Pauline Mission Research Articles

From timely exegesis to contemporary ecclesiology: Relevant hermeneutics and provocative embodiment of faith in a corona-defined world – Generosity during a pandemic

In a world where economies have no moral conscience, biblical theologians can challenge local cultures with ancient wisdom about generosity and equity. Systemic solutions require changes in the habits of virtue, and this study focuses on the habit of generosity. Building on the work of Stephan Joubert’s Paul as Benefactor, this study concentrates on Paul’s collection in one notable instance: what he says about generosity in 2 Corinthians 8-9 and, in particular, what he means by isotēs in 2 Cor 8:13–15. Does it mean “equality” or “equity”? Beginning with a reinvigorated interest in the economic vision of the apostle Paul about what is meant by “weak” and “good works” and what the Pastoral Epistles communicate with eusebeia (not “godliness” but “social respectability and civility”), we reconsider the collection as an act on the part of the Pauline mission churches to express more than ecclesial unity. This act embodied a theology of grace in mutual reciprocity and in equitable provision on the part of the wealthy for the poor, not least and not limited to those in their own Christian assemblies. The term isotēs is too easily glossed over when translated as “fair balance”, “fairness”, and so the translation of the term with “equity” or “equality” comes closest to the vision of the apostle. Too few studies on this term baptize it sufficiently in the economics of the ancient world and the early Christian radical vision of siblingship and family.Contribution: From the perspective of the Historical Thought and Source Interpretation of the work of Paul, the question of systemic equality or equity is as crucial to navigating the current economic climate as it has ever been. Equality or equity is not limited to Christian communities but following the early church in embodying a theology of grace.

„ … so dass ihr ein Vorbild geworden seid für alle Gläubigen in Makedonien und Achaia” (1Thess 1,7): Übergemeindliche Verbindungen im 1. Thessalonicherbrief

The occurrences, nature and significance of translocal relationships of early Christian communities are discussed in several issues in New Testament studies. This article examines such links in 1 Thessalonians, one of the early letters of the Pauline mission. Translocal links are constituted through the exchange of information and journeys before the composition of the letter; through the authors who are embedded in early Christian communities, serve in this context and represent them; the spread of news in the Christian network; and missionary activities beyond local confines. Translocal links serve to satisfy mutual longing for each other, encouragement, and ethical instruction, and to secure mission efforts. They find expression in prayer for other Christians and in exchanging greetings. Such links play a significant role in the identity construction of new Christ-followers in adverse circumstances. While there is rhetorical hyperbole, the portrayal of such links is at least historically plausible.

Paula Fredriksen. Paul: The Pagans’ Apostle. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017. xii + 319 pp.

