Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures: Theologizing in the Space Between 9781472550705, 9780567046369, 9780567466372

Table of contents :
Contents
Abbreviations
Preface
Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 At the Crossroads – in a New Light
1.2 The Challenge of Translation
1.3 Hermeneutical Presuppositions and Methodological Issues
1.4 Terminology
1.5 Outline, Scope and Limitations of this Study
Part I Setting the Scene: Paradigms and Contexts
Chapter 2 Paradigms of Cultural Encounters: Fusion, Blending or Hybridity?
2.1 The Judaism/Hellenism Debate Revisited
2.2 The Concept of ‘Hellenism’ and its Limitations
2.3 Postcolonial Concepts of Hybridity, Fusion and Creolization in Pauline Studies
2.4 The Concept of Hybridity in Critical Discussion
2.5 Conclusions
Chapter 3 Linguistic and Cultural Diversityand Identity Formation: Contemporary Approaches
3.1 Language, Culture and Identity: Complex Networks
3.2. Bilingualism, Biculturalism and Ethnic Diversity
3.3 Language Adaptation, Lingua Franca and Identity/Belonging
3.4 Conclusions
Chapter 4 The Context: Linguistic, Cultural and Ethnic Diversity in the Roman Empire
4.1 The Function of Greek and Latin in the Roman Empire
4.2 Linguistic Diversity under Rome
4.3 Greek, Roman and Other Ways of Life: Cultural and Ethnic Diversity
4.4 Bilingualism/Biculturalism: Negotiating Identity under Greek and Roman Domination
4.5 ‘Us and Them’: Networks and Stereotypes
4.6 Conclusions
Part II Paul at the Crossroads
Chapter 5 Mapping Paul
5.1 On the Map of the Imperium Romanum: Israel and the Nations
5.2 ... in Roman Perspective
5.3 Paul and his ...
5.4 ... in Jewish Perspective
5.5 Between Israel and the Nations: God-Fearers and Sympathizers
5.6 Between Cultures and Traditions: the Bicultural Go-Between
5.7 Conclusions
Chapter 6 Scripture and Tradition: Translating the Narrative
6.1 The Primacy of Scriptural Tradition and the Challenge of Translation
6.2 The Significance of the Greek Translation of the Narrative: the LXX
6.3 Reclaiming Identity in the Face of Violence and Totalitarian Ideology: Apocalyptic Tradition
6.4 The Addressees and the Framework of Understanding
6.5 Israel and the Nations: Unity with a Difference
6.6 The Pauline Discourse of ...
6.7 ..., Fides and the Unity of the Nations
Chapter 7 Identity Formation by Doing: Cult Practice and the Translatability of Rituals
7.1. Cult Practice – Pietas/Piety in Action
7.2 The Role of Cult and Diaspora Judaism
7.3 Cult Practice and the Table of the Lord
7.4 Cult Practice: ‘Loss and Gain’ in Translation
Chapter 8 Theologizing in the Space-Between
8.1 Biculturalism, Bilingualism and Diversity in the First Century ce
8.2 The Narrative and Practice of Belonging
8.4 Paul’s Theologizing: Negotiating Meaning in the Space-Between
8.3 ‘To the Jew first and also to the Greek’
Bibliography
Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources
Index of Modern Authors

Citation preview

Library of New Testament Studies

456 Formerly the Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series

Editor Mark Goodacre Editorial Board John M. G. Barclay, Craig Blomberg, R. Alan Culpepper, James D. G. Dunn, Craig A. Evans, Stephen Fowl, Robert Fowler, Simon J. Gathercole, John S. Kloppenborg, Michael Labahn, Robert Wall, Steve Walton, Robert L. Webb, Catrin H. Williams

PAUL AT THE CROSSROADS OF CULTURES Theologizing in the Space-Between

KATHY EHRENSPERGER

LON DON • N E W DE L H I • N E W YOR K • SY DN EY

Bloomsbury T&T Clark An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway London New York WC1B 3DP NY 10018 UK USA www.bloomsbury.com Bloomsbury is a registered trade mark of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published 2013 © Kathy Ehrensperger, 2013 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Kathy Ehrensperger has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by Bloomsbury Academic or the author.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this books is available from the British Library. ISBN: ePDF:

978-0-56746-637-2

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

Typeset by Free Range Book Design & Production

To Urs

B

Contents Abbreviations xi Preface xiii

1. Introduction 1 1.1 At the Crossroads – in a New Light 1.2 The Challenge of Translation 1.3 Hermeneutical Presuppositions and Methodological Issues 1.4 Terminology 1.5 Outline, Scope and Limitations of this Study

1 3 5 8 10

I Setting the Scene: Paradigms and Contexts 2. Paradigms of Cultural Encounters: Fusion, Blending or Hybridity ? 17 2.1 The Judaism/Hellenism Debate Revisited 2.2 The Concept of ‘Hellenism’ and its Limitations 2.3 Postcolonial Concepts of Hybridity, Fusion and Creolization in Pauline Studies 2.4 The Concept of Hybridity in Critical Discussion 2.5 Conclusions

18 20 29 31 36

3. Linguistic and Cultural Diversity and Identity Formation: Contemporary Approaches 39 3.1 Language, Culture and Identity: Complex Networks 3.1.1 Language and identity: sociolinguistic insights 3.1.2 Identity and the interplay between social agents and social and cultural fields 3.1.3 Definitions of culture and ethnicity 3.1.4 Language, culture and identity: conclusions 3.2 Bilingualism, Biculturalism and Ethnic Diversity 3.2.1 Shifting perspectives: from monolingualism to bilingualism 3.2.2 Definitions of bilingualism 3.2.3 Perceptions of bilingualism 3.2.4 Bilingualism and power 3.2.5 Bilingualism, emotions and identity 3.2.6 Biculturalism

40 40 43 47 50 51 51 52 53 54 55 57

Contents

viii

3.3 Language Adaptation, Lingua Franca and Identity/Belonging 3.4 Conclusions

59 61

4. The Context: Linguistic, Cultural and Ethnic Diversity in the Roman Empire 63 4.1 The Function of Greek and Latin in the Roman Empire 64 4.2 Linguistic Diversity under Rome 72 4.3 Greek, Roman and Other Ways of Life: Cultural and Ethnic Diversity 76 4.3.1 Greek and Roman ways of life in mutual perception 77 4.3.2 Local identities under Greek and Roman domination 83 4.4 Bilingualism/Biculturalism: Negotiating Identity under Greek and Roman Domination 90 4.4.1 Bilingualism/biculturalism among local elites 91 4.4.2 Bilingual and bicultural go-betweens 95 4.5 ‘Us and Them’: Networks and Stereotypes 97 4.6 Conclusions 100

II Paul at the Crossroads 5. Mapping Paul 5.1 On the Map of the Imperium Romanum: Israel and the Nations 5.2 Ta_ 1Eqnh in Roman Perspective 5.3 Paul and his Ge/nov 5.4 Ta_ 1Eqnh in Jewish Perspective 5.5 Between Israel and the Nations: God-Fearers and Sympathizers 5.6 Between Cultures and Traditions: the Bicultural Go-Between 5.7 Conclusions

6. Scripture and Tradition: Translating the Narrative 6.1 The Primacy of Scriptural Tradition and the Challenge of Translation 6.2 The Significance of the Greek Translation of the Narrative: the LXX 6.3 Reclaiming Identity in the Face of Violence and Totalitarian Ideology: Apocalyptic Tradition 6.4 The Addressees and the Framework of Understanding 6.5 Israel and the Nations: Unity with a Difference 6.6 The Pauline Discourse of Pi/stiv 6.6.1 The LXX discourse of Pi/stiv 6.6.2 The faithful response of those called 6.6.3 Pi/stiv and Roman Fides 6.7 Pi/stiv, Fides and the Unity of the Nations

105 106 108 113 121 126 131 138 140 140 143 149 152 154 160 160 165 167 172

Contents

7. Identity Formation by Doing: Cult Practice and the Translatability of Rituals 7.1 Cult Practice: Pietas/Piety in Action 7.1.1 ‘Holding the world together’: aspects of Roman cult and domination 7.1.2 The role of sacrifices 7.2 The Role of Cult and Diaspora Judaism 7.3 Cult Practice and the Table of the Lord 7.3.1 What is wrong with meat? 7.3.2 To have or not to have knowledge 7.3.3 To be or not to be at the table: 1 Cor. 8.7-13 and 10.14-22 7.3.4 To be seen at a temple table: 1 Cor. 8.17-22 7.3.5 Participation in Christ or with demons: 1 Cor. 10.14-22 7.3.6 Pa/nta e1cestin: 1 Cor. 10.23–11.1 7.3.7 Centre stage: the glory of God 7.4 Cult Practice: ‘Loss and Gain’ in Translation

8. Theologizing in the Space-Between 8.1 Biculturalism, Bilingualism and Diversity in the First Century ce 8.2 The Narrative and Practice of Belonging 8.3 ‘To the Jew first and also to the Greek’ 8.4 Paul’s Theologizing: Negotiating Meaning in the Space-Between

ix 175 178 180 183 186 189 190 194 196 197 200 205 209 210 214 214 216 219 222

Bibliography 225 Index of Ancient Sources 251 Index of Modern Authors 257

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Abbreviations ARA AuA BibInt

Annual Review of Archaeology Antike und Abendland Biblical Interpretation: A Journal of Contemporary Approaches BR Bible Review BTB Biblical Theology Bulletin BZ Biblische Zeitschrift CBQ Catholic Biblical Quarterly CQ Classical Quarterly EvTh Evangelische Theologie ExpTim Expository Times HTR Harvard Theological Review IBS Irish Biblical Studies ICC International Critcial Commentary Int Interpretation JAC Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum JBL Journal of Biblical Literature JBV Journal of Beliefs and Values JECH Journal of Early Christian History JFSR Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion JR Journal of Religion JRS Journal of Roman Studies JSIJ Jewish Studies, An Internet Journal JSNT Journal for the Study of the New Testament JSNTSup Journal for the Study of the New Testament, Supplement Series JSOT Journal for the Study of the Old Testament JSOTSup Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, Supplement Series JSP Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha JSPSup Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha, Supplement Series JSS Journal of Septuagint Studies JTS Journal of Theological Studies LSJ H.G. Liddell, Robert Scott and H. Stuart Jones, Greek– English Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 9th edn, 1968) JJS Journal for Jewish Studies JRS Journal of Roman Studies

xii

Abbreviations

JSNT Journal for the Study of the New Testament KuI Kirche und Israel LXX Septuagint NovT Novum Testamentum NovTSup Novum Testamentum, Supplements NRSV New Revised Standard Version NTS New Testament Studies PT Political Theology RB Revue Biblique RelSRev Religious Studies Review SBL Society of Biblical Literature SBLASP SBL Abstracts and Seminar Papers SBLDS SBL Dissertation Series SBLSP SBL Seminar Papers SBLSS SBL Semeia Studies SCI Scripta Classica Israelica Scr Scripture ScrB Scripture Bulletin SJT Scottish Journal of Theology SNTSMS Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series SNTU Studien zum Neuen Testament und seiner Umwelt SR Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses ST Studia Theologica TDNT Theological Dictionary of the New Testament TWNT Theologisches Wörterbuch zum Nuen Testament TynBul Tyndale Bulletin TZ Theologische Zeitschrift VT Vetus Testamentum WBC World Biblical Commentary WA World Archaeology WW Word and World WUNT Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament ZNT Zeitschrift für Neues Testament ZNW Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft

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Preface This book emerged through a long journey with numerous twists and turns en route and led to unforeseen avenues and insights. Although it was my journey, there were numerous travel companions in conversation with me for longer and shorter distances; they took time to discuss aspects of this project, provided critical feedback and helped me to clarify my thoughts and my writing. Parts of chapters of this study were presented as papers at various conferences where feedback and discussions contributed to the development of my approach. Some important research was conducted during a research period when my husband William S. Campbell held the Tuohy Chair of Interreligious Studies at John Carroll University, Cleveland, OH in the spring semester 2011. I would like to thank the Department of Theology and Religious Studies for providing me with access to their facilities, especially the excellent library system. An invitation by the New Testament Society of South Africa gave me the opportunity to present some of the ideas of this project, particularly of chapters 2 and 5, at their annual conference in September 2011 at the University of the Northwest in Potchefstrom as well as at the research seminar at UNISA in Pretoria.1 Excellent discussions and feedback from within a context with which I had not previously been familiar contributed significantly to deepening aspects of the project. Pieter Botha, Pieter Craffert and Chris deWet were great hosts, and I would like to express my deep gratitude for the opportunity their invitation provided for me and my husband. Early versions of part of chapter 7 were presented at the symposion Decisive Meals2 at the University of Basel in February 2011, and at the SNTS Annual meeting at Baard College in Anandale-on-Hudson in August 2011 supported by a travel grant from the British Academy. I am also grateful to the British Academy for their support through the award of a Mid-Career Fellowship from September 2012 to August 2013 which included time to prepare for the dissemination of some of the results of this project to a wider public. The University of Basel library was a great resource for further studies during two periods of research in summer 2012 and December/January 2013. Many colleagues in various parts of the world have discussed parts of this project with me, and commented on sections of it. I would like to thank Brian Tucker in particular for helping me to clarify several crucial points. This journey was certainly also informed by my own experience of having lived in different 1 Published in Neotestamentica 2/2012 2 A different version has been published in the conference proceedings in Ehrensperger, MacDonald, and Rehmann 2012: 114–33.

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Preface

linguistic and cultural contexts. I learned that understanding is not merely an issue of language but, more importantly, one of culture. Having moved from Basel in Switzerland to west Wales, I became more aware than ever that the use of the same words in a conversation does not necessarily imply the same meaning. Meaning is so closely related to experiences and customs that the codes and encyclopedias which resonate with the same words and concepts may differ significantly. This is most evident when it comes to humour. Jokes generally fail to cross cultural frontiers. But the central role of experiences and customs in communication, or in Bourdieu’s terminology, of the ‘habitus’, indicates that even within the same culture and society differences in understanding are more frequent than may be assumed. Translation processes are central and significant in all these contexts, and understanding is both a challenge and a gift. I was reminded of this during the time this project matured, when our family grew and two grandchildren, Rahel and Kilian’s children Laurin and Helena were born. Learning to speak is far more than learning to say words, and learning to understand a child means much more than to learn to understand the words he or she says. It is a joy and privilege to see another generation embark on their exploration of life and the wonders of this world. All of my children. Rahel, Joachim and Aurelia, on their particular journeys in their lives continue to be great conversation partners who enrich my life enormously in letting me be part of their ‘worlds’. The most important partner on this journey, enduring not only numerous hours, but evenings and weekends with me being absorbed at my laptop, and not getting tired of discussing points I wished to clarify, reading my drafts, and correcting my English, has been Bill. This study could not have been completed without him and my thankfulness for his endurance, patience, and support, not only during this project, cannot be expressed in words. In short, a community of people accompanied me on the journey of this project, contributing in various ways to it and providing me with invaluable support, but what is presented here is, of course, entirely my responsibility. There is one person who contributed to this project before even I knew about it. At a very early age my brother Urs planted in me an interest in studies, curiosity, and a fascination for asking questions together with an awareness that there is always yet another perspective from which to look at things. This study is dedicated in thankfulness to him. Kathy Ehrensperger Llanarth, Wales, 4 March 2013

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Chapter 1 Introduction Paul was a go-between. He lived mostly on the road and his role as an apostle of Christ rendered him a mediator between peoples, traditions and cultures. It has long been noticed and acknowledged that in the processes that led to the emergence of Judaism and Christianity as two separate religions, the interaction of people of different linguistic, cultural and ethnic traditions played a significant role. The Christ-movement was part of, and emerged from within a specific tradition, the tradition of the Jewish people, and developed into a movement that encompassed people of different linguistic, cultural and ethnic traditions. Intercultural interaction and communication lie at the core of this movement and contributed significantly to the formation of its self-understanding. I am aware that I am not the first to notice this and that this states the seemingly obvious. There is a long tradition of analysing the interplay of Greek, Roman, Jewish, and other cultural and ethnic traditions in Pauline studies in particular, with various emphases proposed as having had the decisive impact in the development of ‘Christian’ identity. The most influential paradigm for the analysis of such interactions has been the concept of ‘Hellenism’. It was considered to be the cultural milieu within which the early Christ-movement emerged, with Paul as the most significant early player in this context.

1.1 At the Crossroads – in a New Light This study sets out to explore afresh the role of Paul in the context of intercultural interaction and communication between Jewish, Greek, Roman, and other cultural and ethnic traditions. I concur with the significance attributed to Paul in previous studies. But I am not convinced that paradigms of syncretism, fusion and blending are the most appropriate lenses for the analysis of cultural translation processes. I will thus in this study explore the potential of a new paradigm for the analysis of the activity and communication of Paul in a context which was so significantly marked by diverse peoples, cultures and languages. This new paradigm is informed by recent insights from sociology and sociolinguistics, particularly with regard to bilingualism and biculturalism. Bilingualism and biculturalism are widespread phenomena

2

Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

in contexts of linguistic and cultural diversity, and have recently moved from the margins towards the centre of interest in sociolinguistic studies, paired with the recognition that bilingualism and biculturalism are not marginal phenomena but rather actually the characteristic of a majority in many parts of the world. Given the ethnic, cultural and linguistic diversity in the Roman Empire of the first century ce, it is no surprise then to find significant evidence for the existence of bilingualism and biculturalism. The insights of contemporary research in this area, and the evidence for it in the area and period of Paul’s lifetime, provide a significant incentive to explore the potential of the paradigms of bilingualism and biculturalism in the analysis of the Pauline discourse in its socio-historical, cultural and linguistic contexts. This study builds on my earlier work on Paul and does not see him as a lone individual but as part of, and representative of, a team of apostles and coworkers collaborating in different ways for the same purpose.1 I have argued previously that I do not consider scenarios which envisage a rift between Paul and Jerusalem, between Peter and Paul, or, as it is often discussed, a Jewish version and a so-called law-free version of the gospel to be at play in the early Christ-movement.2 Paul did not seek to dissociate himself from other apostles or those in Judaea and Jerusalem. If this had been the case, why would he have been so concerned about establishing a concrete and visible link between the e)kklhsi/ai of the nations and Jerusalem through the collection (Rom. 15.23-26)? Rather than being an issue of versions of the gospel in competition with each other, the agreement in Jerusalem to which Paul refers in Gal. 1.9 demonstrates that diversity within the Christ-movement was recognized, and was not considered a hindrance to fellowship in Christ but as actually constituting it. This unity in diversity among the early Christfollowers provides the immediate context from within which Paul embarks on reaching out to bring about the u(pakoh_n pi/stewv toi=v e1qnesin (Rom. 1.5). The diversity within the movement certainly involved debates and discussions, as not all and every aspect of what this meant theologically, and in terms of everyday life for Jews, as well as for those from the nations, had as yet been worked out. The implications of the gospel had to be explored and negotiated in new contexts and situations, with unanticipated questions most likely arising afresh on numerous occasions. But for Paul and his colleagues to embark on such a challenging project as to transmit and translate the message of the gospel into the world of the nations from within a tiny movement, which was split at its roots, is difficult to envisage.3 Discussions and debates within a group do not inherently lead to divisions or ‘partings of ways’; they are part of life within a group. A split at the core of the movement would have had considerable implications not only in terms of group dynamics but also theologically. How could one trust a message of peace and reconciliation built on initial conflict and divisions? I consider it more likely that problems 1 On the team aspect of Paul’s work and letters see Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 35–62. 2 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 41–45; Campbell 2006/2008: 33–46. 3 Campbell 2006/2008: 42–50.

Introduction

3

arising in the assemblies of Christ in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire had less to do with such internal strife among the apostolic leaders, and more with the difficulties of a cultural translation process required to translate a message from within a Jewish symbolic and social universe into the world of the nations. When we take into account that ‘the activity of translation necessarily involves both decontextualizing and recontextualizing’,4 ‘loss’ and ‘gain’ in translation can easily be envisaged as part of this process. It necessarily includes new understanding in new contexts, but can also lead to misunderstandings or non-anticipated effects in translation. These were issues Paul had to address in his letters, rather than a fundamental split between his mission and Jerusalem. Paul’s call as apostle to the nations implied a role as translator and mediator between cultures, peoples and languages, including the chances and risks of ‘loss’ and ‘gain’ in the process of translation. This study aims at considering implications of this translation process in the light of the paradigm of bilingualism and biculturalism.

1.2 The Challenge of Translation Where people from different cultural, ethnic and linguistic contexts come into contact with each other the question of mutual understanding evidently becomes a challenge. It has been argued that ‘understanding itself is a kind of translation, turning other people’s concepts and practices into their equivalents in our own “vocabulary”’.5 In that sense this study is about something ordinary in which we are all involved in our everyday activities. Communication processes do not inherently lead to understanding, and understanding actually cannot be assumed but involves a process of negotiation between those involved in a conversation.6 If we take seriously the fact that translation is always a shift not only between two languages but also between two cultures,7 negotiating understanding involves an awareness of differences at the level of cultures and people’s traditions as well as of languages. Such differences can be minor, as possibly within a family who live together, but they can be major where distance in terms of space or time makes contact between peoples and discourses more difficult. Differences are part of communication processes at all levels. However, communication is not merely a matter of language. It involves experiences in social and cultural contexts. Vision and sound, odour and touch, emotion and knowledge, customs and traditions all play their part in processes of communication between people. Although in Paul’s letters we are dealing with a literary form of communication, the communication between the parties involved here is not restricted to this literary form. Rather, as I have argued elsewhere, I consider the communication via letters to be 4 Burke 2007: 38. 5 Burke 2007: 8. 6 Levinas 1992: 72–76. 7 Rajak 2009: 92; also Eco 2003/2004.

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Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

part of a communication and interaction process which was based on, and continued to involve, direct communication in person through visits of Paul or others from the team working together with him. But even for the literary part of this process it needs to be acknowledged that more than literary contexts of language use, that is, ‘universes of discourse’, are relevant for the interpretation of these texts. The relevance of the universe of a discourse is not restricted to the realm of texts. Contexts of interpretation as of communication in general are not simply verbal but ‘it is now increasingly recognized that the non-verbal elements of a situation and the wider influence of social setting and cultural background are also of direct relevance to the complete understanding of a communication event’.8 These contexts involve more than the individual even when individuals are communicating with each other. The meaning of that which is communicated ‘is not determined by correct grammar but rather constructed through the usage of a language community’.9 Thus Stowers has argued concerning texts that ‘The marks on the page do not magically jump into the mind and force a meaning upon the reader. The text is a set of socially agreed-upon cues from the wider range of language that the reader constructs into a pattern of meaning according to the codes … of the corresponding practical social context.’10 Thus cultural codes determine meaning even for sentences that use the word ‘all’ or ‘every’. The significance of this in contemporary contexts of increasing intercultural interactions has been recognized, and sociolinguistics in general, and studies into bilingualism and biculturalism in particular, provide differentiated approaches for the analysis of cultural interaction and translation processes. The context of a discourse, the differences not only between languages but also between cultural and ethnic traditions are aspects which need to be considered in communication and translation processes. In distinction from earlier approaches, awareness is growing that in order to achieve sustainable, peaceful and respectful cooperation between people from different cultural, ethnic and linguistic contexts in democratic societies, language adaptation and assimilation to the cultural and ethnic traditions of the majority is often not the adequate way. In this the continued existence of differences is obscured rather than rendered part of the process of social integration. One presupposition for peaceful cooperation is the recognition of differences as an initial step to facilitate understanding.11 In Pauline studies the use of the Greek language has for a long time been considered to be an indication of shared culture and, as such, as facilitating 8 Hill 1967: 6. 9 Seidman 2006: 151. Ando has drawn attention to recognition of this by ancient authors ‘For what Qunitillian, Polybius, and Gaius draw our attention to is the contingent particularity and cultural specificity of concepts and the terms used to represent them. In other words they draw our attention to translation as an historical problem, one we should seek to locate not simply in place and time, but from place to place, and time to time’ (2009: 49). 10 Stowers 1994: 8. 11 Within the parameters of a democratic society.

Introduction

5

the transmission of the gospel into the non-Jewish world. The assumption was that there were ‘two worlds’, Jewish on the one side and Graeco-Roman on the other, with the notion of ‘Hellenism’ serving as a bridge between these in the Diaspora. Thus a division between Palestinian Judaism and a Hellenistic form of Judaism in the Diaspora was set up, with the latter providing the springboard for the spreading of the gospel into the non-Jewish world. With the studies of scholars like Lieberman, and Hengel, this division between different forms of Judaism in Judaea and Galilee and the Diaspora, that is, of the so-called Judaism/Hellenism divide, was demonstrated as being an inadequate perception of the relationship between ‘Hellenism’ and Judaism. It was postulated that Judaism, whether in the Diaspora or in the Land of Israel, was as much part of this ‘Hellenistic’ world as were other peoples of the Near East and Eastern Mediterranean. However, Dale Martin has raised the question as to whether the overcoming of this dualism was the solution to the understanding of the context of Paul’s activities. Arguing that there must be more than two worlds, which seem to be permeating each other, he maintains that ‘none of us would claim that these were the only two cultures in the Eastern Mediterranean. What about for instance, Syrian culture? After all, Paul did not come from Greece or Rome, but from Cilicia and Syria. Was nothing left of older (indigenous?) cultural elements in Tarsus, Antioch or Damascus?’12 With the postulation of the concept of ‘Hellenism’ as a fusion of oriental and Greek cultures this question seemed to be answered. However, the assumption that languages, cultures and peoples easily and necessarily fuse in encounters has been questioned by sociolinguistic research into bilingualism/biculturalism. The relevance of such insights for Pauline studies will be explored in an exemplary way in the course of this study.

