Christianity – Page 62

Why you shouldn’t rebuke people by email

Al posted this thoughtful bit of pastoral advice the other day.

“Relationally it’s better to get on the phone. And if people are already against you then in my experience it’s best not to answer them in black and white.”

And then, just a day later, this video appeared on the Gospel Coalition blog.

It’s good advice. And all the points are valid. Especially in the context of ministry. I’ve got to say though, I found keeping an email trail was incredibly beneficial for protecting oneself from future recollections of a conversation – so sometimes it is worth having things in writing.

November 8, 2010

Church History Trading Cards: Irenaeus

Irenaeus studied under Polycarp, and then under Justin Martyr. A pretty enviable education. He rejected the latter’s fusion of philosophy and Christianity.

Despite serving in a church in the Latin West, Irenaeus was a Greek, born in Smyrna, his work was written in Greek, but the originals have been lost and the oldest copies are Latin translations.

His writings have been described as almost unintelligible to the modern reader. Here’s what someone wrote in the introduction to Book 1 of his most famous work, Against Heresies:

“Not a little of what is contained in the following pages will seem almost unintelligible to the English reader. And it is scarcely more comprehensible to those who have pondered long on the original. “

Irenaeus even makes an apology for his own writing in the introduction.

“Thou wilt not expect from me, who am resident among the Keltæ, and am accustomed for the most part to use a barbarous dialect, any display of rhetoric, which I have never learned, or any excellence of composition, which I have never practised, or any beauty and persuasiveness of style, to which I make no pretensions. But thou wilt accept in a kindly spirit what I in a like spirit write to thee simply, truthfully, and in my own homely way; whilst thou thyself (as being more capable than I am) wilt expand those ideas of which I send thee, as it were, only the seminal principles; and in the comprehensiveness of thy understanding, wilt develop to their full extent the points on which I briefly touch, so as to set with power before thy companions those things which I have uttered in weakness. “

He refuted the Gnostics on the basis that the Church had carried true beliefs from the time of Jesus through to his present time, here’s his summary of Christian belief:

“The Church, though dispersed through our the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith: [She believes] in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and His [future] manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father “to gather all things in one,” and to raise up anew all flesh of the whole human race, in order that to Christ Jesus, our Lord, and God, and Saviour, and King, according to the will of the invisible Father, “every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess” to Him, and that He should execute just judgment towards all; that He may send “spiritual wickednesses,” and the angels who transgressed and became apostates, together with the ungodly, and unrighteous, and wicked, and profane among men, into everlasting fire; but may, in the exercise of His grace, confer immortality on the righteous, and holy, and those who have kept His commandments, and have persevered in His love, some from the beginning [of their Christian course], and others from [the date of] their repentance, and may surround them with everlasting glory.

As I have already observed, the Church, having received this preaching and this faith, although scattered throughout the whole world, yet, as if occupying but one house, carefully preserves it.” – Against Heresies, Book One, Chapter X

Which stands the test of time.

November 7, 2010

Church History Trading Cards: Justin Martyr

Justin Martyr was another one of those influential early Christian thinkers who came to Christianity from a background in Greek philosophy, and another guy who was deeply influenced by Platonism, but also had sympathy for Stoic philosophies, and went so far as to call Socrates a Christian because of the truths he recognised in Socratic thought. After his conversion he continued wearing his philosopher’s robe, and wandered around the empire teaching, before settling in Rome. He used his knowledge of philosophy as a string in his evangelistic bow, and wrote an apology for Christianity to the Roman Empire seeking to convince Rome to consider its position on the Christian faith more carefully.

From the Introduction to his Apology

Reason directs those who are truly pious and philosophical to honour and love only what is true, declining to follow traditional opinions, if these be worthless. For not only does sound reason direct us to refuse the guidance of those who did or taught anything wrong, but it is incumbent on the lover of truth, by all means, and if death be threatened, even before his own life, to choose to do and say what is right. Do you, then, since ye are called pious and philosophers, guardians of justice and lovers of learning, give good heed, and hearken to my address; and if ye are indeed such, it will be manifested. For we have come, not to flatter you by this writing, nor please you by our address, but to beg that you pass judgment, after an accurate and searching investigation, not flattered by prejudice or by a desire of pleasing superstitious men, nor induced by irrational impulse or evil rumours which have long been prevalent, to give a decision which will prove to be against yourselves. For as for us, we reckon that no evil can be done us, unless we be convicted as evil-doers or be proved to be wicked men; and you, you can kill, but not hurt us.

He was another famous martyr – beheaded in Rome during the reign of Marcus Aurelius. He was born in Judea, but it is likely that his father was a Greek or a Roman.

His writings recognise many of the books in our New Testament as scripture, and his reading of the Old Testament was influenced by the way the New Testament authors used it to point to Jesus as fulfillment, and by his Stoic predisposition for allegory.

There are some links to a few good articles about Justin Martyr here, and you can read his Apology and other writings here (though it’s in a slightly clunky form presented section by section on separate pages) unless you download this PDF of primary documents of the church fathers (including Justin Martyr) from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library.

November 7, 2010

Church History 101: Robyn’s Guide To Gnosticism

I don’t want to present Robyn as an expert on heresy… but here’s her third guide to the heresies of the early church…

If you want a proper summary of Gnosticism I suggest you read this article from the online dictionary of philosophy, before reading the wikipedia entry, and then dismiss anything that isn’t also in the textbook.

November 6, 2010

Church History 101: Robyn’s Guide to Marcionism

Marcionism, the heresy coined by Marcion, holds the dubious honour of being the first heresy identified as such by the church proper. Here’s Robyn’s guide to Marcionism:

Marcion also tossed out the Jewish Scriptures and most of the New. He went with ten chapters of Luke (that he’d edited) and ten of Paul’s epistles.

Some people think Marcionism is similar to Gnosticisim. It really wasn’t. The Gnostics were all about their “secret knowledge” while Marcionism based knowledge on Marcion’s canon. Which prompted the creation of the actual canon.

Marcionisms view of Christ was “docetic” – it denied the humanity of Jesus (and thus denied the Demiurge’s role in the make up of Jesus (the Demiurge was what Marcion called the God of the Old Testament – who he thought existed, but was evil). The Gnostics believed in this Demiurge, but also believed that Jesus was fully human.

