Andrew Boakye, Paper on Pauls Self Identity, Jan 2011.

A number of key Pauline commentators have posited that Paul remained a Torah observant Jew throughout his association with the ancient Jesus movement and his career evangelising gentiles. This short paper, without particularly offering a committed position as to whether such scholars are correct or not, aims to highlight some of the salient difficulties that their assertions raise, in order to suggest where work might need to be done to arrive at a more satisfactory way of describing Pauls on-going relationship with Judaism. Perhaps we should note initially that the term only appears twice in the Pauline corpus, and in one letter: , , (Gal 1:13).

, (Gal 1:14).

Indeed, the word only appears in these two verses in the entire New Testament (NT). It appears also in 2 Maccabees 2:21; 8:1; 14:38; 4 Maccabees 4:26, where it seems to refer to the mode of life, worship and religion of the elect people over and against the Hellenistic culture and philosophy that the Syrian Kings were attempting to impose. Though references to are far more ubiquitous in Paul, a clear definition is assumed rather than explicated directly, and to arrive safely at just what Paul and his contemporaries meant by Jew would require us to go well beyond the Pauline corpus. However, for the purposes of this investigation, it at least makes sense to start there.1 Several commentators on Paul have (somewhat smugly albeit correctly) asserted that Paul never writes I am a Christian as part of their general case that he did not cease to be a Jew when he encountered the risen Christ and began preaching to gentiles indeed such scholars are quick to dismiss the term as inherently anachronistic and largely inert as a description of the earliest disciples of Jesus. Strictly speaking, however, Paul never writes I am a Jew either, but this will require qualifying.

Ultimately we would need to go well beyond the NT itself, though again very useful capital could be made by considering how other wings of the ancient Jesus movement reckoned with the term, for example, a close analysis of the seemingly pejorative use of the term in the fourth gospel.

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Luke records this statement attributed to Paul following a near riot, in response questions about who he actually was from members of a Roman cohort based in Jerusalem: But Paul said, "I am a Jew of Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of no insignificant city; and I beg you, allow me to speak to the people" (Acts 21:39). I will not attempt to rehash the convoluted arguments surrounding the historical reliability of Lukes account of Pauls missionary journeys, save that I see no pressing reason to deny the basic authenticity of Pauls declaration in Acts 21:39. What does need to be said however is that even in affirming the basic historicity of such statements we can be far less certain about the Lucan editing of Pauls speeches. As such, arguments whose import embodies the specificities of precise terms (as in this case the term ) should not be dependent on secondary evidence and no such statement as we find in Acts 21:39 appears anywhere in Paul. Some may point to Gal 2:15 where the apostle writes: we ourselves are Jews by nature and not Gentile sinners. In and of itself this does not advance the arguments of those asserting that Paul remained a Jew all his life. Even though Paul speaks here both in the first person and in the present tense (bearing in mind of course that there is no verb in the Greek), the phrase by nature (Greek ) could potentially negate the idea that Paul remained a Jew he may have been a Jew by nature (allowing that this term could be translated in more than way) but something else by virtue of the alleged transformation he experienced in Christ. Indeed, many translations render as by birth and no one would disagree that Paul was a Jew by birth the question is whether he remained a card carrying Jew after the Damascus Road christophany. Furthermore, Paul uses the first person plural when addressing the Galatian gentiles in certain places, for example, at the end of his argument in Gal 4, stating , , , (so then, brothers, we are not children of the slave but of the free) though it could not be argued convincingly on the basis of Gal 4:31 that Paul saw himself as a gentile. So if Paul never in unqualified fashion refers to himself as , what selfdesignatory ethnic terminology does he use? He refers to himself as an Israelite ( ) in Romans 11:1 and in slightly oblique fashion in 2 Cor 11:22, where he also uses the term Hebrew ( ). In a more explicitly autobiographical clause he writes in Phil 3:5
2

