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Because I want my embassy to be burned down...

Hehe.

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Essential adornments for theologians

1. Pipe.

2. Glasses.

3. Tweed jacket.

What else have I missed?

Mistaken identity

I became suspicious a while ago when people asked me about my book New Testament: A Student's Introduction and then my suspicions grew further when lots of people began to arrive at this site by searching for things like Stephen Harris + New Testament Book and things like that.

It turns out that there is in fact another Stephen Harris who is Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at California State University, Sacramento, and that he has indeed published a book called New Testament: A Student's Introduction and is now retired.

I, however, am not he. Sorry if you've been confused.

I'm Steven Harris (with a 'v') and I'm 24 and study in Manchester, England. I'm not Professor Emeritus of anything (give me time) and am still some way short of retirement by approximately 40-odd years, and yes, I am aware I share a name with the bass player from Iron Maiden, and also a Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol.

NPP and Galatians 3:10-14

Well I never. No sooner am I about to finish my thesis on Galatians 3:10-14 when up pops David Field with a summary of his reading of the passage which is almost identical to mine. You can read's David's summary here. There's nothing here I would disagree with at all, although I'd like to elaborate one or two points made about verses 3:13 and 3:14.

On 3:13 David writes:

"He, the corporate messiah, the true Israel, bore the curse which the law had rightly placed us under for our centuries-long, national covenant failure. He experienced Israel's exile, he took Israel's punishment, he bore Israel's judgment."

I would agree with this completely, but it can go further still. I think one of the major problems in Galatia is not only to do with law v faith as a menas of inheritance, but also church unity. In Gal 2 we see that under pressure from the circumcision-party, Peter has now abandoned fellowship with Gentile Christians on the basis of Jewish food laws, and these (and other) 'works of the law' are dividing the body of Christ up and bringing disunity. If the focal point of Christian unity is Jesus Christ, then insistence upon observance of the law will only subvert and shatter this unity.

Christ's being hung on a tree (3:13) shows that he is considered as one who is outside of the covenant (for the OT background see Deut 21:23 -although Paul interestingly omits ὑπὸ θεοῦ from his citation of the OT text...), but by dying in such a manner that would show him to be cursed and outside the covenant, he identifies not only with disobedient Israel but also with the Gentiles. Thus he abolishes any division between Jew and Gentile that previously existed. Consequently sharing in Christ and the Spirit now identifies the true people of God, not the works of the law.

David also has some wise insights into Gal 3:14:

"And by faith (just as Habakkuk said) we cursed Jews move into the New Covenant which is, of course, above all, a thing of the Spirit - the promise-blessing Spirit-Life. How? Through incorporation (by faith) into Messiah-King-Israel: Jesus. That way we find ourselves no longer "cursed-under-the-law Jews" but rather new covenant, "blessed-as-promised" Jews."

There is one more thing I would like to add though, and it's something that almost all commentators on Galatians seem to gloss over. In 3:14 Paul makes a rather interesting statement about the blessing promised to Abraham:

"He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit."

It is in some ways remarkable that Paul identifies the blessing promised to Abraham with the promise of the Spirit, since God's promises to Abraham make no mention of the Spirit at all. Here Paul shows himself to be much more of a narrative theologian than some of his interpreters have given him credit for.

The promise to Abraham was for an offspring through whom God would bless the world, but crucially the promise does not end there. Throughout the OT narrative, the idea of a people who would obey God (and by extension, bring blessing to the world) is developed more and more clearly. In the Torah God anticipates a people who will obey him with all their hearts, but only after they have been through the purification of exile (Deut 30) and at the time of exile this vision is refined further in such a way as to include the gift of the Spirit in the formation of the people of God, the true children of Abraham (see Ezekiel 37:26).

What I suggest Paul is doing here is evoking almost the entire narrative of the OT in one verse (slight exaggeration admittedly), but tracing the idea of the people of God from its inception with the promise to Abraham and on through the Law and the Prophets (and then on to Christ of course) in this manner is the only way I can think of to explain how Paul identifies the promise of the Spirit as the substance of the promise made to Abraham. Anyone have any other thoughts?

Blogging through Paul pt 2

Part One here. This second part looks at other key developments in Pauline scholarship in the period prior to the work of Ed Sanders.

W. D. Davies

Paul and Rabbinic Judaism (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1948)

Davies' work is a seminal piece in the history of Pauline scholarship, he went further than Schweitzer before him, and like Schweitzer he saw that it made infinitely more historical sense to understand Paul not as a hellenist, but as a Rabbinic Jew. He rejected the position of Montefiore who saw Paul as a diaspora Jew, arguing instead that Paul's brand of Judaism correlates much more closely with Palestinian Judaism. Davies was likewise critical of scholars who saw Paul as being in opposition to his fellow Jews in his theology. Rather, argued Davies, Paul's thought shows a great deal of consistency with Pharasaic Judaism, for example in his understanding of the flesh and sin; the old and new humanity, the old and new Israel; the old and new man; the old and new covenant, and so on. In Davies' own words:

"Paul was a preacher of a New Exodus wrought by the 'merit' of Christ who was obedient unto death, but this New Exodus like the Old was constitutive of community, it served to establish the New Israel; it also led to the foot of a New Sinai, and Paul appeared before us as a catechist, the steward of a New Diadache that imposed new demands. 'Torah', 'Obedience' and 'Community' then are integral to Pauline Christianity no less than to Judaism. The source of Pauline Christianity lies in the fact of Christ, but in wrestling to interpret the full meaning and implication of the fact Paul constantly drew upon concepts derived from Rabbinic Judaism; it was these that formed the warp and woof if not the material of his thought."

