The Letters of Paul: Interpreting Biblical Texts Series

PREFACE

This book is the product not only of the usual research one does but also of many conversations with students through the years who have joined me in the study of Paul’s letters. An early draft of part 1 of the book was read by a class in the Center for Theological Studies in Florida and substantially revised in light of the responses of students. Several chapters in part 2 have been discussed with classes at Columbia Theological Seminary, who pushed me to tighten up arguments and to struggle for greater clarity. Several friends graciously read portions of the manuscript and made invaluable contributions to the final version. Special thanks to Ellen Anderson, Jack Daniels, Beverly R. Gaventa, and Shirley C. Guthrie.

During my work on the manuscript, I was a member of the Pauline Theology Seminar in the Society of Biblical Literature. Though the dialogues were at times frustrating due to our large numbers and diverse opinions, I learned an immense amount from the group. Many of the interpretations in part 2 of this book have their origins in comments from or conversations with members of the seminar.

I am grateful to the Board of Trustees of Columbia Theological Seminary for a sabbatical leave to complete the manuscript and to my colleagues David Moessner and Stanley Saunders, who picked up extra work in my absence.

Betty, my companion for over forty years, has had to share her office with me and, as usual, has shown remarkable patience and support throughout the project.

INTRODUCTION

ON READING THE LETTERS OF PAUL

John Chrysostom, the archbishop of Constantinople toward the beginning of the fifth century, had a special fondness for the letters of Paul. Hearing them read was like listening to a spiritual trumpet that roused him as nothing else could. But I grieve and am pained that all people do not know this man [Paul] as much as they ought to know him.¹ Not every reader of Paul’s letters, however, has responded with the archbishop’s enthusiasm; for some people, in fact, reading the letters has brought grief and pain.

Why have the Pauline letters been such a problem? For one thing, reading Paul is hard going. His manner of communication is at times dense, and his logic is often carried along by an unusual use of Old Testament citations. Paul places heavy demands on his readers. Slugging through the theological argument of Romans 1–11 is not easy. Readers of the New Testament are more likely to be attracted to the vivid parables of Jesus, to his accepting manner with the outcasts and sinners, to the way he pricks the balloons of the pompous religious authorities. In contrast to Jesus, Paul seems dogmatic, cocksure, at times hotheaded, always determined to get his way. Even his efforts at humor (I wish those who unsettle you would castrate themselves! [Gal 5:12]) appear to some readers as harsh and unforgiving. Has Paul not taken the simple, straightforward message of Jesus and turned it into a rigid and complex theological system?

Then there are those who take offense at certain statements in the letters about women and others who find Paul anti-Semitic. He becomes in the minds of many the explanation for the church’s long and sordid oppression of women and Jews. To still others, Paul’s letters show an insensitivity to the anguish and distress of human life. They speak about suffering not as a tragic riddle to be solved or as a reason for rage against God, but as an expected component of Christian experience (e.g., Phil 1:29–30; Rom 8:36; 1 Cor 4:9–13; 2 Cor 4:7–15). Taking strategies to avoid persecution characterizes those who are opponents of the gospel (e.g., Gal 6:12).

If you are among those who have disliked or ignored Paul (or if you are among those who have been fascinated by him), this book is an invitation to read the letters again. There is no guarantee that you will come away from your reading as much a devotee as Chrysostom was. You have a lot to say about that yourself. Nor will this book resolve all the difficulties you will meet along the way. Its intent is simply to make the letters a bit more accessible by putting you in touch with some of the generally accepted approaches to reading them and to offer some explorations into topics that figure prominently in Paul’s conversations with his churches.

This book is by no means a substitute for reading the letters themselves. It is meant to be a companion piece and won’t make much sense without an open Bible at hand. Scripture quotations in the book come from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), except where otherwise indicated. You may prefer another translation, such as the Revised English Bible, the Jerusalem Bible, or the New International Version. Or better still, you may want more than one translation handy in order to compare them. What will become immediately obvious is that translators differ in the way they render the text into English. All translations (not just paraphrases) involve interpretive decisions on the part of the translators. Since these differences show up in the letters more than in the Gospels, we will note some of them in dealing with passages.

