tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5759844.post116322057347146224..comments2024-03-21T14:59:20.729-04:00Comments on NT Blog: Were the Galatians already circumcised? IIIMark Goodacrehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05115370166754797529noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5759844.post-1163305625028909532006-11-11T23:27:00.000-05:002006-11-11T23:27:00.000-05:00As I understand it, Paul's not asking anyone to re...As I understand it, Paul's not asking anyone to reverse their circumcision. Rather, he does not want the Galatians to continue on their policy of circumcizing proselytes; cf. Gal 5:2 περιτεμνησθε, a <B>present</B> subjunctive, not aorist.<BR/><BR/>Note also that this verb is middle, so I don't need to take a position on who the actual circumciser or mohel is, because this is not in focus here.Stephen C. Carlsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18239379955876245197noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5759844.post-1163303555730531202006-11-11T22:52:00.000-05:002006-11-11T22:52:00.000-05:00Steven,I don't understand your comment. Now the ad...Steven,<BR/>I don't understand your comment. Now the addressees are not only circumcised, they are the circumcisers? This must assume no kind of Jewish context for circumcision, which is a ritual process with special people trained in the ritual of circumcision to exercise the practice on the initiates? Aren't you confusing the identities in your post? Moreover, a bump in the road is the language of being in a process that can change, whereas to have been circumcised is a pretty permanent completed change (I know it can be reversed, but you are not suggesting that is Paul's message, esp. with appeal to 1 Cor 7).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5759844.post-1163282602788018982006-11-11T17:03:00.000-05:002006-11-11T17:03:00.000-05:00A question for you, Mark, is how Paul can express ...<I>A question for you, Mark, is how Paul can express in 5:10 that he is confident they will remain on his (non-circumcision) course (to stay on it after hitting an obstacle along the way, i.e., contemplating a detour; v. 7) if they have already become circumcised?</I><BR/><BR/>I think that getting back on the course means to stop circumcising new people. Paul is perfectly happy with people remaining the way that they are (eg 1 Cor 7:19-20).Stephen C. Carlsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18239379955876245197noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5759844.post-1163243162016647352006-11-11T06:06:00.000-05:002006-11-11T06:06:00.000-05:00Mark,First, thanks for noting my essay! But I must...Mark,<BR/>First, thanks for noting my essay! But I must say, I do not think that Paul addressing them as ἀνόητοι lends any support to your argument. It connotes shamelessness, that is, thinking wrongly from the accuser's (Paul's) point of view, and in that sense failing to think (meaning, to think correctly, with the accuser's way of thinking). The idea is that they are perhaps being effected by something since otherwise they would be expected to think otherwise (like the accuser thinks), not that they are not thinking versus thinking. My essay explains some of the implications that Paul is springing on them in this accusation, which is also in the style of ironic rebuke in this comment, and the rhetorical question style of the following sentences too (vv. 1-5 form a unit of ironic rebuke).<BR/><BR/>Anyway, the bottom line is that your argument does not forward your thesis as far as I can see. It does tell us that Paul is upset by developments among the recipients, and he seeks to make them suspect that those influencing these develoments are not doing so in the helpful or benign way that the addressees have supposed, but rather from self-interest, from the envious motive to put the recipients in their place (implying to put the Galatian recipients under themselves, since not circumcised, like those influencing them are). <BR/><BR/>Actually (although I was not yet thinking this way when I began to write this reply), I think this piece of evidence in Gal 3:1 works against your thesis that some of the Galatians to whom Paul writes have already been circumcised. If already completing proselyte conversion (circumcision), then this would eliminate that which Paul accuses the influencers here of doing, of "evil eying" the addressees; that is, of the influencers "envying" (=begrudging) the Galatian addressees for claiming to have the gift of the Spirit reserved for those who are circumcised children of Abraham. That seems to depend on the addressees not yet being circumcised, but being instead non-Jews who should not be entitled to have the Spirit and miracles in their midst. In the eyes of the influencers, the addressees are but Johnnie-come-latelys for making such claims when they have not yet undertaken the ritual that gives them the right to do so. (Whether the influencers have such malevolent motives is beside the point; Paul's accusation is calculated to make the addressees suspicious of the influencers' motives. That is what evil eye accusations are all about!) <BR/><BR/>The point is, 3:1 suggests that the addressees of Paul's letter are not yet "complete" by the standards to which the influencers subscribe, but to which the addressees are apparently attracted now, to Paul's dismay. That means that the addressees are not yet circumcised, as far as Paul is concerned. His ironic rebuke is calculated to undermine any steps in that direction by undermining the addressees' trust in the influencers' message as if it offered the promise of good news; that is, for how to become complete and thus their claims (based on the action of the Spirit and miracles in their lives; v. 5) completely accepted by the influencers as legitimate signs that the addressees are indeed fellow children of Abraham with the influencers.<BR/><BR/>I do not mean to say it is impossible that some Christ-believers Paul left behind in Galatia have become proselytes (been circumcised), but I do not think that they constitute Paul's addressees in this letter, who are instead considering this course in a way Paul does not want to see develop into undertaking it. Instead, he wants them back on the course they had begun under his counsel (5:7-10). <BR/><BR/>A question for you, Mark, is how Paul can express in 5:10 that he is confident they will remain on his (non-circumcision) course (to stay on it after hitting an obstacle along the way, i.e., contemplating a detour; v. 7) if they have already become circumcised? (I don't mean that Paul is merely expressing this rhetorically, with which I would agree; but the basis of this rhetorical challenge, is it not predicated on them not having already taken another course in such an irreversable, severing way?)<BR/><BR/>Fellow want-to-undertand-Galatians guy, in good will,<BR/>Mark D. Nanos<BR/>marknanos.comAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5759844.post-1163227387465607622006-11-11T01:43:00.000-05:002006-11-11T01:43:00.000-05:00Good stuff, Mark. I look forward to the rest of th...Good stuff, Mark. I look forward to the rest of the posts.Matthew D. Montoninihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16771037323124064875noreply@blogger.com