Sound familiar? If you're read a lot of N T Wright it will, as Davies' is one of Wright's major influences.

H J Schoeps

Paul: The Theology of the Apostle in the Light of Jewish Religious Liberty (ET: London: Lutterworth, 1961)

Another who followed Schweitzer, Schoeps insisted that Paul could only be understood correctly if he is understood primarily as a Jewish eschatological thinker, and that he believed that the Torah would come to an end with the advent of the Messiah (hence Rom 10:4). Paul of course differs from his fellow Jews in that he believed the Messianic age had dawned with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Schoeps is critical of Paul's approach to the Torah however, and argues that Paul had an overly legalistic view of the Law and failed to recognise it as God's covenantal seal on his relationship with Israel, although this perhaps reflects some of Paul's interpreters rather than Paul himself. According to Schoeps, Paul had forgotten the covenant behind the law, and so he misunderstood it as a means by which it man is to make himself righteous, which is impossible because man is a sinner.

Krister Stendahl

Paul among Jews and Gentiles and Other Essays (London: SCM, 1977)

Although I find Stendahls' conclusions to be unusual in some areas (for instance, the insistence that Paul's opponents in Galatia were Gnostics) he helps correct some of the misreadings of Paul in the western tradition. Beginning with Augustine and arriving at modern Protestantism via Luther and the Reformers, Stendahl argues that Paul's concern is to include the Gentiles in the Messianic community, and not to ease his troubled and guilt-wracked conscience in the mould of Martin Luther.

Before his conversion Paul says he was blameless in regards to the law (Phil 3:6) and after his conversion his regret is that he persecuted the church, not that he had failed to satisfy God's standards in regards to the law. Even the anguish of Rom 7:19, says Stendahl, is not an analysis of the human predicament, but rather an attempt to lay the blame for it at the feet of of the flesh and of sin, while the law itself is held up as good. The human problem is not a failure to keep the law, but rather flesh and sin.

The next post in this series will outline the work of Pauline scholars who took other interesting directions in their reading of Paul prior to the publication of E. P. Sanders' groundbreaking work.

Creation Science Hermeneutics

Joel over at the Boar's Head Tavern offers some sensible reflection on the rather interesting hermeneutics of creation science maestro Ken Ham:

"[He is] mangling the Bible into something it is not. "How did Noah fit dinosaurs on the ark? He took babies." This claim is purportedly "biblical." Wow. I must never have come across chapter 6.5 in my editions. It is jaw-droppingly fantastic that one could believe that one is being faithful to what the Bible says on the one hand and adhere to absolutely zero interpretive principles because you've got an infinitely malleable text on the other hand. Words fail. "

 The LA Times also have a rather interesting article on Ham's 'creation evangelism' here.

Blogging the Scots Confession

My good friend and study-buddy Richard has begun a series of posts looking at the Scots Theological Confession of 1560 over at his blog The Destruction of Gog. Richard has a sharp theological brain and will probably be famous one day so go and visit his blog and you'll be able to say "I knew him then." The first part in the series is here, and the second post on the nature of God is here. Here's something to whet your appetite:
 

"The act of faith is never and purely individual act it must be an act of the whole church, claiming universal validity. But the importance lies not in the act of the church but to whom they confess and acknowledge the one God. The one that must be the centre of our lives that must be in now way pushed aside."

Phew.

The new template is all finished, and I managed it relatively painlessly. Usually templates work fine with Mozilla but then you have to spend hours tweaking them so that Internet Explorer can display them properly, which can make one very stressed and irritable.

I think we all know which browser Jesus would have used.

What's new?

Well not all that much beyond cosmetic appearances, which will hopefully make for easier reading and faster page load times. I've added a few links to other areas of my site, and if you want to send trackback then you can now generate a trackback key that you can actually use and not one that will splurge over half the page when you generate it. There are also some links to some of the more popular posts that I've written in the last year or so.

I'm going to re-add the daily quote generator, but I need some fresh quotes. If there are any good ones you'd like to see then just e-mail me and let me know. (They need to be no longer than 150-200 words)

Renovations

I'm redesigning the blog template (again) so some things might be a little strange for a few days. I'm hoping this format will run more smoothly in IE and that the longer posts I write will be easier to read than with the previous template.

Evening pondering

Some timely wisdom.

"Some of these [spiritual] beginners, too, make little of their faults, and at other times become over-sad when they see themselves fall into them, thinking themselves to have been saints already; and thus they become angry and impatient with themselves, which is another imperfection. Often they beseech God, with great yearnings, that He will take from them their imperfections and faults, but they do this that they may find themselves at peace, and may not be troubled by them, rather than for God’s sake; not realizing that, if He should take their imperfections from them, they would probably become prouder and more presumptuous still. They dislike praising others and love to be praised themselves; sometimes they seek out such praise. Herein they are like the foolish virgins, who, when their lamps could not be lit, sought oil from others.

[...]

There are other of these spiritual persons, again, who fall into another kind of spiritual wrath: this happens when they become irritated at the sins of others, and keep watch on those others with a sort of uneasy zeal. At times the impulse comes to them to reprove them angrily, and occasionally they go so far as to indulge it and set themselves up as masters of virtue. All this is contrary to spiritual meekness."

St John of the Cross - "The Dark Night of the Soul"