1.3 Hermeneutical Presuppositions and Methodological Issues The approach presented in this study is eclectic. I will not apply a particular model to the Pauline discourse but rather read Paul in light of insights from sociolinguistics, studies into bilingualism and biculturalism, and aspects of Bourdieu’s sociological theories. Such a reading in light of insights involving empirical studies in contemporary societies is a way of acknowledging not only the differences in the disciplines but also the ‘data’ that is available in New Testament studies. We are dealing here with literary evidence, which is perceived as located in, and informed by, a specific context in the first century ce. The sources providing some information about this context are these letters themselves and other literary data of around the same time and geographical location, as well as material finds. The basis for applying models from empirical research is too narrow in my view for them to be applied in their entirety to the data available for the subject in question here. Nevertheless, 12 Martin 2001: 30.

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Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

insights gained from such studies in contemporary contexts can shed light on some of the processes in the first century ce. There is sufficient evidence for the simultaneous use of different languages, and for cultural translation processes available from the period, that it is possible to meaningfully analyse language use and interaction between people who differed through the lens of bilingualism/biculturalism. The danger of overstretching the evidence can hardly be entirely avoided. Bourdieu’s general warning needs to be kept in mind, that we should avoid confusing any ‘model of reality with the reality of the model’,13 and not mistake sociologically constructed observations for actual everyday life. This not only applies to sociological models, but to interpretation in general. Although Paul’s letters are literary products and can be analysed as purely that, I consider them to be part of an ongoing communication process between Paul, the colleagues around and with him, and the e)kklhsi/ai he had founded.14 In and with them some indications concerning context and issues addressed are provided, either explicitly or implicitly.15 All of the evidence available to us obviously stems from a period of history and from societies at a significant distance from our own. It is fragmentary and only allows for fragmentary insights, which necessarily leaves room to be filled by the ‘informed imagination’ of the researcher. Whether New Testament literature, Jewish literature of the Second Temple period, Greek and Latin literature or archaeological finds are considered, they are all part of an interpretive process. No evidence speaks for itself. It passes through the lens of the hermeneutical presuppositions of the interpreter. In addition to aspects mentioned above concerning the proposed paradigm and the perceived character of the letters, this study is informed by the presupposition of Paul’s embeddedness in Judaism as well as of the relevance of the imperial context in the emergence of the Christmovement. Furthermore, it is recognized that the significance of social history is not confined to issues of group dynamics. Thus the everyday activities of people are considered as significant for understanding this movement, as is the narrative framework of belonging for people at the individual as well as at the collective levels. The elite culture is considered to be of more limited relevance than in other New Testament studies as I consider it questionable how influential this dimension was in matters of everyday life for the majority of the population under Rome, except for the impact of activities imposed in recognition of Roman domination. This project does not only draw on sociolinguistics and bilingualism/ biculturalism studies. The context of the Pauline letters requires that insights from the disciplines of Classics and Ancient History and Archaeology, as well as Jewish Studies have to be taken into account. This is thus a challenging project in terms of the extent of multidisciplinary expertise involved and I am aware of Sanders’ warning that, in order to analyse the diverse contexts of 13 Bourdieu 1977: 29. 14 Ehrensperger 2007/209: 55–57; also Becker 2002: 150–55. 15 See Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 3–4.

Introduction

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Paul’s activity, his Jewish context, as well as the world of the Christ-followers from the nations, expertise from more than one area is necessary, and that no one expert can do this on his/her own.16 It requires the collaboration of numerous subject specialists contributing to the diverse aspects involved. The current volume understands itself as an attempt at initiating a conversation with colleagues in order to explore in more depth the trajectories of the different cultures and traditions Paul engaged with, in light of the paradigm of bilingualism/biculturalism, including the implications this had for the inherent cultural translation processes and the formation of the identity of the Christ-movement. Thus what is presented here is not a thick description or comprehensive overview, but a fragmentary and eclectic survey of the topic, providing some theoretical underpinning to the project by drawing on the significant insights gained from bilingual/bicultural studies. In light of these, an analysis of what are considered to be two core aspects in Paul’s translation activities is presented, that is, of the narrative framework of the Christ-event, and the role of cult practices in the Christ-movement. This is a comparative study and as such it draws on material that has been previously known or considered relevant in Pauline studies. The proposed new paradigm for reading Paul consists in reconsidering familiar contextual literary and material information in light of insights from sociolinguistics and the paradigms of bilingualism and biculturalism. This reading of familiar information, it will be argued, will move under the spotlight aspects and evidence which previously had gone in part or entirely unnoticed. Although this study focuses on processes of intercultural interaction and translation during the first century ce, mainly before 70 ce, at certain points sources from the second and third centuries are discussed. Such sources can obviously only shed limited light on the earlier period and no direct equivalence is presumed with situations in the first century. Such later material is considered relevant only in cases where, for example, it provides literary or archaeological evidence for the use of a local language, and where it can be assumed that this is an indication of the continued use of this language from an earlier period, rather than a re-emergence of a previously lost language use. The methodological problem here has to with the fact that local languages were predominantly not the languages of elite culture and thus little literary or archaeological evidence may exist for their use. However, this cannot be taken as evidence against the continued oral use of a vernacular language, for which literary evidence exists for the second or third century, stretching back into the first century. My hermeneutical presuppositions include a theological stance in that I am conscious of the relevance of the Pauline letters for Christian identity in diverse contemporary contexts. This study is concerned with this dimension in that it seeks to contribute to a reading of Paul relevant for churches and society today. Thus critical analysis in the vein of traditional critical methods, in conjunction with the recognition of the decisive role of hermeneutical presuppositions 16 Sanders 2009: 75.

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Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

in any interpretation, is what informs the approach taken in this study. This includes emphases formulated particularly, but not exclusively, in feminist biblical interpretation, that interpretation is itself a communicative process, a conversation over the meaning of scriptural traditions which involves diversity as well as openness combined with commitment.17 Since translation and interpretation have close similarities and are actually inseparable, in that in both activities meaning is being negotiated, no interpretation should be regarded as ‘a definitive solution to a problem’ but rather ‘as a messy compromise involving losses or renunciations and leaving the way open for renegotiations’.18 This study is a contribution to the interpretation of the Pauline discourse in this sense, a contribution to the negotiation of meaning in a conversation, which is never final but open for renegotiation.

1.4 Terminology Some clarification is needed here concerning the use of certain terms and concepts, and translations from the Greek in this study. Although I do not analyse group dynamics as such, and thus social identity theory is not considered here specifically, the fact that we are dealing with issues of cultural translation that pertain to groups and individuals and their identity interchangeably requires clarification concerning the terminology used.19 Thus the term ‘collective identity’ is used here throughout with reference to the identity of groups, whereas the term ‘social identity’ is used for the group-related aspect of the identity of individuals. The multilayered dimension of individual and collective identity is a significant point of discussion in social identity theories. Frequently this dimension is referred to in terms of a multiplicity of identities, that is, the identity of a group or of an individual is described as consisting of ‘multiple identities’. This is established terminology in many social identity theories. I cannot discuss the implications and problems of this terminology here in any detail but I think this use of the terms ‘identity’ and ‘identities’ in different and overlapping ways should be considered more critically. The use of the plural multiple identities for designating the multidimensional aspect of identity is, in my view, not very helpful as the same term is used for a person or collective in their entireness and integrity, as well as for different aspects of this entity. Although clarification is often sought by distinguishing between different salient identities of one and the same person or group, I prefer to refer to diverse or multiple ‘aspects of identity’ of an individual or of a group, rather than ‘multiple identities’ throughout this study.

17 Cf. Ehrensperger 2004: 189–94; Ehrensperger 2008; Grenholm and Patte 2000a. 18 Burke 2007: 9. 19 For an analysis of aspects of the Corinthian correspondence through the lens of social identity theory see Tucker 2010 and 2011, for an analysis of Romans see Esler 2003: 19–39.

Introduction

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There are a number of further uses of terms that require initial clarification here. The use and translation of ta_ e12qnh has given rise to controversial discussions. As a term used by Paul for all non-Jewish nations it has been regarded as contributing to an undifferentiated perception of those other nations in their diversity, and as well as to a dualistic division of the ‘world’. It certainly is a term used to differentiate between Jews and non-Jews, but it has also been demonstrated that this does not mean that Paul obscured, or was not aware of, the diversity of these nations.20 The translation of ta_ e12qnh in most English Bibles as ‘gentiles’, however, is more problematic than Paul’s use in my view, in that it suggests that there exists a singular form in parallel to the plural, with ‘gentile’ thus expressing a particular but nevertheless generic identity.21 However, ta_ e12qnh is the collective term for the diverse peoples who are not part of the people Israel. It refers to a collective entity whether used in the plural (as mostly by Paul), or in the singular. It thus does not designate the particular identity of a member of any of these e12qnh. The translation ‘gentiles’ will be avoided in this study, and replaced wherever grammatically possible with the more or less equivalent collective term ‘nations’. Although there are some problems with this term as well, as it evokes perceptions of modern nation states which are anachronistic for the first century, it is preferable to the theologically burdened and linguistically inadequate ‘gentiles’. The use of a collective term for ta_ e1qnh is in keeping with ancient Christian traditions as is evidenced by Augustine who in De vera religione refers to populi for non-Christians rather than ‘pagans’. Where appropriate I will occasionally use ‘polytheistic’, but will avoid the often negatively charged term ‘pagan’, in order to capture the dimension of cult practice among the nations; and when the focus is on the diversity of the nations or on individuals, I will refer to ‘Greeks and barbarians’ as the primary distinction Paul makes in terms of differences between the nations. Paul here seems to replicate a common differentiation in Greek and Roman perspective: there are those who speak Greek and mainly live in the East of the Roman empire, and there are those who live in the West of the Roman empire, and who do not speak Greek, who are referred to as ‘barbarians’ in Roman and Greek perspective. Of course the latter group encompasses other peoples than merely Spain, Northern Africa from Carthage West, and Gaul, but as Woolf recently has argued the division into ‘Greeks and barbarians’ seems primarily to have this linguistic division in view with far-reaching political and cultural implications.22 Paul’s use of ‘Greeks and barbarians’ seems to be a shorthand reference for the wider diversity of which he seems to be aware since he mentions Asia, Galatia, Macedonia, Achaia, Illyricum, Spain, in addition to the diverse cities where he had founded e)kklhsi/ai, such as Philippi, Corinth, Thessaloniki, and Rome. Concerning the discussions around the translation of the term 'Ioudai/oi I continue to use ‘Jews’ as the most accurate expression. Although I appreciate 20 Stanley 2011: 119. 21 A similar problem exists with the German translation ‘Heiden’. 22 Woolf 2011: 32–58.

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Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

some of the motives for translating the term with Judaeans as, for example, an attempt to emphasize the inherent connection between people, land and religion,23 I agree with concerns raised by Amy-Jill Levine and others that this disconnects the Judaism of the first century from contemporary Judaism and thus creates a problematic dichotomy which opens the door for disinheriting contemporary Judaism from its past. The term e)kklhsi/a is mostly left untranslated or rendered with ‘assembly’ as the term ‘church’ evokes associations based on the later institutionalized organization which in my view prevents a more precise and accurate analysis of events, characteristics and practices among these newly formed groups of Christ-followers in the first century ce.

1.5 Outline, Scope and Limitations of this Study As mentioned above, this study sets out to explore aspects of the Pauline letter in light of the proposed new paradigm of bilingualism/biculturalism. Part I, Setting the Scene, chapters 2–4, discusses the theoretical concepts: Hellenism and hybridity on the one hand, and sociolinguistic and sociological insights into the links between language, culture, and identity, bilingualism and biculturalism on the other; it presents an overview of aspects of linguistic and cultural diversity in the Roman empire in light of these theories. Part II, Paul at the Crossroads, chapters 5–8, locates Paul within this diversity and presents an analysis of two core dimensions of Paul’s activities and theologizing in light of bilingualism and biculturalism, followed by some concluding considerations of implications of the proposed paradigm for Paul’s theologizing. Thus in chapter 2 a critical discussion of the most prominent paradigms used for analysing processes of the cultural interaction in the context of transmitting the gospel into the world of the nations is presented. The concept of Hellenism is analysed with a particular focus on its rootedness in the particular sociopolitical and intellectual context including the prevailing concept of history of mid-nineteenth-century Germany. The hermeneutical presuppositions of the concept will be critically discussed and, based on this, the adequacy of a continued use of the concept in contemporary New Testament research will be questioned. Such critical evaluations of the concept of Hellenism have been presented in the disciplines of Ancient History and Classics, where the usefulness of other generalizing concepts such as Romanization24 and Mediterraneanism25 are also challenged. For the purpose of this study I have to confine my critical discussion here to the concept of Hellenism but consider it important for future New Testament research to take the critical discussions of the other concepts into account as well. The postcolonial concept of 23 Levine: 2006: 161–66; Esler 2003: 63–74. For an excellent discussion of the issues see also Runesson 2008: 62–70. 24 Hingley 2010: 58–59; Mattingly 2010: 287–88; also Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 17–28. 25 Harris 2005b; Herzfeld 2005.

Introduction

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hybridity has also recently been applied to the interpretation of New Testament texts, often with the aim of unveiling interpretive traditions which contributed to colonialism and imperialistic exploitation. Such critical analyses of the dominating effects which certain readings of scriptural texts have had, and still have, are important for biblical interpretation in general, and for Pauline studies in particular. However, the heuristic value of the concept of hybridity for the analysis of cultural translation processes will be questioned. In its generality this concept just states the obvious, namely that all cultures, peoples and languages are influenced by and influence each other when they come into contact. There can be hardly any doubt that this was the case in antiquity as much as in contemporary societies. But it will be argued that hybridity is not a sufficiently precise analytical tool to be able to contribute substantially to the processes on which this study focuses. Given that the established and recent paradigms used in Pauline studies are considered to be of limited heuristic value for analysing processes of cultural interaction and translation, I will discuss in chapter 3 insights from sociolinguistic theories and empirical studies in general, and studies of bilingualism and biculturalism in particular, considered relevant to this study. First, the inherent link between language and identity at the collective as well as at the individual level is discussed. This link is not seen as ontological but as emerging through shared experiences and social interaction, traditions of knowledge and practice, which form cultural codes and encyclopedias with which terminology in a particular language or culture is infused. From a sociological perspective, aspects of Bourdieu’s theories of ‘habitus’ and ‘fields’ complement the linguistic aspect of this link of experience, social interaction and language. The identity-shaping implications of these insights are then considered in light of studies into bilingualism and biculturalism, complemented by analyses of the use of a language as a ‘lingua franca’. Having established the importance of the link between identity and language, and of biculturalism/bilingualism in particular, for the analysis of linguistic as well as cultural translation processes in contemporary contexts in chapter 3, chapter 4 presents an overview of linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity in the Roman empire, with a particular focus on the evidence for bilingualism and biculturalism. It will be argued that the use of Greek as a lingua franca cannot be taken as evidence for acculturation, or for the deep impact of the Greek language and culture in the Eastern part of the Mediterranean. It is rather in most cases the light ‘veil’ under which an enormous linguistic and cultural diversity continued to flourish. Such diversity in terms of ethnic identity and sense of belonging could even be maintained with the use of the Greek language in certain circumstances and contexts. Thus an image of a diversity of peoples, cultures and languages is found to be prevalent in the Roman empire of the first century ce rather than a universalizing common ‘Hellenistic’ or Graeco-Roman culture. This diversity is the context of Paul’s activities, and chapters 5 to 8 focus on Paul, and his role, activity and theologizing. In chapter 5, Paul, the Jewish apostle to the nations himself is located on the map of the diversity within the Roman empire. His location is

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Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

considered in relation to his own people Israel as well as in relation to the nations. He is found to be a Jew, firmly rooted in his tradition, but as a Diaspora Jew familiar enough with the cultures and languages of the neighbours from the nations to be able to meaningfully relate to them. As such it will be argued he is a bilingual and bicultural Jew, who is ideally equipped to serve as a mediator or go-between on behalf of the gospel to the nations. The relevance of the imperial discourse of the subjugated nations is explored in relation to the Pauline discourse of the nations, alongside the inherent connection between Paul’s discourse and the Jewish tradition of Israel and the nations. It will be argued that a particular group between Israel and the nations, i.e. sympathizers and God-fearers, played an important role in the translation process in which Paul was involved. Having located Paul on the map of the Roman empire, and presented him as a bilingual and bicultural go-between, we then present an analysis of two core dimensions of the translation of the gospel into the world of the nations, the narrative of belonging and cult practice in chapters 6 and 7 respectively. It will be argued that these two dimensions are crucial for the identity and sense of belonging of people in antiquity generally, and thus also of Israel and the nations. Chapter 6 considers the implications of the fact that decisive identity-shaping narratives for Christ-followers are the Jewish Scriptures and traditions. They obviously are identity shaping in different ways for Jewish and non-Jewish Christ-followers. But the Christ-event and its implications could only be understood from within this particular symbolic and social universe, that is, in light of these Jewish traditions. The fact that they were transmitted in Greek facilitated and hindered the translation process into the world of the nations. A particular Greek Jewish tradition had evolved over centuries of contact with the Greek way of life, particularly in the Diaspora. It was a tradition which at the same time as it used the Greek language in the translation of the LXX also created a particular Jewish way of using Greek, thereby distancing this discourse from the dominating Greek and later Roman pattern. This Jewish Greek tradition enabled and supported the transmission of the message of the gospel, but if the gospel was detached from this particular context, ‘loss’ or misunderstanding could easily be the result in the cultural translation process. An analysis of aspects of the Pauline discourse of pi/stiv and its potential resonance with the Roman discourse of fides is presented as well as a comparison between the notion of the unity of the nations in Pauline and Roman perspectives. In chapter 7 we then turn to cult practice and rituals as locations of identity formation in antiquity. The realm of the divine permeated all aspects of life. This not only applied to people from the nations, but equally, though differently, to Jews. For Jews in the Diaspora, cult practice was something which happened some distance away in Jerusalem, not as something in which they could participate frequently if at all, but the fact of cult practice retained its central role even if it was restricted to the reading or hearing of the respective texts. For people from the nations, cult practice was part of their everyday lives, and participation of the particular practice of offering a sacrifice would have been a normal activity whether this

Introduction

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involved the offering of an animal or not. Piety was expressed in cult practice rather than in belief. The relevance of cult and ritual has been highlighted in a number of recent publications, arguing that this dimension would have facilitated the understanding between Paul and Christ-followers from the nations. However, I will argue here that, rather than facilitating translation, cult practice is one of the core dimensions that created a significant problem for the translation of the gospel into the world of the nations. Although Christfollowers from the nations would of course have been very familiar with the language and practice of cult and ritual, their cultural codes and encyclopedias would not necessarily have rendered understanding Paul’s terminology and discourse as straightforward as is often assumed. Moreover, the request to abstain from any cult practice, which Paul called idolatry, would have been the most strange request from a polytheistic perspective. It will be argued that this caused major problems, which Paul tried to resolve in Corinth. Chapter 8, by way of conclusion, summarizes some of the findings of this study and presents aspects of their significance for biblical interpretation and theologizing in contemporary church and society. As mentioned above, this study is eclectic in numerous ways, and limited in its scope. The potential for the application of the paradigm of bilingualism/ biculturalism in the interpretation of Paul’s activities as apostle to the nations could only be explored here in an exemplary way in relation to aspects of the narrative framework of belonging, that is, the Scriptures, and in relation to aspects of cult practice as they are addressed in 1 Corinthians. This is a very limited range of texts, topics and issues for the exploration of the approach proposed here. There is a wide open field for further research through which the paradigm needs to be tested, for example in relation to issues pertaining to community formation and organization, and further issues concerning cult and ritual, such as purity and holiness, Temple and other aspects of Paul’s metaphorical use of language. The study presented here does not claim to have found the solution to all the problems pertaining to cultural translation processes in the Pauline discourse, but it aims at pointing to pathways for further explorations at the crossroads of peoples, cultures, traditions and languages.

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Part I

Setting the Scene: Paradigms and Contexts

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Chapter 2 Paradigms of Cultural Encounters: Fusion, Blending or Hybridity? When F. C. Baur in the 1830s stated that Paul, in the tradition of the ‘Hellenists’, freed Christianity from its particularistic Jewish constraints, and thus enabled it to come into its own as the true and absolute universal religion, he signalled an awareness that a cultural translation process must have had a significant identity-shaping influence in the earliest period of the Christ-movement.1 The recognition of a cultural translation process at the heart of emerging Christian self-understanding is highly significant and has not lost any of its relevance since Baur presented his version of the nature of this process. As innovative as it was at the time, it rather sounds like the repetition of something that has been taken for granted in one form or another in Pauline studies ever since. To say that Paul was a mediator of some kind seems to be stating the obvious. However, when the implications of this assumption are considered, the differences between perceptions past and present could not be more disparate. Whilst Baur’s key interest was to demonstrate that Paul had unlocked the universalism inherent in the message of Jesus Christ and the kingdom of God and thus brought Christianity into its own as the highest possible form of religion,2 a key aspect in more recent publications is the presupposition that ‘Hellenism’ per se played an important role in this transmission process.3 Postcolonial studies have added to the debate of intercultural interaction in recent decades and insights from these have now also been applied in Pauline interpretation. Concepts of ‘hybridity’, in particular, have gained some prominence in discussions about Paul’s identity and about the identity of the early Christ-movement. In the following sections I will briefly revisit the ‘Judaism/Hellenism’ debate, present a critical evaluation of the concept of ‘Hellenism’ and its limitations, following with a critical overview of the debates around ‘hybridity’ and its application in Pauline studies, which leads to the proposal of the alternative paradigm developed in chapter 3.

