Ben C. Smith wrote:Michael, spin is correct here. Any verbal force to be found in the participle has to belong to whatever/whomever the participle is modifying. In all three cases, the participle is modifying an understood "they/them", which is common for Greek participles. If anyone is "thinking" or "considering" here, it is the pillars (the "they"), not Paul; therefore the best sense is "seeming" — the pillars seem to be something.
Mark 10.42 has a similar construction for "those who are considered to rule the gentiles" (those "seeming" to rule the gentiles). This is a case where the participle is given a definite article and modifies an understood "they", exactly as we find in the verses in Galatians.
To make Paul be the one who is "seeming" or "thinking" or "supposing" (or however you want to translate the participle) is simply an imposition upon the text.
Mark 10:42 has δοκουντες which could be translated as “ones-recognised” because δοκέω should be seen as positive. Therefore “you know that those who are recognised to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them.” The question seems to be who is doing the recognising. Can it be general i.e. everyone recognised them or is the Greek ending such that it has to be only the “lords” who recognise them as such? Please can you give the different Greek words for both meanings?
Turning to Gal 2:6
ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν δοκούντων εἶναί τι ὁποῖοί
…
ἐμοὶ γὰρ οἱ δοκοῦντες οὐδὲν προσανέθεντο,
(A literal translation)
From now the ones-recognised to-be something
…
To-me for the ones-recognised nothing added
(A more correct English one)
Now from those who are recognised to be something
…
For those recognised added nothing to me;
The replacement of “repute” with “recognised” does not remove the negativity of “something”.
spin wrote:Michael BG wrote:I don’t understand your argument. In Gal 2:7a Paul states that his gospel is to the uncircumcised and in Gal 2:9 that “they (James, Peter and John) [go] to the circumcised”. Therefore Paul is implying a difference between the messages to the uncircumcised and the circumcised.
There is no other gospel than the one that Paul preaches. There is no other gospel. You cannot represent Paul as thinking of a gospel to the uncircumcised and a gospel to the circumcised. There is just one gospel. Talking of a
gospel to the uncircumcised would not make sense to Paul.
The interpolation 2:7b-8 included the words "to the uncircumcised".
You posted:
spin wrote:Gal 2:7b-8 which injects Peter rather than Cephas into the text does not reflect Paul, but later values that wish to put Paul in his place.
You did not specify what you meant by “7b”. I assume that letters are added to specify part of the verse and there is a natural divide between these parts.
RSV
but on the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel to the circumcised
The break between a and b must be between “uncircumcised,” and “just”. If your position was to include “to the uncircumcised” you did not make this clear. I think the normal place for the split is between “uncircumcised,” and “just”.
spin wrote:Michael BG wrote:How can Paul state that James, Cephas and John gave Paul and Barnabas “the right-hand of fellowship or partnership” if James and Cephas and John didn’t give the impression to Paul that they had done so?
The notion of hospitality must be quite foreign. You don't have to agree with someone to be hospitable. You can shake hands and wish someone well, despite not agreeing with their views.
Now we are having a discussion of the meaning of κοινωνιας. I see it as meaning more than hospitality. According to Liddell and Scott it means communion, association or partnership (
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/mor ... ek#lexicon). Therefore James, Cephas and John are not just offering hospitality. Paul is giving the impression that James, Cephas and John gave acceptance to Paul and Barnabas as partners; as associates; in communion together sharing thoughts and beliefs.
spin wrote:Michael BG wrote: Paul I think is clear that the law does not apply to Gentiles:
And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith,…
that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.
Therefore there is no need for anyone anymore to be circumcised.
Paul is offering a choice to the Galatians between Jesus and the law/circumcision. Circumcision says Paul has no meaning in Jesus. Anyone can follow Jesus, be they circumcised or not.
I agree.
spin wrote:Michael BG wrote:
We can agree that we know that James, John and Cephas gave Paul the impression they were happy for him to preach his gospel of Jesus Christ to the uncircumcised. You think that we cannot assume this means that James, John and Cephas accepted a gospel regarding Jesus Christ. While I think it is illogical for messianic Jews to give the impression that they would be happy for a false message to be preached to gentiles.
You are happy with non-trinitarians self-defining as christians. I'm sure many christians are for the sake of a spirit of ecumenicalism will accept all sorts of astandard christian views, but you don't think the broad church of Judaism is able to do the same. There were so many different flavors of Jewish belief at the time representing the one ethnos, Pharisaism, Essenism, Rechabitism, Messianism, Gnostic Judaism.... Within some of these there were different sub-flavors. Paul and the pillars might not have agreed, but it doesn't mean they would have acted out on a disagreement. Paul left unimpressed with them, "what they actually were makes no difference to me" (2:6), but he still presented the departure positively.
Paul could be referring to their former positions – disciple; brother, when he writes, “what they actually were”.
I do accept that Jews could recognise Paul as a Jew. There is a question mark whether all Jews did. However I do not consider the partnership and communion between James, Cephas and John and Barnabas and Paul as just a recognition of their Jewishness but a recognition of a shared view regarding the resurrection of Jesus.