You should not think that you have to solve all the riddles in the letters in order to be a discerning reader. Some of the problems are in fact insoluble. In many cases, the difficulties exist because we do not have adequate information about the historical, sociological, or literary issue in the text or because we are unable to understand the implications of the information we do have. Other difficulties arise because of our limited angle of vision. But a recognition of the issues and how they have been addressed can help us avoid falling into the traps that have caught other interpreters.

This book is not about the man Paul and his life and work; it is about his letters. The former would require a careful sifting of material from the Acts of the Apostles and a linking of Luke’s portrait with the information gained from the letters as well as from the apocryphal books. Our concern is limited to the letters, how they can be read, and what they say. It is not at all clear that we could read the letters more intelligently if we knew more about the man and his work.

Part 1 of this book provides a map indicating various approaches to the letters taken in contemporary scholarship. Separate chapters consider (1) the importance of recognizing the literary form of Paul’s communication—letters; (2) the rhetoric Paul employs in making his arguments as persuasive as possible; (3) the sources Paul draws on, sources often recognized by his readers as authoritative and trustworthy; (4) the congregations to which he writes and a profile of the members; and (5) the efforts to move from the various letters to a coherent statement of Paul’s theology. Part 1 seeks to introduce you to the discussion of the methods used today in reading the letters, but makes no effort to be exhaustive or to offer a comprehensive history of Pauline research.

The five chapters of part 2 discuss critical themes emerging in the letters. Each chapter consists of careful treatments of relevant passages—the only way I know to address an issue responsibly. My choice of themes in these chapters inevitably reflects my own reading of the letters. My purpose is to provide a sampling of Paul’s thinking and to give you an orientation to the larger theological questions. Other interpreters no doubt would have chosen other topics and dealt with different passages. Furthermore, limitations of space have meant that the topics are not treated exhaustively; for example, much more could be said about God from the letters than is covered in chapter 7.²

The primary focus throughout the book is on the seven so-called undisputed letters of Paul (Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon). Part 3 gives attention to the other six letters bearing Paul’s name that appear in the canon of the New Testament. Though likely not written by the apostle himself, each has merit in its own right and deserves to be heard as an echo of the apostle’s voice in later decades of the church’s life. At the end of the book is a suggested bibliography for those who wish to read further.

Before beginning our journey through the letters, we need to give attention to those who make the journey—both ourselves and others who have gone before us and whose research we will consider. The interpretation of a text is a lot like the production of a drama. When one sees or participates in a performance of Hamlet, the effect is determined not only by the words Shakespeare wrote, but also by a number of other ingredients—the director who construes the script a particular way, the actors who bring gifts and limitations to their roles, the sets, costumes, and even the theater itself. All contribute to the interpretation of the play.

We who read the letters of Paul are much like directors and actors. The text of the letters lies mute on the page until we begin to interpret it—until we try to make sense out of words, sentences, paragraphs, and entire books. Like directors and actors, we bring our particular experiences, presuppositions, dreams, biases, limited perspectives—all our human baggage—to the text, and the text comes to have meaning precisely in our engagement with it. We may interpret the text in different ways, because the lenses through which we read it differ. Two performances of Hamlet can vary greatly, because the directors and actors interpret Hamlet’s indecisiveness in contrasting ways. They are bound to respect the words Shakespeare wrote (otherwise they perform something other than Hamlet), but their interpretation of the words may result in strikingly different performances.

Another way to put this is to say that the old notion that interpreters must rid themselves of their experiences, presuppositions, and biases and must employ a scientific, objective, value-free method of approach to get at the true meaning of a text is a foolish fancy. In truth, all readers bring something to the script that can contribute to or distort what they derive from it.

At the same time, interpreters have to be open to the text, willing to have their presuppositions challenged by what they read. Interpretation, if it is to yield anything worthwhile, involves a dialogue with the text, a persistent questioning of passages. The venture inevitably puts readers at risk, since as a conversation partner the text asks questions in return, questions that may involve new directions, even transformations for the readers. Arguing with the letters of Paul is perfectly in order, but in doing so, one cannot claim immunity to change.