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which I render as: circumcised on the eighth day, of the race of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew among Hebrews, a Pharisee according to the Law. Here, even the word I translate race - a hotly debated term whose currency had been discredited in much present day ethnic discourse - is a derivative of which with the preposition denotes derivation out of. This once more suggests little more than that Paul is of the original stock, not a proselyte, which no one disputes. Indeed, once the argument in Galatians draws to its climax in 6:16, even the word Israel itself may reflect a good deal of the re-evaluative processing Paul has performed in attempting to define the seed of Abraham. What all the above should make clear is that it will not suffice to simply collapse the array of ethnic terms that Paul employs into one without specifying how the various nuances affect the arguments, and furthermore, that Pauls ethnic self-identity is not as manifest as one might assume. Why is it for example that Paul can explicitly say claim I am an Israelite but refrain from stating baldly I am a Jew? Whilst I admit that the overall benefit from trying to argue along the lines of what Paul has not said is limited, I think it sufficiently raises the issue of definitions, nuances and contexts (not least of all ancient versus modern) of terms like Hebrew, Israelite and Jew. In this respect, I have found the recent work of Love Sechrest to be an enlightening conversation partner, both in my agreements and disagreements with her findings. In her most recent work, Sechrest has cogently argued that the religious component of ancient Jewish models of race and ethnicity is so significant that to treat ethnicity and religion as utterly separate entities something she is critical of various scholars she deems guilty of doing is a grave error.2 She helpfully cites Dunn, who engages with the dilemma stating:
When Paul first believed in Jesus, did he cease to be a Jew? Put like that the answer invites the answer, No! Of course, Paul did not cease to be a Jew
2

Sechrest, L. A Former Jew: Paul and the Dialectics of Race (New York: T&T Clark International, 2009) 54-109. Dr. Sechrest somewhat showed her hand in the title of her book and her stance, that Paul changed racial identity, has met with mixed reactions, though i would argue in her defence that accusations that the monograph is unsympathetic to Jewish people, anti-Semitic and even reflective of the kind of thinking that led to the holocaust is grossly overstated.

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how could he?...Complications emerge, however, as soon as we realise the ambiguity and unclarity of the terms involved. Does Jew denote an ethnic identity (which, of course, Paul retained) or a religious identity?3

Sechrest, whilst applauding Dunns attempt to demonstrate a New Perspective contribution to the question of Pauls self-identity, strongly disputes Dunns parenthetical remark above and ultimately accuses Dunn and also John Barclay of insisting that the core of Jewish ethnicity rests in territory, kinship and custom to the exclusion of religion. Though she does not draw attention to it, I can sympathise with her view on the grounds of Galatians 2:15-16 which I read as: We are by nature Jews, and not of the gentile sinners having known also that a man is not rectified by works of law, if not through the faith in Jesus Christ, even we put faith in Christ Jesus, that we might be rectified by the faith in Christ, and not by works of law, because all flesh will not be rectified by works of law.4 Whatever one may think of how people are rectified (faith in or the faith of Jesus Christ), the contrast is evident: Jews by nature/rectification by works of Law; gentiles (who are sinners by nature)/rectification through faith in Christ. This makes the flow of thought as follows: we who are by nature Jewish, know that the thing that makes us Jews by nature, i.e. the works of the Law, does not put us in the right relationship with God (as Paul goes on to explain, that was never its God-intended purpose). It is at this point I would draw attention to Sechrests emphasis on the Torah as central to ancient Jewish identity, though whether she over emphasises it remains an open question. If the Torah is understood as an identity defining moment for the Jews, though one which does not rectify, then faith in Christ becomes the identity defining moment which does. This said, it is possible to see where the conflict lay in Antioch5
3

