Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Greek)

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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

Post by Peter Kirby »

spin wrote:Some responses to Peter:

Argument by reversal:

The process of inverting Pauline statements to reveal his opponents' views does not work—at least as attempted here. Paul is talking specifically to the Galatians and contrasting the views of his opponents with what he specifically taught those Galatians. There is no opportunity to see the references to Jesus in these statements as bearing any relevance to what his opponents believed.

Gal 5:2 Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you.

The Galatians have been told that they should accept circumcision, but Paul tells them that Christ will be of no advantage to them. There is no reflection on his opponents' views on Jesus in this. There is no indication that the opponents knew anything about Jesus.

Gal 5:4 "You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace."

The Galatians have been told that to follow the Jewish way of other proselytes to Galatia they need to follow the law (to become justified). Paul tells them that seeking justification through the law will sever them from his Christ, having fallen from grace.

One cannot derive opponents' views about Jesus through the process of inversion as it does not take into account the audience or Paul's pastoral relationship with those he writes to. What is being inverted may contain more information about the supposed original than can reasonable be derived.

It is Paul who is bring the views disturbing his Galatians into contrast with Jesus. It is Paul who is separating the opponents from his Jesus.

Circumcision does not exclude people from justification through Jesus, for circumcision and uncircumcision are irrelevant to Paul's Jesus cult. Otherwise he might not be eligible for his own religion. But those who make circumcision important to their life—Paul tells the Galatians—are severed from Jesus and have fallen from grace. Paul continually tells the Galatians the choice is Jesus or the religion of his opponents. He is not simply contradicting his opponents, but preaching to the Galatians about Jesus.

The process of inversion is liable to assumptions about what to invert. How does one discern what was derived from the opponents and what was not?


Argument from the irrelevance of Jerusalem to Paul

The assertion "The others, such as James and Cephas, are a threat to Paul's authority because they also make claims regarding Jesus Christ" contains the unjustified link to Jesus. We don't know anything about the messiah of Paul's opponents. If we can judge by the story of the messianic proselytizer Apollos mentioned in Acts 18, people preached the Johannine cult of the coming messiah without any knowledge of Jesus. One can be a messianic prepper without any notion of Jesus and one can proselytize a non-Jesus messianism.

Paul before his trip to Jerusalem was a lone wolf preacher, who had no backing, unlike those who were sent by the Jerusalemites. By interacting with them Paul is upping his creds. He has a relationship with the people in Jerusalem and supports the poor there. He suddenly stops being a loner and can place himself into a wider context. Thus, by his trip to Jerusalem his raises his credibility to potential proselytes. It is not important what the Jerusalemites believe, but how Paul can sell his Jesus messianism.

The letter to the Galatians sells the notion that the people in Jerusalem with their insistence on living the
law just don't get it. On the other hand Paul runs with the big guys in Jerusalem so he is someone with an improved claim to apostleship. The trip to Jerusalem is good brand placement.


Argument by retrojection of the terminus technicus "apostle"

The term "apostle" at the time Paul wrote indicated a person who was sent with orders, with a mission. It could not have developed the sense carried by the later christian terminus technicus. The contrary seems to be that a whole technical vocabulary was born in the head of Paul, who received his gospel (and its vocabulary) from a vision. We must scratch the imputation that Paul used the term "apostle" in any christian sense. Terms develop specific significances within linguistic communities over time. We can understand the term apostle from Gal 1:1, which indicates that an apostle was usually of men and/or from men. Paul's mission however came from God. Paul's use of the term was the common usage: he just claims that God gave him his orders. Being an apostle does not imply a commission from God to make converts to the Jesus religion. Just Paul's apostleship. Those who attend Paul would have the same view of their apostleship. They could be described as apostles sent by any recognized organization. Paul contrasts his job as apostle from others by claiming his apostleship was from God, which allows him to compete in the proselytism game, while not having been sent by anyone.

Cephas and Apollos, by virtue of their ambulant proselytizing, could be called apostles sent by Jerusalem or some other such entity. The status of James is ambiguous: although he is implied to be an apostle in Gal 1:19 he does not appear to have been sent anywhere, though he does send people. If we can judge by 1 Cor 9:5, he is separated from people called apostles, "the other apostles and the brothers of the lord and Cephas".

