Re: Paul's struggle against the imperial cult in 2Cor 11:1-1
Posted: Thu May 25, 2017 3:58 pm
Pax EsseneFransJVermeiren wrote:Rome’s Jewish enemies, the Essenes, had to make an enveloping movement when propagating their own triumph and the utter defeat of the Romans. Even the Qumran Essenes did not mention the Romans by name, but called them the Kittim. But, writing in a foreign language in a distant area, they did not have to veil their information as much as Paul had to. I think the following passage of the War Scroll gives some insight in the purpose of the Essenes (1QM I:3-9):iskander wrote:
But , once the Emperor of Rome is gone , what will the anonymous Christ put in his place ? What would replace the Emperor of Rome in the community of men and women?
[The king] of the Kittim [shall enter] into Egypt, and in his time he shall set out in great wrath to wage war against the kings of the north, that his fury may destroy and cut the horn of [Israel]. This shall be a time of salvation for the people of God, an age of dominion for all the members of His company, and of everlasting destruction for all the company of Belial. The confusion of the sons of Japheth shall be [great] and Assyria shall fall unsuccoured. The dominion of the Kittim shall come to an end and iniquity shall be vanquished, leaving no remnant; [for the sons] of darkness there shall be no escape. [The sons of righteous]ness shall shine over all the ends of the earth; they shall go on shining until all the seasons of darkness are consumed and, at the season appointed by God, His exalted greatness shall shine eternally to the peace, blessing, glory, joy and long life of all the sons of light.
I think it is quite obvious that the messianistic Essene Paul knew the messianistic Essene Qumran writings. If we compare the fragment above with Romans 8:18 for example, we can discern Paul’ source in the War Scroll quote above: I consider that the sufferings of the present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. The ‘sufferings of the present time’ (with Rome dominating the world) have a parallel in 1QM’s ‘iniquity’ under Roman dominion. The bad present times are contrasted with a future time of glory in both writings (in the last sentence of the 1QM quote).
Also compare 'for the sons of darkness there shall be no escape' with 'their end will correspond to their deeds' in 1 Cor 11:15.
It might be clear that Paul only entrusted to paper carefully veiled messages that were understandable to the well-informed and not to the enemy. He could tell quite different things in the closed circle of his audience and the shrewd reader could make the connection.
I did not study the parallels between the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Pauline letters in detail on this subject, but I believe that in general the Christ would take over world dominion from the Roman emperor, with a ‘pax Christi’ comparable to the pax Romana after the utter defeat of the latter, with the Jews (the Essenes) imposing their religion and moral prescriptions on all the inhabitants of the then known world, levying taxes to make them prosper instead of the Romans, accumulating the wealth of the world in Jerusalem instead of Rome, etcetera. Writing down such things would be suicidal under the totalitarian Roman regime.
What happens on the tremendous day of the Lord? Is the anonymous Christ an Essene Emperor?FransJVermeiren wrote:2. He is going to appear in the near future on the tremendous ‘day of the Lord’. The ‘second coming’ interpretation of the many future-oriented passages in Paul’s letters is groundless.