Dunn, J.D.G. Who Did Paul Think He Was? A Study of Jewish-Christian Identity in New Testament Studies 45 (1999) 179. Cited from Sechrest (2009) 163 4 I am aware of the plethora of unresolved and thorny lexico-grammatical, exegetical and theological issues in which this short but quite pivotal text finds itself engulfed. This is not the place to explore all those issues, so I will simply state my choices here my reasons I expound elsewhere: should be rendered by nature and not by birth; when Paul uses the first person plural at the beginning of 2:15, he is referring to himself and Peter, that is to say, the thought process originating from the Antiochene fellowship meal continues; my rendering of is rectify and not justify; I treat the genitive clause objectively, though I do not rule out the possibility of Jesus own faithfulness from Pauline thought entirely; my admittedly awkward rendering of the final section of 2:16 is borne of my view that has inter-textual significance for Paul here and in his other uses of it, with respect to Joel 2:28. 5 Of course, here I am reading Gal 2:15-16 as a continuation of the line of thought instigated by the Antioch fellowship meal controversy. At this point Paul is addressing Peter for the benefit of the Galatians.

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what is the primary matrix of identity of the covenant people? Those from James appear to have seen their primary identity as Jewish and within this identity matrix they comprehended faith in Christ. For Paul, it was vice versa indeed I would go as far as to say that this is where we most fully apprehend the Pauline phrase in Christ to be in Christ is have Christ as the primary index of identity, by which all other aspects of identity are rendered peripheral and virtually incidental though not nonexistent.6 This goes towards explaining Pauls assertion that this was something that Peter knew (Gal 2:16); almost as if to say surely we know that we are not right in the eyes of God just because we are ethnically Jewish. The thing which may not have been known was that being in Christ was primary for the identity of Gods people; James associates clearly did not recognise this, and the actions of Peter, Barnabas et al, suggested that they were not clear on it either. It is precisely because being in Christ is so unremittingly central for Pauls understanding of the politics of identity that he can so confidently assert that there is not Jew or Greek, there is not servant nor freeman, there is not male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:28). Furthermore, it seems very likely to me that because the ethnic question was the most controversial for Paul that it is the only couplet which is repeated in all of Pauls statements of equality in Christ Col 3:11; 1 Cor 12:13; Romans 3:9; 10:12; 1 Cor 1:24; etc. In Christ Jesus, there is neither Jew nor Greek, but a third entity primarily defined in relation to Christ (see concluding comments). Whilst I do not take the complete line suggested by Sumney, who intimates that the Galatians teachers may not have been demanding that gentiles be circumcised, I think his summary of the Antioch fellowship meal is very much in line with my own thoughts. For it is true that neither Peter nor James associates would have demanded circumcision from gentiles, but rather:
separation at the table embodied an understanding of their primary identity that made Christ-believing (or better, being in Christ) secondary to their

At the summation of this stage of the argument, Paul writes that which I now live in the flesh ( ) I live by faith in the son of God. Though he saw himself as some way as transformed, there was manifestly an aspect of his life that registered as earthly, here and now and subject to the same ethnic scrutiny as before his transformation.

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identity as JewsIt is subordinating belief in Christ or membership in Christ to membership in the Mosaic covenant that Paul will not accept .7

In my own reckoning, it does not venture far enough then to simply see Paul as a Jew in Christ for this still treats his primary identity as Jewish. He is in Christ, and incidentally anything and everything else. New terminology and identity paradigms are thus required to state meaningfully what this is. Irrespective of the differences that exist between scholars on this very point, it usefully highlights a related question where Christian scholarship is playing catch-up who is a Jew? In earlier writing, I have shown how convoluted a question this is by citing three views from Jews of some description. I repeat the comparison here for completions sake; Solomon Zeitlin has written:
To sum up: the answer to the question Who is a Jew? is that anyone who is born of a Jewish mother or one who has embraced Judaism, regardless of whether he observes or does not observe the precepts is a Jew. Judaism is a universal religion and no one can exclude himself.8

In sharp contrast, Hebrew scholar Lawrence Schiffman notes:

It was, therefore, the halakhah regarding who was a Jew which to the tannaim, ultimately determined the expulsion of the Christians from the Jewish community and the establishment of Christianity as a separate religion.9