Paul didn't put up his apostleship at the beginning of 1 Thes as he does in all his other letters, despite mentioning it in 1:7. Perhaps he didn't see it as such a badge at the time. Yet he feels he has to clarify his status as apostle in various ways, including 1 Cor 1:1 "called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God". Paul does not use the term "apostle" in any christian sense, yet he sees himself as sent by God on a mission, which makes him an apostle on behalf of God.

We know Paul's view of Cephas in Galatians is quite ambivalent. I don't know if that view is improved in 1 Cor. One cannot glean from the mentions of Cephas in 1 Cor that he believed in the messiah called Jesus. One can say that he was a messianic proselytizer. Was he any different from the Apollos mentioned in Acts 18:25 "who taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John"? That story has Apollos being informed of Jesus by Priscilla and Aquila, but he had been proselytizing for John's messiah, a Christ before Paul began preaching Jesus. Was that what Apollos was doing in 1 Cor and Cephas likewise? Paul doesn't tell his readers. He does however take advantage of their work.

One cannot place too much significance on the term "apostle" as generally used in Paul's writings. He gives the term special significance only when applied to him (and perhaps his) through his sentiment of have been sent by God.
Well, that was a very interesting exchange, and I hope people can compare your response to the original and not simply accept some kind of conclusion that none of these considerations (in the way that they were expressed in my post, as they're distinctly weaker in the retelling) have any merit whatsoever. I think we covered the bases, but the reader can construct their own version of what all the epicycles would be if we went back and forth a bunch of times.

(My guess - first argument is highly difficult to sustain, first to be thrown out. Third argument is not totally bad, but fails to be conclusive, because it relies on the reader making some kind of a naive, prima facie reading stick, when it's not explicit. The second argument has the greatest staying power to be debated ad nauseam, but spin's view is that it's completely wrong, because we have different opinions about what is more likely in a general way. Overall, the opinions are justified only on the razor's edge one way or another, IMO -- we've literally cut the debate down to whether the Messianists called their Messiah Jesus, nothing, or something else -- and this somewhat thin-wedge delicate debate is going to be hard to win, no matter how you slice it.)
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

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My last post was merely a reaction to your arguments, Peter, so we can't really talk about the debate being cut down to the naming of the messiah. There is a whole facet that has not been touched upon—Paul's christology, Christ crucified. There is no reason to accept that Paul's opponents had any notion that their messiah had already done the job of facilitating salvation through death on the cross, thus obviating observance of the law. That after all is the principal part of Paul's gospel. In fact Paul's opponents' maintenance of the law shows they do not hold to the Jesus of Paul's theology or the salvation Paul preaches. The faith in Jesus involves believing that Jesus had died, opening the way for resurrection for believers.
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

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spin wrote:My last post was merely a reaction to your arguments, Peter, so we can't really talk about the debate being cut down to the naming of the messiah. There is a whole facet that has not been touched upon—Paul's christology, Christ crucified. There is no reason to accept that Paul's opponents had any notion that their messiah had already done the job of facilitating salvation through death on the cross, thus obviating observance of the law. That after all is the principal part of Paul's gospel. In fact Paul's opponents' maintenance of the law shows they do not hold to the Jesus of Paul's theology. The faith in Jesus involves believing that Jesus had died, opening the way for resurrection for believers.
Yes, but I actually agree with you on that part. The long post before this one (in the first argument) touched on some points that did tend to show that Paul's opponents (in Galatians, at least) did not believe in "salvation through death on the cross" that Paul believed in. This appeared to be a rift, one which Paul was clear to assert his authority on (Gal 3:1). So I support this argument that James, at a minimum, and others like him, didn't believe in the death, nor obviously in any of Paul's theology according to which that cross/blood sacrifice event opened up an opportunity for "sons of Abraham by adoption." While the debate in general isn't limited to this, I believe that the most salient way, currently, in which we view the matter slightly differently is simply this (the naming of the Messiah, maybe some other vagaries).