Reviewed by: Paul: The Pagans' Apostle by Paula Fredriksen Mark Reasoner Paula Fredriksen. Paul: The Pagans' Apostle. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017. xii + 319 pp. doi:10.1017/S0364009419000989 Paula Fredriksen's Paul: The Pagans' Apostle seeks to correct the stereotype of Paul as the anti-Jewish inventor of Christianity by highlighting the Judaizing nature of Paul's gospel and mission. This book has the refreshing voice of a [End Page 192] breathless discoverer of a new Paul, and it advances the conversation on Paul especially in relation to Paul's very Jewish vision of Israel praising God in the resurrection, with the nations. Yet Fredriksen has ignored some parts of Paul, the "yes and no" man (2 Cor 1:17), who can be more negative on Torah—even with reference to Israel—than Fredriksen admits. Chapter 1, "Israel and the Nations," sets the eschatological stage of Israel's expectations, in which the nations praise the God of Israel alongside Israel: "The nations are partners in Israel's redemption" (28). Fredriksen helps readers to see the Pauline mission as one of several outreach attempts by Jews to bring the nations in by means of the Christ, all starting within twenty years after Jesus's death (30). Chapter 2, "Fatherland and Mother City," describes the first-century Mediterranean, in which each city and people had its own deity. Fredriksen compellingly shows how integrated Jews were in the Mediterranean world, where most of them were living by choice, though she does not mention enslaved Jews in the Diaspora (47–48). She clarifies that Jews did not expect pagans to keep the ritual law of Torah (52), thus preparing for her next chapter that explains why Paul argued that converts from paganism should remain uncircumcised. Chapter 3, "Paul: Mission and Persecution," asks why Paul was persecuted. Fredriksen clarifies that first-century Jews were not offended by crucifixion per se. She argues that Paul's point about the curse on anyone hanging on a tree (Gal 3:13) was rhetorically driven and did not reflect widespread Jewish belief (83–84). She denies that Paul was persecuted for being lax on Torah observance, noting the variety within first-century Judaism. For Fredriksen, Paul was persecuted by synagogue officials and Romans because his converts were perceived as shifting loyalties from their ethnic/municipal deities to a foreign god, thus disturbing the peace of the gods (87–92). This explanation is unsatisfying, because it is difficult to believe that synagogues comfortably situated in the Diaspora would be troubled enough by someone converting to Judaism to inflict the thirty-nine lashes. Fredriksen's appeal to variety in first-century Judaism, which she uses to dismiss the "Paul was loose on Torah" explanation, could just as well be used to say that some synagogues persecuted Paul for this very reason, as well as for the perception—as two of the damage-control sections of Romans indicate—that he was encouraging people to sin (3:8; 6:1). The persecution Paul experienced from synagogue, municipal, and imperial authorities may not be attributable to a single explanation. I am in qualified agreement with Fredriksen's strategy of reading Paul's letters as addressed to gentiles, a major pillar in her fourth chapter, "Paul and the Law." But many letters have more than a single audience. The evidence in Romans points to an audience more complex than a single group. Paul's positive statements on the value of Torah, his insistent identification as a Hebrew, and his engagement with Israel's destiny are evidence that he is writing with a concern for how fellow Jews will read his letters and understand his identity (Rom 3:1–2, 31; 7:12, 14; 9:1–3; 11:1). While Fredriksen cites Romans 11:13 as evidence that Paul is writing to gentiles, the abrupt placement of his "Now I am speaking to you gentiles" indicates another implied audience in the preceding context. [End Page 193] The reason why the implied audience matters is that if Paul wrote singularly to a gentile audience, it makes it much easier to explain away Paul's negative statements about the Law. Fredriksen asserts that Paul continues...

An Investigation of the Mission Motif in the Letters to Timothy and Titus with Implications for the Pauline Authorship of the Pastoral Epistles

Abstract This exploration of the mission motif in the Pastoral Epistles (here called “Letters to Timothy and Titus” [LTT]) fills an often-neglected gap in scholarship on these letters. In addition, the investigation of the mission motif in the LTT serves as a case study in reexamining the plausibility of Pauline authorship. While conventional avenues of investigation—such as vocabulary and stylistic elements, theological and ecclesiological comparisons, and so on—have largely proved inconclusive, a study of the mission motif provides a fresh way of approaching the issue. Not only are these writings grounded in the Pauline mission but the strategy and missionary ethos reflected in these letters is congruent with the mission strategy in Paul’s undisputed letters (which, for purposes of this article, are identified as the other 10 Pauline letters in the NT canon) and the book of Acts, which heightens the plausibility that Paul wrote the LTT, whether personally or with the help of an amanuensis.

« Je me suis fait tout à tous pour en sauver sûrement quelques-uns » : la pseudépigraphie paulinienne comme incarnation de 1 Co 9,22

À partir de la formule de Paul en 1 Co 9,22, « Je me suis fait tout à tous pour en sauver sûrement quelques-uns », Valérie Nicolet * interroge les pratiques rhétoriques de Paul dans les lettres authentiques, puis dans la littérature pseudépigraphe rattachée à Paul. Son étude cherche à montrer qu’un dialogue avec le Kierkegaard du « Point de vue explicatif de mon œuvre d’écrivain » peut être utile pour réfléchir à la façon dont la mission paulinienne, et celle des cercles pauliniens, peuvent être comprises comme communication indirecte, plutôt que comme stratégie uniquement utilitariste.