The last Jew in this short comparison is the apostle Paul himself, whose contribution must be reason to pause when considering both how he conceived of Judaism in general and how he perceived of his own Judaism (though, of course, an aspect of what I am attempting to demonstrate is that his perception of Judaism must have changed in light of his association with the Jesus movement Judaism to Paul the non-believer and Paul the believer in Jesus were not the same thing). Paul declares:
For he is not a Jew who is [so] outwardly, neither [is] circumcision that which is outward in flesh; but a Jew [is] he who is [so] inwardly, and circumcision [is] of the heart, in spirit, not in letter, of which the praise is not of men, but of
7

Sumney, J.L. Paul and the Christ-Believing Jews Whom he Opposes in ed. Jackson-McCabe, M. Jewish Christianity Reconsidered: Rethinking Ancient Groups and Texts (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2007) 69 8 Zeitlin, S. Who is a Jew? A Halachic-Historic Study in The Jewish Quarterly Review. Vol 49, No. 4 (April 1959) 269. 9 Schiffman, L. Who Was a Jew? Rabbinic and Halakhic Perspectives on the Jewish Christian Schism (New Jersey: Ktav Publishing House Inc, 1985) 6-7

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God for not all who *are+ of Israel are these Israel; nor because they are seed of Abraham [are] all children.10

When the question of Pauls Judaism is posed, there are some silent assumptions made by interpreters which require a good degree of deconstruction, for naturally how one answers will depend on what is meant by Judaism in that context. Is it simply the fact of being biologically, maternally related to a Jewish woman? Is it in the practice of halakah? Is it an internal designation that nothing to do with geography, genealogy or praxis? The following suggests some Biblical and postBiblical inroads into describing Jewish identity. Now the son of an Israelite woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the sons of Israel; and the Israelite woman's son and a man of Israel struggled with each other in the camp (Leviticus 24:10). The passage above provides Biblical witness for the stance of Zeitlin, that the offspring of a Jewish mother is a member of the Jewish community. The issue is raised again in Ezra 10:
2

Shecaniah the son of Jehiel, one of the sons of Elam, said to Ezra, "We have been unfaithful to our God and have married foreign women from the peoples of the land; yet now there is hope for Israel in spite of this. 3"So now let us make a covenant with our God to put away all the wives and their children, according to the counsel of my lord and of those who tremble at the commandment of our God; and let it be done according to the law (Ezra 10:2-3). This text demonstrates that the children of marriages where the father is Jewish but the mother is foreign to Judaism can be put away in other words they are not deemed Jewish. This is confirmed in the Mishnah, in the tractate of Kiddushin 66B which states that if a child's mother is not Jewish then the child is not Jewish. A number of texts also testify to the possibility of converting to Judaism, which would seem to resonate with Schiffman. The story of Joseph and Aseneth expands the text in Genesis which states that: Then Pharaoh named Joseph Zaphenath-paneah; and he gave him Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On, as his wife. And Joseph went forth over the land of Egypt.11
10

Romans 2:28-29; 9:6b-7a

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Aseneth goes through a mystical conversion experience when she marries Joseph. In the tale of Judiths mission to rescue Israel from the Assyrians we read of the conversion of an Ammonite soldier: When Achior saw all that the God of Israel had done, he believed firmly in God. So he was circumcised and joined the house of Israel, remaining to this day. (Judith 14:10). Josephus preserves the story of the Conversion of the Royal Family of Adiabene12 where the centrality of circumcision within the process of proselytism is the critical issue. The Acts of the Apostles evidences the presence of the , God fearing Gentiles who were probably the first Gentiles to join the Jesus movement. Acts 13:43 relays that: when the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and of the God-fearing proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, were urging them to continue in the grace of God. It strikes me that when all is considered, there can be no totally satisfactory solution to determining Pauls attitude towards Judaism until we resolve what Paul considered Judaism to be in both his pre-Jesus and post-Jesus life. In other words, if we are to assert that Paul remained in Judaism, then we must conclude that it is not a Judaism that required gentiles to adopt Jewish practice indeed it was one that appears to quite specifically forbid gentiles from so doing (Gal 5:1-6). We must also conclude that this form of Judaism was unconcerned with such specificities as biological relation to Abraham (contra Zeitlin), for the children of the flesh these [are] not children of God; but the children of the promise are reckoned for seed; for the word of promise [is] this; According to this time I will come, and there shall be to Sarah a son (Romans 9:8-9). It must be a Judaism that sees the Law as having a limited role (contra Schiffman) for Christ is an end of law for righteousness to everyone who is believing (Rom 10:4; cf. Gal 3:22-25) and is even possibly a form of Judaism which in some sense requires someone to die to Torah as Paul says of himself - I through Law died to Law in order that I might live to God (Gal 2:19; cf. Rom 7:6). The question then comes of course, what strand or brand of Judaism is this and what would Paul have made of it before his allegiance to Jesus? If a Pharisee who did