What does all this mean for a faithful reading of the Pauline letters? It certainly means that readers are to be self-conscious, to be aware and even critical of the personal and cultural presuppositions they bring to the task of interpretation. We all read texts from the perspective of our various social locations. Gender, nationality, racial identity, socioeconomic class, and educational level shape what we see and do not see in a passage. In recent years, feminist readers, African American readers, and readers from developing nations have explicitly interpreted the Bible out of their own experiences and contexts and have shattered any lingering notion that what readers bring to the text is irrelevant. There is simply no such thing as interpretation without presuppositions.

If the personal experiences and social location of readers are critical ingredients in the process of understanding, and if the text is susceptible to a variety of interpretations, are we left in a hopelessly confused situation? Does this mean that anyone’s reading of a text is just as valid as any other? What reasonable controls can there be on the interpretive process to prevent pure relativism?

Two responses. First, the presence of a community of interpreters is essential to a valid interpretation, particularly when the community includes a measure of diversity. One reader can express her or his understanding of a text and then be queried by a fellow reader, who comes at the text from a different angle and with different questions. The interchange can expose the biases of each interpreter and bring to light new dimensions of the text that may have been hidden to both. The circle of the community has to include the rich resources of interpreters past and present, whose writings evidence a serious struggle with the text. As with renditions of Hamlet, all interpretations are open to the critique of the larger community of interpreters.

The notion of a community of interpreters by no means implies that the most valid interpretation of a text is arrived at by majority vote or by consensus of the group. Most of the New Testament documents themselves (including the letters of Paul) were likely minority reports that would hardly have received the approval of the majority. Moreover, the long history of interpretation is marked by individuals who through study and struggle have perceived aspects of the biblical message that the majority, for whatever reasons, has ignored.

Second, there are critical questions that have to be addressed, especially when there is a need for adjudicating various readings. (1) Does the interpretation take into consideration the whole text? Are there words, phrases, and sentences that are ignored? If there are gaps in the text (important matters left unsaid), are they adequately explained? (2) Does the interpretation take into account the immediate literary context? The old adage is still true, that a text out of context is a pretext. Often the immediate context helps to frame the question that the text seeks to answer. (3) Is the interpretation compatible with the broader context? Is the reading of a passage in one letter in line with what is found in the other Pauline letters? As we shall see, all the letters do not say the same thing, and yet it may be possible to discern a coherence of meaning in the whole.

Nicholas Nash observes that the notion of interpretation as performance, when applied to the biblical text, is intensely practical and urgent. What is at stake is not merely the judgment of the drama critics, but fundamental issues of life and death. "If the texts of the New Testament are to express that which the Christian faith declares them capable of expressing, the quality of our humanity will be the criterion of the adequacy of the performance."³

Obviously, as the writer of this book I have brought my own presuppositions to the reading of Paul, tempered by dialogue with several generations of students, with ministers, and with lay-people in the church. I will not remind you of this on every page; instead, I welcome you to the reading (or rereading) of the letters and to a conversation about their meaning.

PART ONE

ISSUES IN READING THE LETTERS OF PAUL

CHAPTER 1

PAUL WRITES LETTERS

Paul’s enduring legacy is in the form of letters he wrote to churches that he had established or to churches he intended to visit. The more closely the letters are studied the more obvious it becomes that they are not hastily scribbled directives, such as one might send to a friend or family member to report what one had for lunch or to request a favor. They are carefully crafted communications, written to persuade readers to think or act in a particular way. Even a group of Paul’s opponents, who charge him with a weak sense of presence and poor speaking skills, acknowledge that his letters are weighty and strong (2 Cor 10:10).

Increasingly, the argument has been made that form cannot be separated from content. Both contribute to the meaning of a single passage or a document as a whole. As David Aune notes, Literary genres and forms are not simply neutral containers used as convenient ways to package various types of communication. They are social conventions that provide contextual meaning for the smaller units of language and text they enclose.¹ Thus it is critical in seeking to understand the subject matter of the Pauline writings to take seriously the fact that they are letters. Their arrangement and even their contents are shaped by the conventions of the letter form—and at the same time their subject matter often forces a modification of the conventions.

Though Paul’s letters are the earliest that we have from the Christian community, letter writing was a common means of communication throughout the Greco-Roman world and became a characteristic literary form in early Christianity. Twenty-one of the twenty-seven writings in the New Testament bear features that mark them as letters, and both the Acts of the Apostles (15:22–31) and Revelation (2:1–3:22) contain letters.² It is likely that the form and practice of writing letters were taught early in Greco-Roman schools, probably on the basis of model letters. While the most obvious reason for writing was the communication of information, letters nevertheless served a host of functions, such as issuing orders, mediating disputes, nurturing friendships, and offering praise or blame.