1 Baur 1845.1: 58–60. 2 Baur 1845.2: 212–14 3 For an excellent summary of the reception history see Martin 2001.

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Paul at the Crossroads of Cultures

2.1 The Judaism/Hellenism Debate Revisited The so-called Judaism/Hellenism debate, which emerged in the mid nineteenth century with the rise of the Tübingen School and gained prominence particularly in German scholarship, seemed to have been resolved with the publication of Martin Hengel’s Judaism and Hellenism.4 But whilst it was widely recognized that the older view of a fundamental difference between ‘Palestinian’ Judaism and Diaspora Judaism was untenable, the debate continued in a varied form in that questions concerning the extent of the ‘Hellenization’ of Paul himself as well as of Judaism in the first century were raised and critically discussed. This debate is ongoing in Pauline studies. However, the concern focuses less on the degree of the ‘Hellenization’ of his addressees, as it seems to be widely assumed that these were thoroughly ‘hellenized’, than on the degree of the ‘Hellenization of Paul himself. With regard to Paul, this debate is often combined with the question of whether or how Paul was and remained Jewish after his call experience. Although there is now a significant and established strand in Pauline studies which presupposes that Paul was and remained a Jew, the questions of the extent to which he remained Jewish, the extent to which he was Hellenized, and what significance such Hellenization had for his theologizing, are not settled. In most of these discussions the concept of Hellenism is taken as the stable factor; even when it is critically considered, it is taken as a concept which is more or less self-evident. Thus although Martin Hengel5 acknowledges that the term has been used in a variety of ways and has consequently been rendered imprecise and oscillating, he nevertheless hopes to get to an understanding of the essential characteristics of the era which shows the imprint of ‘Hellenism’.6 Despite the stated awareness of the problems inherent in the term, scholars continue to use it as the most accurate label for describing the cultural characteristics of the period after Alexander the Great. Hengel has certainly presented substantial arguments for overcoming the position that there were significant differences between Palestinian Judaism and the Judaism of the Diaspora, with the former viewed as hardly touched by the cultural encounter with Greeks and Romans, whereas the latter is seen as being profoundly influenced by it. Against this dichotomy Hengel argued with substantial evidence for such an encounter also in Judaea/ Galilee prior to, and during the first century ce, thus maintaining that Judaism, whether in Judaea/Galilee or in the Diaspora, at the time was ‘Hellenized’ to a vast extent.7 What is striking in Hengel’s and other scholars’ assumption is 4 Published in German 1969, ET 1974. 5 Cf. the analysis of Bichler 1983: 181. 6 Hengel 1974, I: 2–3. 7 Interestingly, ‘Diaspora Judaism’ refers almost uniquely to the Greek-speaking Diaspora, that is, the Diaspora under Greek and Roman rule. There is hardly any consideration of the Diaspora in the East, under Parthian rule, in these discussions, possibly assuming that this Diaspora had no implications for the Judaism/Hellenism debate. Edrei and Mendels have drawn attention to issues concerning the relationship between the Jewish Diasporas in the East and in the

Paradigms of Cultural Encounters

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their decision to ignore the relevance of the historical context in which the term ‘Hellenism’ emerged. The term and concept were developed by Droysen in the same political and intellectual climate as Baur and the emerging Tübingen School developed their historicizing approaches to biblical literature. Rather than presenting a critical analysis of Droysen’s concept, Hengel approvingly notes that ‘Droysen … already saw quite clearly the essential criterion of that time and its culture. Something fundamentally new arose in “Hellenism” – through the encounter of Greece with the Orient …’8 Although he shows awareness that the concept ‘became very indefinite and variable’ and ‘must be treated as a complex phenomenon’,9 Hengel does not embark on showing that Greek influence on Judaism existed here and there but asserts that ‘an attempt is made to depict the inner contours of Jewish and Palestinian thought in the tension between acceptance and rejection of the Hellenistic Zeitgeist’.10 ‘Hellenism’ is thus used as the term which encompasses all aspects of the encounter between Greece and the Orient, implying the concept of fusion (and for the religious dimension ‘syncretism’) as argued by Droysen, without any further critical assessment of the concept. It seems that the lack of critical engagement with Droysen’s concept, including its metaphysical underpinnings, may have to do with similarities in Hengel’s perception of the role of Hellenism, and Hellenistic Judaism in particular, in the emergence of Christianity, which Hengel also sees in a sense as being the expression ‘of the free and sovereign saving revelation of God in history, which no longer recognized national and historically conditioned limitations’.11 ‘Hellenism’ has a spirit which is logical, rational and critical; it actually is a form of ‘Greek Enlightenment’12. The negative perception of Judaism as the paradigm of nationalistic zeal and particularity against which the image of a ‘free’ universalistic Christianity is depicted prevails here, as J. J. Collins has noted.13 And Dale Martin comments: ‘Judaism in the end still represents particularism, limitation, reaction, and even extinction. Hellenism, or the “Greek Enlightenment”, is the force for individualism, universalism, and freedom.’14 Hengel’s work has been highly influential and is thus used to describe what is perceived as a ‘comprehensive cultural melting pot’, a ‘mixture which was sufficiently similar across time and places for a culture to count as a single, comprehensive entity’.15 Although Engberg-Pedersen does allow for diversity rooted in pre-Hellenistic traditions he maintains that all the people in the lands conquered by Alexander lived ‘within the comprehensive mix of Hellenistic

West, and argue that after 70 this had far-reaching implications for the development of Judaism and Christianity (Edrei and Mendels 2007). 8 Hengel 1974, I: 2. 9 Hengel 1974, I: 3. 10 Hengel 1974, I: 4. 11 Hengel 1974, I: 314. 12 Hengel 1974, I: 121, 305. 13 Collins 1989: 226–28. 14 Martin 2001: 44. 15 Engberg-Pedersen 2001: 1–16, 2.

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culture’.16 Even when ‘Hellenism’ and ‘Hellenization’ are seen as ‘Problematic Historiographic Categories’, Hellenism is seen as ‘a broadly uniform culture pervading the whole region, within which various groups adapted the dominant cultural patterns and structures in order to create subcultures and establish ethnic identities’.17 Diversity is acknowledged here but only as a variant of a generic overarching super-culture. The concept of an overarching, all-permeating culture is thus not questioned but presupposed and varied only slightly in order to provide some space for apparent cultural differences which could not otherwise be explained. Focusing more on late antiquity, Assman maintained that: As they were translated into the common semiotic system of Hellenism, the borders between the different traditions tended to become much more permeable than they had been within the original language barriers. A process of interpenetration took place which not only for Jews and Christians but also for the ‘pagans’ themselves made the differences between them much less evident than what they had in common. Hellenism, in other words, not only provided a common language but helped discover a common world and a ‘cosmopolitan’ consciousness’.18

The concept of an overarching entity is retained as that which characterized the language and way of life of all the peoples who had come under Greek influence after Alexander’s conquest.

2.2 The Concept of ‘Hellenism’ and its Limitations Recently, critical reviews of this concept of ‘Hellenism’19 have been formulated by classicists and ancient historians drawing attention to its emergence in 16 Engberg-Pedersen 2001: 2. 17 Alexander 2001: 70. He further notes ‘The pattern itself is not intrinsically Greek or Jewish. Rather we should think of a cultural pattern generic to the whole region that has been specified in each subculture in slightly different ways’ (2001: 71). 18 Assman 1996: 33–34. 19 Critical assessments of the concept of ‘Romanization’ and ‘Mediterraneanism’ have also been presented but cannot be considered within the limitations of this study. Since ‘Hellenism’ has played and still plays such an important part in Pauline studies I will focus here on this concept, although the critical analysis of the other concepts is also important for Pauline studies and should be taken seriously. Concerning ‘Romanization’, cf. e.g. Mattingly who argues that ‘the best way forward is to discard the term Romanization and to employ other interpretative frameworks to explore the cultural diversity of the empire’ (2011: 40). He explains that ‘what makes Romanization and Hellenization particularly unhelpful constructs is that the terms are used to describe both process and outcome, so that the terms have become their own explanation’ (2010: 285–86). Cf. also the discussion in Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 9–14. On Mediterraneanism see the discussion by Schwartz who notes that ‘at the moment of its (M.) decline as an ethnographic hypothesis, Mediterraneanism was embraced, in its crudest and most deterministic form, by scholars of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament’. He nevertheless attributes some heuristic value to the concept (2010: 21–44); others such as Harris (2005a) and Herzfeld (2005) advocate more critical stances. Cf. also Abulafia 2003b.

Paradigms of Cultural Encounters

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a specific historical, intellectual and political context in nineteenth-century Germany, as well as to methodological problems associated with its emergence, and the questions which this inherently raises for the contemporary use of the term and concept in studies of the period.20 Thus, analyses of the context and milieu of the emergence of the concept of ‘Hellenism’ were presented most recently on the occasion of the 200th birthday of its ‘father’ Johann Gustav Droysen. The German historian developed the term in broad outline in his Geschichte des Hellenismus, first published in 1836, republished in 1877–78, with some initial delineations in his work on Alexander the Great published in 1831. He used the term to denote the period between the era of classical Greece and the emergence of Christianity. Rather than being a period of deterioration of the Greek spirit after Alexander’s conquest of the Persian empire,21 Droysen saw Alexander as the great personality who was called to bring about the fusion of oriental and occidental cultures in order to pave the way for the gospel of Jesus Christ.22 Birchler in his evaluation of ‘Hellenism’ draws attention to these metaphysical historical presuppositions underpinning Droysen’s concept. He notes that for Droysen the decisive role of history up until the incarnation was its preparation and education of humankind for the coming of Christ. Birchler summarizes his position as follows: ‘Die Stadien, in denen der Geist der Menschheit reif und zur Entfaltung drängt, und die Stufen, in denen sich die Gnade Gottes den Sterblichen mitteilt, gelten dem Gläubigen als Marksteine auf dem Weg der Menschheit zu Gott.’23 The key aspect of the era of ‘Hellenism’ for Droysen was its function as a necessary stage that served as the catalyst for the breakdown and overcoming of paganism and the advancing of the sense of longing for redemption among humankind which was actually a longing for the arrival of Christianity.24 Although Droysen frequently seems to refer to the fusion of oriental and occidental cultures as a process of cultural encounter between equals, this was far from being so. It is evident that Droysen’s perspective on this assumed process was not only deeply 20 Sherwin-White and Kuhrt noted in 1993: ‘Older ideas of a “fusion” (or synthesis) of Greek and “Oriental” culture, with the overtone of an easy “instant whip”, are generally – and it seems rightly – now regarded as too crude to be of much use in analysing the complicated process of cultural change’ (1993: 144). Cf. also Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 17–28; Hingley 2005: 20; Mattingly 2011: 207. 21 This is Hegel’s evaluationof the period, cf. Wiemer 2012: 116. 22 Wiemer 2012: 114; it is worth noting here that despite his decisively Christian perception of the process of world history, Droysen abstained from any moral qualification of such ‘historical personalities’ (‘historische Persönlichkeiten’) as Alexander. Such personalities were seen as called (‘berufen’) to decisively shape world history and as such were seen by Hegel as well as by Droysen as being above moral norms and ethics. Hence, where the great purposes of world history are concerned, all means to achieve these are considered legitimate, provided they lead to success. Cf. Wiemer 2012: 118. 23 Bichler 1983: 152, also 2012: 206. (‘The stages in which the spirit of humanity matures and aspires to unfold its full potential, and the steps in which God’s grace transmits itself to mortals, are guide posts for believers on humanity’s progression towards God’, ET mine). 24 Bichler 2012: 206; Wiesehöfer 2012: 180.

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Eurocentric but predominantly advocated the superiority of Greek culture. Greece as the birthplace of a European spirit is idealized.25 Alexander’s role is seen also as ending the antagonism between Orient and Occident whereby ‘das Griechentum’ with its ‘burning vitality’ and ‘Asian people with its dead masses’ are fused to the benefit of both.26 The dynamic Greek spirit is the positive power of history which overcomes the passive and actually barbarian Orient in this process of ‘Hellenization’. The colonial overtones of the time, with their degradation of Eastern cultures, are quite obvious. This is Droysen’s terminology and it is evident that this is not formulated in a language of mutual respect but in a language of superiority and domination of one over the other. Droysen had a preference for all things Greek, as was typical for a German scholar of his time.27 Thus the peoples conquered and dominated by Alexander and his successors are described as ‘stagnierende Kulturen’, which had to be infused with new life and whose religious traditions had to be broken down (zersetzt) by Greek rationality in preparation for the coming of Christ. He praises the spreading of Greek education which had overcome its particularistic constraints and turned cosmopolitan: ‘man wird behaupten dürfen, dass die geistigen Interessen überhaupt nie zuvor so weit verbreitet, so lebendig, von so persönlich und allgemein bedeutsamem Inhalt gewesen sind; sie sind das Gemeingut der gesammten hellenistischen Welt geworden’.28 There is no hint at any recognition of the value of Eastern cultures in their own right. Rather the opposite: the advocated fusion rather than being an encounter of equals is a process of domination of the higher (Greek) culture over inferior ‘others’.29 This encounter is what Droysen called ‘Hellenism’. Thus, rather than being a synthesis of Greek and oriental cultures, ‘Hellenism’ is primarily an achievement of the ‘Griechenthum’.30 It is obvious that the component of power in a context of conquest and domination31 was not an issue which would have concerned Droysen. He lived in a period of heated colonization of non-European peoples by European imperialistic powers, which was 25 Hingley 2005: 20. 26 Wiesehöfer 2012: 167. 27 On the Philhellenism of German scholars in the nineteenth century in the context of the Greek war of independence (1821) and German unification attempts, see Martin 2001: 41–43. 28 Droysen 1877: 567; cf. Bichler 2012: 228 n. 138 (‘it is possible to claim that the interests related to the spirit never have been spread so widely, they have never been so vivid or were of such personal and universally relevant contents: they have become the common good of the entire Hellenistic world’, ET mine). 29 Bichler 2012: 209–11. 30 Cf. Wiesehöfer 2012: 168. 31 Thus Momigliano notes: ‘So besehen hatte der Hellenismus zwei Aspekte. Er war eine kulturelle Bewegung, die eine neue Synthese orientalischer und griechischer Ideen hervorbrachte. Er war aber auch eine politische Entwicklung, die zur Entstehung eines Staatensystems führte, in dem orientalische Einheimische von einer griechisch-mazedonischen Aristokratie beherrscht wurden’ (2000a: 147) (‘In this perspective there were two aspects to Hellenism. It was a cultural movement, through which a new synthesis of oriental and Greek ideas emerged. But it was also a political development, which led to the emergence of a system of states in which oriental natives were dominated by a Greek-Macedonian aristocracy’, ET mine).

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inherently intertwined with imperialistic and racist ideologies. He seems to have been influenced partly by the Roman historian Niebuhr, who had argued for a fused form of Greek in parallel to creole languages spoken in Haiti and Santo Domingo.32 That the paradigm of language served as an early model for cultural interaction in colonial contexts in the nineteenth century has also been noted by R. J. C. Young, who draws attention to the fact that in the nineteenth century ‘hybridity was a key issue for cultural debate’. Infused by racist theories the ‘race mixture’ as well as the mix of languages was perceived negatively and warned against since it was considered to be a degeneration or ‘miscegenation’ of human beings.33 Although Droysen tries to attribute some positive value to the supposed process of the fusion of cultures in his concept of ‘Hellenism’, this is only possible, in his view, through the ‘enhancement’ achieved by the impact of the Greek ‘spirit’ on the ‘static’ oriental cultures. The role of Judaism in this process is confined to its function in the preparation of Christianity in which the spirit would come to itself. As such the Hebrew idea of messianism was fruitfully blended with the deep humanity of Greek philosophy. Thus Droysen writes: es vollendet sich … in der Lehre des Neuen Bundes, in dem jener letzte und tiefste Gegensatz überwunden sein, in dem Juden und Heiden, die Völker aller Welt, in ihrer ethnischen Kraft gebrochen und auf den Tod erschöpft, endlich … Trost und Ruhe und für die verlorene Heimat hieniden eine höhere, geistige, die in dem Reiche Gottes finden sollten.34

The fusion initiated by Alexander the Great had enabled the emergence of the idea of one kingdom/empire which was not of this world but inherent to which was the notion of one humanity in which all distinctions between peoples had been obliterated.35 Droysen only touched upon Judaism in its preparatory function within the wider context of world history. He did not discuss in any 32 Ref. in Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 20, cf. n. 66. It is noteworthy that the contexts in which a creolization of languages seems to occur are marked by colonial eradication of local or indigenous traditions. In the Caribbean context through the uprooting and dehumanizing of African people through slavery, in the context of the Roman West through a similar process whereby the oral local traditions seem to have had no chance of survival except in the guise of Roman tradition, hence the eventual emergence of the Romance languages Italian, French and Spanish. Cf. also Woolf 2011. 33 See Young 1995: 5 and 6–19. 34 Droysen 1843: 581 (‘in the doctrine of the new covenant fulfilment is achieved … in it the last and deepest opposition is overcome and Jews and heathen, the peoples of the world, with their ethnic strength broken they are exhausted to death … find consolation and calm, and for the homeland they have lost down here below they will find the higher, spiritual one in the kingdom of God’.) 35 Droysen 1877: 7. Baur in a similar vein saw the path paved for Christianity in the decline and breaking down of the religious tradition of the time on the one hand and in the establishment of the universal Roman empire on the other: ‘Der Universalismus des Christentums hat so zu seiner wesentlichen Voraussetzung den Universalimus der Römischen Weltherrschaft’, Baur 1863: 4.

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detail any further aspect of Judaism whether in ‘Hellenistic’ times or in later times in his publications, although he seems to have intended to deal in more depth with Second Temple literature at a later stage in his career. Momigliano noted the relative lack of interest Droysen showed in Judaism compared with his extensive dealings with Egypt, Babylonia or Syria and other peoples and cultures of the time, and attributed this to some deliberate reluctance on Droysen’s part to mention Judaism. Momigliano argues that Droysen saw more affiliation between Greek polytheism and Christianity than between Judaism and Christianity. Birchler, in a recent evaluation of sources, considers this to be overstating the case.36 Whatever the reasons, the difficulties Droysen encountered with this are mentioned in a number of his letters but he never completed any detailed work on this literature.37 ‘Hellenism’ is thus a term which encompassed numerous phenomena, including language, religion and tradition.38 This inclusion of such a variety of aspects combined with the fact that Droysen himself only presented broad overviews of what he saw as implied by this concept, and he never actually completed the detailed historical work he seems to have intended to write. The term and concept remained somewhat vague and thus open to a process of reception which included oppositional views about the ‘essence’ of ‘Hellenism’ and terminological confusion rather than clarification along the path of its use. The vagueness of the concept was possibly one of the reasons for its wide and unquestioned reception over more than a century. Thus Bichler notes: Das Hellenismus-Werk indes konnte als ein faszinierendes Torso seinen Platz in der Wissenschaftsgeschichte behaupten. Die Verheissung seiner Fortsetzung, deren potenitelle Erfüllung immer wieder in grandios gestalteten Ausblicken aufleuchtet, aber letztlich nie eingelöst werden musste, hat ihre Wirkung nicht verfehlt. Wäre diese Verheissung nicht so eng mit dem suggestiven Universalbegriff verknüpft, hätte sie indes diese Faszination kaum ausüben können.39

36 Cf. Momigliano 2000a: 153–54. Cf. Bichler 2012: 213 n.96. 37 Cf. Bichler 2012: 214. 38 ‘Der Hellenismus selbst localisiert sich; in Sprache, Religion und Sitte beginnt er sich in je unterschiedlichen Mischungsverhältnissen zu unterscheiden … Gerade das Freiwerden von den localen und nationalen Einflüssen, diese geistige Freiheit und Allgemeinheit, die die höchste Errungenschaft des Griechenthums war, scheint sich aufzugeben, nur um in erhöhter Potenz des altnationalen, heidnischen Wesens wieder aufzutreten’, Droysen 1877: 33. 39 Bichler 2012: 218. (‘The work about Hellenism maintained its place in the history of the humanities as a fascinating torso. The promise of its sequel, which here and there shone in grand surveys, but which was never fulfilled, has not failed to have its impact. If this promise had not been so closely connected with the suggestive concept of universalism, it could never have exercised the fascination it did’, ET mine). Momigliano notes about the second revised edition of Droysen that he never wrote about the details of the cultural developments he considered to be characteristic of Hellenism. He never wrote anything which would have gone beyond programmatic declarations (2000a: 149).

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The only aspect about which some agreement seems to have emerged is the period and space it encompasses, beginning with Alexander the Great and ending around the reign of Augustus, although the latter is more open than the beginning.40 Bichler in his profound studies of the concept of Hellenism maintained that since the term and concept were coined in the nineteenth century, and thus deeply rooted in a specific metaphysical concept of history, any attempt to separate it from these roots and to define its essence and characteristics apart from these is problematic. Trying to define the essence of the ‘Hellenistic era’ means to search for a terminological and conceptual unambiguousness which does not exist. The specialization and insights of recent research have led to such a diversity of information about the period that we are now dealing with such complexity of issues (geographical, cultural, in terms of time, etc.) that it is not possible to subsume all of these under one clearly defined concept without resorting to anachronistic simplifications.41 In addition, the concepts upon which Droysen’s ‘Hellenism’ was built have been fundamentally challenged in light of paradigm shifts in the disciplines of history as well as cultural studies. Particularly the perception of grand cultural entities such as Orient and Occident and ideas of acculturation or Hellenization (and Romanization)42 related to these are now seen in the context of their emergence as replications and ideological justifications of imperialist discourses and instruments of domination. As such, Bichler argues, they are inadequate tools to explain the complex, diverse, intercultural world of the Mediterranean and the Near East in antiquity. A challenge to the concept of Hellenism similar to that of Bichler has recently been presented by Classicist Andrew Wallace-Hadrill. In addition to aspects mentioned in the critical discussion of Droysen’s work above, WallaceHadrill emphasizes an aspect already noted by Bichler in his earlier work, on the term ‘Hellenism’ itself, and points out that in ancient Greek it did not encompass what Droysen used it for. There is actually no Greek equivalent for the term as used by Droysen and subsequent scholarship. Thus Bichler argued that: ‘Der Ausdruck hellenistisch hat kein Gegenstück im Griechischen, und die Vorstellung von einer west-östlichen Völkervermischung, die durch eine eigene Sprache charakterisiert wurde, ist anachronistisch.’43 It clearly referred to the linguistic dimension of Greek in the first place. This had already been noted in 1928 by linguist Richard Laqueur, who maintained that the verb 40 Cf. Bichler 2010: 199. 41 Cf. Bichler who maintains ‘Wer sich von diesen geschichtsmetaphysischen Voraussetzungen lösen und gleichwohl “Wesen“ und “wirkliche” Dimension des Hellenismus bestimmen möchte, muss notwendigerweise in ein Dilemma geraten’ (1983: 153), and further ‘Die Suche nach “wahren” Konturen des “Hellenismus” setzt eine begriffliche Eindeutigkeit voraus, die nicht gegeben ist’ (1983: 181). Now also Bichler 2012: 230–32, 68, 73. 42 Cf. n.19 above. 43 Cf. Bichler 2010: 198 (‘There is no equivalent term for “Hellenistic” in Greek, and the notion of a fusion of peoples from the East and the West characterised by its own language is anachronistic’, ET mine).

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e9llhni/zein refers to speaking Greek, that is, to what Greeks do when they speak Greek rather than to any fusion in the vein of a ‘Mischgriechisch’.44 It is particularly used to emphasize that a non-Greek speaker speaks Greek more or less correctly. The term e9llhnismo/v is only found in this form in 2 Macc. 4.13 and there refers to doing things in a ‘Greek way’ rather than to any kind of fusion of cultures or languages. Wallace-Hadrill thus draws attention to the fact that neither the Greek language of the three centuries commonly subsumed under this term nor the Greek culture show any sign of fusion or creolization (there are no Egyptian or Syrian elements in the Greek language of that time). There are very few and only rarely occurring terms which might be taken as an indication of a fusion of cultures or languages, such as mice/llhnev or miga/dev but these can actually not be taken as referring to what has been understood by the concept of ‘Hellenism’.45 Iris von Bredow presents a detailed analysis of such terms found in an inscription in Olbia,46 and others from texts by Apollonios of Rhodos (4.420) and Ps.-Skymnos (756) from around the fourth century bce. The latter describes the population of the region of Dobrudza, the western coast of Pontus as en) meqori/ov de_ kai_ th=v Krobu/zwn kai_ th=v Skuqw=n xw/ra miga/dav 3Ellhnav oi)khta_v e1xei. It is here implied that Thracians and Scythians lived close but separate from each other, whereas the characterization of the miga/dev 3Ellhnev as oi)khte_v indicates that those referred to, rather than being a mixed population (since the Thracians and Skythians are mentioned separately) seem to be of low social status living at the margins of the main population. Von Bredow concludes the Olbia inscription and the texts mentioned do not, as might be assumed, refer to children of mixed marriages, but rather to Greeks who lived in either socially or geographically marginal areas, possibly enclaves, surrounded by a nonGreek population. The archaeological findings point to such enclaves rather than a mixture of cultures and it is quite telling that a reference in Strabo to miga/dev, which is understood as a synonym for mice/llhnev, clearly rejects the notion of fusion as advocated by the ‘Hellenism’ concept when he states ti/nev d’ei)si_n oi( miga/dev; … kai_ ga_r ei) katemi/xqhsan a)ll’ h( e)pikra/teia pepoi/hken h2 E 3 llhnav h2 barba/rouv tri/tov de/ ge/nov ou0de_n i1smen to_ mikto/n. (‘But who are the “Migades”? … Thus even if they were mixing, the primacy would render them either Greeks or barbarians: we do not know of a third “kind” that would be mixed.’)47 Given that no evidence for a mixture of cultures or languages in the sense argued by the concept of ‘Hellenism’ seems to have existed in antiquity and that metaphysical concepts of history were at the heart of the concept from the start, the model of ‘Hellenism’ as the fusion or blending of Greek and oriental 44 Bichler 1983: 12. 45 Funck and Gehrke 1996: 8. 46 Von Bredow refers to an inscription in Olbia from the third century bce, the decree of Protogenes (IOSPE I 32=Syll. I.495), which on B26 and B27 contains the word mice/llenev (1996: 468). 47 Von Bredow 1996: 472–73.