11 12

Genesis 41:45 Antiquities 20.2.1 4.3

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not embrace the Messiahship of Jesus happened upon a Paul after he embraced Jesus would he have considered him apostate? Alan F. Segal negotiated the quandary by suggesting that Paul must be understood as a convert in the basic sense of the word which he reckoned as one who has changed religious communities something he understood Paul to have done without changing religions. Paul was a Pharisaic Jew who converted to a new apocalyptic, Jewish sect and then lived in a Hellenistic gentile Christian community as a Jew among Gentiles.13 Interestingly, in Segals reasoning, Paul was not a Jewish Christian in the sense that many others were he did not see Christianity (for want of a more accurate word) as simply completing his Judaism. Those that did (James perhaps?) would have seen no contradiction with their former life and practice as Torah observers and would not have changed any such practice. (Though there is evidence that Paul still practiced some aspects of Torah, e.g. Acts 21:20-26, whether he felt obligated to do so is a separate question). Pauls Christianity, however, was based on his mystical, apocalyptic and visionary Jewish experience.14 Segal has at very least illuminated the tension in using words like conversion and speaking in blanket fashion about Pauls continuing Judaism. If the Judaism we attribute to Paul when he was apostle to the gentiles is of a form that is so radically different to the Judaism he knew prior to his apostolic call, it does not seem accurate to me to simply and in unqualified fashion to assert that Paul remained a Jew. There are many within this field, not least of all Krister Stendahl, whose insistence that Pauls ethno-religious status remained unchanged stems from the fact that Paul did not in general expect Jews to even have faith in Jesus. In Stendahls work, there is no critique of Judaism within Pauls work for his aim was to defend gentiles, not attack Jews. Stendahl claimed that the doctrine of justification by faith was hammered out by Paul for the very specific and limited purpose of defending the rights of Gentile converts to be full and genuine heirs of the promise of God to Israel.15 In his reading of Romans, the section in chapters 9-11 that dealt with the fate of ethnic Israel was the climax of the letter and the absence of Jesus name anywhere in Romans 10:17-11:36 was significant; it was part of the divine plan that
13

Segal A.F. Paul the Convert: The Apostolate and Apostasy of Saul the Pharisee (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990) 6-7 14 See the entry by Segal, A.F. Some Aspects of Conversion and Identity Formation in the Christian Community of Pauls Time in ed. Horsley, R.A. Paul and Politics: Ekklesia, Israel, Imperium, Interpretation. Essays in Honour of Krister Stendahl (Harrisburg: Trinity Press International, 2000) 184-190 15 Stendahl, K. Paul among Jews and Gentiles (London: SCM Press, 1977) 2