In his favour, at least according to Origen, he ruled out the allegorical interpretations favoured by guys like Clement and Augustine, who essentially had the same issues with the Old Testament picture of God (before they allegorised their worries away). Tertullian reckons he was open to allegorical interpretations that suited him.

A guy named Robert Price reckons Marcion was the first to collect Paul’s epistles. This is because Robert Price is an idiot who thinks that Luke, Timothy and Onesimus are fictional characters. And doesn’t think most of the books of the New Testament were written until the second century (if that’s the case you’ve got to wonder why there’s no mention of the destruction of the Temple in AD 70. And why Acts ends where it does. And why John’s letters claim to be written by an eyewitness to Jesus ministry. Yeah. They must have been lying and ignoring some really compelling fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy about the future of the temple, and forgetting that first century philosophical biographies (which Luke-Acts appears to be similar in genre to) normally ended with, or recounted, the death of the person they were writing about.

November 6, 2010

Church History Trading Cards: Clement of Alexandria

Clement was basically the proto-Augustine. Or, you could argue that he followed in Justin Martyr’s footsteps (and his omission from this series thus far will soon be rectified), and that Justin Martyr was the proto-Augustine. Basically his way of thinking and approaching the Greek school of philosophy was pretty similar to Augustine’s approach, and he, like Justin Martyr before him, and Augustine after him (and also like Philo before Justin) claimed that Plato had plagiarised Moses.

He knew Greek philosophy pretty well, and he sought to integrate it into his preaching of the gospel to a pretty educated audience in Alexandria. A city famous for being well educated and culturally sophisticated. Apollos (as in the Apollos of the Bible, as in “I follow Paul, I follow Apollos” also came from Alexandria).

Clement was a vegetarian, and like most vegetarians he had a moral superiority complex so he assumed that Jesus was a vegetarian too. I reckon Jesus hated vegetables, which is why he cursed the fig tree and hung out with fishermen.

Clement liked Plato, and he also liked Pythagoras. Who was the Pythagoras. The c²=a² + b² guy who figured out triangles and invented the self-draining siphon cup to play practical jokes on his greedy friends. Pythagoras was from Samos. The whole point of that paragraph was so that I could post this photo of a triangle in Samos.

From Samos

Clement wrote some pretty cool stuff too. Like everybody else who is famous from back then.

There are some good Clement resources here. And you can read his Exhortation here.

I like the motif he uses for the Gospel, that it’s a song that brings life to stone. He intertwines his systematic introduction to the gospel and appeal for conversion with the Bible in a fairly cohesive way – and he intersects that with Greek mythology and theology. He, like Augustine, was a little prone to allegory. Here are some highlights.

The silly are stocks and stones, and still more senseless than stones is a man who is steeped in ignorance. As our witness, let us adduce the voice of prophecy accordant with truth, and bewailing those who are crushed in ignorance and folly: “For God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham;” and He, commiserating their great ignorance and hardness of heart who are petrified against the truth, has raised up a seed of piety, sensitive to virtue, of those stones–of the nations, that is, who trusted in stones. Again, therefore, some venomous and false hypocrites, who plotted against righteousness, He once called “a brood of vipers.” But if one of those serpents even is willing to repent, and follows the Word, he becomes a man of God.

Others he figuratively calls wolves, clothed in sheep-skins, meaning thereby monsters of rapacity in human form. And so all such most savage beasts, and all such blocks of stone, the celestial song has transformed into tractable men. “For even we ourselves were sometime foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another.” Thus speaks the apostolic Scripture: “But after that the kindness and love of God our saviour to man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy, He saved us.”

Wisdom, the celestial Word, is the all-harmonious, melodious, holy instrument of God. What, then, does this instrument–the Word of God, the Lord, the New Song–desire? To open the eyes of the blind, and unstop the ears of the deaf, and to lead the lame or the erring to righteousness, to exhibit God to the foolish, to put a stop to corruption, to conquer death, to reconcile disobedient children to their father. The instrument of God loves mankind. The Lord pities, instructs, exhorts, admonishes, saves, shields, and of His bounty promises us the kingdom of heaven as a reward for learning; and the only advantage He reaps is, that we are saved. For wickedness feeds on men’s destruction; but truth, like the bee, harming nothing, delights only in the salvation of men.

Behold the might of the new song! It has made men out of stones, men out of beasts. Those, moreover, that were as dead, not being partakers of the true life, have come to life again, simply by becoming listeners to this song. It also composed the universe into melodious order, and tuned the discord of the elements to harmonious arrangement, so that the whole world might become harmony. It let loose the fluid ocean, and yet has prevented it from encroaching on the land. The earth, again, which had been in a state of commotion, it has established, and fixed the sea as its boundary. The violence of fire it has softened by the atmosphere, as the Dorian is blended with the Lydian strain; and the harsh cold of the air it has moderated by the embrace of fire, harmoniously arranging these the extreme tones of the universe. And this deathless strain,the support of the whole and the harmony of all,–reaching from the centre to the circumference, and from the extremities to the central part, has harmonized this universal frame of things, not according to the Thracian music, which is like that invented by Jubal, but according to the paternal counsel of God, which fired the zeal of David.

This is the New Song, the manifestation of the Word that was in the beginning, and before the beginning. The Saviour, who existed before, has in recent days appeared. He, who is in Him that truly is, has appeared; for the Word, who “was with God,” and by whom all things were created, has appeared as our Teacher. The Word, who in the beginning bestowed on us life as Creator when He formed us, taught us to live well when He appeared as our Teacher; that as God He might afterwards conduct us to the life which never ends. He did not now for the first time pity us for our error; but He pitied us from the first, from the beginning. But now, at His appearance, lost as we already were, He accomplished our salvation. For that wicked reptile monster, by his enchantments, enslaves and plagues men even till now; inflicting, as seems to me, such barbarous vengeance on them as those who are said to bind the captives to corpses till they rot together. This wicked tyrant and serpent, accordingly, binding fast with the miserable chain of superstition whomsoever he can draw to his side from their birth, to stones, and stocks, and images, and such like idols, may with truth be said to have taken and buried living men with those dead idols, till both suffer corruption together.

I also like his exhortation to renounce pagan customs and turn to God…

“Let us then avoid custom as we would a dangerous headland, or the threatening Charybdis, or the mythic sirens. It chokes man, turns him away from truth, leads him away from life: custom is a snare, a gulf, a pit, a mischievous winnowing fan.”