Does this mean I should be more open to the idea of James not having the name "Jesus" for his Messiah? More open than I was originally, yes. I can't say that it's more probable than not. But it's not a dumb idea. It certainly hasn't been disproven.
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

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Peter Kirby wrote:Does this mean I should be more open to the idea of James not having the name "Jesus" for his Messiah? More open than I was originally, yes. I can't say that it's more probable than not. But it's not a dumb idea. It certainly hasn't been disproven.
The corollary to this is that Paul did not need any information about his messiah from the real world. There is no reason to suspect that he garnered Jesus information from the Jerusalemites and there is no reason to suspect that there had to be a real Jesus behind Paul's religion. It is sufficient that Paul believed in the necessity of his messiah, a Jew eligible to offer himself up to the law in the performance of a salvific act as a spotless proxy for anyone who accepts him.

This does not mean that Jesus did not exist, but that there is no evidence to suppose he did, other than a developing mass of traditions that followed Paul's time (which tends to shape our perception of Paul and his context). There is, therefore, a burden of proof on people who suppose that Jesus existed to show that he did. Otherwise the best that can be said is that the historicity of Jesus is a popular belief.
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

Post by Giuseppe »

A very intriguing discussion!

Assuming no historical Jesus, it seems that the difference between spin and Peter is the same between the Paul of Roger Parvus and the Paul of Doherty/Carrier: between a Paul real founder of the Christ Myth (and clashing against the Pillars) and a Paul in harmony with the Pillars (apart the Torah's problems).

In my modest view, it seems that the spin's reconstruction seems to take more into account the unpredictability of human psychology: especially when he describes Paul as a real adventurer who co-opts credentials of other leaders.

Differently from both spin and Peter, the Mythicist robert_j thinks that Paul invented a Jerusalem Church in order to persuade the Galatians.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

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"From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer."

Paul here is talking rhetorically, since he never knew Christ according to the flesh but it was revealed to him by "revelation."

If he was not talking rhetorically then this revelation would be analogous to Joseph's brothers receiving a revelation of the true identity of their brother in the OT.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=CEB

In the NT, the analogy would be to Peter's revelation. . . flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father in heaven..
Last edited by arnoldo on Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

Post by Giuseppe »

It seems that there were other "Pauls" in action before Paul:
His title announces in advance the conclusion of the book: that it was Paul, not Jesus, who really started the Christian religion. (As Lüdemann himself notes, this is an old debate.) I must confess that he has left me unconvinced that Paul deserves either the blame or the honor. Agreed that Jesus is more a figurehead than a founder, but Paul seems a surfer on the wave of a Hellenistic Christ cult that had started before he tested the waters.
http://www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com/rev_ludetwo.htm
One cannot simply make Paul's fair-weather friends in a single congregation, on a single occasion, equivalent to the whole of pre-Pauline Hellenistic Christianity.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

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Peter Kirby wrote:Ernst Barnikol concludes that this is the extent of the interpolation in Gal 2:7-8.

https://depts.drew.edu/jhc/barnikol.html
to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel to the circumcised 8 (for he who worked through Peter for his apostolic ministry to the circumcised worked also through me for mine to the Gentiles), 9 and when James and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars,
Leaving this text:
On the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel and perceived the grace that was given to me, they gave the right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and me, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. 10 Only, they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do.
I misread Barnikol, with the help of a translation that wasn't in the Greek order.

Barnikol's translation is:
Those, I say, who were of repute added nothing further to me; 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--for he who worked through Peter for the mission to the circumcised worked through me also for the Gentiles--] and when they perceived the grace that was given to me, James and Cephas and John, who were reputed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised (Gal 2:6-9).
(See Barnikol's Greek text for confirmation of this.)

So Barnikol retains the reference to those "reputed to be pillars," who are "James and Cephas and John."
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

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Ben C. Smith wrote: Thu Apr 20, 2017 8:21 pm
Peter Kirby wrote:Perhaps if we had more evidence, we'd have the letters or tractates in which a usage like the Christian one is found in the DSS.
Doing some searching.... Bezalel Porten often puts "brother" in quotes in his collection of Elephantine papyri because it the term can mean virtually any family member (including "father"!) and also colleagues or peers. On page 77 he describes one letter as follows:

A business letter from a Persian boatowner, instructing two Egyptian lessees or servants on the handling of the ship and the disposition of funds and grain, still addressed them as "brothers" and opened the letter with a salutation familiar from family letters but also found in an administrative letter.