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Judaism and Christianity would co-exist side by side without it being incumbent upon the church to evangelise the Jews.16 For these readers, a whole host of textual problems arise for which more convincing answers need to be forthcoming. How is Pauls grief in Romans 9:2-4 to be explained, especially with Paul wishing that he might be cut off from Christ if it was not so that his Jewish kinsmen would embrace Christ? In what sense is Christ the end of the Law?17 Should we believe that the him of Romans 10:11 (everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame, citing Isaiah 28:16) is any other than Jesus in light of 10:6-10? If the Jews will be grafted in as long as they do not continue in their unbelief (Romans 11:23), what are we to accept that the Jews are not to continue disbelieving in, other than Christ? I could go on. In this paper I have deliberately stopped short of showing my hand with respect to my position on Pauls ethno-religious classification post-Damascus. I prefer to play Devils Advocate in this paper; though it might be argued that the burden of proof lies with those who insist that Paul ceased being Jewish, my defence is to reiterate that this is not the position I adopt for now. For now I wish only to tease out from those who consider Paul a lifelong Jew ways of explaining passages which on face could very easily suggest otherwise. My reasons for this are simply that, as the saying goes, the jury is still out. I would, however, suggest that the warning of Qoheleth in Ecclesiastes 7:18 applies here the one who fears God avoids all extremes! I do not think it is meaningful to posit either that Paul considered himself utterly purged of any relic of his Jewish heritage, culture or religious indoctrination. On the other extreme, to suggest that Paul the Pharisee who did not believe in Jesus simply became Paul the Pharisee who did believe in Jesus with no other differences or changes to speak of, does not appear to be borne out by the texts and it is the texts, i.e. the words of the apostle himself, notoriously difficult as they often are to reconcile, from whence the stalemate arises.18

16

Ibid 4. Two influential scholars who have picked up where Stendahl left off are John Gager (esp. The Origins of Anti-Semitism) and Lloyd Gaston (esp. Paul and the Torah). 17 Romans 10:4 18 If we may cite the Lucan evidence, the account of the Jerusalem council meeting in Acts 15 depicts some Pharisees who were believers insisting that gentiles are circumcised and made to obey the Law of Moses (Acts 15:5). This, of course, is the very opposite of what Paul preached to gentiles, and even if we allow that not all Pharisees saw gentile admission into the covenant people the same way, this at very least suggests that the picture is more complex for Paul than simply adding belief in Jesus to his Pharisaic credentials. What is more, the kind of Pharisee that Paul claims to be in Philippians 3 strikes me as being of conservative enough pedigree to have been in agreement with those Pharisees whose views are being represented in Acts 15:5.

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With all that I have said it makes sense to highlight some of the troublesome texts, though I stress again that what these passages typically do is make it very difficult to unambiguously say how Paul conceived of his own identity after his encounter with the Risen Jesus. In Romans 1-3 Paul aims to roundly condemn Jews and gentiles alike so humanity is shown to be adrift of God and in need of a remedy. At the beginning of chapter 3 he backtracks so as to not dismiss the contribution of the elect people. Though his use of the first person sometimes suggests that he is not speaking personally (e.g. 3:9 ) why does Paul speaking of the Jews being entrusted with the oracles of God use the third person plural; he states of the Jews that they were entrusted ( ) with the . Why does he not say we were entrusted? A similar quandary is flagged by Donaldson who observes Pauls uniquely polemical use of the Jews in 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16, in which the apostle attempts to encourage the believers in Thessalonica by comparing their suffering to that of the Judean church at the hand of these Jews.19 Paul writes: For you became imitators, brothers, of the assemblies of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus, for you also suffered the same things under your own countrymen, just as they have under the Jews, who also killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and chased us away. And they are not pleasing to God and are against all humanity (1 Thess 2:14-15, my translation). Once again the Jews appear as a group separate and distinct from Paul they chased us away. In 1 Corinthians 9 Paul is defending certain apostolic rights and states that: , , , , , (1 Cor 9:20-21).

I render the above as follows: And I became to the Jews as a Jew, in order that I might gain Jews; to the ones under Law as one under Law, in order that I might gain those under Law; to the ones
19

Donaldson, T.L. Jews and Anti-Judaism in the New Testament: Decision Points and Divergent Interpretations (London: SPCK, 2010) 109