Starting by presenting a call from Jesus:

This am I, this God wills, this is symphony, this the harmony of the Father, this is the Son, this is Christ, this the Word of God, the arm of the Lord, the power of the universe, the will of the Father; of which things there were images of old, but not all adequate. I desire to restore you according to the original model, that ye may become also like Me. I anoint you with the ungent of faith, by which you throw off corrup tion, and show you the naked form of righteousness by which you ascend to God. Come to Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest to your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden light.

And then his response:

Let us haste, let us run, my fellowmen–us, who are God-loving and God-like images of the Word. Let us haste, let us run, let us take His yoke, let us receive, to conduct us to immortality, the good charioteer of men. Let us love Christ. He led the colt with its parent; and having yoked the team of humanity to God, directs His chariot to immortality, hastening clearly to fulfil, by driving now into heaven, what He shadowed forth before by riding into Jerusalem. A spectacle most beautiful to the Father is the eternal Son crowned with victory. Let us aspire, then, after what is good; let us become God-loving men, and obtain the greatest of all things which are incapable of being harmed–God and life. Our helper is the Word; let us put confidence in Him; and never let us be visited with such a craving for silver and gold, and glory, as for the Word of truth Himself. For it will not, it will not be pleasing to God Himself if we value least those things which are worth most, and hold in the highest estimation the manifest enormities and the utter impiety of folly, and ignorance, and thoughtlessness, and idolatry. For not improperly the sons of the philosophers consider that the foolish are guilty of profanity and impiety in whatever they do; and describing ignorance itself as a species of madness, allege that the multitude are nothing but madmen. There is therefore no room to doubt, the Word will say, whether it is better to be sane or insane; but holding on to truth with our teeth, we must with all our might follow God, and in the exercise of wisdom regard all things to be, as they are, His; and besides, having learned that we are the most excellent of His possessions, let us commit ourselves to God, loving the Lord God, and regarding this as our business all our life long.

November 6, 2010

Saddle Up For Jesus

Got a friend who needs converting, or just to step out courageously for Jesus?. This will fix that.

Saddle Up And Ride from Family Christian Center on Vimeo.

Bringing people to God by the power of horses…

Because what the early church should have done was planted in the Hippodrome.

November 6, 2010

Missional v Attractional

This video made me laugh a little bit. Too much or too little of both of these extremes is a bit dumb. If you sound like one of these guys (and only one of these guys) then you’re creating false dichotomies.

Jesusville from Granger Community on Vimeo.

Via ChurchCrunch

November 6, 2010

Church History 101: Robyn’s Guide to Montanism

Montanism was a new prophecy. A movement that the church eventually decided was heretical. It arose in about 160 A.D in Asia Minor. Tertullian eventually became the most famous Montanist.

Here are some facts about Montanism included in the picture above. See if you can match them.

Montanus was a “prophet”
He was accompanied by two prophetesses named Pricilla and Maximilla.
Pricilla and Maximilla abandoned their husbands to take up this role. The Montanists didn’t think much of marriage.
They claimed to prophecy directly under the Holy Spirit.
They were greatly interested in the end times, and kept proclaiming that it was near.
Pricilla and Maximilla were early feminists, promoting women in leadership.
They put on public displays featuring displays of fervour, tongues and lots of noise.
They wrote holy texts, which were circulated and included prophecies written in the first person.
They paid their church leadership which directed funds away from the church.
Quintilla was one of the early converts who became influential. She was obsessed about the end of the world.
Some of their erroneous beliefs included the denigration of marriage, false teaching about the end times, misrepresentation of God in the trinity, and that the heavenly Jerusalem would be in Phrygia.
They strongly advocated church discipline and believed people couldn’t come back after leaving the church, and they loved martyrdom.

November 6, 2010

Church History Trading Cards: Tertullian

Tertullian is one of my favourite, if not my favourite writers from early church history. He writes acerbically with wit and biting sarcasm. There’s just something that resonates with me about the good guys from the Latin West (Augustine is cool too). Tertullian’s Apology is a must read. Check out the Tertullian Project for a batch of Tertullian flavoured resources.

Legend: L = Latin West, A = Apologist, Scroll = Author of primary documents you should read, Thumbs up = Theologically sound (mostly), Thumbs Down = Became a Montanist (which actually stopped him becoming a Catholic Saint, so it might have been worth it).

Here’s a sample from the Apology:

On the Legal Process for charges against Christians

“BUT if it is resolved we must be guilty, pray what is your reason for treating us differently from other criminals ? For it is a rule in law that where the case is the same, there the procedure of court ought to be the same also. But when we and heathens are impeached upon the same articles, the heathen shall be allowed the privilege of the council, and of pleading in person for setting off his innocence, it being against law to proceed to sentence before the defendant has put in his answer; but a Christian is permitted nothing, not to speak what is necessary, either to justify his cause, defend the truth, or prevent the injustice of his judges. On the contrary, nothing is attended to in his trial, but how to inflame the mob, and therefore the question is about his name only, and not the nature of his crime : whereas if you sit in judgment upon another criminal, and he pleads guilty to the indictment, suppose of homicide, sacrilege, incest, or rebellion (to instance the common
heads of your libels against us), upon such confession, I say, it is not your method forthwith to proceed to sentence, but you have patience to examine the nature of the fact in all its circumstances, viz.—the place, the time, the manner, and the accomplices of the action: but in the trial of a Christian, all these forms of justice are overruled.

On the foundation of Common Charges against Christians

…you ought on both sides to be equally severe in the examination of fact, and see to the bottom of those reports, so frequently and so falsely thrust upon us. For instance, to bring in a true list of how many infants every Christian has killed and eaten, what incests committed in the dark, what cooks we had for the dressing these children’s flesh, and what pimping dogs for putting out the candles.

On the response to changes wrought in people’s lives when they become Christians

Thus indeed they praise what they know, but vilify what they know not; they blot the fairest examples of virtue shining in their very eyes, because of a religion they are entirely in the dark about; whereas certainly, by all the rules of reason, we ought to judge of the nature of causes we see not, by the effects we see, and not pre-condemn apparent goodness for principles we understand not. Others, discoursing of some persons, whom they knew to be vagrants, and infamously lewd before they came over to our religion, drop their praises upon them in such a manner, that they stigmatize them with their very compliments; so darkened are they with prejudice that they blunder into the commendation of the thing they would condemn. For (say they) how wanton, and how witty was such a woman ! how amorous and frolicsome was such a young gentleman ! but now they are Christians : thus undesignedly they fix the amendment of their lives upon the alteration of their religion.