Magie und Apokalyptik im Zentrum lukanischer Geschichtsschreibung – Historizität am Beispiel von Apg 13.6–12

Acts 13.6–12 has been viewed as highly significant in the debate about the historicity of Acts, since the beginnings of the Pauline mission among the Gentiles are supposed to be rooted here, and the story illustrates Paul's self-understanding as an apostle. On the other hand, signs of literary creativity of the author with regard to the overall theological concept and the controversy about miracles, magic and apocalyptic traditions are clearly seen in this section that seem to contradict the description of the beginnings of the Pauline mission. This paper explores the apparent contradiction in the debate about the historicity of Luke-Acts in general and Acts 13.6–12 in particular, and shows that magic and apocalypticism can be incorporated within the ancient understanding of historical verification.

Why Should a “Law-Free” Mission Mean a “Law-Free” Apostle?

Law-free is a phrase habitually used to describe both Pauline mission itself, and Paul's own personal repudiation of traditional practices. The present essay argues that phrase misleads on both counts. Paul demanded of his gentiles a much greater degree of Judaizing than either synagogue or Jerusalem temple ever required or presupposed of theirs; and gentile involvements in community institutions, whether ekklesiai, synagogues, or temple, in principle can tell us nothing about levels of Torah observance within these same institutions. The essay concludes that much of Pauline mission was Jewishly observant and traditional, and that Paul's Judaizing demands of his gentiles are to be understood as an aspect of his absolute conviction that he lived and worked in history's final hour.(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)Law-free is a phrase habitually used to describe Pauline mission, even by scholars (like me) who think it is wrong.1 The phrase seems historically useful because it serves to signal, economically, what long scholarly tradition has considered to be identifying characteristics of Paul's gentile mission: no to circumcision, no to the works of (Sabbath, food ways, circumcision), no to Torah, no to Jewish ethnic pride. For Paul and for his communities, as of our colleagues has phrased it, criterion of revelation and thus of salvation was grace, not race.2 And not only did Paul promote this message (so goes this interpretation), he himself embodied it. After revelation of risen Christ, Paul himself was law-free, dead to law (see Gal 2:19).This view of Paul's personal rejection of ancestral custom has proved remarkably enduring, stretching from earliest patristic theologies to current modern and postmodern ones, uniting those scholars of New Perspective with those of Two-Covenant perspective. No matter how various their interpretive frameworks, all of these scholars hold that Paul himself, in pursuit of his gentile mission, had ceased to observe traditions of fathers.3Finally, this idea of serves as a cover theory to explain history of earliest postresurrection movement. Why split between Hellenists and Hebrews? Hellenists were supposedly looser on issue of Torah observance.4 Why did Paul persecute ... in Damascus (Gal 1:13)? Because its members mingled too closely with uncircumcised Gentiles, an index of their own lax attitude toward law. And why eventually did Paul get as well as give synagogue punishment-five times forty lashes less one (2 Cor 11:24)? Because his own law-freeness offended or enraged synagogue communities in diaspora, just as, before his conversion, such laxness had offended and enraged him. To quote Alan Segal, Paul apostle was Paul apostate.5This reconstruction, in my view, is utterly wrong. I argue here that earliest movement's energetic extension to pagans, while socially unprecedented, was in fact Jewishly traditional. I also argue that main criterion for a pagan's joining movement was his or her commitment to a radical form of Judaizing. Additionally, I argue that scholarship's traditional emphasis on so focuses attention on synagogue resistance to Paul that it obscures involvement of many other ancient actors who likewise resisted Paul's mission: irate pagans, Roman magistrates, and most especially lower cosmic gods (2 Cor 4:4, 11:25- 26). Finally, I argue that levels of Torah observance in principle can tell us nothing about levels of Torah observance, whether within Christ movement or outside of it. To make my case, I will ask you to bear two contexts in mind: that of Greco-Roman city, and that of restoration theology.We are so used to knowing that gentiles, in order to join this new messianic movement, had to foreswear worship of pagan gods, that we easily fail to see what an odd idea this was, both in wider context of ancient city and in narrower context of resident diaspora community. …

