to attain without him (I
Cor 2:6-3:4). Given suggests that Paul is claiming to
have a "secret and hidden wisdom of God" (I Cor 2:7)
available only to the privileged -- which would make
him as bad as the gnostics he just finished bashing
(in I Cor 1:18-25). Paul thus makes the rules and
breaks them (see pp 95-103).

Paul's more infamous deception is the one he candidly
admits to: that he "becomes like a Jew in order to win
Jews" to the gospel (I Cor 19:20) and "becomes like
the lawless in order to win the lawless" (I Cor
19:21). Despite scholarly attempts to avoid the
obvious implications (or treat as hyperbole), the
apostle is admitting that he temporarily, and
cunningly, practices Torah in order to win Jews, and
then behaves like an immoral pagan in order to win
Gentiles. Paul's real view, of course, squares with
neither behavior, for he insists that while the Torah
is obsolete, the best of its requirements are
fulfilled on the avenue of the spirit. It's as if a
Southern Baptist were to try converting a group of
Jews by observing Torah in their presence, and then
later mix with heathens by drinking, dancing, and
smoking pot.

People were incensed by Paul's chameleon behavior --
in II Cor 12:16 he responds to charges of "taking
people in by deceit" -- and rightfully so. While it's
perfectly acceptable to lie and deceive in the
honor-shame Mediterranean, especially against enemies,
it's not acceptable to beguile one's potential
converts like this. Given locates the rationale for
Paul's deception in an apocalyptic world-view: because
he believed people were so blinded by the heathen gods
of the present world -- and too easily taken in by
pagan deceptions -- they needed to be deceived in turn
for their own good. (see pp 115-117). Paul's strategy,
in this sense, mimics those of Socrates and Aristotle:

"Just as Plato's Socrates feels free to break the
rules of dialectic if necessary in order to win an
argument, and Aristotle can counsel the use of
sophistic *elenchus* to defeat sophists on their own
terms, so Paul feels free to leave the world of being
for that of seeming, 'to become all things to
everyone,' in order to propagate the truth, his gospel
truth... In a Platonic-Socratic world-view, the
ignorance from which humanity suffers results from the
elusive and changing nature of the sphere of becoming,
but in Paul's apocalyptic worldview, the deceptive
character of existence in 'this world' is even more
acute because 'the god of this world' is himself a
diabolically clever sophist...[In either case], the
deceived must first be deceived for their own good."
(pp 117, 176-177, 117)

This is an interesting way of looking at it, but I
wonder if Paul really ever thought about justifying
his deceptions this way. Is Given perhaps trying too
hard to find a rationale here? The idea that people
need to be deceived for their own good is fairly
common, and one we practice all the time, if without
realizing it. Paul's masquerades may simply reflect
normal human behavior more than anything.

Rome

According to Given, if Paul was ambiguously insulting
in Athens, cunningly self-serving in Corinth, he was
deceptively patronizing in Romans. Scholars have tried
accounting for Romans' more positive estimation of the
Torah and Israel in various ways: Sanders thinks Paul
changed his mind over time -- that after struggling
through certain theological dilemmas, he came to a
more positive view of God's purpose in giving the law
and Israel's salvation (_Paul, the Law, and the Jewish
People_). Tobin thinks Paul revised his arguments for
more expeditious reasons -- out of concern for the bad
reputation he had acquired by this time (_Paul's
Rhetoric in its Contexts_). Esler thinks the situation
in Rome provides the answer -- that Paul was trying to
resolve ethnic conflict in the Roman church, and the
success of his strategy depended on acknowledging the
value of each group's ethnicity; i.e. there had to be
something good about being Jewish (_Conflict and
Identity in Romans_).

In contrast to these approaches (though in a way
similar to Tobin's), Given thinks Paul's views didn't
change one bit since Galatia and Corinth. He "hasn't
really softened his view of the law at all" (p 157),
only his scandalous rhetoric. His true position on the
law and the Jewish people remained exactly the same.
The law may be holy (Rom 7:12), and God may have given
it for the best of reasons (for "life" in Rom 7:10),
but it's still entirely useless and unable to do the
job God gave it; the best it had to offer can be
fulfilled only by a radically different route (the
spirit) (Rom 8:1-4). The only difference between
Galatians and Romans in terms of the law's purpose is
that in one the law (and thus God) is an active agent
in confining Israel under the power of sin (Gal
3:19-26), while in the other sin itself is the agent
(Rom 7:7-25) -- thus absolving God of the blame. But
"subtract the sin scapegoat in Rom 7, and what
remains?" asks Given (p 157). Exactly the same as
before: an ineffective and completely useless law,
unable to save people.

Likewise, even though Paul now credits the Jewish
people with having "adoption", "the covenant/law",
"worship", "the promises", and "the patriarchs" (Rom
9:4-5), that's empty credit, because we know what he
really thinks: that real adoption comes from being
liberated from the law (Gal 4:5) and being led by the
spirit (Rom 8:14-15); that there are two covenants, an
old and a new, the former of which has been superseded
by the latter (II Cor 3:6-14); that real worship takes
place "in Christ" (the temple of one's body) rather
than the Jerusalem temple (I Cor 3:16-17); that the
real heirs to God's promises are Jews and Gentiles in
Christ rather than Israel under the law (Gal
3:19,22,29; Rom 4:13-14; Rom 9:6-24); that the only
patriarch who means anything is a revisionist Abraham,
the father of those who have faith regardless of their
ethnicity (Gal 3:6-9; 4:1-17), and the root of a tree
from which natural branches (Jews) broke off in order
to make room for unnatural branches (Gentiles) (Rom
11:17-24). What Paul really thinks, says Given, isn't
hard to figure out (see pp 159-168).

I agree that Paul is deceptive in Romans, but I'm also
confident that he has changed his mind about a few
things. It's difficult to ascribe the passionate
arguments of Rom 7:7-25 and 11:1-36 to pure deception.
Paul was human enough to deceive, but he was also
human enough to care. And Sanders is right: Rom 7 & 11
show a deep concern about God's perversity and
inconsistency. Perhaps the best way of putting it is
that Paul wants to have it both ways. He wants to
improve his theology without admitting that he's doing
so, or that he was ever wrong. In that sense he's
indeed a deceiver, and more than likely, a
self-deceiver.

Concluding Observations

Given is most persuasive about Corinth. That's where
Paul is aggressively deceptive, in more ways than one.
I like his treatment of Romans too, though would
insist that at least some of Paul's opinions about the
law and Israel have truly changed. With regards to his
speech before the Athenians, the ambiguously-insulting
rhetoric probably owes more to Luke than Paul, who had
less tact.

I don't want my criticisms of _Paul's True Rhetoric_
to suggest an ambiguous enthusiasm on my part for the
book. That would be deceptive indeed. This is a
fantastic book for asking all the right questions, and
trying to understand Paul in terms that western people
are inclined to distrust. I hope to see more work that
builds on Given's approach.

Loren Rosson III
Nashua NH
http://lorenrosson.blogspot.com/




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  • [Corpus-Paul] Paul the Deceiver, Loren Rosson, 11/30/2005

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