On the New Atheists (before they were even invented):

Some others are arrived to that pitch of aversion to the very name of Christian, that they seem to have entered into covenant with hatred, and bargained to gratify this passion at the expense of all the satisfactions of human life, acquiescing in the grossest of injuries rather than the hated thing of Christian should come within their doors.

On the Meaning of the word Christian

“But Christians is a Greek word, and means nothing more than a disciple of Christ, which by interpretation is the Anointed; and when you misname it Chrestian1 (for so far are you from understanding our religion, that as yet you know not our true name), even then it implies nothing worse than a benignity and sweetness of temper; thus outrageous are you at the sound of a name as inoffensive and harmless as those who bear it. But do men use to let loose their passions at this rate against any sect merely from the name of its founder ? Is it a new thing for scholars to be named from their masters? Is it not from hence that philosophers are called Platonists, Epicureans, Pythagoreans, etc.?”

November 5, 2010

Church History Trading Cards: Marcion the Heretic

Marcion holds the honour of being the first person named and shamed by the church as a heretic. It was after Marcion that heresy hunting became a fun bloodsport for Christian writers and thinkers.

He couldn’t figure out how the Old Testament and New Testament could be reconciled (much like today’s atheists) so he decided to throw away the Old Testament, only accept Luke’s Gospel, and the writings of Paul, and believe in two Gods, the good one of the New Testament, and the Bad “Demiurge” of the old. This prompted a bit of an outcry (the guy was earlier excommunicated by his bishop, who happened to be his father), and Tertullian famously wrote a bunch of books addressing his heresies (you can read them online here). His description of Marcion’s home region, in volume I, and then his statement that as bad as it is, Marcion is the worst thing about it, is a beautiful piece of ad hominem polemic.

Marcion’s heretical understanding of Scripture also proved the catalyst for putting together a formal canon. So that’s another silver lining.

Key: The Spartan Helment – Marcion was from the Greek East, the Thumbs Down – Marcion was a heretic.

November 5, 2010

Church History 101: A map of the Roman Empire split into “Latin West” and “Greek East”

So, to make understanding Early Church History, and figures therefrom, we refer to them as being from the Greek East, or the Latin West. Here’s a map that clarifies what is what. It’s a bit clearer than the maps our wonderful, and very brilliant, lecturer Andrew Bain drew on the whiteboard.

MapEWRomanEmpire

Here, too, is a Wikipedia article on the distinction, useful for background. And another article on the schism that occurred between them, where there were eventually two emperors, one in the east, and one in the west, and then eventually just the western “empire” where there was a later schism and, for a while, two popes (irrelevant for this exam). The East became known as the Byzantine Empire.

Of real interest is the interaction of different Christian views from the two sides of the empire, and how that interaction worked itself out in Christian belief… “Eastern Christianity” now describes “Orthodox” Christianity – as in the type practiced by Russian, and Greek Orthodox churches (they wear funny black robes, have beards, and hats). The current Greek Orthodox Bishop of Corinth looks like this:

Western Christianity now describes us, and the Catholics. The Latin speaking bit is carried over into Catholic liturgy. Here’s a little line diagram from Wikipedia:

When it comes to our subject, the East-West distinction helps place someone geographically, and has some bearing, but doesn’t necessarily define, somebody’s theology. It has some impact. But Augustine and Tertullian were from the west, and they were good, and Polycarp was from the East, and he was good too. Chronology has some bearing on how “good” or “bad” or “Biblical” or “heretical” somebody might be, when assessed geographically. All very confusing, no?

November 5, 2010

The Bible and Women

So, the comment thread in that post I linked to from the Friendly Atheist yesterday has just about descended into anarchy. But there are some people in there intent on pushing the line that “the Bible is nasty to women.” Now, some nasty things happen to women in the Bible – but this doesn’t mean that the Bible affirms them. There are a few stories of rape, and a few cases where servants and concubines are used to produce children – that to our 21st century sensibilities look a little archaic. That’s because they are archaic. The Bible is an old book. It’s a product of its times. But let me introduce you to one of my favourite words – anachronism. According to Wikipedia, anachronism is:

“is an accidental or deliberate inconsistency in some chronological arrangement, especially a chronological misplacing of persons, events, objects, or customs in regard to each other. The item is often an object, but may be a verbal expression, a technology, a philosophical idea, a musical style, a material, a custom, or anything else so closely associated with a particular period in time that it would be incorrect to place it outside its proper domain.”

Now, this relates to the issue of the Old Testament law – because it is anachronistic to read our modern ideas about law and order back into Israel’s situation, and to find it wanting by our standards. We can’t measure their fairness or rightness using our standards. What we can do is look at those stories and laws and see what principles underpinned them in their time, and their place.

One of the current favourites in this sort of debate is to bring up Deuteronomy 22, which says:

“²³ If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and he sleeps with her, ²⁴ you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death—the young woman because she was in a town and did not scream for help, and the man because he violated another man’s wife. You must purge the evil from among you.

²⁵ But if out in the country a man happens to meet a young woman pledged to be married and rapes her, only the man who has done this shall die. ²⁶ Do nothing to the woman; she has committed no sin deserving death. This case is like that of someone who attacks and murders a neighbor, ²⁷ for the man found the young woman out in the country, and though the betrothed woman screamed, there was no one to rescue her.

²⁸ If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, ²⁹he shall pay her father fifty shekels^[c] of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.”

The Bible is pretty clear that adultery is ruled out for God’s people – both Israel, and Christians. It’s in the Ten Commandments – rape is a breach of these Ten Commandments – so it’s clear from the outset that these three occurences are dealing with people who have broken God’s law. They’re essentially a retrieval ethic. They’re dealing with how to punish wrongdoers – it’s not a guide for how to get a wife.