The letter itself appears on pages 123-124, and begins and ends:

To my brothers Hori and Petemachis, your brother Spentadata. The welfare of my brothers may the gods, a[l]l (of them), seek after at all times.

....

To my brothers Hori son of Kamen and Petemachis, your brother Spentadata son of Fravartipata.

In a footnote Porten writes:

If they were servants, the rent would have been collected from people who hired the boat from them. If they were lessees, the rent would have been what they themselves owed. The instructions that they are given makes it more likely that they were in the employ of the Persians. At any rate, they were addressed as peers, "my brothers" (line 1).

The Passover letter from Elephantine to Jerusalem is printed on pages 125-126 begins and ends thus:

[To my brothers Je]daniah and his colleagues the Jewish T[roop], your brother Hanan[i]ah. The welfare of my brothers may the gods [seek after at all times].

....

[To] my brothers Jedaniah and his colleagues the Jewish Troop, your brother Hananiah s[on of PN].

There are other examples, though admittedly not as many, or with as great a concentration, as we find in the Christian epistles. Nor are there as many instances in the body of the letters; most seem to fall in the greeting and/or the closing. Also, of course, we are talking about a time period several centuries before Paul. Still, however, these are ancient epistles addressed to nonliteral "brethren", so there may be some relevance.
Highlighting this follow-up / edit (as of today, Feb 3, 2018).

Interesting. Do you have any additional thoughts on this?
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Re: Apostle Rehab: could James or Peter write a line? (of Gr

Post by Ben C. Smith »

Peter Kirby wrote: Sat Feb 03, 2018 6:01 pm
Ben C. Smith wrote: Thu Apr 20, 2017 8:21 pm
Peter Kirby wrote:Perhaps if we had more evidence, we'd have the letters or tractates in which a usage like the Christian one is found in the DSS.
Doing some searching.... Bezalel Porten often puts "brother" in quotes in his collection of Elephantine papyri because it the term can mean virtually any family member (including "father"!) and also colleagues or peers. On page 77 he describes one letter as follows:

A business letter from a Persian boatowner, instructing two Egyptian lessees or servants on the handling of the ship and the disposition of funds and grain, still addressed them as "brothers" and opened the letter with a salutation familiar from family letters but also found in an administrative letter.

The letter itself appears on pages 123-124, and begins and ends:

To my brothers Hori and Petemachis, your brother Spentadata. The welfare of my brothers may the gods, a[l]l (of them), seek after at all times.

....

To my brothers Hori son of Kamen and Petemachis, your brother Spentadata son of Fravartipata.

In a footnote Porten writes:

If they were servants, the rent would have been collected from people who hired the boat from them. If they were lessees, the rent would have been what they themselves owed. The instructions that they are given makes it more likely that they were in the employ of the Persians. At any rate, they were addressed as peers, "my brothers" (line 1).

The Passover letter from Elephantine to Jerusalem is printed on pages 125-126 begins and ends thus:

[To my brothers Je]daniah and his colleagues the Jewish T[roop], your brother Hanan[i]ah. The welfare of my brothers may the gods [seek after at all times].

....

[To] my brothers Jedaniah and his colleagues the Jewish Troop, your brother Hananiah s[on of PN].

There are other examples, though admittedly not as many, or with as great a concentration, as we find in the Christian epistles. Nor are there as many instances in the body of the letters; most seem to fall in the greeting and/or the closing. Also, of course, we are talking about a time period several centuries before Paul. Still, however, these are ancient epistles addressed to nonliteral "brethren", so there may be some relevance.
Highlighting this follow-up / edit (as of today, Feb 3, 2018).

Interesting. Do you have any additional thoughts on this?
Yes and no. I visited this thread just today to recollect information about James 1.1 and 2.1, because I recently read a book chapter having to do with the potential interpolations in those verses. I have been trying to figure out where James (both the shadowy figure and the epistle) falls in early Christianity. I do have some thoughts, but I am still working on how to sort them out, much less present them.
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