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without Law, as one without Law, not being without Law to God, but in Law to Christ, in order that I might gain the ones without Law. In what sense did Paul feel the need to become as a Jew if he was already one in every sense of the word already? In a recent paper, Mark Nanos argued that Paul refers here not to halakah but rather to rhetorical styles Paul tailored his arguments as a Jew to win the Jews.20 This would seem a rather odd reading of to my mind, which without any elaboration clearly implies that Paul became like a Jew with regard to practice; furthermore, his assertion in v22 that to the weak I became weak, that I might gain the weak sits rather uncomfortably with Nanos reading. Is the seemingly tautological distinction in 9:20 a rhetorical device or does Paul posit a difference between Jews and those under Law? Convincing answers to these problems have not made headlines. What are readers to make of the statements where Paul puts limits on the role of Torah, such as Galatians 3:22-25, and even suggests that in order to live to God, Paul dies to Torah (Gal 2:19)? One route that has become popular in this respect is that adopted by Lloyd Gaston, which suggests that when Paul discusses the Torah and even makes what are apparently negative comments about it (as in the two texts I mention above) he is talking about the Torah in relation to gentiles and not its role in a Jewish context. With this line, Donaldson shows hearty agreement, stating:
Lloyd Gaston is at least right to this extent: everything Paul has to say about Jews and Judaism is addressed to gentile churches. Even if it should be the case that there was a Jewish element, Paul chooses to conceive of his churches as gentile. His comments about Jews and Judaism are third party references in letters addressed to non-Jewish believers in Christ.However we understand his comments about Jews and Judaism, they appear in letters whose primary purpose is to build up gentile churches to reinforce their basic identity and self-understanding; to provide teaching and guidance; to address problems and dangers; and so on.21

Unless I am grossly misunderstanding Gaston, Donaldson and others here, it strikes me that they are effectively suggesting that Pauls statements are knowingly false if when Paul suggests, for example, the limited role of Torah in stewarding people to Christ (as Gal 3:22-25), he is somehow only saying this because he is speaking to gentiles, are we to understand that he does not consider the statement to be
20 21

Paper delivered at Society of Biblical Literature conference, Atlanta 2010. Donaldson (2010) 136

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empirically true? Is his only goal to build up gentiles in his churches, even if it means conveying things he does not hold to be accurate? It is difficult to conceive that any comment about Torah could mean one thing when addressed to gentiles and mean something else or indeed be wholly untrue, irrelevant or devoid of real meaning within a Jewish framework. In short, I do not think that texts like Gal 2:19 can be neutralised by suggesting that their significance is bound up solely in gentile contexts. Then there are such texts as demonstrate that Paul has reconsidered the significance of circumcision. That those opposing Paul in Galatia were trying to impress circumcision upon non-Jews seems evident (Gal 5:2) and, what is more, this one act of Torah observance places one under an obligation to do the whole Torah (Gal 5:3). Of Dunns identity markers, circumcision is foremost; indeed, the Jews are commonly referred to as by Paul. Yet we read that the un-circumcised can be reckoned as circumcised (Romans 2:26); real circumcision is inward (Romans 2:28-29); Abrahams rectification predated his circumcision (Romans 4:9); circumcision like un-circumcision is nothing, only faith working through love (Gal 5:6), new creation (Gal 6:15) and keeping the commands of God (1 Cor 7:19). We also read this in Phil 3: , , . ,