These laws also bear certain similarities to ANE contemporaries – from what I’ve read so far, only forcing the woman to marry her rapist is different, and I’d argue that’s a retrieval ethic aimed to protect the victim from a life of miserable poverty (or worse). Assyria had almost identical punishments and rules about rape in the city (I don’t know if that link goes straight to the page on Google Books – but its on page 131 if it doesn’t). In Assyria the rapist of a married woman was given whatever punishment the husband inflicted on his wife. The Assyrian laws about a betrothed woman, or virgin, were similar – the father could take the rapist’s wife as punishment, he could swap the rapist’s wife for his daughter, forcing his daughter to marry the rapist. If the rapist was single he had to pay three times the bridal price and marry the daughter. Sound familiar? But the father could also punish his daughter however he wanted for her offense…

Atheists don’t like the first Deuteronomic law above because they like to suggest a woman is being punished for not screaming loud enough. Because they are unable to read anything with nuance, or accept that even the laws are written with a little bit of artistry that requires actually thinking in order to properly interpret a passage. The man in this case finds a woman, and “he sleeps with her” – there’s no violence described. The judgment suggests that were she not complicit she would have said so – it’s a pretty calcified reading to suggest that it’s dealing with circumstances where the woman would have called for help, but couldn’t. The plainer reading seems to me that the woman in this instance is being stoned as an adulterer, not as a rape victim. I’d have serious questions about how this stoning would be carried out – there isn’t a description of court proceedings prior to stonings, and it’s an argument from silence to suggest such proceedings happened or didn’t, but I suspect the Israelites were pretty concerned about not spilling innocent blood (and fine with spilling the blood of the guilty. The second prohibition makes it clear that rape is a problem – a crime punishable by death. And the third presents an ethical dilemma.

Here’s a slightly edited version of how I tried to tackle it on the Friendly Atheist – I’d be interested in others thoughts on this, kicking off with the comment I was responding to (I had suggested that most references to submission and intergender relationships in the Bible are in the context of marriage (ie. that other women I know don’t have to submit to me because I am male, that Biblical submission is in the context of marriage, with reference to creation, and linked to the husband’s sacrificial role as a picture of Christ’s relationship with the church) :

…may I add, that gender is mentioned plenty of times in the bible outside of the context of marriage, including calling for stoning for wearing masculine garments, rapes, kidnappings and enslavements of women of other groups, murder of pregnant and non virgin women, killing women for not screaming loud enough while being raped, forcing women to marry their rapists, etc…

The reason you do not object to the sexism and homophobia in the bible is because you are a homophobic sexist, glad we cleared that up.

Can you find me a place where I’ve said anything that makes you think I fear gay people? Or that I negatively judge women (or men) on the basis of their gender?

Homophobia and sexism aren’t in the Bible they are in the actions of people wrongly using the Bible. The Levitical laws regarding rape sound nasty, but they were a retrieval ethic trying to salvage some good from bad. Rape was also illegal. It’s not as if the law said “run around raping whoever you want, just so long as you marry them afterwards.” Read the story of Dinah in Genesis to see how Israelites treated rapists (and this story formed part of the Torah). Her brothers convince the rapist’s village to get circumcised – all of them – and then they come in with swords and put them to death. Primitive. Yes. But it shows that rape wasn’t taken lightly by the men.

Do you know what happened to a raped woman who fell pregnant in the Ancient Near East? She was either killed as an adulterer, exiled from her people and her home (which was also essentially a death sentence), or forced to live a lonely and sad existence in her fathers household as an economic burden. Here’s an Ancient Near Eastern (and Jewish) account of the ethical problem presented, and the plight of the victim, the story of Tamar in 2 Samuel 13 (again, just because it’s in the Bible it doesn’t mean the Bible affirms the narrative, most of the Old Testament is about how people fail at living God’s way and can’t keep the law).

¹² “No, my brother!” she said to him. “Don’t force me! Such a thing should not be done in Israel! Don’t do this wicked thing. ¹³ What about me? Where could I get rid of my disgrace? And what about you? You would be like one of the wicked fools in Israel. Please speak to the king; he will not keep me from being married to you.” ¹⁴ But he refused to listen to her, and since he was stronger than she, he raped her.

¹⁵ Then Amnon hated her with intense hatred. In fact, he hated her more than he had loved her. Amnon said to her, “Get up and get out!”

¹⁶ “No!” she said to him. “Sending me away would be a greater wrong than what you have already done to me.”

But he refused to listen to her. ¹⁷ He called his personal servant and said, “Get this woman out of my sight and bolt the door after her.” ¹⁸ So his servant put her out and bolted the door after her. She was wearing an ornate^[a] robe, for this was the kind of garment the virgin daughters of the king wore. ¹⁹ Tamar put ashes on her head and tore the ornate robe she was wearing. She put her hands on her head and went away, weeping aloud as she went.

²⁰ Her brother Absalom said to her, “Has that Amnon, your brother, been with you? Be quiet for now, my sister; he is your brother. Don’t take this thing to heart.” And Tamar lived in her brother Absalom’s house, a desolate woman.

Absalom ends up killing his step brother Amnon for his crime – and the whole episode pretty much destroys King David’s family. The story highlights man’s inability to keep the law, and the heavy price paid for transgressions. There are no winners. Would the situation have been better for all involved if Amnon had met his legal obligations, owned up to his crime, and treated Tamar better? Yes. Would it have been much better if he hadn’t raped her in the first place? Absolutely. But the law exists to deal both with trying to prevent the crimes and trying to provide solutions for human sinfulness. Insisting that actions have consequences.

Forcing a rapist to marry the woman probably saved her life, and definitely provided for her material needs – poor recompense, yes, and we’d certainly do it differently today. But these were primitive times, and evil people existed then as they do now. Seriously. What do you think “law” does now? It seeks to protect and recompense victims and punish wrongdoers.

The law in the OT was the minimum standard. We’re talking about the criminal code. Israel was meant to act with love to their neighbours and surrounding nations. It might not look like justice to our modern eyes – but that’s some sort of anachronistic superiority complex. There aren’t many cultures from the past that look good in our eyes. Nor were non-Christian cultures any better with how they treated women. In fact, they were worse.

