Corpus-Paul

["Tim Gallant" <tim AT rabbisaul.com>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ron Price" <ron.price AT virgin.net>
> > For some gentiles, Jewish respect for their ancestral traditions, even 
> > when it
> > worked against their economic or human interests, was
> > something to be admired.
>
> Do you have evidence that any contemporary Gentiles admired the custom 
> under
> consideration?
>
> Jewish respect for their ancestral traditions was one of the primary 
> causes
> (if not *the* primary cause) of friction between James and Paul (Acts 15).
> Paul was to express his willingness to abandon it all for the sake of 
> Christ
> (Php 3). If Gentiles had generally admired Jewish ancestral traditions 
> there
> might never have been a separate religion called Christianity.

Well, that response is far too comprehensive and blurs a lot of things. The 
fact is that Paul himself continued to maintain the ancestral traditions 
insofar it was possible without compromising his Gentile mission. James' own 
words and his eagerness to listen to James's suggestion (not to mention 
Paul's words later in self-defense) clearly show that he never instructed 
Jews to abandon the traditions; and in fact, that he himself practiced them. 
Indeed, Acts depicts a Paul who takes Nazarite vows.

Of course, Paul no longer considered the law as the way of salvation; and he 
no longer saw himself as under the law (e.g. Rom 7.14, but esp 1 Cor 
9.19-21).

There simply was no friction between James and Paul on this point. The only 
tension that can be posited from the biblical evidence (from Gal 2 - and I 
suggest it is overread) is over whether *Gentiles* should keep the law.

tim
----------------------
Tim Gallant
Pastor, Conrad Christian Reformed Church
http://www.timgallant.org