Emerging Leadership in the Pauline Mission: A Social Identity Perspective on Local Leadership Development in Corinth and Ephesus. By JackBarentsen. Princeton Theological Monograph Series 168. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011. Pp. xviii + 378. Paper, $44.00.

Emerging Leadership in the Pauline Mission: A Social Identity Perspective on Local Leadership Development in Corinth and Ephesus. By JackBarentsen. Princeton Theological Monograph Series 168. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011. Pp. xviii + 378. Paper, $44.00.

Emerging Leadership in the Pauline Mission: A Social Identity Perspective on Local Leadership Development in Corinth and Ephesus. By JACK BARENTSEN.

This monograph aims to offer new insights into the nature of early Christian leadership through a fresh application of social identity theory: a method which starts from the observation that leadership is shaped by social and psychological processes within a group. By first examining group dynamics and local leadership patterns in Pauline congregations, Barentsen then analyses Paul’s strategy for dealing with local leadership. Paul sets an example for believers—encouraging, exhorting, and strengthening congregations through his letters. Meanwhile, he engages existing structures, sometimes affirming, sometimes correcting, but always attempting to shape local leadership to his ideal of Christ-like service. The thesis of the monograph is that a study of the Corinthian and Ephesian churches reveals a clear pattern in Paul’s strategy, as he attempts to equip leaders to be ‘entrepreneurs’ of Christian identity. In the Preface, Barentsen notes that he has produced this monograph after a career of church planting and ministry; the application of social identity theory is thus the link which joins his experiences of church leadership with the academic enterprise of finding new insights into Paul’s letters.

House Church and Mission: The Importance of Household Structures in Early Christianity. By ROGER W. GEHRING.

It is well known that the first-century Christians met in houses, and generally agreed that in our literature oikos refers not just to the physical structure whose ground plan archaeologists can occasionally uncover but to the extended family that lived in it and formed a small community that was in turn seen as the basic unit of which the city itself was composed. House churches might therefore better be termed ‘household churches’. Building on the extensive work done in this area by many scholars, especially in the last twenty-five years, Gehring sets out to provide the most comprehensive review yet of the evidence for household churches and to argue that the patterns of authority inherent in the household determined the organizational and leadership structures of the churches and that this contributed greatly to their success. A unique feature of this study is that it focuses not only on the churches of the Pauline mission but that it attributes the origin of the household church to Jesus himself and traces its development through the churches at Jerusalem and Antioch. Gehring argues first that Jesus himself was at least some of the time resident at, and based his itinerant mission on, the house of Peter in Capernaum, for which archaeology provides evidence that it was an early house church. The same thing appears to have happened in Bethany, suggesting to Gehring that similar house churches came into existence wherever Jesus preached and formed a network of communities in and around Capernaum and the surrounding villages, where the disciples of Jesus lived at the family of God. Secondly, he argues that the disciples were instructed to find a house from which to carry out their mission, as evidenced by the mission discourse, especially as found in Luke 10. It is argued that this does not simply reflect the practice of Christians in their post-Easter mission but goes back to Jesus. These households became centres for mission to their towns, offering a family of faith to those who had left home for the sake of the gospel, since while some were called to itinerant evangelism, others stayed at home and supported them.