That’s what I said there. I commend this article from a blog called M and M that I just discovered while looking for some evidence to back up my statement about ANE rape victims (Hammurabi’s Code also punishes adultery (and the perpetrators of rape) with death, though it ties the adulterers together and drowns them), I read it somewhere, can’t remember where… Anyway, these paragraphs from that post are worth thinking about when approaching this question:

Deuteronomy is an Ancient Near Eastern Legal text; it therefore is part of a literary genre from that period of time. We are aware of other texts from the same genre such as the ancient Hittite Laws, Middle Assyrian Laws and Code of Hammurabi, and its important to note that legal codes written in this Genre differ significantly from modern legal codes. Hiller notes,

[T]here is no evidence that any collection of Near Eastern laws functioned as a written code that was applied by a strict method of exegesis to individual cases. As far as we can tell, these bodies of laws served educational purposes and gave expression to what was regarded as just in typical cases, but they left considerable latitude to local courts for determining the right in individual suits. They aided local courts without controlling them.[5]

The same point is made by Raymond Westbrook in his comparative study of Ancient Near Eastern Legal Codes. He notes that such laws “reflect the scribal compilers’ concern for perfect symmetry and delicious irony rather than the pragmatic experience of the law courts.”[6] The method used in legal texts was “to set out principles by the use of often extreme examples.” Christopher Wright calls this “paradigmatic law,” which he explains as “the detailing of specific circumstances with the view to giving judges basic principles and precedents on which to evaluate the great variety of individual cases that may come before them.”[7]

Some of these passages in the Old Testament present prickly questions and handling them without bringing our modern views to bear on them is hard – how do you answer that sort of question and accusation? To see just how nasty the comment I was responding to hit the Friendly Atheist link in yesterday’s post (if I link it here it appears in the comment thread as a trackback and will create all sorts of angst). And I’m meant to be studying.

November 5, 2010

New Testament 102: The Galatian Equation

Galatia. A place Paul wrote to. That’s about all I know about Galatia, not having been there. Except that Galatian Christians faced much the same problem from Rome as Christians throughout the empire. Which is where this post is heading. I’m finally finding a use for the extended edition of an essay I wrote last semester (the extended edition was twice the word limit, I removed half the essay and handed it in – taking out pages at random¹). Eagle eyed readers will notice the same clump of references regarding the legal status of Christianity that featured in the last post. It’s from a different essay. I aim to include them in every essay I write for Bruce (3 out of 3 so far)².

Basically, one of the issues going on in Galatia is circumcision. Sometimes you just have to cut to the chase on these things. Romans weren’t circumcised. As demonstrated by this picture that Facebook flagged as inappropriate.

Romans weren’t circumcised, but Jews were – which meant that Roman converts to Christianity could literally blend in by getting the snip (really? How literal is that? Did they invert their clothing in the first century? Covering everything but their bits?). Well no. But Romans thought circumcision was an abominable practice, and they tolerated it in Jews but abhorred it personally – and it was a real marker of converting to Judaism, which earned one exemption from the Imperial Cult, and thus freedom from some of the persecution that came from converting to Christianity. Below you’ll find my take on the issue from the essay I hacked to pieces (the footnotes are there so you can dig up Bruce’s article on the matter – except I can’t find it on google, I think last time I found it I found the book of the proceedings of the conference it was presented at somewhere on the interwebs), it was more than possibly identical to whatever handouts he gave us in class. Anyway, here are some bits and bobs:

The question of references to the Imperial Cult in Galatians is a Jewish question. Winter’s (2002) thesis on the motives behind Jewish agitation in Galatia (Galatians 6:12) is that Jewish Christians were encouraging gentile converts to use Jewish camouflage to avoid participating in imperial cult, or persecution for failing to participate.[1] Jews in the Roman Empire are understood to have been exempt from cultic practices, free instead to practice their own religion.[2] This freedom varied from emperor to emperor, and region to region. There was no written charter providing such freedom.[3]

Josephus and Philo record that the Jews abrogated their cultic responsibilities by offering sacrifices for the emperor,[4] Herod, not content with this arrangement, built three temples dedicated to the emperor and Rome, McLaren (2005) suggests honouring the cult was a major priority in Judea.[5] This did not prevent the use of the cult as a weapon in Jewish-Roman relations.[6]

Winter (2001) argues that Gallio’s decision (Acts 18:12-17) initially served to protect Christians from participating in the Imperial Cult under the mos maiorum, and Gentile converts to Judaism were recognised as Jewish by imperial law.[7]

Hardin (2008) in his extensive treatment of the situation follows Winter, adding a minor addendum to reflect his findings that the Jews actually participated almost fully in the practices of the Imperial Cult. He suggests Christians were in no man’s land – neither Jew, nor gentile, and that the agitators, Jewish converts, wanted the church to pick a side.[8] He concludes his monograph by suggesting that the imperial cult forms an important backdrop for the study of Galatians, and the New Testament as a whole.[9]

[1] Winter, B.W, ‘The Imperial Cult and Early Christians in Roman Galatia (Acts XIII 13-50 and Galatians VI 11-18),’ in Actes du ler Congres International sur Antioche de Pisidie, eds., T. Drew-Bear, M. Tashalan and C. M. Thomas: Iniversite Lumiere – Lyon 2 and Diffusion de Boccard, 2002, 67-75, This thesis finds some support from Stanton, G, Jesus and Gospel, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 2004, pp 43-46, and Hardin, J.K, ‘Avoiding Persecution and the Imperial Cult,’ Galatians and the Imperial Cult, (Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck), 2008, pp 85-115

[2] Letter of Claudius to the Alexandrians, Papyrus found at Philadelphia in the Fayum, Egypt, The Roman Empire: Augustus to Hadrian, ed. and trans. Shrek, R.K, pp 83-86 – “Therefore, even now I earnestly ask of you that the Alexandrians conduct themselves more gently and kindly toward the Jews who have lived in the same city for a long time, and that they do not inflict indignities upon any of their customs in the worship of their god, but that they allow them to keep their own practices just as in the time of the god Augustus, which practices I too have confirmed after hearing both sides”

[3] Rajak, T, ‘Was there a Roman Charter for the Jews?’, The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol 74 (1984) pp 107-123, Pucci Ben Zeev, M, ‘Jewish Rights in the Roman World – The Greek and Roman Documents quoted by Josephus Flavius’, 1998, Mohr Siebek, pg 412, Rutgers, L.V, ‘Roman Policy Towards Jews’, Judaism and Christianity in First Century Rome edited by Donfried, K.P and Richardson, P, pp 93-116, one only needs to consider Caligula’s aborted attempt to hijack the temple, and its destruction under Nero to accept this point.