Which I read as: Watch out for the dogs, watch out for the ones who work evil, watch out for the flesh cutters; for we are the circumcision, the ones serving God in the Spirit and boasting in Christ Jesus and not having confidence in flesh (Phil 3:2-3). Once again Paul uses the emphatic first person plural ( ) to stress his separation from the ones who cut the flesh ( ). It is difficult not to imagine that Paul does not imply that we are the true circumcision in the context seems here to operate with the same tone of vulgar sarcasm that is carried by Gal 5:12. The whole passage seems to resonate well with the contextually similar inference of Romans 2:28-29, where again the physical cutting of flesh is contrasted with a circumcision linked with the Spirit. If as Paul suggests, physical circumcision is evidence of ones obligation to the performance of Torah, then his
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apparent reworking of its meaning is suspicious for one who has not in any way rethought his position on Torah. Needless to say I have merely scratched the surface with the above examples and considerably more could be said on these texts and a host of others, but what I have sought to highlight is the need for a thoroughgoing examination of all the problematic texts related to Torah, Judaism, conversion, etc., paying the due attention to both the advances and critiques of the New Perspective, but not allowing our interpretive hands to be tied by our social consciences, a point I will return to in my concluding statements. These texts are controversial and troublesome but must first be understood within the context of Pauls rhetorical objectives and his socio-cultural/religious milieu, and then permitted to speak without being tamed, suffocated or sanitised. It is my view that the fears apparent in some readings, that unless certain Pauline texts are whipped into shape they will lead to xenophobic, anti-Semitic or inflammatory conclusions are not as well founded as their defenders assert. Indeed, I see in Paul enormous potential to open up hermeneutic space to combat the very social diseases that some interpreters have claimed Paul has been used to defend. To conclude then, there are many who have suggested that Pauls Jewish ethnicity, as the ethnicities of all people incorporated into Christ, has been relativised.22 This is an assertion I am inclined to agree with, although some attempt needs to be made to quantify this relativisation, something which it seems scholars are reticent to do. My own attempt to quantify the ethnicity of those in Christ at this stage would go something like this. If as I think, passages like 1 Cor 10:32, Gal 3:28 and Eph 2:14-15 place the Jesus movement in a third category that is neither Jewish nor gentile, then I would say of this third category that it does not extinguish ones origins but it does make them decidedly secondary to ones in Christ classification. Ethnicity for those in Christ must be reckoned with respect to Christ; such a one is not primarily Jew or gentile, but in Christ. If ethnicity refers to the identification of a group based on a perceived cultural distinctiveness that makes the group into a people, (and I accept that there is no hard and fast definition of ethnicity) then we might reasonably ask what Paul may have considered made the early Jesus movement into a people and what did not? Such a line of inquiry yields some fairly concrete answers. For whatever
22

E.g. Barclay, J.M.G. Neither Jew Nor Greek: Multiculturalism and the New Perspective on Paul in ed. Brett, M.G. Ethnicity and the Bible (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers Inc., 1996) 211

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Andrew Boakye, Paper on Pauls Self Identity, Jan 2011.

definition of ethnicity one opts for, it manifestly has to do with the grounds for distinction or difference, even if these grounds are fluid, artificial and subject to change by those on the inside. Paul would say that baptism and the Lords Supper distinguished the disciples as a people, but their Jewishness or non-Jewishness did not. Being defined by the presence of the Spirit of God made them a people, adherence to Torah did not. Their appellation as the sons of God through faith in Jesus made them a distinct people, but being the physical descendants of Abraham was irrelevant. Whether such distinctions can accurately referred to as ethnic is debateable; we should read ones identity as the primary answer to the question who am I? if for Paul I am a Christian and I am a Jew are incomplete answers and I am a gentile is an incorrect one, then there must surely be grounds for reading three groups (underlined) in Pauls statement , the third of which defies any current categorisation. The concerns of scholars who do not wish to allow racists and anti-Semites to load their weapons with ammunition derived from the Pauline corpus are very real and their aims are eminently laudable. Humanitys hands are stained with the blood of multiple millions who have been marginalised, oppressed and killed purely because they belong to the wrong group, are members of the other tribe or look physically different from the majority. Responsible biblical studies cannot turn a blind eye to such realities, but cannot be dictated to by them; neither the Holocaust, nor the Crusades nor the slave trade, nor any number of atrocities for which mankind is guilty, form the correct cultural contexts from which to embark on the interpretation of Paul, something which I fear happens more than many might realise. A correct Christian response to all acts of human wickedness may be meaningfully informed by allowing Paul to speak both freely and contextually. If the church was in dereliction of duty during the Holocaust or the slave trade, then in my view, a balanced reading of Paul serves to indict the churchs negligence and not excuse her apathy. For now, aware as I am that I have raised more questions than I have answered, I close by urging the many brilliant voices involved in this debate to do what many a preacher teaches congregations about reading Biblical texts - begin with interpretation and end with application. People on both sides of the argument have social concerns; these concerns are best served if they are informed by Pauls own immediate concerns rather than doing the informing.

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