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cultures is a rather inappropriate tool for analysing the rich cultural interaction during the period in question.48 Rather than being a fusion of different cultures ‘Hellenizing’ is what Greeks do when they speak Greek, and foreigners do when they use Greek. It is intransitive, thus never something that is done to someone else but only something that one does to oneself. No colonial power can thus ‘Hellenize’ another people! However, Droysen’s concept remains influential and Hengel’s influential work presupposes Droysen’s concept and stands in the tradition initiated by the German scholar. Hellenism in its initial period (up to the third century bce) is seen by Hengel as ‘the political, economic, and cultural permeation of the East by the conquerors from Greece and Macedonia’,49 followed by a ‘process of fusion’ as postulated by Droysen. This perception and evaluation of the interplay between ‘Hellenism’ and Judaism can already be found in F. C. Baur, who maintained that the ‘Hellenistic’ influence on Judaism especially in Alexandria opened up this part of Judaism from its particularism in the direction of universalism, albeit in a limited way, stating: ‘Der eigenthümliche Charakter dieses alexandrinischen Judenthums bestand darin, dass die Schranken des alten jüdischen Partikularismus so weit durchbrochen and aufgehoben wurden, als dies überhaupt möglich war, ohne den Standpunkt der alttestamentlichen Religion völlig aufzugeben.’50 ‘Hellenistic’ Judaism, as a syncretistic phenonmenon in which Jewish and ‘Hellenistic’ culture are fused,51 is thus seen as the more ‘advanced’ form of this particularistic religion by Baur and as such it is closer to the ideal of a universalistic religion which eventually manifests itself in its absolute form in Christianity. This perception of the role of so-called ‘Hellenistic’ Judaism is widespread and aspects of it resonate also in Hengel. Although he notes the existence of bilingualism in linguistic as well as cultural terms, he evaluates the knowledge and influence of Greek as ‘the expression of higher social standing, better education and stronger contacts with the world outside Jewish Palestine’.52 This opening up of Judaism came to a halt with the Maccabaean reaction against Hellenization, which put a ‘brake on syncretism, fixed intellectual development and precluded any fundamental criticism of the cult and the law’.53 Thus an almost complete fusion of religion and nationalism prevented any further assimilation with the consequence that national self-preservation centring around the Torah became 48 Sherwin-White and Kuhrt note: ‘The old image of Alexander the Great and the Greeks resuscitating a moribund and bankrupt “oriental” despotic state by introducing new forms of economic and social life … which still lingers in some approaches to the Hellenistic world, can now be seen as untenable. All of these apparent Greek innovations had existed in the Achaemenid empire’ (1993: 1–2). 49 Hengel 1974: 3. 50 Baur 1863: 19 (‘The peculiar characteristics of Alexandrian Judaism consisted in its ability to break down and abrogate the confinements of particularism as far as possible without completely abandoning the stance of the religion of the Old Testament’, ET mine). 51 Cf. Satlow 2008: 43–44. 52 Hengel 1974: 105. 53 Thus Collins evaluation of Hengel in Collins 2005c: 21–22.

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the core characteristic of Judaism. Hengel asserts that ‘The zeal for the law aroused at that time made impossible all attempts at an internal reform of the Jewish religion undertaken in a prophetic spirit, as soon as the nerve centre, the law, was attacked.’ The Pharisees are depicted as an embodiment of this Judaism limited by nationalistic zeal. 54 Thus, although Hengel demonstrated that Jewish culture in Palestine was deeply ‘Hellenized’ and the division of Judaism into ‘Palestinian’ and ‘Hellenistic’ was inconceivable, the analytical value of the categories ‘Judaism’ and ‘Hellenism’ were not questioned by him. Hellenism is here seen as the pathway to universalism which was abandoned by Torah-centred Judaism. This is the point where Christianity steps in: ‘Christology took the place of “Torah ontology” as an expression of the free and sovereign saving revelation of God in history, which no longer recognized national and historically conditioned limitations.’55 It is evident that Droysen’s metaphysical concept of history is shimmering through Hengel’s work and decisively shaped his evaluation of numerous phenomena subsumed under the concept of ‘Hellenism’. It is less evident why such discrepant phenomena as bilingualism, analogies between Jewish wisdom literature and Stoic philosophy, knowledge of and sympathies for the Greek way of life among the elite, and the influence of ‘oriental Hellenistic syncretism’56 on apocalyptic literature should all be subsumed under one overarching concept. Hengel’s presupposition is shared widely;57 thus a critical evaluation of the concept of Hellenism per se is hardly considered relevant in New Testament and Pauline studies (as far as I am aware)58 – the debates circle around the extent of the Hellenization of first-century Judaism, and the early Christ-movement rather than the concept itself. Since Hengel’s work and subsequent studies apparently demonstrated Hellenistic influence on Judaism in the Diaspora as well as in Galilee and Judaea, it seemed that the Judaism/Hellenism divide postulated by earlier scholarship had been overcome and demonstrated to be anachronistic.59 However, if the critical reviews of Droysen’s work and thus of the concept of ‘Hellenism’ are taken seriously, the key problem concerning Judaism in the first century, and the location of Paul and the early Christ-movement in this context, is not the question of the extent of ‘Hellenization’, nor is it the question of a Judaism/Hellenism divide or its overcoming. The question of 54 Hengel 1974: 314. 55 Hengel 1974: 314. 56 Hengel 1974: 312. This phrase itself demonstrates the difficulties with the concept as such – if Hellenism is this postulated fusion of oriental and western cultures, why then add the qualifying terms ‘oriental’ and ‘syncretism’? 57 As is noted by Martin 2001: 44, also Satlow who notes that ‘The category of “Hellenistic Judaism” grew in the middle space to represent a phenomenon thought to be halfway from Judaism to Christiantiy.’ (2008:42). 58 Except for recent studies which view the Maccabaean revolt not as triggered by forced Hellenization but by the imposition of dominating power using Greek cultural markers. Cf. Portier-Young 2011: 185–216; also Schwartz 2007: 257–64. 59 Collins 2005b; also Martin 2001.

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the intercultural encounter then needs to be asked afresh and from a different perspective. If the cultures of the Mediterranean and the Near East did not mix and fuse as proposed in the syncretistic concept of ‘Hellenism’ including Judaism, what happened in these diverse cultural, ethnic and linguistic encounters during that period ? It has been noted that ‘It is striking … given the long history of cultural interaction, how few models have been developed to analyse it.’60 Recognizing that cultures are not closed or static entities but that contact and mutual exchange renders mutual influence rather likely, the quest for new approaches to these interactions in antiquity needs to be addressed.

2.3 Postcolonial Concepts of Hybridity, Fusion and Creolization in Pauline Studies These issues seems to have been addressed in the wake of postcolonial studies, when a number of theoretical frameworks were proposed for analysing interactions that led to the emergence of the Christ-movement in general and an analysis of the Pauline letters in particular. These include concepts such as hybridity, creolization, fusion and blending. I cannot provide a detailed discussion of these theories per se here, but will only consider aspects of them in terms of their potential contribution to understanding processes of intercultural encounter in the early Christ-movement in the first century ce as far as we can discern these through evidence found up until now. The term and concept ‘hybridity’ has ‘acquired the status of a common-sense term, not only in academia but also in culture more generally’.61 One of the key aspects emphasized by it is an anti-essentialist stance in intercultural and identity discourses as perceived from a postcolonial and globalized perspective. There seems to be a consensus that hybridity, often used in conjunction with other concepts such as creolization and diaspora, is a useful heuristic concept in postmodern and postcolonial challenges to essentialist perceptions of identity, be this at the individual or the collective level. Informed by postcolonial New Testament interpretation in general, which argues ‘that there are substantial parallels in the operations and effects of colonial domination in different times and places and that an awareness of these cross-cultural patterns can enhance our understanding of the Bible and its world’,62 the concept was also recently introduced to Pauline studies, with a number of publications presenting attempts to analyse the Pauline letters through postcolonial theories, including the concept of hybridity.63 What these attempts share is the positive perception of hybridity as an idea that inherently promotes the agency of the subaltern and thus has the

60 Young 1995: 4. 61 Combes and Brah 2000: 1. 62 Stanley 2011: 5. 63 Jervis 2011; Marchal 2011; Seesengood 2006; Marshall 2008; Sechrest 2009: 40–41; 223–24.

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potential of challenging any notion of closed hegemonic power discourses.64 In addition, as mentioned above, it is seen as a core concept against any essentialist claims and as a way to avoid the clear separation between Jewish, Hellenistic or Roman trajectories in the Pauline letters.65 What is less clear is what is understood by the concept itself in specific analyses of the Pauline letters. There seems to be a trend to perceive ‘hybridity’ as describing the cultural identity of people in colonial contexts where both colonizer and colonized are affected by each others’ cultures, a process which, with reference to Bhabha, is seen as inevitable: all involved in a colonial context are affected by the enforced encounter and those in dominating power positions cannot avoid being influenced by those subjugated and vice versa – hence all are ‘hybridized’ in such interactions. Paul is thus seen as a hybrid in the context of the Roman empire and it is impossible to say that ‘any particular impulse, idea or theme in Paul’s writings arises, unmodified, un-hybridised, from Paul’s “Jewishness”, his “Hellenism”, or his status as Roman citizen’.66 This seems to indicate an understanding of hybridity as a mixture or fusion of cultures, where elements of a precolonial ‘indigenous’ past and of colonizers’ present culture are fused to form a new hybrid identity. This seems to be R. S. Sugirtharaja’s understanding when he states that ‘One of the legacies of colonialism is an intermingling of people and cultures, and the result is a hybridized identity …’67 A variation to this understanding focuses more on the aspect of power dynamics prevalent in colonial settings and sees Paul as a hybrid in the power space between colonizer and colonized, fitting into both categories and neither, the dominating and the subjugated, being ‘not exclusively Jew, Greek or Roman, neither colonizer nor colonised’.68 Paul here emerges either as a free-floating individual who is neither attached nor rooted anywhere in time or space except in the ‘in-between’ or ‘third space’, a noman’s land that is characterized by hybridity. Perceived in this vein this position ‘in-between’ and ‘nowhere’ is considered as in and of itself liberating. Old binaries of dominated and subjugated, colonizer and colonized, are overcome in this ‘third space’ where therefore something entirely new, something not seen before, can emerge. Alternatively, he is seen as mimicking the colonial/imperial discourse of domination, re-inscribing ‘the imperialism of the time, and thus becoming in fact a (Jewish) colonizer of gentiles’, for example by Marchal who maintains ‘The fact that Paul twice justifies his travels in the name of progress echoes the historical rationale for colonization: empire is for the good of the subjects, a paternalistic, civilizing force of advancements.’69 This fuzziness/ 64 Prabhu 2007: 1. 65 Lopez 2011: 76. 66 Seesengood 2005: 23. 67 Sugirtharajah 1998: 16. 68 Lopez 2011: 77. 69 Cf Marchal, 2011: 153; and also ‘Paul casts the community in the dependent, subordinate role of a hierarchical system, a system he explains and maintains by reference to gendered power dynamics endorsed by the divine’ 2011: 159. Cf. also Johnson-DeBaufre, Nasrallah’s critique in 2011: 170.

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obscurity in the understanding of the concept of hybridity in Pauline studies is a feature shared with postcolonial studies more generally, where it is less and less clear what is being implied with the use of terms like hybridity, creolization and métissage. Hybridity has a variety of particular meanings as used by its key proponent Homi Bhabha, and many critical interactions with his work in Pauline studies do not clearly specify the meaning they attribute to it in their respective use.

2.4 The Concept of Hybridity in Critical Discussion Possibly one of the difficulties in capturing the concept of hybridity more clearly has to do with the fact that Bhabha himself did not develop it in the vein of a systematic theory but in a number of essays which were subsequently republished in The Location of Culture. Bakhtin’s notion of linguistic hybridity, pointing to the possibility that language ‘even within a single sentence can be double-voiced’, has the ‘fundamental ability to be simultaneously the same but different’70 and thus has the potential to subvert the notion of authority within a discourse, can be seen as a precursor of Bhabha’s introduction of the term into postcolonial theory. According to Bhabha, hybridity is inevitable in contexts of colonial encounters, in that both the culture of the colonizer and of the colonized are changed through mutual influence. There seem to be two key aspects to this process as emphasized by Bhabha: (1) Hybridization is seen not as a characteristic attributed to people but as a space that is located beyond the binaries of two cultures which meet. According to the colonizers’ evaluation of these two cultures, the culture of the colonized and the culture of the colonizers were mutually exclusive and formed a dualistic and static hierarchy71 of domination and subjugation, with superior (colonizer) and inferior (colonized) culture. Against this colonialist perception, Bhabha postulates hybridity as a space that opens up at the boundaries of cultural encounter, neither located in one nor in the other culture but ‘in-between’ the space of beyond72 or, as Bhabha famously called it, opening up a ‘third space’. In this liminality of ‘no man’s land’ it is possible to develop a double perspective, particularly for the colonized artist, poet and intellectual who is thereby enabled to move between the cultures of colonizers and colonized, who ‘speaks from two places and inhabits none’.73 This is thus the space where the subaltern has a voice, where disruption of the binary opposition between colonizer and colonized occurs; hence, where the meaning and valuation of cultures is being negotiated in a continuous flux of exchange. This ‘third space’ ‘creates a sense of the new as 70 Young 1995: 20. 71 Not all hierarchies are static as Derrida has argued, convincingly in my view; for a discussion of respective theories and their relevance for Pauline studies see Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 31–34. 72 Bhabha 1994: 7. 73 Anthias 2001: 626.

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an insurgent act of cultural translation’.74 It is here, in this ‘in-between third space’ that claims to any originality or purity of cultures claimed by colonial powers are challenged and rendered untenable. As Bhabha outlines, ‘It is that Third Space, though un-representable in itself, which constitutes the discursive conditions of enunciation that ensures that the meaning of symbols of culture have no primordial unity or fixity; that even the same signs can be appropriated, translated re-historicized and read anew.’75 In this description hybridity seems to be understood as that which happens at the borderline between cultures; it is the exchange as such, the acts of negotiation and translation between cultures out of which meaning emerges in specific contexts and at specific moments in time.76 This activity is considered to be in and of itself emancipatory in that it enables the subaltern or colonized to free themselves from the imposed dominating discourse of the colonizer, relating to it, but from their own perspective thereby disrupting it, as Bhabha notes with reference to the Algerian struggle for liberation.77 Bhabha argues that ‘Translation’ or ‘negotiation’ of meaning is a liberating act per se: it is the name for the strategic reversal of the process of domination through disavowal (that is, the production of discriminatory identities that secure the ‘pure’ and original identity of authority). Hybridity is the revaluation of the assumption of colonial identity through the repetition of discriminatory identity effects. It displays the necessary deformation and displacement of all sites of discrimination and power but implicates its identifications in strategies of subversion that turn the gaze of the discriminated back upon the eye of power.78

Thus the concept is clearly understood as the process of negotiation in the liminal space-between. At the same time, the term is also used to designate this actual ‘third space’.79 When the metaphor of space is pushed further, it emerges that this space has boundaries, that is, the boundaries of the cultures which interact with each other. As such the term presupposes a concept of ‘pure’ culture which in the processual understanding of hybridity is then challenged in turn. This inconsistency is one of the criticisms raised in response to the concept of hybridity as ‘third space’, with which I will deal in more detail below. (2) By maintaining that ‘all cultural statements and systems are constructed in this contradictory and ambivalent space of enunciation’, Bhabha introduced a generalizing notion into this discourse and opened up the possibility of also understanding hybridity as a blending or fusion of cultural elements. He refers to those who are engaged in the negotiation of meaning in the third space as 74 Bhabha 1994: 7. 75 Bhabha 1994: 37. 76 Bhabha 1994: 38. 77 Bhabha 1994: 38. 78 Bhabha 1994: 112. 79 Bhabha 1994: 112, ‘For the colonial hybrid is the articulation of the ambivalent space ...’

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‘the bearers of a hybrid identity’.80 This implies that elements of cultures are combined in such a way that they take on an identity constituting function, and contribute to the formation of a ‘hybrid identity’. Hybridity thus takes on the form of cultural difference itself.81 Thus Floya Anthias notes that: ‘Approaches that find hybrid social forms to be the result of intercultural and diasporic relations … also claim that these signify new forms of identity. Through the declaration of “hybridities” they postulate the transcendence of “old ethnicities”.’82 Numerous critical assessments of and interactions with Bhabha’s writings and with the concept of hybridity in particular have been put forward from within postcolonial and cultural studies and from outside them. Core to my project are those which take up issues concerning hybridity as a ‘third space’ and as a form of cultural difference or alternative identity. Floya Anthias questions the claim that this ‘third space’ is in itself liberating from a sociologist perspective. She acknowledges the concept as an attempt to address issues of mono-cultural views of identity and their essentialist perceptions of culture and ethnicity, but she is not convinced that this location at the borders, this liminal space per se has an emancipatory function.83 What needs to be critically considered, in her view, is the fact that it depends on which aspects emerge as the ‘new’ negotiated in this ‘no-man’s land’, rather than the emergence of ‘newness’ in itself, for an assessment of its potential to contribute to emancipatory processes in contexts of domination and oppression. It is not inherent to this negotiation process that emancipation is inevitably the result. It has also been noted that Bhabha’s claim that potential migrants can reinvent themselves, ‘that one can bring newness into the world, that one can reinvent oneself when one is writing from the cultural interstices’, obscures the fact that he refers to intellectuals who are part of a specific cultural literary setting, that is, a specific group of people and a specific social location of thought rather than migrants generally.84 Hybridization theories are thus seen as products of the self-identification/self-description of a specific group of intellectuals who define themselves in a specific social context at a particular moment in time, rather than describing a general condition in which all colonized people find themselves. This is not considered inherently problematic, but only when a normative and generalized function is attributed to this self-identification which subsumes and swallows up the identities of others into its self-description. 85 It also reveals a rather individualistic perception of the self in that individuals are seen to be able to reinvent themselves almost as ‘free-floating’ persons, 80 Bhabha 1994: 38 refers to Fanon’s perception but does not distance himself from it which implies that he considers this as an accurate application of the term ‘hybridity’ in this context. 81 Young 1995: 23. 82 Anthias 2001: 620. 83 Anthias 2001:628. 84 Van der Veer 1997: 102; Friedman 1997: 79. 85 Friedman 1997: 81, 88.

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and ignores the fact that migration and border crossing can also lead to a ‘ghettoization and enclavization process’.86 In addition, it has been noted, as mentioned above, that the concept of a hybrid ‘third space’ presupposes the concept of purity, that is, ‘pure’ cultures (on the side of the colonized as well as on that of the colonizers) which may have existed before international border crossing in the wake of colonization took place, and which now enter into a negotiation process in the ‘third space’.87 Bhabha explicitly states that this is what his idea is trying to counteract: ‘the concept of homogenous national cultures’,88 which may be suspected to be a concept set up in contradistinction to the liminial, third space of hybridity. Thus it seems that what is being challenged is actually presupposed.89 This is a space that is mainly accessible to intellectuals, and examples of what it actually entails come from the realms of art and literature, and are provided primarily by intellectuals and artists living in the West. What seems to be absent is the outworking of this concept in social and communal terms in contexts of struggle. Its liberationist potential has thus been questioned as it seems to be a concept which attempts to address the problem of self-perception in colonial/postcolonial contexts rather than advocating changes in terms of social asymmetry and power over access to resources. Culture and consciousness seem to be the core concern rather than ‘social inequality and exclusion’.90 Schüssler Fiorenza has pointedly noted that ‘postcolonial criticism and “diaspora” studies seem firmly rooted in the academy and located in the first world … the tendency of postcolonial criticism has been to privilege the act of reading of socio-political analysis’.91 If hybridity is seen as ‘cultural syncretism’, as in many approaches, involving the intermingling of cultural components, a pick and mix of cultural elements, fusion, and borrowings, then it is neither a new phenomenon nor a new concept. It has actually some quite close similarities with Droysen’s idea of Hellenism. It is postulated as being something new and as enabling the emergence of new forms of identity through which ‘old ethnicities’ are destabilized and transcended. It is seen as having the power to dislocate essentialist certainties and stabilities of ethnic identities.92 As such, and overlapping with perceptions of the ‘third space’, this mixture results in a new identity and, as noted above, is considered emancipatory in and of itself. The questions need to be asked, which and how cultural elements are merged, by whom and to what purpose. Anthias has pointed to the example of the cultural mix found in pop music, which may be neither progressive nor transgressive, or the ideology of fascism, which certainly is a fusion of cultural elements but can hardly be considered

86 Anthias 2001: 628. 87 Friedman 1997: 73. 88 Bhabha 1994: 5. 89 Friedman 1997: 73. 90 Anthias 2001: 638; also 2010: 97 and 101–102. 91 Schüssler Fiorenza 2009: 97 and 101–102. 92 Anthias 2001: 620, 625.

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emancipatory.93 There is also no inherent necessity for cultural mixtures to lead to new identities; they do not necessarily lead to a change in ethnic or other identity-shaping solidarities or to a disappearance of ethnocentrism or racism.94 This evaluation of the potential of hybridity perceived as a mixture, fusion or creolization is not surprising if it is taken into account that there is a widespread and uncontested consensus of the almost common-sense notion that ‘all cultures have always been the products of import and a mix of elements’.95 As such, culture is always hybrid, involving ongoing negotiations in the process of the emergence of symbolic and social worlds. In that sense, all cultures are hybrid, rather than monolithic, influenced by and influencing each other at crossroads and in webs of networks, in ongoing negotiations. Rather than resulting in absolutely new identities it is a creative process in which different aspects of identity are renegotiated in relation to changing contexts. When it is recognized that culture ‘as an analytical concept is always hybrid … since it can be understood … only as the historically negotiated creation of more or less coherent symbolic and social worlds’,96 then the use of the word hybrid to label a particular phenomenon is rather meaningless. The recognition that all cultures are actually mixtures, emerging through mutual interaction, and thus unstable, substantially challenges the claim that hybridity is a new heuristically illuminating concept, beyond the immediate context of postcolonial literary studies in which it emerged. Sociologically it can actually contribute little that is really new to approaches concerned with the analyses of intercultural interaction. From the perspective of Classics, Wallace Hadrill is also not convinced that this postcolonial concept, which he acknowledges may have validity in specific analyses in postcolonial contexts, is helpful for analysing cultural interactions in antiquity. Being unconcerned with processes of interaction at individual level, he maintains that neither the metaphor of ‘fusion’ nor that of ‘hybridity’ can adequately describe the complexities of cultural identity and interaction, especially ‘the layering of identities in the wake of passages of conquest and colonisation’.97 The latter is one of the decisive factors which needs to be taken into account when talking of cultural encounter in the period under discussion. This seems to render postcolonial paradigms ideal as analytical tools, but the concept of hybridity, as we have seen, is of limited value in sociological and political terms. When it comes to these aspects of conquest and domination, the concept of hybridity, being so general as to be applicable to any cultural encounter, is not of sufficient heuristic value. Thus the use of the Greek language in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Near East was not a matter of choice which could be negotiated. The Greek language and institutions in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Near East were 93 Anthias 2001: 627–28. 94 Anthias 2008: 10 95 Lévi-Strauss 1993: 424. 96 Werbner 1997a: 15. 97 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 7.

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the language and institutions of conquest. In the first instance economic, military and political power was in the hands of Greek speakers. This was the culture of those in power, with the power to enforce their control over the non-Greekspeaking population.98 Even though over time interaction between colonizers and colonized naturally intensified at various levels, cultural encounter and interaction in Wallace-Hadrill’s view cannot be described with the help of metallurgical or biological examples, which would assume that identities are blended or hybridized to form something entirely new or different. He maintains that even in ‘colonialist circumstances, different cultures do not simply blend to form a single new entity (fusion, hybridization, creolization, métissage), but that the elements can survive in plurality alongside each other …’99 Waves of different conquests, ruling powers and thus cultural impositions do not wipe out what has been there before; rather, in complex interactions many diverse cultures coexist linguistically and retain highly distinctive particular identities under the dominance of Roman and Greek economic, military and political power in the Western and Eastern Mediterranean.100 And although the concept of hybridization allows for the active role of the colonized/dominated in the shaping of a new identity, this constitutes only a shifting of the problem in that it is still assumed that the ‘old’ or ‘original’, now colonized, identity is displaced by the new ‘hybrid’ identity.

2.5 Conclusions This critical analysis of the concept of hybridity demonstrates that rather than providing Pauline scholarship with a new tool for the analysis of Paul and his letters, it is actually a very limited concept for the analysis and self-description of a particular group of intellectuals in specific locations and situations, whether it is perceived as a ‘third space’ or ‘a third race’. Understood as the merging of cultural elements, it is actually not a new but rather an uncontested concept, which is so broad and all-encompassing that it is hardly of any specific analytical value. The issue of the merging of elements of culture has already been analysed with regard to the concept of ‘Hellenism’, where it has been demonstrated that this concept of fusion is ideologically driven. The notion of hybridity as a middle or ‘third space’ and as inherently emancipatory has been challenged, as we have noted above. Scholars in the wake of Droysen have often considered ‘Hellenism’, and ‘Hellenistic’ Judaism in particular, as a ‘middle space’ between Judaism and Christianity, paving the way for the latter. Inherent in this stance is the perception that ‘Hellenism’ here has some 98 Adams and Swain 2002: 12. This is not to claim that the process of the instigation of Greek language and customs was a programmatic aim of Alexander’s conquest; it is more likely that this process of so-called Hellenisation was ‘an adjunct not an aim of imperialism’. SherwinWhite and Kuhrt, 1993: 145. 99 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 13. 100 Adams and Swain 2002: 11.