The last third of the twentieth century has brought significant advances in our understanding of the ancient letter form and its adaptation by Paul.³ Two factors have sparked this recent interest. First, toward the end of the nineteenth century archaeologists discovered a host of documents (papyri) and ostraca (pottery fragments with inscriptions) from the town archives and old libraries of ancient Egypt. Among them were hundreds of letters of various sorts, both official and private, from the Greco-Roman period. During the early part of the twentieth century, Adolf Deissmann began to sort through this material and make initial judgments, but it has remained for later specialists to continue the project and to determine exactly what can be learned from the discoveries about the practice of letter writing in general and particularly about the letter writing of Paul.⁴ The material provides a substantial supplement to what was already known from the more literary tradition.

Second, the investigation of the papyri has been paralleled by research into the ancient theorists, such as Demetrius, Cicero, and Seneca, who either produced handbooks on letter writing or in their rhetorical instruction included directions about the practice of composing letters. For example, Demetrius acknowledged that a letter is analogous to a dialogue and should be plain, but at the same time it should be written in a more studied style since it is sent as a gift. Certain topics, such as those of complex logical subtleties, should be avoided in letters. A letter is designed to be the heart’s good wishes in brief; it is the exposition of a simple subject in simple terms (On Style 231).⁵

What has the research taught us about Paul’s letters? When Deissmann began the investigation of the papyri, he drew a distinction between letters and epistles. Letters, he argued, are nonliterary, generally private communications, serving the purpose of conversation between two persons. They can be illustrated by the typical commercial or familial letters that turn up in the papyri collection. Epistles, on the other hand, are not letters in the usual sense of the word but are artistic creations. They are composed with skill according to established literary conventions and are intended for a wide audience. The epistle does not go abroad, like the letter, on a single sheet of papyrus, but it is reproduced at once at the beginning by slaves of the bookseller in the great city: it is to be bought, read, and discussed in Alexandria, in Ephesus, Athens, Rome.⁶

Paul, Deissmann contended, wrote true letters and not epistles. They were directed to specific situations, not repeated, and were not to be compared with the literary art of an Epicurus or an Aristotle. Paul’s letters emerged almost spontaneously in the midst of the storm and stress of his wandering life, which was so rich in moving experiences.⁷ They are misjudged, Deissmann argued, when they are regarded as treatises or literary productions.

More recently, however, Deissmann’s distinction between letters and epistles has come under considerable criticism, particularly when applied to Paul.⁸ For one thing, Paul’s letters were written to churches and probably were soon copied and shared with other churches. It is hard to speak of them as private communications. (Even Philemon’s address includes the church in your house; see Phlm 2.) Furthermore, an analysis of the language and rhetoric of Paul’s letters leads to the conclusion that these were not communications hastily dashed off in the hustle and bustle of a busy ministry. Even the letter to the Galatians, which Deissmann thought was dictated by sacred indignation and which he labeled a fiery letter of self-defense,⁹ is better seen as a carefully constructed argument, employing a variety of persuasive strategies designed to convince his Gentile readers not to accept circumcision.

When set alongside the everyday letters found in the papyri collection and the more artistic letters from the literary culture of Greece and Rome, Paul’s letters in terms of style fall somewhere in between. He does not produce flat, humdrum communications with no flourish at all. While his imagery may not be as lively as the parables of Jesus, he draws comparisons that clearly make telling points (for example, the law as our disciplinarian in Gal 3:24; the creation’s groaning like an expectant mother in labor in Rom 8:19–23; the breaking off and grafting in of branches on an olive tree in Rom 11:17–24). His convictions are tightly argued and are even punctuated with earthy humor (Gal 5:12). At the same time, Paul hardly matches the aesthetic and artistic standards of the ancient litterateur.

THE STRUCTURE OF PAUL’S LETTERS

It is not surprising that the issue of the structure of Paul’s letters has received considerable scrutiny. Our own letters, whether personal or business, generally follow a recognizable pattern that provides a framework