The ‘Gospel’ and the ‘Word’: Exploring Some Early Christian Patterns

Graham Stanton and others have made important steps toward understanding the origins and development of ‘gospel’ language in earliest Christianity. This article attempts to provide a similar contribution regarding the use of ‘word’ language as synonymous with ‘gospel’ language among the earliest Christians. A distinctive and predominant ‘word (of x)’ pattern can be discerned in this regard, particularly evident in the Pauline writings and in the description of the Pauline mission in Acts. This use of ‘word’ language in synonymy with the gospel most likely had its origin in the legal and prophetic ‘word’ language of the Jewish scriptures, acquired through the eschatological self-understanding of the early Christians in general and the prophetic self-understanding of Paul in particular.

Proclaiming the gospel in Macedonia, Achaia and in every place. Missions and 1 Thessalonians 1:6-8: research

In this article the author analyses 1 Thessalonians 1:6-8 in order to illuminate missiological activities of Pauline Christianity. Paul is often regarded as the zealous missionary who took the rural, Palestinian gospel of Jesus to key cities in the Roman Empire and thus contributed decisively to the founding of Christianity. Information in this passage gives a more balanced picture of Pauline mission, illuminating its corporate nature, its outward nature and its expectations that converts should become actively involved in spreading the word in a life-embracing manner. Keywords: 1 Thessalonians 1:6-8, 1 Tessalonissense 1:6-8, New Testament Exegesis, Nuwe-Testamentiese eksegese, Pauline Mission, Pauliniese sending Acta Theologica Vol.22(2) 2003: 43-57

Oikonomia Theou: the Theological Voice of 1 Timothy From the Perspective of Pauline Authorship

AbstractThe point of this thought-experiment is to assess the theological character of 1 Timothy. The perspective assumed—not argued for—is that of Pauline authorship: at the very least, this means that the letter is to be read as a production of the Pauline mission under the authority of Paul himself within his lifetime.1 The reader of the present essay should constantly bear in mind that the goal here is not to demonstrate the validity of such a perspective but to use it as a way of viewing this literary composition from what is today considered an unusual angle.

Church and Mission in Paul

Did Paul expect the churches founded through his mission to assume responsibility for similar missionary outreach? A careful review of the relevant data yields no clear support for the impression that Paul intended his churches to become independent instruments of an active mission such as he himself was engaged in. The most the evidence indicates is that these churches were to facilitate accessions to their community by an attractive behaviour and by a responsiveness to inquiries. But an energetic, aggressive, mobile missionary outreach of the sort prosecuted by Paul himself is not described, expected, or enjoined for his churches. Apparently Paul perceived the missionary role in terms of believing individuals rather than believing communities. These findings suggest some careful rethinking of common assumptions regarding church and mission in Paul and a more sophisticated precision in the paradigms by which the Pauline mission is interpreted.

Tradition and Creativity: The Paradigm of the New Testament

What must I believe to be a Catholic? Catholicism is a highly variegated phenomenon, with an extraordinary diversity of beliefs, practices and traditions. Is this Tradition an inheritance to be cherished, or a stifling burden?This question becomes especially acute when the Church tries to discover its identity in a new culture or society, as when Paul brought Christianity to the world of the Greek city, or, in our own day, when we ask what it might mean to be a Catholic in monetarist Britain. One way to answer this question would be to scrutinise the Tradition, to see if one can discern an essence that must be preserved, while leaving one some freedom to be creative. Clifford Longley recently described a liberal conservative theologian, such as Karl Rahner, as one who ‘sits under obedience to Tradition, and applies his intellectual ingenuity to the negotiation of as much freedom as can be justified within those limits.’ Many Catholics can identify with that picture. But I would suggest that if one looks at the genesis of the New Testament one can discover a different paradigm of the relationship between tradition and creativity, fidelity and freedom.There were several moments between the time of Jesus and the canonisation of the New Testament when the Church was faced sharply with the question: What must we believe? What in the inherited tradition must be preserved? This was so with the Pauline mission to the Gentiles, with the gradual separation of Christianity and Judaism towards the end of the first century, and with the emergence of the Great Church in the second to fourth centuries.

Book Review: Pauline Theology and Mission Practice

Book Review: Pauline Theology and Mission Practice