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kind of emancipatory bridging function, and is thus not far from a perception of non-‘Hellenistic’ Judaism as being in need of ‘emancipation’. Here, the notion of ‘middle/third’ space, rather than being emancipatory, actually inscribes into the discourse of the first century a dichotomy between Judaism and the early Christ-movement that is at risk of reproducing anti-Jewish stereotypes. Thus in any assumptions of mixture and fusion the hermeneutical presuppositions of specific concepts and their theoretical framework need to be analysed, as the mere statement that culture is mixed does not contribute much in terms of analytical clarification and does not shed light on specific processes of interaction between cultures in particular contexts and circumstances. Aspects of power and domination come into play here, as well as questions of ethnic and other dimensions of the identity of communities and individuals. What is not included in the acknowledgement of cultures as mixtures is the fact that not all aspects of culture are suitable for processes of fusion; they may actually be incommensurable, so neither fusion nor translation may be a possibility. This may lead to marginalization, exclusions and notions of ‘lost in translation’ which cannot be subsumed under the concept of hybridity in any form, be this fusion, space or process. Neither fusion nor hybridity as such are emancipatory categories. Thus, although all cultures are the result of intercultural interaction and exchange, attention needs to be paid to the specific processes involved, which may or may not lead to exchange, which may or may not lead to translatability, which may or may not lead to integration. And there are other aspects of intercultural interaction which may not be captured by the common-sense statement that cultures are mixed. It is thus of little analytical value, in my view, to refer to Paul as a hybrid Jew who addresses hybrid communities in writing literary documents of a hybrid nature. Nor is there significant analytical value in concluding that Paul was a Hellenistic Jew who addresses Hellenistic communities in writing letters of a Hellenistic nature. Both concepts are not specific or differentiated enough to be able to be of significant heuristic value for an analysis of the processes of intercultural interaction that contributed to the emergence and shaping of Christ-following communities in the first century. That the contexts in which these groups emerged and in which the Pauline group operated were characterized by various diversities – cultural, ethnic, linguistic, economic, political and in terms of power and domination – is beyond doubt. That these diversities impacted on each other in multiple ways is also undisputed. But to assume that this ‘automatically’ and inherently would lead to fusions, hybridities and new identities is to ‘ignore’ the diversity of possible ways and outcomes of interaction in linguistic, cultural, social and political encounters. Having found that neither the ‘old’ paradigm of Hellenism nor ‘new’ paradigms such as hybridity or creolization provide adequate tools for analysing the processes of intercultural interaction in the context of the early Christ-movement in general and the role of Paul in particular, I will propose in the following chapter that insights from studies into bilingualism and biculturalism could shed new light on the processes which led eventually to

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the emergence of the early Christ-movement and early Judaism respectively. This is not a development of a new model, but a proposal to read the Pauline letters in the light of insights from contemporary concepts of bilingualism and biculturalism and to explore the heuristic potential of these insights for the period and processes in question. In that sense, I am proposing an alternative paradigm for reading Paul, not in the sense of a model to be applied but in the sense of an exploratory journey, trying to listen into conversations, and negotiations, between Paul and his communities, trying to pick up traces of events and activities, and trying to consider where and how these might resonate with insights from bilingualism/biculturalism. Therefore I will outline insights from contemporary research into bilingualism/biculturalism as I consider them relevant for an analysis of the Pauline discourse.

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Chapter 3 Linguistic and Cultural Diversity and Identity Formation: Contemporary Approaches Considering the linguistic and cultural diversity which existed in the Roman Empire during the first century ce, with distinctive features of cultures and languages other than Greek or Roman clearly being found in material culture as well as in literary documents, the search for alternative paradigms to those of blending, fusion and hybridization is not merely desirable but a necessity for New Testament studies. Thus although there is no evidence for Creole languages in the Greek East or in the Roman world as it is known, there is abundant evidence of bi- and multilingualism at all social levels. This leads Wallace-Hadrill to propose bi- or multilingualism as a paradigm for analysing cultural interaction in the period under discussion.1 Such bi- or multilingualism is not confined to the knowledge and use of different languages, it includes biculturalism or cultural bilingualism. The concepts of fusion, hybridization etc., including ‘Hellenism’ are based on the assumption that culture is unitary, that one has to be one or the other, or a blend of two which results again in one entity. Amartya Sen in his analysis Identity and Violence notes that much violence has been and is being generated in human history through the illusion that ‘any person pre-eminently belongs, for all practical purposes, to one collectivity only – and no more and no less ... The intricacies of plural groups and multiple loyalties are obliterated by seeing each person as firmly embedded in exactly one affiliation.’2 To envisage that two or more languages and cultures can be in use at the same time, and thus can be handled by one and the same person, seems inconceivable. However, research into the relationship between language and identity, and into bilingualism and biculturalism in particular, demonstrates that this is actually precisely what is possible.3 In this chapter I will thus explore and discuss, from a non-specialist perspective and with a view to non-specialist use, insights from sociolinguistics, sociocultural linguistics, sociology and cultural studies I consider relevant for the purpose of this study. I will firstly discuss research into the connection 1 Cf. Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 13. 2 Sen 2006: 20. 3 Cf. e.g. Pavlenko 2005.

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between language, culture and identity from a sociolinguistic perspective, then I will look at Bourdieu’s theory of practice, paying particular attention to the interplay between social and cultural fields and the dispositions of the ‘habitus’, and finally I will discuss definitions of culture and ethnicity in different disciplines as well as from interdisciplinary research. Whilst the research in these subject disciplines seems to build on the presupposition of monolingualism, or at least does not demonstrate awareness of the difference between mono- and bilingualism (except for Bourdieu in his attention to the link between language and power), attention has been drawn to the fact that a majority of the world’s population is bi- or multilingual to some extent.4 In the second section of this chapter I will thus discuss research into the connection between bilingualism and biculturalism respectively, and its relevance for processes of identity formation. The third section will then focus on research into the adaptation of a particular language in diverse cultural contexts, and particularly on the use of a language as a ‘lingua franca’. Insights from these diverse areas of research will provide indications for exploring the relevance of linguistic and cultural diversity in the first century ce beyond the fusion or hybridization paradigms proposed in previous and recent New Testament scholarship. The relevance of these indications will subsequently be explored, in an exemplary rather than a comprehensive way, in relation to Paul and the early Christ-movement.

3.1 Language, Culture and Identity: Complex Networks One of the key aspects in the formulation of the concept of Hellenism as a ‘blended’ but unitary culture was the assumption that the spreading and use of the Greek language throughout the regions which came under the influence and domination of Greek and later Roman rule carried with it the notion of the spreading of the culture associated with it. As demonstrated in the analysis in chapter 2, this predominance of Greek language and culture was actually at the heart of the concept of Hellenism in the first place, rather than a balanced blending of ‘East and West’ as claimed in the wake of Droysen. 3.1.1 Language and identity: sociolinguistic insights Recent research in sociolinguistics acknowledges links between language, culture and identity but refrains from asserting the kind of essentialist claims which were prevalent in the nineteenth century particularly under the influence of Herder’s, Fichte’s and subsequently von Humboldt’s theories of the inherent connection between the culture of a particular people, expressed in the ‘Volksgeist’ and their language.5 Inherent connections between social 4 Pavlenko 2005: 4. 5 Herder, in his Ueber den Ursprung der Sprache (1772), had postulated an intrinsic connection between ancestral language and nation, whilst Fichte, in Addresses to the German Nation (1807), maintained that since German was ‘the original language’ and thus superior to all

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context, culture, language and identity formation at individual and collective or group level are the focus of diverse approaches in the field of sociolinguistics, and more recently in sociocultural linguistics, 6 and ethno-linguistics.7 The latter in particular is in a sense a revival of von Humboldt’s essentializing assumptions which I consider highly problematic.8 But to shy away from analysing a supposed innate nature of and connection between language, culture and identity does not mean to deny any connection between these. Sociolinguists such as John Joseph, John Edwards and Farzad Sharifian presuppose in their approaches what the Basel biologist Adolph Portmann had called the socially premature birth of human beings. Everything, in addition to its immediate needs, that a child needs for survival has to be learned socially. Language is one of these dimensions. Language use is learned communicatively by a child not merely as a system which he/she learns to apply, but as something he/she creatively construes in an ongoing process of social interaction with the people around him/her. In this sense ‘language is a text, a story about talking that is at the same time a story about ourselves …’9 Communication, language, identity formation and social and cultural contexts are inherently intertwined from those early moments on when we are interacting with others. Language learning is not the learning of a mere system of signs in which the elements are all related to each other; it is not a system of rules which needs to be learned and which exists apart from people actually communicating.10 Language is relational and social, and with the language the child ‘learns’ a particular way of being in the world; he/she is being ‘embedded’ and ‘embeds’ him/herself in the world around them through particular cultural and social codes and perceptions which are shared by the small social unit of family with the wider social and cultural context of society (clan, tribe, ethnicity, nation, religion, social class/status etc). Particular traditions of ‘how to see, hear, smell, taste, feel, categorise and others, the German nation was superior. German superiority here is seen as based on the purity and superiority of the German language. Greek is the only language which is considered as being of equal status to German. See Edwards 2009: 208–11; also Joseph 2004: 45–48, 108–11. 6 Cf. Buchholtz and Hall who define sociocultural linguistics as ‘the broad interdisciplinary field concerned with the intersection of language, culture and society’, 2005: 586. 7 Wierzbicka 1992. 8 Hutton has analysed the role linguistics played during the Third Reich. Being unable to confirm racial distinctions based on biological aspects, racist ideology resorted to the tradition of Herder, Fichte and von Humboldt, that is, the postulated ‘natural’ connection between language (mother-tongue) and the cultural essence of people. Thus Slavic languages were declared inferior, being the product and producer of the lower intellectual capacity of Slavonic peoples. Yiddish was considered the Jewish core language, and although clearly a German dialect its core was declared as being mixed at most, and so Jews were considered to be anomalous in that they had no mothertongue, and thus no linguistic identity, which was evidence that they were essentially parasitic. Cf. Hutton 1999: 188–232. 9 Joseph 2004: 89. 10 ‘[I]nfants learning language are not academic grammarians inferring rules abstractly and independently of use. Whatever else language is, it is a systematic way of communicating to others, of affecting their and our behaviour, of sharing attention, and of constituting realities’, Bruner 1983: 119–20.

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interpret things’11 and experiences are passed on through this process. Through language more than words is transmitted. This is not a one-way process, nor a linear one in terms of cause and effect. Language, culture and individual and collective identities are intertwined in a network of mutual exchange/influence, being constituted by and constituting each other in a flux of ongoing interaction. In addition to the inherent link between language and socialization, and thus identity, sociolinguists alert us to different functions of languages, mainly dividing these into communicative and symbolic or representative functions.12 The communicative dimension is understood as providing the means by which human beings can communicate with each other, by exchanging information. The symbolic or representative dimension of language, on the other hand, is seen in ‘the historical and cultural associations which it has accumulated’ and which ‘provide a rich underlay for every communicative interaction, a powerful underpinning of shared connotations’.13 In this latter sense language is not merely a means of communication but a way of interpreting experience and being in the world. Language is thus a ‘witness to the ways in which their speakers have conceptualized experience throughout the history of their existence’.14 But sociolinguists like Joseph and Sharifian maintain that, rather than being clearly separable, the interpretative or symbolic and the communicative dimensions of language are inseparable. Language is thus an aspect of cultural cognition in that it is shaped by ‘cultural conceptualisations’ and serves as a ‘collective memory bank’. ‘In this sense language can be viewed as one of the primary mechanisms which stores and communicates cultural conceptualisations’, as Sharifian asserts.15 Since social groups interpret and conceptualize experiences of life and the world around them in different ways, language differences may also be part of such culturally different interpretations and thus also of different traditions.16 Rather than advocating a ‘natural’ essence of culture which manifests itself in a particular language, what is argued by Joseph, Edwards and Sharifian is a ‘weak’ Whorfianism in that ‘language influences our habitual ways of thinking’.17 Despite his emphasis on the inherent link between the 11 Joseph 2004: 35. 12 Joseph 2004: 15, 190–93; Edwards 2009: 55. 13 Edwards 2009: 55. 14 Sharifian 2011: 47. 15 Sharifian 2011: 39. 16 Sharifian 2011: 47; cf. also Edwards 2009: 60. 17 Edwards 2009: 61. The ‘strong’ Whorf-Sapir hypothesis (entry ‘Whorfianism’) is defined in the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary (1993) as follows: ‘one’s perception of the world is determined by the structure of one’s native language’, whereas the weak version is defined as follows ‘the structure of language partly determines a native speaker’s categorization of experience’ (cited in Joseph 2004: 55). Joseph considers the influence of an article by Malinowski as decisive in that Malinowski argued that meaning is not inherent in words but depends on the context of the situation in which they are spoken or formulated. The very fact of talking to each other can be the meaning of a conversation as a social act. Joseph critically evaluates this position pointing to the impossibility of knowing whether a speaker does not actually infer meaning beyond the merely social aspect of a conversation but considers Malinowski important

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communicative and representative or symbolic dimension of language, Joseph draws attention to the difference between ‘mother-tongue’ language and acquired language when it comes to these two core aspects of language. Aspects of this will be discussed in more detail below (3.2 and 3.3); here I only wish to refer to Joseph’s assertion that ‘the mother tongue has a very special role, bound up as it is with representation, which is to say with the way we think’.18 Much like Edwards he refers to this not as a strong Whorfianism, but instead asserts ‘that we have a particular attachment and allegiance to the languages in which we classify, interpret, imagine and dream’.19 Culture and language are thus seen as inherently intertwined, language bearing the traditions of sociocultural groups which may or may not also form speech communities. This emphasis leads us to consider the relationship not only between language and identity formation, but also between social and cultural traditions themselves (which are ingrained in and transmitted by language to some extent) and identity formation.20 3.1.2 Identity and the interplay between social agents and social and cultural fields The contribution of Pierre Bourdieu and his analyses of the structurally inherent connections between the individual and collective dimension of identity provide illuminating insights which in my view are relevant to an analysis of the intercultural interactions that contribute to the emergence of the Christ-movement. I do not consider all aspects of his concept of his Theory of Practice to be useful in this respect, and thus will propose an eclectic approach focusing particularly on those aspects which deal with the inherent connections between individual and society, or, to use Bourdieu’s preferred terms, between social agents and social and cultural fields.21 in so far as he drew attention to the importance of non-verbal aspects of verbal communication which decisively influence the reception of what is communicated. Thus Joseph notes that ‘it has been solidly and repeatedly demonstrated that interpretation of the speaker’s trustworthiness from the non-propositional content of utterances bears directly on the hearer’s assessment of the “truth value” of the proposition itself’, Joseph 2004: 17–25 (24). Read in the light of this insight Paul’s ‘weakness’ in terms of bodily appearance and rhetorical performance actually supports the trustworthiness of a message which focuses on the ‘foolishness of the cross’, argues for respect of the weak, etc. Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 104–14, 185–91. 18 Joseph 2004: 185. 19 Joseph 2004: 185. 20 The intertwined dimension of individual and collective identities has been analysed most prominently in social identity theory as developed by Tajfel. The identity of a person thus always embodies aspects that are decisively shaped by the group or groups this person belongs to or associates herself with. I am not aware that the social interplay between the individual and collective aspects of identity have been analysed in relation to language and culture specifically, hence I will not pursue the relevance of this important sociological approach any further in the course of this study. As noted above, Esler has applied social identity theory to an analysis of Romans (2003); recent research has explored its potential in relation to other letters, e.g. Tucker 2010 and 2011. 21 I have reservations about the ‘economic’ dimension of Bourdieu’s approach as well as his focus on conflictual aspects of social and cultural fields. Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 31.

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Although it does not focus on the question of identity per se, but is rather driven by the question of how people get to act in particular ways without being ordered to do so, that is, without obeying rules,22 his theory, in my view, has significant implications for understanding identity formation as well as for understanding the role of language in this process. Bourdieu emphasizes that human beings are socialized from their earliest moments through experiences in the family and their social environment into certain ways of acting, relating to, perceiving, and thinking about the world around them, which in turn generate certain dispositions in such a way that these imprint themselves on the body, which Bourdieu calls the ‘habitus’. This notion does not emerge in and out of itself but always in interaction with that which is already there, or what Bourdieu calls ‘fields’. Fields are something like socially conditioned diverse contexts; in terms of Bourdieu’s focus on recent Western societies, these are the arts, literature, academia, education, politics, etc., but they do not seem to be confined to these. Bourdieu also refers to social and symbolic universes as fields or as culture more generally. There is an intrinsic relation between ‘fields’ and ‘habitus’, the ‘habitus’ being structured by the structures of ‘fields’ and in turn structuring these again. This relationality is the key factor in that neither the individual actor (who embodies the ‘habitus’) nor the ‘field’ in and of themselves can be defined. The ‘habitus’ of a social agent is not something that is ‘seen’; rather it is the effects of a ‘habitus’ in practices or convictions and values, that is, in lived lives, which are visible in relation to respective contextual social ‘fields’.23 ‘Habitus’ links the social and the individual in that the individual embodies the structures of the social, and as an agent in the social realm replicates, structures and transforms these in as much as she/he is being transformed in relation to the social world inhabited. Bourdieu considers primary socialization in the social network (often the family) as being of deep significance, making a durable, transposable, but not fixed or immutable, impact on an individual.24 One of the criticisms raised against this concept is that it does not leave room for the transformative agency of an individual.25 22 Bourdieu 1998: 34. 23 Maton 2008: 61. 24 Bourdieu formulated this in numerous ways as, e.g., ‘Having the (biological) property of being open to the world, and therefore exposed to the world, and so capable of being conditioned by the world, shaped by the material and cultural conditions of existence in which it is placed from the beginning, it is subject to a process of socialization of which individuation is itself the product, with the singularity of the “self” being fashioned in and by social relations’, 2000: 134. 25 Cf. e.g. Kögler 2011: 271–99. Kögler argues that this is due to what he considers to be Bourdieu’s notion that the social ‘habitus’ is built up prior to the linguistic ‘habitus’; thus the latter is grounded in the former, prestructured by it, which restricts the potential agency of an individual in replicating the social ‘habitus’ without accurate potential for critical reflection and thus transformation. I think Kögler misinterprets Bourdieu’s statement that ‘the factors which are most influential in the formation of the “habitus” are transmitted without passing through language and consciousness, but through suggestions inscribed in the most apparently insignificant aspect of the things, situations and practices of everyday life’, Bourdieu 1991: 51. There is no sequential perception of the acquisition of social and linguistic ‘habitus’ indicated here, but rather an emphasis on the significance of aspects of the ‘habitus’.

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Indeed, Bourdieu does pay significant attention to the inscription of structures of domination embodied by agents via the dispositions of the ‘habitus’. The use of a so-called legitimate language by speakers of variations of this language or dialects is a telling example for Bourdieu in this respect, in that it demonstrates that the subconsciously accepted notion of the legitimacy and thus superiority of this legitimate language impinges on the self-perception of the dialect-speaker and his/her attempts to relate or not relate to the legitimate/official language. Since a legitimate or official language is the language that is the one declared as such by those who have the power to do so, the structure of domination is inherent in the relation between ‘legitimate/official language’ and dialects or non-official languages. If Bourdieu’s concept were deterministic, there would be no other way for this dominating power structure to be embodied than in succumbing to it. However, the interrelationship between structure and structured, or social and cultural ‘fields’ and ‘habitus’ should not be seen to be linear or mono-causal; in being relational, as emphasized by Bourdieu, it is multidimensional, as are social and cultural ‘fields’ themselves. To come back to the example of legitimate/official language and dialects and other languages, the possible dispositions this may imprint on an agent are multiple and diverse as well, depending on a multitude of factors. Acceptance and submission to the dominant structure is only one option, by, for example, denigrating one’s native dialect or language, but the opposite may also be an option transmitted by the social and cultural micro-context of family or region. The continued use of dialects and minority languages despite official suppression may be an example of resistance against this dominating discourse and policy.26 Although the dominating discourse can never be entirely ignored, there are numerous and complex options in between these extremes which do not necessarily lead to submission to the dominant pattern but may lead to creative negotiations and thus also potential transformations of the dominating discourse.27 Thus the emphasis on the durability of the ‘habitus’ should not be understood in a deterministic way (and in my understanding was not understood in a deterministic way by Bourdieu), in that early experiences leave traces of specific dispositions which enable a person to relate to and act creatively in different situations and contexts in a variety of possible but limited ways. Bourdieu describes ‘habitus’ as ‘a system of lasting, transposable dispositions which, by integrating past experiences, functions at every moment as a matrix of perception, appreciations and actions and makes possible the achievement of infinitely diversified tasks, thanks to analogical transfer of schemes permitting the solution of similarly shaped problems’.28 New experiences continue to shape the ‘habitus’, not as a tabula rasa but in relation to the dispositions which are the traces of previous experiences. There is an interplay 26 As is the case e.g. in the role of the Welsh language in maintaining the Welsh culture and identity despite attempts to marginalize the language, particularly in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as a form of inner-British colonization. 27 This aspect will be discussed in more detail below in chapter 4. 28 Bourdieu 1977: 82–83.

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and irresolvable relation between the durable, transposable and mutable seen at work. Social agents (as Bourdieu prefers to refer to individuals) are not blown about as free-floating persons by winds of change roaming a no-man’s land, but are always related to the social worlds, past and present, which they inhabit even if only temporally.29 Past, present and future are linked in the ‘habitus’ as Bourdieu emphasizes: ‘The habitus, as the word implies, is that which one has acquired, but which has become durably incorporated in the body in the form of permanent dispositions. So the term constantly reminds us that it refers to something historical, linked to individual history.’30 Intrinsic to ‘habitus’ is thus the notion of improvisation within defined limits bearing some resemblances to the use of language, in that possible practices are not infinite but enabled to act creatively within a more or less clearly limited range of options.31 Bourdieu’s concept captures the interrelationship between the individual and sociocultural dimensions of identity and action in a comprehensive manner, in that it holds together the uniqueness of an individual’s life and the social and cultural structures and forces that are embodied by an individual in a particular way. He describes its cornerstone as ‘the two-way relationship between objective structures (those of social fields) and incorporated structures (those of the habitus)’.32 Significantly, Bourdieu does not postulate these social and cultural structures and universes or ‘fields’ as universal concepts; rather they are contextually and historically located, that is, intrinsically relational in that sense as well.33 The historicity of ‘habitus’, ‘fields’ and thus identity are decisive aspects of his theorizing, as he emphasizes: ‘My entire scientific enterprise is indeed based on the belief that the deepest logic of the social world can be grasped only if one plunges into the particularity of an empirical reality, historically located and dated, but with the objective of constructing it … as an exemplary case in a finite world of possible configurations.’34 The socialization into social and cultural ‘fields’ is intrinsic to identity, and thus ‘habitus’ is not something one can leave behind or break out of as it is part of an agent’s life story, of his/her history, a way of being,35 stored in the conscious and unconscious embodied memory. Culture and language are intrinsic parts of this embodied memory, which in turn interacts through activation of appropriate dispositions in specific situations in and with these, contributing to their shape, transformation and ongoing history. The relationship between ‘habitus’ and the social and cultural world can be described as one of mutual and continuous imprinting and transformation. 29 Bourdieu 2000: 131. 30 Bourdieu 1993: 86. 31 Steinmetz 2011: 51. 32 Bourdieu 1998: vii. 33 Bourdieu 2000: 116. 34 Bourdieu 1998: 2. 35 ‘It (habitus) expresses first the result of an organizing action, with a meaning close to that of words such as structure; it also designates a way of being, a habitual state (particularly of the body) and, in particular a predisposition, tendency, propensity or inclination,’ Bourdieu 1977: 214.