[4] McLaren, J.S, ‘Jews and the Imperial Cult,’ p 271

[5] McLaren, J.S, ‘Jews and the Imperial Cult,’ p 259, these temples were constructed at Caesarea Maritima, Sebaste, and Banias

[6] McLaren, J.S, ‘Jews and the Imperial Cult,’ p 262, Imperial cultic requirements were a flashpoint. The Greek citizens of Alexandria triggered the incident leading to Claudius’ missive by erecting statues of the emperor in the synagogue. If the Jews removed the statues this would be seen as imperial impropriety, Josephus’ account of the incident suggests the Greek citizens used the cult as a weapon, Pilate also caused some consternation in Judea by introducing inscribed shields to Jerusalem, see Fuks, G, ‘Again on the episode of the gilded Roman shields at Jerusalem,’ Harvard Theological Review, 75 no 4, 1982, pp 503-507

[7] Winter, B.W, After Paul Left Corinth, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans), 2001, pp 278-280, Winter, B.W, ‘Gallio’s Ruling on the Legal Status of Early Christianity (Acts 18:14-15),’ Tyndale Bulletin 50.2 (1999) 213-224.

[8] Hardin, J.K, ‘Avoiding Persecution and the Imperial Cult,’ Galatians and the Imperial Cult, (Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck), 2008, pp 85-115

[9] Hardin, J.K, Galatians and the Imperial Cult, p 155

¹ That is simply not true, and I apologise for the dishonesty.
² That is actually true.

November 5, 2010

New Testament 102: All about Gallio

Bruce has a real soft spot for Gallio. I reckon if he played that speculative game “who would I invite to dinner,” Gallio would make the list. Gallio is a popular boy in Corinth too. His appearance in Corinth at the Bema (Justice Seat) in Acts 18 marks the one exact spot we know Paul stood in Greece. The Orthodox Church in Corinth made the scene with Gallio the mural on the back wall of their brand new conference room…

Here’s Robyn standing in front of the Bema.

All this is only vaguely related to the potential essay question. But I’m setting the scene.

Here’s the passage from the Extra Spiritual Version (ESV), complete with whatever footnotes Bible Gateway thinks are relevant:

¹²But when Gallio was^(W) proconsul of Achaia,^(X) the Jews made a united attack on Paul and^(Y)brought him before the tribunal, ¹³saying, “This man is persuading people to worship God contrary to^(Z) the law.” ¹⁴But when Paul was about to open his mouth, Gallio said to the Jews, “If it were a matter of wrongdoing or vicious^(AA) crime, O Jews, I would have reason to accept your complaint.¹⁵But^(AB) since it is a matter of questions about words and names and^(AC) your own law, see to it yourselves. I refuse to be a judge of these things.” ¹⁶And he drove them from the tribunal. ¹⁷And they all seized Sosthenes, the ruler of the synagogue, and beat him in front of the tribunal. But Gallio paid no attention to any of this.

Cool story. I love how the crowd turn on the agitator at the end. They were there to give a beating – so they’re going to give a beating. All right. This judgment may well, if some first century historical reconstruction type people, have made Christianity a legal presence in at least the Achaian province of the empire. Gallio was the proconsul of the province. He was like Chuck Norris in Walker Texas Ranger. If you messed with him you got round house kicked to the face. Gallio’s brother was Seneca. So was his father. Seneca the Older paid to have his kids brought up real good in Roman society. Gallio was even adopted by a rich benefactor (and so changed his name from Novatus to Gallio) His kids were movers and shakers. Seneca the Younger (he’s on wikipedia) was a philosopher who was also Nero’s (the crazy emperor) tutor and adviser. He eventually killed himself (because he had to) after failing to topple Nero in a backstabbing conspiracy (the guy was a nutter – Nero that is). Gallio suffered a similar fate – Nero ordered him put to death, but he may have beaten him to it. Dodging a bullet by taking a bullet (well, a sword or an arrow).

The crux of it

Some people suggest he was basically a pimple on the backside of Roman history who made no real contribution to Rome or humanity. Others think Gallio was a bit blasé about the whole trial of Paul thing. Wikipedia does anyway.

“His behaviour on this occasion shows the impartial attitude of the Roman officials towards Christianity in its early days.”

Lets treat that as a summary of the consensus view on the matter and then we’ll disagree with it. And show that Gallio’s snap judgment (and he was famous as a juror) was a legal decision with consequences that spread through his province and made Christianity a legal subset of Judaism under his rule. While this didn’t set an empire wide precedent (Gallio wasn’t the emperor) – it certainly says something about the legal situation of Christians in first century Rome.

The esteemed B.W Winter wrote an article for the Tyndale Bulletin called Redeeming Gallio and His Judgment in Acts 18 (PDF), there’s another one called Gallio’s Ruling on the Legal Status of Early Christianity (.doc) You should definitely read them if you want to pass this exam.

Here’s the summary of the first one:

“By first-century Graeco-Roman standards, a recent assessment of Gallio – a Roman senator, proconsul and consul of Rome – would have been seen as something of a damnatio that resulted in the dismissal of his achievements and the formal disfiguring of his name from the imperial inscription that bears it in Delphi. However, a re-examination
of the evidence of ancient witnesses comes to a somewhat different conclusion about this important Roman senator. Such testimonies would confirm Luke’s presentation of this legally competent proconsul who made a landmark judgement under Roman law on the status of the early Christian movement.”

Jerome Murphy-O’Connor (and what would he know – he’s only an “expert on Paul” according to Wikipedia) reckons Gallio was a hypochondriac wuss who ran away from his post when the going got tough. But Bruce says the Emperor Claudius reckons Gallio was alright, and if he was alright by Claudius, he’s alright by us too. Gallio’s name wasn’t removed from the Delphi inscription because he wasn’t disgraced. And he went on to be a consul of Rome. Basically Murphy-O’Connor is the bad scholar in this answer. And Bruce is fighting the good fight for Gallio. Murphy-O’Connor says the only good thing about Gallio is that he helps us date Paul’s time in Corinth (because Gallio himself was only in Corinth for a year (51-52 A.D).

Gallio did his year of regional service, and then got sick (he wasn’t a hypochondriac, as the bad guys have suggested). Here’s a paragraph from Bruce about a paragraph from a primary source about Gallio:

“In a discussion titled ‘On the Medicinal use of seawater’, Pliny the Elder (AD c.23/4-79) recorded ‘there being many other uses, the chief however being a sea voyage for those attacked by consumption, as I have said, and for haemoptysis, such as quite recently within our memory was taken by Annaeus Gallio after his consulship (post consulatum)’ According to Pliny it was after he completed the one-year term set for a senatorial consulship.”

Gallio the Juror
Gallio was a nice guy. According to his brother.

