Pauline Language Research Articles

African American Readings of Paul: Reception, Resistance, and Transformation. By Lisa M. Bowens. Foreword by Emerson B. Powery. Afterword by Beverly Roberts Gaventa

American slaveowners defended the practice of racial slavery, to the outside world and to the enslaved, by way of the Bible, most especially by way of the Pauline command that slaves obey their masters. Lisa Bowens asks how the enslaved and their descendants responded to this use of Paul and how they reinterpreted Paul, creating a Paul who resisted racial injustice and oppression. The result is a fascinating study that deserves a wide audience. The book has four major chapters, with three defined temporally (the early 18th to the early 19th century, the mid to late 19th century, the late 19th to the mid 20th century) and one thematically (Pauline language in conversion narratives). The book also includes a clear introduction and conclusion as well as a foreword (Emerson B. Powery) and afterword (Beverly Gaventa). The analysis Bowens presents is richly and deeply researched. She offers detailed analysis of widely...

"La caída para levantarse": san Pablo, espejo de Quevedo

This study reflects upon La caida para levantarse, focusing in particular on its representation of Saint Paul as a transhistorical model of eloquence. Fusing his authorial project with the apostle’s auratic word, Quevedo endows his own writing with a providential stature. While thus engaging in a deliberate anachronism that obviates the differences between their respective historical horizons, he concomitantly foregrounds the relevance of Pauline language to the conflicted cultural context of the Counter Reformation. Addressed here are both the way in which Quevedo exploits the argumentative versatility already present in the rhetoric of his precursor, and the audacious manipulation entailed in his adaptation of the apostle’s millenarian discourse to the requirements of baroque ingenuity.

Pauline Language and the Pastoral Epistles

In Pauline Language and the Pastoral Epistles, Jermo van Nes argues that the language of the so-called Pastoral Epistles is not significantly different from the other Pauline writings, and therefore should no longer be used as a criterion in discussions of their authorship.

The State of Research on the Manichaean Bishop Faustus

According to Augustine’s own Confessiones, the Manichaean bishop Faustus of Milevis played a significant role in his apostasy from Manichaeism. Somehow Augustine became disappointed with the intellectual explanations Faustus provided for some of Manichaeism’s fabulous doctrines and thereby with Manichaeism as a religion. That same Faustus published a work, the Capitula in which he discussed some exegetical controversies. This work has been preserved, because Augustine cited it in its entirety in his Contra Faustum Manichaeum. In the last hundred years Faustus and his work have received some significant scholarly attention. During that period our view of Manichaeism and subsequently on the Manichaean bishop, has changed. At the beginning Faustus’s exegesis was considered merely a form of Manichaean propaganda. Its Christian elements were accepted as a tactic tool in order to covert Catholic Christians to Manichaeism, which was not considered a Christian religion at all. In the course of the 20th century primary Manichaean sources have been discovered. They have enhanced our understanding of the ancient religion immensely. Comparing these texts with Faustus’s Capitula reveals that the Manichaean bishop not only defended well-known Manichaean dogmas through his exegesis of scripture, he seems to have contributed to Manichaean exegesis and even Manichaean prophetology. Furthermore, Faustus’s Christian, Pauline language can no longer be accepted as a mere tactic adaption to Catholic preferences, but seems to have been his own, genuine language. This article provides an overview of both the research and the debates on bishop Faustus and his works.

Marriage and the Law: Politics and Theology in Measure for Measure

In Measure for Measure, Shakespeare portrays a clearly political problem: a city whose citizens are so unable to govern themselves that only the most severe legal punishments appear capable of restoring civic order. Yet the play's conclusion, for all its dramatic fireworks, does not obviously resolve this problem. All that happens, it appears, is that everyone gets married. Understanding marriage's political significance, therefore, is key to unraveling the play's political teaching. By carefully framing marriage within Pauline language of sin and grace—and in particular by using the image of death and rebirth through baptism—Shakespeare offers a theological as well as a political image of a kind of self-government capable of easing the city's legal dilemmas and reconciling justice with mercy.

Voices and Visions from the Margins on Mission and Unity: A disability‐informed reading of the Pauline metaphor of the church as the body of Christ

AbstractDisability studies from a missional perspective in the Indian context are rare. Mission and unity cannot be “talked” about without the active inclusion of those in the margins; rather, they are the subject of mission and unity of the church which, in Pauline language, is the body of Christ. With the help of a disability‐informed reading of the Pauline metaphor of church as the body of Christ, an attempt is made to understand the integral constituent of this “body” and its mission and unity. Our deliberations on the metaphor of body make it amply clear that “weaker” members are indispensable for the mission and unity of the church. They are the paradigm for the manifestation of God. Mission and unity of the church depend on the inclusion and equal participation of the margins—the disabled.

Risking Truth: Reshaping the World Through Prayers of Lament: A Response to Scott A. Ellington

This response is directed to ch. 6 of Risking Truth in which Ellington examines the use of lament in the New Testament. His discussion falls into four parts: 1) A reflection on the paucity of prayers of lament in the New Testament. Ellington hints at but does not articulate the best accounting for this paucity of lament, namely that early Christians found the prayers present in the Old Testament to be effective and satisfactory instruments for the expression of their own lamentation; 2) A discussion of the effect that the New Testament teaching on the shared suffering with Christ has on the ongoing validity of lament. In this section Ellington could explore further the function of lament within the eschatological framework of the kingdom message announced by Jesus as well as the function of the Pauline language of 'joy' and 'rejoicing' which all too often is interpreted in a too facile manner; 3) An analysis of the function of lament within the structure of the Apocalypse. Ellington correctly discerns the important role lament plays in the theological structure of the book; and 4) An argument for the canonical function of lament in Matthew. Ellington's treatment of lament in Matthew, wherein he regards Jesus' encounter with the lamenting Canaanite woman as marking a major structural transition in the narrative, is not so convincing. Ellington's brief foray into the New Testament cannot be faulted since his main intention is to explore the contours of lament in the Old Testament. His preliminary statements do reveal that a study delving more deeply into the shape, character and function of New Testament lament would be of great value to the academy and to the Church.

In the Footsteps of Paul: Scriptural and Apostolic Authority in Ignatius of Antioch

Although they agree that the writings of Ignatius make frequent use of Pauline language and reflect seemingly little interest in the Jewish scriptural tradition, scholars frequently ignore these issues when discussing points of contact between the written gospels and the Ignatian correspondence. This article argues that there are in fact few such uses of written "Christian" materials in the letters of Ignatius and that his infrequent reliance on the Jewish Scriptures derives from a desire to subordinate the Old Testament to other sources of authority. The letters of Ignatius thus reflect a transitional state in early Christianity wherein the phrasing of Paul's writings serves as a normative exemplar, although there is not yet any reference to exclusively Christian written authorities.