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3.1.3 Definitions of culture and ethnicity Culture is a term not always clearly delineated in Bourdieu’s work and, as noted above, he can refer to it in the sense of the symbolic and social universe or, more specifically and narrowly, as art and literature. The sociolinguists discussed above also do not provide definitional clarification in that respect as relevant for the period in question. It is a fuzzy term which is often used overlapping with other entities such as ethnicity, religion, or nation. I will thus set out what is meant by culture in this study without claiming that this fuzziness can be overcome and overlaps avoided entirely. What definitions of culture have in common is the clear reference to socially acquired aspects of groups and individuals. These encompass shared patterns of interaction and behaviour, knowledge and interpretation, beliefs and values, that is, the accumulated experience of life and its interpretation by a group which is transmitted through social learning from one generation to the next. Since these patterns are interactively transmitted through generations, they are obviously varied and transformed over time and context. (These shared traditions and patterns have identity-forming dimensions in that they distinguish one group from another.) Since culture does not exist in the form of an abstract template it only manifests itself in the diversity of people who are shaped by and shape a particular culture. The interplay between variability and stability, unity and diversity is characteristic of cultures in general.36 There is in these descriptions of culture a notion of similarity with Bourdieu’s ‘habitus’. Floya Anthias has presented a categorization of culture as used in sociology differentiating three main categories: First, she refers to culture as artefacts and attributes of a locality or group; thus culture is seen as ‘content and practice’. Second, culture is seen as ‘world-view, involving an orientation in the world’. This is seen as a pool from which forms of culture or products and resources are drawn; thus culture is a process or mechanism. Third, ‘culture is defined as a patterned way of knowing and doing’; thus it is a form or structure.37 This attempt at categorizing different uses of the term culture already demonstrates the difficulty in defining it, with obvious overlaps and connections between these. Farzad Sharifian, in his Cultural Conceptualisations and Language: Theoretical Framework and Applications, presents a differentiated theory which, informed by extensive empirical research, attempts to formulate insights into how experience perceived and interpreted contributes to cultural construals. Rather than speaking of culture as a concept, he proposes to speak of ‘cultural conceptualisations’. He considers groups, how they relate to each other, and how they see the world as intrinsically related. Thus, cultural groups are formed ‘by relative participation of individuals in each other’s conceptual

36 Cf. Hingley 2005: 51–53. 37 Anthias 2001: 627.

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world’.38 They share certain ways of being in and perceiving the world, and of doing things accordingly. Cultural conceptualizations thus have to do with life experience and its interpretation. ‘Cultural conceptualisations are the ways in which people across different cultural groups construe various aspects of the world and their experiences. These include people’s view of the world, thoughts and feelings.’39 These conceptualizations are not static and given but, much as the interaction between ‘habitus’ and ‘field’, emerge from interactions between the members of the group; they are ‘negotiated and renegotiated through time and across generations’.40 How these cultural conceptualizations are embodied by individual group members varies (similarly to the embodied ‘habitus’) as they are not appropriated in a mechanical or repetitive way; thus heterogeneity is characteristic for any cultural group. Stable or identical locality is also not a condition for a cultural group, but it means that group members more or less ‘conceptualise experience in a similar fashion’.41 Experiences are understood and conceptualized in different ways in different cultures. The sharing and transmission of cultural concepts are deeply social activities in which language plays an important role, in that cultural conceptualizations, although not exclusively but significantly, express themselves through language.42 Sharifian emphasizes that ‘Language is a central aspect of cultural cognition in that it serves as a collective memory bank … for cultural conceptualisations past and present.’ Language is thus seen as having a primary role in the storing and transmission of culture. Sharifian in his strong emphasis on cognition and language may overstate the cognitive aspects in the processes of cultural transmission, and underestimate their subconscious and corporeal dimensions, which Bourdieu clearly recognized,43 but his approach to culture as an ongoing process of synchronic and diachronic negotiations within a particular cultural group guards against a homogenizing perception of particular cultures and draws attention to the diversity within any culture. In this context some clarification is required concerning the delineation between culture and ethnicity. Anthias draws attention to the necessity of clarifying the relation between these concepts and the difficulties involved in this, noting that: ‘A particular problem in the study of collective identity is the relationship between having a sense of cultural identity … and being placed within the social relations to an attributed “ethnic” group which has particular practices and which is subjected to societal practices, that is, as a lived experience.’44 Cultural groups who share a selection of features as 38 Sharifian 2011: 4. 39 Sharifian 2011: 38. 40 Sharifian 2011: 2. 41 Sharifian 2011: 26. 42 The embodiment of culture is of similar importance in his approach, expressed in the concept of ‘habitus’. Recently sociology and cultural studies have begun to consider the relevance of this at conceptual level. Cf. e.g. Meuser and Keller 2011; Ritzer and Stiglegger 2012;Waskul and Vannini 2006. 43 Sharifian 2011: 39. 44 Anthias 2001: 629.

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noted above do not necessarily cohere with ethnic groups. There are notions of class, gender, trade, education, etc. which express themselves through specific cultural features and may or may not lead to group perception, but are not related to ethnicity, whereas ethnic groups may encompass culturally differentiated groups. Concerning this Anthias notes: ‘Ethnicity cannot be confined to questions of culture and identity, since it is evident that culture and identity need not take an ethnic form.’45 Similarly, Jenkins has emphasized that ‘the existence of a group is not a reflection of cultural difference’.46 Both build on the classical work on Ethnic Groups and Boundaries47 edited by Barth, where the distinction between culture and ethnicity is delineated as that of a ‘kind’ or category, meaning that ethnic groups are a form of social organization, not of culture. Cultural features, selectively used by group members, could designate ethnic identity rather than constituting it. Barth’s notion that ethnic identity is always expressed as the self-perception of a group, distinguishing themselves through boundaries from other such groups established the now accepted common denominator of the various circumscriptions of ethnicity. This self-perception is expressed in culturally diverse ways which may change over time and context, but such cultural variations need not change the boundaries and thus the identity of the group itself. It is a collective rather than an individual endeavour. It is as a group that collective, and thus ethnic, identity is defined, circumscribed and expressed. It is a conscious affiliation with tradition which has a historical dimension in narratives of a shared origin and past. It is enacted in rituals, ‘common symbolic codes and values, common customs and a shared tradition of language’.48 Individuals are born into groups and dispositions are also shaped, as emphasized, by social interaction in terms of ethnic belonging. As Jenkins emphasized, ‘actors may make their own identities, but they do not do so in circumstances of their own choosing’.49 Ethnicity is a concept which only exists relationally. Inasmuch as ethnic identity refers internally to self-perception it presupposes and relates to other groups who perceive themselves in a similar but distinct way. Thus ethnicity only exists in relational plurality. This needs to be taken into account particularly with regard to Judaism, including the early Christmovement in the first century ce, in that differentiation between ethnic groups was the shared cultural context within which Jewish particularity needs to be considered. It was expressed not as an exception to the rule but in the context of cultural features shared by all groups that designated themselves according to parameters that at the time were considered more or less constitutive for being considered a ‘people’. I will discuss the relational aspect of ethnicity in its significance for the first century in more detail below in section 5.3.

45 Anthias 2001: 629. 46 Jenkins 1997: 11. 47 Barth 1970. 48 Strobel 2009: 121. 49 Jenkins 1997: 142.

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With Hall and others50 I consider ethnicity to encompass aspects such as a common name, a myth of common ancestry, cultural practices such as common customs, language, religion, shared history or memory of the past, location (actual or symbolic), and communal solidarity. Edwards has pointed to the fact that the sense of group boundary and some shared objective characteristics are decisive aspects of ethnic identity although social and cultural patterns may change over time. For Anthias, the decisive aspect of ethnic identity is the sense of belonging that is sustained by a shared narrative of belonging. The identity is sustained as long as people enact such narratives and boundaries in practice, that is, as communities of practice via embodied and embodying transmission and not merely through mental acts of remembering. I think Edwards’ and Anthias’ emphases on shared characteristics and a narrative of belonging are decisive specifications which contribute to the differentiation between the concept of culture and ethnicity and help to create a sense of the interplay between these without conflating them.51 Although culture and ethnicity are always intertwined, their realms may or may not overlap or overlap to various degrees. Cultural changes may not affect ethnic identity and the continuity of ethnic identity is not identical with cultural continuity. Cultural practices, structures, even perceptions of the world can sustain more than one ethnicity, as can languages, but certain cultural aspects may be unique to a particular ethnic identity – and the same applies to languages.52 3.1.4 Language, culture and identity: conclusions These considerations about language, culture, and collective (ethnic) and individual identity demonstrate the inherent interweaving of these aspects in networks of mutual influence as inseparable embodied dimensions of identity at group level as well as at the level of the individual. Although these aspects are inseparable, they are neither static nor immutable. In emphasizing their interrelation I do not advocate an immutable essentialism of culture and ethnicity or a perception of languages as closed entities, hermetically sealed against any outside influence. Where people and thus cultures and ethnicities come into contact with each other there is mutual exchange and thus influence. In that sense, as noted above, they are always ‘hybrid’. Hence the question which arises from this – the question that proponents of the concept of Hellenism as well as of theories of hybridity have tried to resolve – is how contact and interaction between different cultures and languages affect the identity of groups and individuals. Informed by the aspects of recent sociolinguistic and sociological theories outlined above, what is of special interest is how people who live in contexts where different cultures and languages are present within a limited geographical area, and during a specific 50 Hall 2002: 9–19; Hutchinson and Smith 1996: 6–7. 51 Edwards 2009: 251; Anthias 2001: 633. Cf. also Hodos who states that ‘ethnicity is an active designate of an explicitly political nature, whereas cultural identity arises from the broader social patterning’ (2010: 11). 52 Cf. the analysis of the Jewish Greek discourse below, section 6.2 .

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period, in particular circumstances, as is the case in the Roman Empire of the first century ce, relate to and engage with each other. As noted above, WallaceHadrill has drawn attention to the fact that there is ample evidence for the parallel presence and use of different languages in antiquity, and thus what can be asserted is that this implies the existence of people who were bilingual at least and were thus able to act as translators between different speech and cultural communities.53 The implications of this for the interaction of ethnic groups during the first century ce, and between Jews and those generally subsumed under the term e1qnh will be considered below in section 5.3.

3.2. Bilingualism, Biculturalism and Ethnic Diversity 3.2.1 Shifting perspectives: from monolingualism to bilingualism Since, as I have outlined above, there is a consensus among sociolinguists that language, culture and identity are closely intertwined, the fact that some people are using more than one language, and thus participate in more than one speech community, raises questions concerning the implications this has for the identity and sense of ethnic and cultural belonging of bilinguals. Although this is only a recently emerging area of interdisciplinary research, it not only adds an aspect to linguistic studies but also challenges the notion particularly prevalent in linguistic research studying the interplay between language and emotion (which is inherently intertwined with identity) that what applies to monolinguals also applies to bi- or multilinguals. The challenge to this widely held perception has been compared to feminism calling into question the assumption (not just in academic disciplines) that what applies to men applies equally to women. Thus, if research privileges monolingualism as the norm, bi- and multilinguals are inherently marginalized as the curious exception. The particularity of their experience, which in terms of numbers is actually that of a majority, is thereby not recognized in its own right and the complexity of bi- and multilingualism is segregated into a marginal specialist field.54 The significance of this complex experience has thus not been recognized and, much like the challenge of feminism to the dominating paradigms, it will most likely be a long journey to the general recognition of the significance of bilingualism for all aspects of life, not least the emotional dimension and individual and collective identity formation. Pauline studies, like most disciplines which consider phenomena of cultural diversity, have been conducted from a ‘monolingual’ perspective. The significance of cultural and linguistic diversity has been subsumed under the assumption that what applies to adherents of one culture and language is transferable to people of different cultural and linguistic contexts. As mentioned above, this leads to the notion that one person is viewed as an adherent of one culture and language 53 On the role of translators as mediators see Burke 2007: 11–16. 54 Pavlenko 2005: 5.

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only. The only way to solve the presence of more than one culture seems to have been blending, fusion or hybridization in order to re-establish a unitary framework through which one could then apply a ‘monolingual’ perspective for the analysis of a particular individual or group. Bilingualism and biculturalism research demonstrates that in most instances this is a reductionist perception which does not pay adequate attention to the complexity of these dimensions. In view of the fact that the period under discussion and the context of the early Christ-movement were undoubtedly encompassing a wide range of diverse cultures, ethnic groups and different languages, I consider bilingualism and biculturalism research as being highly significant for New Testament studies generally and Pauline studies in particular. While the previous sections focused on aspects of collective identity and the interplay between collective and social individual identity, the focus in this section is more on the individual’s identity since situations in which an entire speech community is bilingual are not frequent phenomena (an exception is Wales, where Welsh speakers are, with hardly any exception, bilingual). Collective dimensions of bilingualism and biculturalism in particular will be considered below in section 3.3. 3.2.2 Definitions of bilingualism In line with the convention in bilingualism research I refer to bilingualism and biculturalism as including multilingualism and multiculturalism respectively. With regard to the question as to who is considered to be a bilingual person, the answer is complex. There are various degrees of bilingualism which encompass bilingualism from early childhood to acquired bilingualism with some limited ability to use the language. Scholars in the field now mainly use the term in a user-based way. Bi- or multilinguals are thus people who use more than one language in their daily lives, either simultaneously or consecutively. Mostly they may or may not have equal fluency in their languages ‘due to the complementary principle – that is, the fact that their multiple languages are usually acquired and used in different contexts, with different people, and for different purposes’.55 There is a high degree of variation in the relation between the languages of bilinguals which need not be discussed in detail here, but what is significant is the insight that bilinguals are not two monolinguals in one person but have ‘a distinct compound state of mind – multicompetence’;56 they are people with a specific and unique linguistic system that differs from monolinguals. Traditionally, research in the dominating monolingual perspective has mainly focused on more technical peculiarities such as code switching, variations in phonology, grammar, syntax, etc. However, the intrinsic link between language and identity, combined with the recognition of the multicompetence of bilinguals, according to Edwards requires that ‘we have to go beyond instrumental matters … and consider issues of psychology 55 56

Pavlenko 2005: 6. Pavlenko 2005: 12.

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and sociology, of symbol and subjectivity’.57 Thus matters concerning belonging, worldviews, i.e. cultural frameworks, values, emotions, etc., are affected when more than one language is involved in identity-related matters at individual and collective levels. Even only limited fluency in languages other than the primary language raises the awareness that there is more than one way of expressing one’s being in the world and one’s perception of life and the world. And obviously the deeper one is involved in more than one language group, or speech community, the deeper this must affect the identity of an individual. 3.2.3 Perceptions of bilingualism Earlier perceptions of bilingualism considered this to have detrimental effects for the individuals concerned. It was assumed that bilingualism was a problem, in that bilinguals had two (or more) incompatible or conflicting identities, a state sometimes referred to as ‘linguistic schizophrenia’58 but also described as a kind of split personality that is more than linguistic. Bilinguals were considered to be ‘mentally retarded, morally deprived, and prone to stuttering’, among other disorders attributed to the fact of bilingualism. Thus even in 1984 Paul Theroux asked whether the Welsh could be explained in terms of being bilingual, which is so often a form of schizophrenia, allowing a person to hold two contradictory opinions in his head at once, because his opinions remain untranslated. The Welsh had that mildly stunned and slap-happy personality that I associated with people for whom speaking two languages was a serious handicap. It made them profligate with language, it made them inexact … a kind of confusion.59

This view is still not entirely overcome, despite the rising recognition of the significance and even benefits of bilingualism, as a comment on the part of David Blunkett in 2002 demonstrates; he maintained that the use of English rather than the native language in Asian British households would contribute to overcoming ‘the schizophrenia which bedevils generational relationships’ in respective families.60 However, a difference in the use of two languages, either simultaneously in a variety of contexts or at the temporal distance of different life stages, is also recognized by bilinguals themselves, though their evaluations are at significant variance from such negative stereotyping. Rather than referring to different personalities or identities in one person, effectively two monolinguals in one body, the use of two languages by one and the same person may involve the salience of different aspects of identity depending on context, location and situation. That different patterns of self-presentation depend on context, social 57 Edwards 2009: 248. 58 Pavlenko 2006a: 3. 59 Theroux 1984: 163–64 cited in Edwards 2009: 250. 60 Cited in Pavlenko 2006a: 3.

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context in particular is not a privilege of bilinguals but applies to monolinguals as well. However, there are clear indications that among bilinguals there is generally greater sensitivity towards and awareness of such differences along with an enhanced repertoire of flexibility and adaptation as well as a ‘heightened awareness of, and concern for identity’.61 It has been argued that L2 users (non-native speakers), with their double or multiple vision, are critical to cross-linguistic research (and, by analogy, to cross-cultural research). Pavlenko draws attention to Robert Lowie, who in 1945 had already noted that the bilingual ‘has insights not granted in quite so vivid a manner to others. He cannot help constantly comparing modes of expression; and what others recognize as an abstract principle is to him an ever-recurring vital experience – the incommensurability of different languages.’62 This is attributed to the fact that for monolingual speakers of a dominant language the link between language and identity is far less obvious since it is not problematic and thus does not require conscious consideration. 3.2.4 Bilingualism and power For bilinguals who are speakers of minority languages or migrants from different language contexts such unawareness is simply not an option. They can ignore neither the complex issues involved in the use of different languages and their intrinsic link with their identity nor the issues of power and domination that accompany the use of majority languages.63 Language use is never neutral, something which is particularly noticeable in multilingual societies ‘where some languages and identity options are … “more equal than others”’.64 Pavlenko also asserts that ‘ideologies of language are not about language alone … but always socially situated and tied to questions of identity and power in societies’.65 Language and power are intrinsically linked, as Bourdieu has argued in his critique of linguistic theories which focus merely on grammatical issues. He drew attention to the socio-historical context and conditions of the emergence of languages in distinction from dialects. What is called a language in the sense of an ‘official’ or ‘legitimate’ language emerges through ‘complex historical process, sometimes involving extensive conflict especially in colonial context’ through which one particular dialect is being constituted as the ‘official’ language, with other dialects and languages being subordinated.66 It is the language of the ‘victorious’ that emerges as a dominant or ‘official’ language – hence the saying ‘Language is a dialect with an army’ is not inappropriate when the implicit power involved in the use of language is addressed. What Bourdieu describes as the process through which ‘official’ languages were defined in emerging nation-states is not identical 61 Edwards 2009: 254. 62 Lowie 1945: 257 cited in Pavlenko 2006a: 21. 63 Cf. Bourdieu 1991: 43–65. 64 Blackledge and Pavlenko 2004a: 3. 65 Blackledge and Pavlenko 2004a: 11. 66 Bourdieu 1991: 44–49.

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with the dominant use of Greek and Latin in the Roman Empire, but there are insights which I consider helpful in assessing the power issues involved in the use of these languages, favoured as they were by the dominating military and political power.67 However, Bourdieu only focused on the issues concerning domination through the ‘legitimate’ language and considered the inscription of domination into any use of this language an almost inevitable consequence. The implication then is that users of other languages and dialects are victims of this inscribed domination without any option for alternative strategies. This ignores the potential of the ongoing use of minority or non-official languages and dialects in ‘local marketplaces’, where agents may well be able to develop or maintain alternative communities of solidarity and practice that subvert the dominating discourse. This could even have implications for the use of the ‘official’ language in that such use is then adapted to the social and cultural practice of the minority group rather than the dominating language imposing its structure on that group. Rather than merely accepting tacitly the world of the dominating language by using it, such communities adapt this language to their perception of the world. The language adjusts to the ‘habitus’ rather than the other way round. Farzad Sharifian has found compelling evidence for such adaptations of the dominating language in his research into the use of English among Aborigines. I will come back to this in more detail below in section 3.3. Further aspects which impinge on an analysis of the Pauline discourse from a bilingual/bicultural perspective are questions about primary attachments of bilinguals who are rooted in more than one speech community; about emotional experience and expressions of bilinguals; the role of a language for members who do not actively speak the language associated with the community; and the analogies and differences between bilingualism and biculturalism. 3.2.5 Bilingualism, emotions and identity Whether or not bilinguals necessarily have a primary attachment to one of the languages and speech communities of which they are part depends to some extent on when they became bilingual. For acquired bilinguals, a primary attachment to the language and community they grew up with in early childhood is certainly being affirmed, even by adherents of a ‘weak’ Whorfianism. The prevalence of the ‘mother-tongue’ and the experiences and associations embedded in the use of language contribute to imprinting dispositions of the ‘habitus’ from an early age. However, things are more complicated with children who grow up bilingually from a very early age. Edwards acknowledges that there is virtually no research which focuses on the identity-shaping aspects of earliest bilingualism. Whether the different languages are integrated at the same emotional and cognitive level from the 67 It is not a phenomenon restricted to Greek and Latin; similar issues of power would need to be considered in the use of Aramaic as the ‘official’ language of the Persian Empire. See below, chapter 4

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earliest days or whether the primacy issue is more subtle is probably difficult to ascertain, but since hardly any research exists no further comments are possible. For most bilinguals there exists a psychological and emotional primacy and their identity, although encompassing several strands, ‘is influenced by one language and culture more than by others’.68 The emotional dimension of bilingualism is an aspect that has only recently become the focus of research. Aneta Pavlenko has drawn attention to this dimension and focuses on questions such as ‘Do bi- and multilinguals sometimes feel different when speaking different languages? Are they perceived as different people by their interlocutors? Do they behave differently?’69 As noted above, different language use and different behaviour depending on context, social group and situation is not restricted to bilinguals. Different aspects of identity may be salient depending on who we encounter, what we wish to achieve, etc. However, Pavlenko maintains that the experience and self-perception of bilinguals is not merely an expansion of monolingual identity, but has some distinct aspect which differentiates bilingual experience from monolingual language variation and diglossia. This is enhanced when a second language (and perhaps subsequent ones) is acquired as an adult, if this has a typologically different structure from the language with which one is familiar, and if there are significant socio-cultural differences associated with the new language. Through data gathered in empirical research, Pavlenko comes to the conclusion that a majority of bilinguals felt as different selves in different languages. These different emotional experiences were attributed to ‘(1) different linguistic and cultural contexts, (2) distinct learning contexts, (3) different levels of language emotionality, (4) different levels of language proficiency’.70 The most interesting aspect in view of the focus of this study is the high percentage of bilinguals who attributed such emotional difference to cultural factors. This indicates that participants associated cultural differences with language difference. Of course, this perception does not exclude other factors and the social context seems to play an important role here as well. This difference has implications for the ability of bilinguals to translate experiences or discourses that for them are rooted in one cultural and linguistic context into another such context. This problem has led writers who write in more than one language either to experience great difficulties in 68 Edwards 2009: 253. I could not find any research into the language use of mothers with their babies in bilingual contexts. I am inclined to think (from non-research-based general observations) that mothers even when they have acquired fluency in other languages will talk to their babies in their own mother-tongue, that is, the language in which they themselves were spoken to during the earliest months of their lives, drawing on their own earliest experiences and singing the same lullabies they know from earliest childhood. Since it is established that babies follow and pick up the intonation of language, which is closely associated with emotions and body language, before any recognition of particular sounds this seems to add weight to the unproven assumptions. Thus I assume that the primacy Edwards mentions even of earliest bilinguals is that of the language they were first mainly spoken to as babies. 69 Pavlenko 2006a: 1. 70 Pavlenko 2006a: 10.

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translating their own texts into their other language, or not to translate at all but feel the need to write different texts entirely because it seems impossible to express the same content/story in the other tongue.71 This draws attention to the difficulties of translation in general and to those of cultural translation in particular. Even where lexical equivalents exist between languages there might be cultural variations in meaning that can render understanding difficult. This is obvious in translations between languages. If languages are storage houses of experiences and act as memory banks, as noted above, cultural narratives, codes and encyclopedias are associated with culturally specific contents. They are context specific in a narrower sense as well, that is, socially, temporally and in terms of location for individuals who will associate embodied aspects of their social identity and their individual experiences with their primary language and culture even in translation. Thus in a conversation the same words may be used but the meaning and associations attributed to these may differ significantly between interlocutors. In that sense, cultural differences may be more significant than linguistic ones.72 This is an issue which needs to be taken into account as far as translation is concerned but it also impinges on our understanding of the implications of the use of a language as lingua franca. I will come back to this aspect below. 3.2.6 Biculturalism The primary importance attributed to cultural difference draws attention to an aspect of bilingualism which may not be exclusively linked to language as such. Biculturalism is a term used for people who have integrated different cultural meaning systems, ways of doing things and of structuring knowledge, emotions and relationships. Bilingualism and biculturalism are in many cases closely intertwined and what has just been outlined as characteristic for bilinguals equally applies to biculturals. Pavlenko often refers to bicultural bilinguals. But the combination of the terms indicates that not all bilinguals are perceived to be bicultural nor that all biculturals are bilingual. Edwards has pointed to the fact that in some cases the continuing sense of a particular cultural and ethnic identity does not depend on the active use of a language associated with that particular group, noting that: ‘The attachment felt by English-speaking Irish or Welsh to a culture and ancestry whose language they no longer possess is a psychologically real one, and demonstrates the continuing power of what is tangible and symbolic … Indeed, there often exist continuing attachments to the “lost” language itself as an important aspect of that ancestry.’73 Cultural difference is maintained despite the use of another 71 Pavlenko refers to Todorov’s experience with a lecture he had given in France and then wanted to give in Bulgaria. The different cultural, social and linguistic context meant he could not merely translate his lecture from French into Bulgarian (2006a: 5). 72 This is particularly evident, for example, in the differences between British English and American English, where linguistic differences are minimal, but in some cases the cultural differences are significant. 73 Edwards 2009: 251.

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language. This aspect will be of particular importance when we later consider Paul’s reference to himself as a ‘Hebrew of Hebrews’, which may or may not refer to his knowledge or fluency in this language but certainly refers to the ongoing significance of the language to his sense of belonging. This specific use of a language by culturally and ethnically different communities of practice demonstrates that the link between language and culture is varied and complex. What emerges is that people who are embedded in more than one language or culture or both have an enhanced awareness of the differences they encompass in their identity. As noted above, they seem to share the awareness that there is more than one way of perceiving and experiencing life and seeing the world. This is a characteristic shared by bilinguals and biculturals. Bilinguals never confuse the different languages they use even when they code-switch. There is no conflation of languages and no blending of these into one. Bilinguals maintain the awareness of difference in their language use. Most of the aspects of bilingualism mentioned above apply by analogy to biculturalism. Like bilinguals, biculturals have varied degrees of competence in different cultural meaning systems and different levels of integrating these in their identity. Thus rather than switching between languages biculturals are seen as switching between their different cultural meaning systems depending on the situation they are responding to or the context they find themselves in. This may be enriching in cases where it enables someone to relate well to the different communities involved, but the meaning and values systems may be very different or even conflicting, thus leading to conflicts for a bicultural person who cannot live both cultures but has to make a choice between them. Although knowledge and familiarity with different cultures or ethnic communities is possible, their equal integration may not always be an option.74 Again, we will consider the relevance of this to Paul and the first-century context in more detail below. Cultural frame switching may be very clear-cut when the different cultural meaning systems involved contrast clearly with one another and it is easy to distinguish their different codes, practices, etc. The issue is more complicated when cultural frameworks vary only to certain degrees; though differences exist they may not always be distinct. There seem to be contexts in which biculturals may use elements from different meaning systems in one and the same situation, subconsciously combining them to a certain degree.75 In addition, since we clearly maintain that cultures are not closed systems but open to influence and interaction at the points of contact, they are blended or hybrid by default. Thus we should expect one and the same person who has knowledge of and is embedded to some extent in more than one cultural meaning system to intermingle different cultural elements. How this affects ethnic identity or the sense of identity of a community of practice is a different matter. Cultural hybridization and blending in the sense noted 74 Benet-Martinez et al. 2002: 496. 75 Grosjean 2010: 178, also 113.