“Seneca reminded Lucilius that his brother was not inept in his relationships with others. He had a great ability to get along with other people and his unaffectedly pleasant personality charms even those it pays no attention to … No other human being is so charming to just one person as he is to all people.’ In Corinth, Gallio politely addressed them as Ό Jews’, and explained that he simply could not proceed be cause there was no case to answer under Roman law. Luke records that he added, ‘If it were a matter of wrong-doing or vicious crime, then I would have reason to allow the legal proceedings’ (18:14).”

Bruce makes the point that Gallio has more integrity, and was less swayed by Jewish political pressures, than Felix or Pontius Pilate before them – he recognises the trial is a farce. And he calls them on it.

“The impression gained from Seneca is that Gallio was an astute judge of situations, and would have been aware of the hubris and the troubling nature of the litigation that had driven the Jews to pursue this case, and the duplicity that stood behind their charges. In fact Luke recorded that he ‘drove’ (άττήλασεν) the plaintiffs from the tribunal.”

Bruce further suggests the decision was thoroughly grounded in Roman law – and a right exercise of due process. He thinks the Jews were suggesting that Paul was operating outside the law because he’d left Judaism but had not taken up the Roman Imperial Religion (which was his legal obligation – from which Jews were exempt). Gallio decides that it is a Jewish matter, that Christianity is still “Jewish” in essence, and that Roman law doesn’t apply. He says the only law that is relevant to the case is “your law” – meaning Jewish law. He made the judgment before Paul had even had a chance to start his defense because he was such a top-notch juror. Like Judge Judy.

On the Beating of Sosthenes

“What was the reason for this fracas in the Corinthian forum? There are a number of possibilities. It is known that leading Roman citizens followed by their clients attended in the forum, and they operated as loyal supporters of their patrons in the realm of politela. Those standing around saw the dismissal of Jews’ case in the Roman criminal court as an opportunity to demonstrate their support for the emperor’s recent anti-Jewish decree recorded by Luke in Acts 18:2 – ‘because
Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome”

“It is more likely that Luke’s final comment [But Gallio paid no attention to any of this.] is to be interpreted as referring to how Gallio had operated in this case. He drove the accusers from the judgement seat because their case was groundless in Roman law, carefully following the correct legal protocol within whose paramètres he alone operated. He was rightly not concerned with matters outside the formal court hearing, for what happened was not within his remit unless Sosthenes subsequently brought another private prosecution, for assault. As Luke rightly noted ‘and none of these things (18:15, 17) concerned Gallio’, but had Paul been guilty of those in 18:14 he would certainly have proceeded with the case.”

On the Legal Status of Judaism (not from Bruce’s article)

If you’re a student preparing an exam answer you’ll already have done the subject The Cross and the Clash of Cultures, which apart from having an alliterative title, prompted me to do some research on the legal status of Judaism under the empire. Here’s a quote from one of my footnotes that may or may not be of use:

The actual nature of Judaism’s status, whether or not it was a “religio licita” is in some dispute. The term religio licita seems to be a later development than this question – but the freedoms and exemptions for the Jews certainly existed. Caesar provided some freedom for Jews to practice their religion within the empire – but this may not have had the effect of freeing them for all time. cf Rajak, T, ‘Was there a Roman Charter for the Jews?’, The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol 74 (1984) pp 107-123 (I think it’s on EBSCO), which suggests that the phrase “religio licita” to describe Judaism was first recorded by Tertullian, that they only required “public backing, with muscle behind it” rather than a charter to establish these rights, and that it was not the nature of the polis to exclude citizens from the practice of customary activities. See also – Pucci Ben Zeev, M, ‘Jewish Rights in the Roman World – The Greek and Roman Documents quoted by Josephus Flavius’, 1998, Mohr Siebek, pg 412 –the treatment of Jews throughout the empire after Caesar’s death suggests this declaration was not all encompassing precedent, while Rutgers, L.V, ‘Roman Policy Towards Jews’, Judaism and Christianity in First Century Rome edited by Donfried, K.P and Richardson, P, pp 93-116 suggests that Jewish status under Roman law varied greatly from Emperor to Emperor – and that there was no charter or official policy regarding the Jews.

The Romans placed huge value on time honoured traditions – it was part of their shtick, they called it the Mos Maiorum and this was the recognition of tradition that protected the Jews from participating in the Imperial Cult.

On the Imperial Cult and Gallio’s Exemption

Here’s what Bruce says in the second article linked (up the top):

“Christianity was a sect within Judaism and therefore a religio licita, part of the mos maiorum. This was how Christianity was judged in the eyes of the Roman governor with expertise as a jurist. What Gallio ruled ‘when Paul was about to open his mouth’ (18:14a) had implications for this early Messianic movement. Whether Jewish Christians or Gentile Christians, Roman citizens, or provincials, they were all seen as ‘a party’ operating under the Jewish umbrella. Therefore being a Christian in the province of Achaea was not a criminal offence, according to Gallio.

Attention has been briefly drawn to the legal immunity the Jews enjoyed with respect to the veneration of the emperor because of the mos maiorum. While New Testament scholars have underestimated the importance of this cult during the Julio-Claudian emperors, evidence showed that it grew more spectacularly throughout the empire during the first century than even the early Christian movement did…

Paul used the same defense again in front of Felix, and then again in Rome in front of Festus and before Agrippa II – and Bruce argues that the verdict was the same on all counts – and the word “unhindered” at the end of Acts is incredibly important.

In the final hearing before Festus in the presence of Agrippa II, Paul again mounted his defence along the same lines—‘I stand to this day testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said should happen’ (26:22). Festus confirmed Gallio’s ruling that the case concerned ‘certain questions of their superstition’ and the alleged resurrection of Jesus (25:19).

While awaiting the hearing of his appeal, Paul was still allowed to engage in his ministry ‘with all boldness’. After that comment, Luke added the highly significant word, ‘unhindered’ (28:31). This term was used to indicate that there was no legal impediment to what a person was doing.

Addendum: On Murphy-O’Connor

Don’t be too nasty in your answer to the bad cop – Bruce has this to say in his final footnote:

“My point of departure with J. Murphy-O’Conner on the assessment of Gallio should not detract in any way from my appreciation of his important service to New Testament Corinthian studies with what is now the third edition of his excellent collection of primary literary sources and some of the important inscriptions.”

November 5, 2010