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above and individual and collective identity formation are not identical and need to be carefully distinguished. The blending aspect does not prevent clear maintenance of an awareness of difference among biculturals, as is evident from examples past and present. Wallace-Hadrill in his reference to Quintus Ennius draws attention to the reference to him as having three hearts, which seems to refer to the core of his identity.76 His Roman citizenship did not lead him to conceive of his Oscan (original) identity as being obliterated, nor did his Greek education lead him to lose his sense of roots. This is only one example of a conscious awareness of the simultaneous existence and handling of different cultural systems. It is cultural multilingualism. What emerges from this is that to have learned Greek, that is, to have been able to speak and/ or write Greek and do certain things the ‘Greek way’, in no way implied that the language and culture of origin had to be given up, nor was there such an expectation. For example, to be able to write fluently in Greek and express his own thinking in Greek ways in no way diminished the Jewish identity and the Jewish way of life for Philo. There is no confluence of ideas or identities in which Romans swapped their clothes for Greek ones, as Suetonius reports: ‘sed et ceteros continuos dies inter varia munuscula togas insuper et pallia distribuit, lege proposita ut Romani Graeco, Graeci Romano habitu et sermone uterentur’.77 It was precisely the awareness of the difference that made such games of exchanging cultural identity markers possible.

3.3 Language Adaptation, Lingua Franca and Identity/Belonging A special case occurs when a particular language is used as a means of communication across a wide range of different linguistic and cultural contexts. This is an exceptional use of language which only seems to occur in association with the imposition of dominating power in contexts of conquest and imperial expansion. Spanish, French and English (and Portuguese, Russian and Chinese) did not become widespread because of any linguistic features but because they were the languages of colonial or imperial powers. This also applies to Greek in the wake of Alexander’s conquest of the regions of Asia and the Near East, as well as later to Latin in the West of the Roman Empire. Such languages have no doubt become means of communication in many parts of the world, and English in particular is used as a ‘lingua franca’. It is questionable whether and to what extent such a use of a language leads to enculturation, or buying into the dominating power structures associated with the language, as has sometimes been advocated in New Testament studies.78 This again is a peculiarity of specific interest with regard to the first century and Greek (and Latin) as the languages of the dominating powers taking on 76 Cf. Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 3. 77 Cf. Suetonius, Augustus 98, quoted in A.Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 39. 78 Marchal argues that ‘both Paul’s letters and Pauline interpretation are the results of imperially gendered rhetorical activities’ (2008: 11); also Kittredge 1998: 91–98, 175–78.

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the function of a lingua franca. Whilst the aspect of domination in the use of an imperial language should be taken seriously, to consider this to be a one-way street does not do justice to the active role of subjugated agents in this respect. Joseph asserts that although language and identity are inherently intertwined, and thus language is culturally loaded, ‘a given language is capable of sustaining more than one culture’. He emphasizes that language and ‘habitus’ are intertwined in such a way that ‘Transferred to a different habitus, the language will mold itself to that habitus, rather than the other way round.’79 The decisive agents in collective identity formation are thus communities who share practice and embody shared beliefs and values as the markers of their identity. Language is important in identity formation as we have noted above, but the link is such that the community of practice shapes the use of language rather than the other way round. The numerous adaptations of English in various contexts of the former British Empire indicate contextual adaptations that cannot be explained by the pattern of domination alone. It does not render the language value-free; imperial history is part of the use of English in any context. That it is English that has been adapted according to the needs of local cultures is due to the fact that it was the language of the Empire. But these variations witness not only to the domination of the Empire but also to the creative agency of its users. English has been and is contextualized when used by particular communities as well as when functioning as a lingua franca.80 Sharifian has drawn attention to the use of English by Aborigine communities in Western Australia and concluded from this that the language is adapted by a community to serve its needs and to express meanings specific to the community and particular situations. He notes ‘that a language implanted in new localities may be adapted and appropriated by its new speakers to express their own native worldview and culture. This has, for example, been observed in the case of Aboriginal people adapting English to clothe their own worldview and cultural conceptualisations.’81 This example of language adaptation by a particular community is an important insight which will significantly inform our assessment of Paul’s and other first-century Jews’ use of Greek as their means of communication in the following chapters. In its function as lingua franca the language is not a neutral or merely utilitarian means of communication either. The widespread use of English as lingua franca does not pass uncontested,82 which indicates that cultural sensitivities are a factor even in the relatively functional use of a language. But important for this study is the general recognition that even a lingua franca, in this case English, reflects the values and interests of its speakers who come from divergent linguistic and cultural backgrounds. English as a lingua franca is thus far from being unitary and monolithic but due to the diversity of its speakers always heterogeneous and locally appropriated. 79 80 81 82

Joseph 2004: 167. Cogo 2012: 97. Sharifian 2011: 34. Cf. Canagarajah 2006: 3.

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Diverse socio-cultural values, backgrounds and understandings are part of any communication in which a language is used as a lingua franca. Understanding can only be achieved through pragmatic negotiation between the interlocutors, which involves more than linguistic exchange. This indicates that far from imposing a one-dimensional perspective or cultural dominance on the user of a language as a lingua franca, it is the agents and the specific context that are the decisive shaping factors in the use of a language in this vein. Rather than being a hindering or obscuring aspect, the use of a lingua franca actually enhances the awareness of diversity among the interlocutors, as well as the recognition of the necessity that for successful communication to be achieved far more than a mere exchange of words is involved. Negotiation of meaning is an inherent requirement of any conversation between people of different linguistic, cultural and social backgrounds. Understanding cannot be assumed in communication but needs to be achieved through conscious effort. The use of a lingua franca is a special use of language and a special case of bilingualism. Both contribute to an enhanced awareness of differences among language users. It has been assumed that as exemplary users of more than one language bilinguals ‘bring with them intuitive strategies that facilitate healthy negotiations’.83 The relevance of this insight will be further analysed with regard to the role of Paul and his team in chapter 5.

3.4 Conclusions We have investigated the multiple and complex aspects of the relation between language, culture and identity informed by current sociolinguistic research and aspects of Bourdieu’s approach to the interplay between individuals and society more generally. Although there is an inherent and primary link between language and cultural embeddedness in the ‘habitus’, this link, although durable, is neither static nor immutable. It is a disposition which enables an agent to relate creatively to situations and contexts in appropriate but also innovative ways. As such, identity is always localized temporally, socially and culturally. Against any deterministic notion we found that this allows for the perception of transformation within the parameters of a given context. That the link between culture and language is not deterministic is also evident when the widespread existence of bilingualism and biculturalism is taken into account. What emerged from our survey is that rather than a language per se being the determinative factor in terms of self-perception and identity, it is the cultural patterns combined with the sense of belonging that, in multilingual contexts, are the decisive identity-shaping factors. Languages are important in that they are adjusted to the communicative and more significantly to the representative or symbolic needs of the community of belonging. The ability to relate to, and communicate in, more than one cultural and linguistic context enhances the awareness of diversity, not just of peoples but also of 83

Canagarajah 2006: 7.

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ways of life and perceptions of the world. Bilinguals are aware of the fact that there is more than one way of seeing the world and experiencing life. This is particularly relevant in contexts where a dominating power attempts to impose not only its military strength but also its perception of the world, that is, its ideological justification of the military domination on those dominated. Bilingualism and biculturalism can be invaluable means of inherent resistance for the dominated. This insight will contribute significantly to our analysis of the Pauline discourse which is seen as shaped and rooted in a linguistic and cultural social and symbolic universe that provides a clear alternative to Roman ideology. Furthermore, we have found that this awareness of diversity embodied by bilinguals provides them with an enhanced sense of the need for negotiation for communication to be successful. Whether all bilinguals are able to enact this sensitivity successfully is another question, but it is an important aspect to consider in analyses of Paul’s role in relation to his communities of Christ-followers from the nations. In a context in which diversity of cultures and languages is the norm rather than the exception, understanding in communication cannot be presupposed, not only because of linguistic issues per se, but also because experiences, including emotions, perceptions of life and the world, beliefs and values are diverse. Conversations and interactions are complex processes that involve the negotiation of meaning and understanding and that include the possibility of misunderstandings or losses as well as gains in translation. How the identity of people who embody more than one culture and language is affected in terms of belonging is a question that we will explore further in the course of this study. Of particular interest will be the interplay between language, culture and identity in the multilingual and multicultural context of the Roman Empire in the first century ce, and how this could have affected Paul, his team and his communities within the Christ-movement.

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Chapter 4 The Context: Linguistic, Cultural and Ethnic Diversity in the Roman Empire Having challenged the adequacy of paradigms of fusion, blending or hybridity as illuminating tools for an analysis of intercultural interaction and communication in a context of linguistic and cultural diversity, and having argued for a paradigm of bilingualism and biculturalism as a more appropriate research tool in such contexts, we now need to consider some particular aspects of linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity in the Roman Empire of the first century with a view to getting a sense of the context of the Pauline communities and their leaders in light of the paradigm proposed. Rather than presenting a comprehensive overview of this context, this study will be eclectic in nature, confined to particular examples. It is evident that linguistically the Eastern Mediterranean seems to have been dominated by the use of the Greek language as the language of writing and as the ‘lingua franca’ of general communication. This use had been established over centuries since Alexander’s conquest, and the Romans seemed to generally have accepted this use of Greek, except in situations and contexts where they felt a need to specifically express or assert their dominating power. This apparently widespread use of Greek in the East contributed to the perception that Greek culture had spread along with the language, and the native peoples were thus ‘Hellenized’ to a vast extent. However, it needs to be noted that ‘the dominance of Latin and Greek in the Western and Eastern spheres of the Mediterranean cultural zones hides an enormous linguistic diversity’.1 This includes cultural and ethnic diversity. Particularly with regard to the East, which is of particular interest here, Greg Woolf notes that ‘the Mediterranean both connected and divided hundreds of islands and coastal plans … Every region was marked by fierce local particularities. The ancient world … formed a human archipelago, a discontinuous spread of urban clusters.’2 With regard specifically to the Near East Wasserstein emphasized that the impact of 1 Adams and Swain, 2002b: 11.Cf. also Wasserstein who notes that translation from one language into another was regarded by Greeks as well as other peoples as a common activity. This is evidence of ‘continuing awareness of linguistic variety’ by the Greeks (2006: 4). Cf. also Iliad II.803–806; IV.433–38. 2 Woolf 2010: 189.

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Greek culture after Alexander’s conquest was ‘in its time, not all pervasive or destructive of local realities, of venerable traditions, of stubbornly surviving native structures. Hellenism took its place beside local aramaicised cultures; it did not supplant them.’3 Awareness of such diversity is expressed, although in a source of a later period, by Rabbi Jonathan of Eleutheropolis: ‘Four languages are appropriately used in the world. And these are Greek for song, Latin for war. Syriac (Aramaic) for mourning. Hebrew for speaking’ (y.Meg. I 71b, col. 748).4 I do not claim this passage as evidence for the situation of the first century but I assume that this awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity did not merely emerge in the late Roman Empire, but that aspects of it could most likely also be found in the first century ce. In this chapter an eclectic overview into evidence for the diversity of languages and cultures in the Roman Empire of the first century will be presented. First, I will discuss the role and function of the dominating languages, Greek and Latin, followed by a consideration of evidence for a widespread and deeply rooted linguistic diversity. In the third section, cultural and ethnic diversity, and its perception in Roman imperial ideology, will be discussed, whilst section 4 will investigate the role and perception of the people who were bilingual and/or bicultural, and were thus able to navigate between and negotiate more than one ‘framework’ of understanding in their lives. The fifth and final section will discuss analyses of perceptions of this diversity in ancient sources, that is, perceptions of ‘us and them’ in kinship networks, family tree analogies and through negative stereotyping. What is presented here is not a deep description but an eclectic survey of evidence which has to be confined mainly to literary and epigraphic documents; material culture of course would need to be taken into account more widely as well. This has to be left to further projects.5

4.1 The Function of Greek and Latin in the Roman Empire The assumption of a widespread ‘Hellenization’ (and ‘Romanization for that matter) is based vastly on literary and epigraphic evidence, and to a lesser extent on archaeological finds. There is little doubt that the majority of written documents of the Eastern part of the Roman Empire were actually written in Greek, and there is also a preponderance of Greek inscriptions in these regions. However, this in itself is hardly evidence for a widespread, and even less for a deeply embedded, Greek culture throughout the population of the Roman East. At most it is evidence that some of the elite of these areas were able to formulate literary documents in Greek, that official documents were written in either Greek or Latin, and that inscriptions in Greek or Latin were commissioned for 3 Wasserstein 1995: 111. 4 Cited by Isaac 2009: 43. 5 For recent discussions concerning archaeological evidence of cultural diversity see e.g. Hales and Hodos 2010.

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public display. All of these witnesses are mainly the product of the male elite and thus represent the dominating culture.6 They thus reflect a very marginal part of the population, the way of life of the elite, and their preferences. Such marginal evidence can hardly be regarded as representative of the views held generally in the Roman Empire or about the way of life of the majority of the population.7 It is rather evidence of a discourse of domination which maintained that a specific form of education, namely Greek paidei/a led to a ‘civilized’ way of life. In Roman perception such paidei/a, combined with Roman values such as virtutes and mores, provided the means by which to achieve humanitas, the way of life most appropriate for civilized peoples in the perception of the Roman elite. The knowledge of Greek and Latin was the presupposition for such an education. No one could become a ‘civilized’ member of this humanitas without knowledge of these languages and introduction into the paidei/a, including the cultural encyclopedia they encompassed. Although paidei/a and humanitas are interlinked, they are not identical, but each is clearly rooted in either Greek or Roman perceptions of values. Although paidei/a allowed individuals to climb the socio-political ladder and become Greek or Roman or both, it meant buying into the Greek and Roman perception of other peoples and their ways of life which were seen as those of barbarians lacking paidei/a and humanitas. Roman domination of subjugated peoples was justified since it allowed humanitas, and thus civilization, to be passed on to what were perceived to be culturally inferior people. Thus Hingley argues that ‘Within the Roman context, the concept of humanitas had become an ideological justification for the Roman elite that supported conquest and domination.’ 8 The example from Agricola concerning the Britons’ adoption of Roman ways of life is telling in this respect: For in order to accustom uncivilised, bellicose men who lived in scattered homes to peace and leisure through pleasures, he privately encouraged and publicly aided them to build temples, fora, houses, praising the keen and punishing the indolent: thus competition to be esteemed by him took the place of compulsion. Furthermore, he educated the sons of princes in liberal arts, and valued the native intelligence of the Britons above the hard graft of the Gauls, with the result that those who had recently refused to accept the Roman language desired to learn oratory. Thus even 6 Eck 2009a: 232–34. 7 Harris notes that ‘we do not find works which were intended for mass consumption … Popular culture had little to do with reading’ (1989: 126). 8 Hingley 2005: 26, also 2010: 56. Contra Thorsteinsson (2010), who is of the view that ‘The sources reveal clearly how basic the tenet of universal humanity was to the Stoic moral teaching, and how strongly the Stoics emphasised impartiality in human relations’ (191), and continues ‘With this teaching, Seneca and his fellow Stoics sought to point out to people something that was inherent in human life itself, something that already existed as part of the creation of the world. According to the Stoics, then, if properly informed and motivated, people will (re)discover their true nature as human beings and act accordingly’ (192). Thorsteinsson does not take into account that such ‘proper information and motivation’ consisted in the adoption of the Roman way of life, and possibly Greek paidei/a and did not include the recognition of different ways of life.

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our dress was esteemed and the toga much seen; gradually, they descended to the seductions of our vices, to porticos, baths and the refinement of dinners. This was called humanitas, civilisation, amongst the ignorant, although it was an aspect of their enslavement. (Tac. Agr. 4.21)9

Humanitas, rather than being evidence for the Roman recognition of some universal human essence, is universalizing and thus imposing the Roman way of life on conquered peoples. It has detrimental consequences for those who do not have and may not wish to conform to this humanitas. They are considered barbarians and might be confronted with ‘the intrusive, destructive, and exclusive face of empire and the profound inequalities of Roman society’.10 The dominance of Greek and Latin in literary and epigraphic documents is thus not a neutral matter of fact. As noted above, language and power are intrinsically linked, as Bourdieu has argued in his critique of linguistic theories.11 He drew attention to the socio-historical context and conditions of the emergence of languages in distinction from dialects. What is called a language in the sense of an ‘official’ or ‘legitimate’ language emerges through ‘complex historical process, sometimes involving extensive conflict especially in colonial context’ through which one particular dialect is being constituted as this ‘official’ language with other dialects and languages being subordinated. It is the language of the ‘victorious’ that emerges as a dominant or ‘official’ language, as noted by Bourdieu: The official language is bound up with the state, both in its genesis and in its social uses … Integration into a single ‘linguistic community’, which is a product of the political domination that is endlessly reproduced by institutions capable of imposing universal recognition of the dominant language is the condition for the establishment of relations of linguistic domination.12

As noted in the previous chapter, the emergence of ‘official languages’ in the context of the nationalist movements of the nineteenth century differs from the dominant use of Greek and Latin in the Roman Empire, but there can be no doubt that power issues are involved in both of these.13 Although the Macedonian conquest was not aiming at imposing Greek culture on the peoples conquered, Greek kings in the aftermath of Alexander’s conquest could deploy ‘Greekness’ as a status marker and as a means to establish and maintain dominance. Although there was no imposition of Greek as the language of administration,14 and Aramaic continued to be 9 Hingley comments on this passage as follows: ‘The disorderly Britons were transformed into “near Romans” … To the elite mind, imperial incorporation offered the opportunity for the privileged barbarian to become Roman’ (2005: 66). Cf also Dench 2005: 83. 10 Dench 2005: 32; cf. also Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 35. 11 Cf. chapter 3, p. 000 above. 12 Bourdieu 1991: 45–46. 13 Cf. p. 55 n. 67 above.. 14 Sherwin-White and Kuhrt 1993: 144–45; also Portier-Young 2011: 104–108.

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used alongside Greek, signs of Greekness such as ‘language, style of dress, public architecture, and religious iconography could readily become symbolic assertions of power and domination’.15 The dominance of the language of the imperial power in conjunction with other aspects of their particular identity was thus primarily part of the strategy to impose and maintain domination over conquered peoples. This particular role of the Greek language changed with the consolidation of the Roman Empire throughout the Mediterranean. The ‘official’ language of the empire was Latin and in most official communication this was the preferred or requested medium. But for reasons which will be discussed in more detail below, the continued use of Greek was not challenged by the Roman rulers. The empire had two languages for official use but of clearly unequal status. Greek was thus rendered a secondary language in some sense, although it remained the most widespread language in the Eastern part of the empire. In addition, it was the language which was associated with paidei/a, the form of education admired by Rome, though sometimes with reservation. Although the complex and ambivalent relationship between Roman and Greek perceptions of each other was not confined to their languages, this was an important aspect.16 Despite widespread use of Greek as a semi-official language, there were situations and contexts in which the Romans considered it inappropriate to speak Greek. For example, Cicero reports that he was criticized for speaking Greek at the senate in Syracuse: ‘ait indignum facinus esse quod ego in senatu Graeco verba fecissem; quod quidem apud Gracos Graece locutus essem, id ferri nullo modo posse’ (‘he said that it was improper that I had spoken in a Greek senate; and that I had spoken Greek before Greeks was absolutely intolerable’ [Verr. 4.147]). Romans also used Latin when they felt the need clearly to express their dominance, even when Greek would have been more intelligible to the audience in question. According to Plutarch, Cato the Elder thus addressed people in Athens in Latin (Plut. Cat. 12.4–5) and required an interpreter to translate his speech into Greek.17 Privately, the Roman elite valued Greek paidei/a, got their sons educated accordingly, mainly by Greek slaves,18 and could admire Romans who were able to speak perfect Greek.19 Educated Romans could also claim Greek as their own language; for example, Suetonius has the Emperor Claudius praising a ‘barbarian’ for his fluency in the two languages ‘cuidam barbaro Braece ac Latine disserenti: ‘“cum utroque” 15 Portier-Young 2011: 113. 16 The wider cultural dimension will be discussed below in 4.3. 17 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 60. 18 Adams notes that concerning slaves ‘Roman households will certainly have preferred Greek speakers … Because the Roman upper classes esteemed Greek and wanted it taught to their children, the language would often have survived in servile families beyond the generation of immigration’ (2003a: 761–62). 19 Cf. Plinius Epist. 4.3.5 ‘hominemne Romanum tam Graece loqui? … inuideo Graecis quod illorum lingua scribere malvisti’ (‘can a Roman speak such Greek? … I envy the Greeks that you have preferred to write in their language’), cited in Adams 2003b: 202.

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inquit “sermone nostro sis paratus”’ (to a barbarian fluent in Greek and Latin he said ‘since you are equipped in both our languages’ [Suet. Claud.42.1]).20 However, there was a deep mutual ambiguity between Romans and Greeks in relation to each other despite these close links. It seems that the Romans displayed some insecurity with regard to Greek as the linguistically and culturally more sophisticated language. This resulted in a kind of ‘linguistic nationalism’ with which Romans considered Latin to be ‘lingua nostra – our language’, which compared with Greek was ‘richer’. Cicero maintained: ‘sed ita sentio et saepe disserui. Latinam linguam non modo non inopem ut vulgo putarent sed locupletiorem etiam esse quam Graecam’ (‘but I feel and have often argued that the Latin language is not only not poor, as is commonly supposed, but is even richer than Greek’ [Fin. 1.10]). Cicero tried to avoid Greek terms as far as possible in public speeches although he did use them to some extent in philosophical writings.21 Valerius Maximus claimed that the Roman magistrates did everything to protect the maiestas of the Roman people in that ‘they adhered with greatest perseverance to the principle of never giving responses to Greeks except in Latin’. He adds that they would have forced Greeks to speak through interpreters with the aim of enhancing respect for Latin, not because they did not know Greek but because ‘there was no single respect in which the pallium should not be subject to the toga’ (Val. Max 2.2.2– 3).22 In public and legal discourse it was thus a necessity for Greek speakers to be able to understand the world in Latin terms. Greek communities and individuals must have learned to negotiate legal affairs in Roman categories and Latin linguistic conceptualizations.23 Thus, far from regarding Greek language and culture as being on an equal level with those of Rome, there was a clear hierarchy between Latin and Greek from a Roman perspective, and primary Greek speakers were considered to be of lower class status. Although Greek was the language of a culture that was to some extent admired, it was also the language of a conquered people and as such not deemed appropriate for official administrative, military and political use.24 The eventual emergence of literature in Latin (Quintus Ennius being seen as the ‘father’ of literature in the imperial language) produced works which clearly supported Roman superiority claims and related those to the power of Latin language and culture. A passage in Virgil’s Aeneid is possibly the most striking, certainly a very explicit, example.25 Juno grants that Latin should not perish and be subsumed 20 Cited in Adams 2003b: 203. 21 Adams 2003b: 202. 22 Cf. Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 59; on the toga Dench notes that ‘If in the Augustan age togas were promoted as suitably Roman wear for the quintessentially Roma political space of the forum, under Claudius non-citizens were apparently forbidden to wear the toga, emphasizing the exclusive nature of the garment … reinforcing the expectation that dress should properly reflect identity’ (2005: 277). 23 Ando 2010: 26, also 45. 24 Cf. Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 64–70. 25 Ian Rock has recently presented a comprehensive, excellent analysis of the prooemium of Romans as resonating with significant aspects of the Aeneid. Cf. 2012.

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under other languages or traditions, but that all the others will be made ‘Latins of one tongue’ (‘faciamque omnis uno ore Latinos’ [Aen. XII.820–40, 837]).26 This ambiguity is replicated by Greek perceptions although in a less explicit way. The two languages accepted by the Romans as the means of communication in relatively clearly defined circumstances are evidence that ‘the lack of official interest in language was a sign of how successfully they persuaded local elites to function in Greek and Latin’.27 In these two functions, as the semi-official language of the empire and as a lingua franca, Greek remained more than the language of another conquered people and less than the language of a dominating power. The use of a language as a lingua franca has to be distinguished from the question of enculturation, as has been noted above, but it cannot be entirely separated from the question of its association with a dominating power. This renders the evaluation of Paul’s use of language more complex than most studies in my view have recognized. They either focus on the linguistic and cultural aspect (to the exclusion of the political aspect) or on the issue of empire with an understanding of the language as an expression of imperial power.28 The complexity of Paul’s use of Greek emerges from the fact that this language (like any other lingua franca) could only begin to serve as a lingua franca because of its dominating status as the language of empires. However, once its function as lingua franca is only partly associated with the imperial power, the questions of enculturation and power present themselves differently. The claim that the use of the language is an indicator of the degree of enculturation and hence identification with the values and ethos of Greek culture, or that it replicates the dominating power system is too simple an explanation, as demonstrated above.29 In a context of multilingualism the use of a lingua franca is more and less than an indication of enculturation and accommodation to the hegemony and domination of the imperial power. On the one hand, its dominance forces speakers of other languages and cultures to express themselves in Greek if they wish to be heard. In that sense it imposes a Hellenocentric matrix upon the writings of the period, in that Greek forms of writing and patterns of expression had to be taken on in order to explain different cultural practices to a Greek or Roman audience, or to enable communication between speakers of different languages where Greek was common to everyone involved. Where the language is used as a means of internal communication, as in most Greek Jewish writings, the adaptation will be the other way around, the language 26 Cf. Hingley 2005: 59–61. 27 Fewster 2002: 245. 28 Marchal 2006 and 2011; Schüssler Fiorenza 2007: 2–15. 29 With regard to the controversy over the impact of ‘Hellenistic’ culture in Judaea/ Galilee Milikowsky refers to Stern’s review of Hengel’s approach and states: ‘It cannot be overemphasized that the question of the penetration of Greek culture and learning cannot be assimilated to the question of the penetration of the Greek language’ (2002: 162). Cf. also Bourdieu discussed above, pp. 45, 54–55.

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adjusting to the ‘habitus’.30 Greek was thus adapted to the Jewish symbolic and social universe. Jewish writings are exceptional in that they form a significant body of literature of the period that engages with, but is not primarily rooted in, Greek or Roman ways of life.31 This aspect, and its relevance to Pauline studies in particular, will be analysed in more detail in chapter 6 below. The use of Greek in the Roman East was mainly a commodity in a context of enormous linguistic diversity. The Romans accepted the use of this language with a few exceptions. Latin was not imposed on the subjugated nations in the East; there was no drive to ‘Romanize’ these provinces in that sense. Belayche notes that ‘Rome never imposed an imperial language, either in Roman entities or for communicating with provincials, as demonstrated by the existence of an imperial secretary ab epistulis Graecis.’32 Roman domination was not associated with the use of the Latin language as such, although it seems to have been expected that a Roman citizen should know Latin. Under certain legal circumstances a Roman citizen had to use Latin as a symbolic expression of his citizenship (specifically male here), and, as mentioned above, in some contexts Romans asserted their superiority through the use of the Latin language. Latin was of ‘super-high status’.33 But the Romans did not impose Latin on the Eastern provinces and used Greek even in the administration and in the army there, and were ‘usually content to communicate and administer through the lingua franca Greek’.34 However, this leniency towards the use of a non-Latin language was restricted to Greek. Other languages were at best non-existent for the Romans and were disregarded.35 Thus official hearings in Egypt were conducted in Greek, and no official documents in Egyptian were acceptable.36 The Roman attitude replicated the Greek perception of their own language as the means by which paidei/a, that is, the Greek – civilized – way of life, was transmitted as that which distinguished Greeks from barbarians. There certainly was a reluctance to learn other languages on the part of the Greeks. Latin may have been acquired for pragmatic political reasons but otherwise language learning was a one-way system. The provincials were expected to communicate with the imperial administrators in these perceived culturally superior, non-barbaric languages. The fact that the majority of documents and inscriptions of the period are written in Greek or Latin cannot be taken as an indication of the spread or depth of the respective language 30 Cf. 3.3. above. 31 Dench 2005: 346. 32 Belayche 2009: 187. The situation was different in the West and in North Africa, where no such established lingua franca prior to the Roman conquest existed. Latin did eventually take on that role there with different long-term outcomes. Although there was no language policy in that sense, the acceptance of only Greek and Latin respectively for official use and documents was in actual fact a means of relegating all other languages irrelevant from the empire’s perspective. Cf. also above, p. 000. 33 Adams 2003b: 198. 34 Adams 2003b: 186, 197. 35 Adams 2003b: 204; Harris 1989: 138. 36 Adams 2003b: 198.

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or its cultural aspects, or as an indication of its impact on the identity of the conquered peoples. The use of Greek (and Latin) in the provinces was mainly confined to members of the respective elite, who for various reasons considered it advantageous to cooperate with the new overlords in order to maintain or acquire status over their peoples and regions as well as express loyalty to Rome. For members of the elite of the Eastern provinces it was actually a necessity to be able to communicate in Greek, both as a means of communication but also as a demonstration that they had at least partially fulfilled the criteria for being regarded as ‘civilized’ trustworthy people in the eyes of Rome. Education was the means by which elite norms and rules of behaviour could be transmitted – the elite way of life and its understanding and application of power and authority. There was a shared elite culture created and perpetuated through Greek (and Latin) education which allowed local elites to be incorporated into the ruling class of the empire.37 But this is a phenomenon confined to the small number of members of the provincial elite; the greater part of the population was not made up of ‘beneficiaries’ of such education and possibly spoke neither Greek nor Latin; certainly for a majority their primary language was neither Greek nor Latin. Local languages were and remained predominant in their respective regions, and even significant numbers of the elite continued to have knowledge of them. In his enormous and detailed analysis of languages in contact and interaction with Latin, J. N. Adams has provided evidence for the continued use of vernacular languages throughout the Roman Empire. On the basis of literary and epigraphic findings he suggests that there were at least eighteen such languages. Although Adams’ focus is on bilingualism and the Latin language, this in itself is evidence of linguistic diversity far beyond Greek and Latin in the Roman Empire. Adams notes the difficulty, when it comes to sources, of studying bilingualism in antiquity, as the only material available is written texts rather than language speakers. These sources are confined either to literary documents written in Greek or Latin that mention the use of other languages or to direct epigraphic evidence. The literary documents are mainly written from Greek and Roman perspectives, with few exceptions. The epigraphic sources indicate more diversity in that multilingual inscriptions that included languages other than Greek and Latin were most likely commissioned by vernacular speakers who attributed significance to their local primary language. Thus Harris notes that: ‘Punic inscriptions which date from after the conquest are known from sites along the North African coast from Tripolitania westwards, powerfully suggesting that it was not the illiterate poor who continued to use the old language.’38 This applies to other areas as well but epigraphic evidence does not always disclose the linguistic diversity of a region. For example, from inscriptions 37 38

Hingley 2005: 60. Cf. also above n. 9. Harris 1989: 179.

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of the Julio-Claudian era it could not have been assumed that Lycaonian was spoken in the town of Lystra any longer. This language tradition is only mentioned in Acts 14.11 and there is little reason to doubt the reference.39 It is most likely that the languages found in inscriptions were actually spoken, but that these spoken languages have not always left material traces. When dealing with linguistic diversity in the Roman Empire a significant underrecording should be assumed. 40

4.2 Linguistic Diversity under Rome As mentioned, there is evidence for the use of Punic in North Africa from Tripolitania westwards in inscriptions from after the Roman conquest. Additional evidence for the continued use of the language and the importance of the local tradition comes from coins with partly Punic legends (until the time of Tiberius) and dedications of public buildings in Punic well into the second century ce. Augustine refers to the use of Punic in a letter to Maximus of Madaura, writing: ‘Nor should you forget yourself, writing as an African to a fellow-African, since we are both settled in Africa, as to think that Punic names should be belittled … or you would surely regret your birth in the cradle of that language’ (Epist. 17.2). Certainly the language was spoken throughout the centuries prior to Augustine.41 For Spain there is epigraphic evidence of four languages in addition to Greek and Latin from the period between the third and first centuries bce, namely Celtiberian, Lusitanian, South Lusitanian, Iberian-Punic.42 As for Gaul, the widespread use of Gaulish/Celtic should be assumed as is now evident from the findings at the pottery in La Graufesenque which produced pottery in the Samian style on a large scale. The pottery seems to have flourished between 20 and 120 ce, precisely the period of particular interest here. Around 200 lists have been found and they contain technical texts with a majority being in Gaulish/Celtic. This is highly significant evidence for the continued use of this vernacular language. This is supplemented by Irenaeus of Lyon, who noted towards the end of the second century that living among the Gauls ‘he was busy with a “barbarous dialect”’.43 With regard to the Eastern provinces, that is Moesia, Thrace, Asia Minor (which included Asia, Bythinia-Pontus, Galatia, Lycia-Pamphylia, Cappadocia, Cilicia), Syria, Judaea, Arabia and Egypt, the situation was similar in that inscriptions show a preference for Greek for epigraphic purposes, but this is 39 It is astonishing that attempts have been made to explain lukaonisti/ as referring to a Greek dialect rather than a distinct language based on the presupposition that Lystra was a fully ‘Hellenized’ city. Cf. Harris 1989: 187 n. 6. 40 Harris 1989: 177. 41 August. Epist. 66.2, 84.2, 108.14, 209.2; August. Serm. 167.4; Ep. ad Rom. Inch. Exp. 12; In Psalm 118.32.8; cf. Harris 1989: 180. 42 Harris 1989: 181. 43 Contra Haeres pref. 3, cited in Harris 1989: 183.

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no indication of a linguistic preference in other contexts in these regions. Other evidence points to the continued use of languages such as Phrygian, Aramaic, Nabataean, Phoenician, Palmyrene, etc.44 As for the other regions mentioned so far, the written evidence for these languages is thin, as would be expected for languages which were mainly used in oral communication by a population which in its majority was illiterate. Thus Strabo is of the view that Asia Minor was Greek-speaking throughout in his time, and that no trace of Lydian could then be found (xii.565; xiii.631). Whether this can be taken at face value is unclear.45 It is unlikely that the native languages just disappeared, as there is evidence for the continued use, for example, of Phrygian from inscriptions of the second to the fourth centuries ce.46 It continued to be spoken throughout antiquity as is evident from a note in Socrates’ Hist. Eccl. v. 23, which mentions Selenas, bishop of the Goths: ‘he was a Goth by his father’s side, but by his mother’s a Phrygian, by which means he taught in the church with great readiness in both these languages’.47 According to Lucian, Celtic and Syriac were spoken in Pontus, as Alexander of Abonutheichos ‘often gave answers in Syriac or Celtic to barbarians who questioned him in their own tongue, though he had difficulty in finding compatriots of theirs in the city. In these cases there was a long interval between application and response, during which the packet might be securely opened at leisure, and somebody found capable of translating the question’ (Luc. Alex. 51).48 Most likely Cappadocian was widespread and Greek had little impact in cities which were significant distances away from each other, with a majority of the population living in rural areas, but literary evidence for this can only be traced in a sermon of Basil of Caesarea from the late fourth century.49 The widespread use of Aramaic in areas formerly under Persian rule is evident, for example, from numerous inscriptions in Palymra (in a specific local variation of the language also referred to as Palmyrene). It has been noted that of the Roman auxiliary troops the Palmyrenes were the only ones who also continued to use their language in public display, as funerary epigraphs demonstrate. Palmyrene soldiers are regularly referred to as bilingual, whereas otherwise soldiers seem, at least in public, to have preferred to emphasize their loyalty to Rome through the use of Latin.50 Aramaic was the lingua franca of the Persian Empire and seems to have continued to be used in that capacity throughout the era of Greek and Roman domination of regions formerly under Persian control. Although epigraphic evidence may not be widespread for a variety of reasons, this cannot be equated with the disappearance or

44 Ball 2000: 4. 45 Adams, Janse and Swain 2002: 249–50; Harris 1989: 186. 46 Haas 1966. Cf. Harris 1989: 186 n. 61. 47 www.ccel.org.cce./schaff/npnf202.pdf (accessed 22.10.12). 48 Cf. also Paus. X.36.1; Jerome Comm. in Gal. ii praef. Harris 1989: 186. 49 Cf. Harris 1989: 187. 50 Adams 2003b: 199.

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even marginalization of Aramaic at all social levels.51 Josephus refers to the preponderance of Aramaic among Jews with reference to himself: I have also taken a great deal of pains to obtain the learning of the Greeks, and understand the elements of the Greek language, although I have so long accustomed myself to speak our own tongue, that I cannot pronounce Greek with sufficient exactness: for our nation does not encourage those that learn the languages of many nations, and so adorn their discourses with the smoothness of their periods; because they look upon this sort of accomplishment as common, not only to all sorts of freemen, but to as many of the servants as please to learn them. (AJ 20.263–64)

Josephus’ reference is interesting in a number of ways: he clearly asserts the perception of Aramaic as the language of his people, but he indicates that language learning was not considered to be a significant acquisition since almost everyone could do it. This seems to indicate that generally the knowledge of more than one language was the norm, and that language learning, although not attributed high prestige, was something very common. Josephus does not attribute prestige to the learning and knowledge of diverse languages, as such knowledge is widespread and common even among slaves (AJ 20.264). This is coherent with the Greek reluctance to learn other languages.52 The perception of Greek as the superior language due to its inherent connection with paidei/a was the hallmark of Greek self-perception. Thus no other language could actually match Greek (or Latin): ‘Der doch häufige Kontakt mit fremden Völkern und ihren Literaten hat weder bei Griechen noch bei Römern ein fassbares Interesse hervorgerufen, die Kenntnis dieser fremden geistigen Güter durch Übersetzungen zu vermitteln.’53 Thus when Herodotus (2.154) notes that Psammetichus arranged for some Egyptian boys to learn Greek in order for them to serve as interpreters (e(rmhnei=v) this cannot be understood as evidence for prestige attributed to language learning. These boys were trained so that there was no necessity for Greek or Latin speakers to learn the vernacular languages themselves.54 Further evidence for the continued use of Aramaic also comes from the Babatha documents from the Judaean desert, which, although written in Greek, clearly contain translations from Aramaic in dealings with the Roman authorities. The documents are thus also evidence for the use of Greek as a lingua franca, here in a trilingual context.55 The Nabataeans retained their 51 Adams and Swain 2002: 14. 52 Adams has challenged this general perception of Greeks as being hostile or indifferent to learning other languages. However, he only refers to Greeks learning Latin which indicates the relative closeness of Greek and Roman elites and the willingness to engage in each other’s cultural endeavours (cf. Adams 2003a: 15–16). 53 Kugelmeier 2010: 342. 54 The function of these interpreters is similar to slaves’ training in reading and writing for the purpose of serving the elite with these skills. Cf. Baumgarten 2002b: 14. 55 Cf. Adams 2003a: 265–68.

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native language when Nabataea became a Roman province, although again there is little written evidence for this. From the fringes of Roman power in south-west Syria and Northern Jordan, however, there is written evidence for the vibrant use of a native language, in the form of 12,000 graffiti in Safaitic. They are attributed to a nomadic people and should be compared to the similarly significant 13,000 or so Thamudic inscriptions from slightly further south in North-Western Arabia.56 Thus there is significant indication also for the Eastern part of the empire that native languages were broadly, most likely even predominantly, in use in combination with Greek as the main lingua franca, and some sparse evidence for the use of Latin in administrative or power-asserting contexts. The use of Hebrew is a special case as it is debatable whether it was still a spoken language during the Early Principate.57 It certainly had a high symbolic value for Jews and as such the epigraphic evidence although fragmentary is no surprise. I will deal in more detail with the role and function of Hebrew for first-century Judaism in chapter 6. There is evidence for the continued use of Demotic in Egypt in tax records and other minor inscriptions or graffiti, and in a few bilingual inscriptions on stelai, although such written evidence diminishes rapidly under Roman rule.58 The diminishing number of written documents, however, cannot be taken as evidence for the decline in the use of the language in everyday life. Fewster’s view is that ‘for most Egyptians Greek remained a foreign language’.59 This brief and fragmentary overview of evidence for the continuing diversity of languages in the Roman Empire during the Early Principate demonstrates that the assumption or claim of a deep permeation of the Eastern Mediterranean by the Greek language cannot be confirmed. The use of Greek (and Latin) remained at surface level for the majority of the population during the late Republic and the Early Principate and, although the material traces are sparse, the indications for the continued use of vernacular languages are recognized as significant.60 The continued use of vernacular languages seems to have been much stronger in the East than in the West, where Latin gradually came to dominate the scene, 56 Harris 1989: 190; Ball 2000: 32. 57 Cf. 5.3 below; also Stuckenbruck 2012a. 58 Adams 2003b: 198; also 2003a: 534–36. 59 Fewster 2002: 245. 60 The debate about the depth the use of Greek attained in the Eastern part of the empire is ongoing, and claims for a wide and strong presence of Greek language and culture in the East are often supported by evidence from late antiquity (e.g. Millar 2008). Such claims have been challenged by Wasserstein (2006) and Hoyland (2004), among others, who argue that the fast decline of Greek after the Arab conquest is evidence that it remained a second language, the language of culture, power and a lingua franca but not a mother-tongue for the majority of the population (cf. also discussion in Papaconstantinou 2012: 58–59). Since this discussion is often concerned with evidence from an enormous timespan (Alexander to the rise of Islam) the focus seems imprecise and the arguments which might be accurate with regard to a specific period and context may not reflect what happened at a later time or in a different context. For our purposes the first century ce is decisive and if there is evidence for deep permeation of Greek in the fourth or fifth century this cannot be taken as representative of the earlier period.

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leading eventually to the loss of local languages. In the East local languages are of the ‘longue durée’, as their continued use after the end of Roman rule in Syria, Palestine and Egypt demonstrates.61 For these regions it can be asserted that: ‘Whatever the relationship between the local Semitic languages and Greek, Greek was the second language introduced by imperial rulers in the region and Latin was the third.’62 Due to the inherent connection between language and culture discussed in chapter 3, this linguistic diversity must also have implications for the perception of cultural and ethnic diversity in the Roman Empire. This aspect will be explored in the following section.

4.3 Greek, Roman and Other Ways of Life: Cultural and Ethnic Diversity Linguistic diversity is indicative of cultural and ethnic diversity, although the interactions, boundaries, and the overlapping and intermingling of these are neither clear-cut nor easy to disentangle in the brief analysis to which I need to confine the discussion here. The use of the Greek language and Greek cultural patterns as such cannot be the taken as evidence for ‘Hellenization’, that is, for the existence of an overarching cultural umbrella which was locally adapted. As Sharifian and others have demonstrated, the use of a language per se, especially its use as a lingua franca, cannot be taken as evidence for the transmission or imposition of the respective cultural practices and encyclopedias on a local population.63 The linguistic diversity hidden under the dominance of Greek and Latin points to much deeper and wider cultural and ethnic variety than a model of adaptation of ‘Hellenistic’ influence would allow for.64 The specific use of languages as lingua franca and the implications of this with regard to issues of identity are not an argument against any link between language and cultural and ethnic identity, as noted above.65 The continued use of diverse languages can be taken as one of the indications of continued cultural and ethnic diversity under Rome. Mattingly argues that ‘the multiple life experiences of people will inevitably create cultural diversity and that expressing difference may be just as significant as registering similarity in the construction of identities. In the context of the Roman Empire there are obvious implications of this for what it meant “to become Roman” or “to be Roman”.’66 It needs to be added that such implications are not restricted to ‘Roman’ but to the identity of others under Roman rule as well. As noted above (section 3.1.3), it is important to differentiate between notions of culture and ethnicity that may or may not overlap. Thus Antonaccio 61 Clackson 2012: 48–49. 62 Isaac 2009: 44. 63 Cf. 3.3 above. 64 Cf. 2.2 above. 65 Cf. 3.1.1 and 3.3 above. 66 Mattingly 2010: 289.

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maintains that ‘(ethnicity) may be seen as a kind of cultural identity, it is not the same as cultural identity per se. … culture may have nothing to do with the distinctive identity that is ethnicity’.67 Shared forms or practice, for example, Greek wine and Greek symposia, rather than being expressions of ethnic identity or fusions of such, are part of an elite discourse in the Mediterranean that is about luxury rather than ethnicity.68 For an analysis of intercultural and inter-ethnic interaction it is important to differentiate between formal style, artefacts and social contexts.69 Ethnic identity does not depend on immutable cultural forms and practices, not even necessarily on language. The continuity of ethnic identity is not identical with cultural and linguistic continuity, and may be maintained throughout all kinds of cultural (and linguistic) changes.70 Rather than drawing direct conclusions from shared forms and practices, and possibly language, to ascertain cultural or ethnic identity or changes therein, the use of such forms and styles needs to be analysed with regard to their function and meaning in particular contexts and circumstances. Whether or not a language or certain cultural patterns are part of the narrative of belonging of a people needs to be considered in relation to specific context and circumstances. However, it is evident that peoples do maintain specific identities through narratives of belonging that may include a particular language, cultural patterns or practices. But none of these aspects in isolation provide the decisive dimension to establish or maintain a particular ethnic identity. With these cautions in mind we will now consider aspects of mutual perception of Greek and Roman ways of life. 4.3.1 Greek and Roman ways of life in mutual perception The fact that Roman and Greek identity were not conflated in antiquity, that there existed no blended Graeco-Roman entity in that sense, should alert us to the wider cultural and ethnic diversity in the Roman Empire.71 Greeks and Romans would not confuse their respective cultural peculiarities, whether they mutually appreciated these and acknowledged their values, or whether they more antagonistically mocked or denigrated each other.72 What did relate them to each other in a specific way was their – unequal – status as expressions of the dominating discourse, the elite culture. I discussed aspects of the linguistic dimension above, but such differentiation included all aspects of life. Before the conquest of Greece by Rome, cultural contact and interchange were already 67 Antonaccio 2010: 33. 68 Antonaccio 2010: 40–41. 69 Antonaccio 2010: 43; Hall 2002: 110. 70 Derks and Roymans 2009: 3; for an analysis of Jewish distinctiveness in a context of shared cultural practice, see Satlow 2008: 46–51. This aspect will be discussed below. 71 Jones 2010: 111; also Preston’s reference to Plutarch’s Parallel Lives not as an expression of a ‘unified Graeco-Roman identity’ but as concerned ‘with Greek and Roman identity and with the similarities and differences between Greek and Roman culture’ (2001: 93). See also the discussion in Richter 2011: 111–12. 72 I am not advocating abandoning the compound ‘Graeco-Roman’ entirely, but it should be used with caution and definitional clarity, if at all.

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ongoing so that it is not possible to set a precise period for ‘pure’ Roman culture coming into contact with one of the forms of Greek culture. The claim made by Dionysios of Halicarnassos that Rome was actually a Greek city from the beginning was possibly not so far off when it is considered in a wider sense.73 The situation changed with the Roman conquest only in that now there was a clear power imbalance between the two. Greek writers maintained and possibly referred more sharply to the cultural superiority of their paidei/a, an assessment that Cicero, for example, could share with regard to the literary competition between Greece and Rome, acknowledging that ‘doctrina Graecia nos … superbat’ (Tusculan Disputations 1.1) but only ‘insofar as the Romans were not interested in winning this particular battle’, as Wallace-Hadrill notes.74 On the other hand, the interaction could also be depicted, for example by Ovid, as a conquest claiming that the Romans had actively appropriated Greek culture.75 However it was perceived, Wallace-Hadrill emphasizes that the process should not be described as ‘a passage from barbarian to Hellenic’ but rather as a ‘perpetually renewable dialogue, a set of exchanges whereby the Hellenic … is constantly imitated without in any way diminishing Roman … identity’.76 He further notes that Greek and Roman cannot be seen as entirely parallel identities: the Roman focus is on political organization and power, whereas the Greek focus, at least in the encounter with Rome, is rather on paidei/a.77 The latter encompasses both the interlinked package of language, cult and custom (no/moi), and the acquisition of those characteristics which were considered superior to all other ways of doing things. Rome emphasized its superiority not in poetry and literature, which were attributed to the Greeks, but in its mores, which had more to do with virtues and morality. The mos maiorum, the practices/traditions of the ancestors, were the decisive factor in Roman self-perception; they were considered superior to Greek paidei/a in every respect. Thus Cicero claims that: it has always been my opinion that our countrymen have, in some instances, made wiser discoveries than the Greeks, with reference to those subjects which they have considered worthy of devoting their attention to, and in others have improved upon their discoveries, so that in one way or other we surpass them on every point; for, with regard to the manners and habits of private life, and family and domestic affairs, we certainly manage them with more elegance, and better than they did; and as to 73 Cf. Preston’s discussion of Roman Antiquties. Against the evaluation of this work as being conciliatory she points to its ‘hellenocentrism’ based firmly on ‘the traditional Greek/ barbarian polarity … It is true that the Romans are assimilated to the Greeks, not the barbarians, but only at the cost of denying the existence of an autonomous Roman culture altogether … For Dionysius there is no Roman culture’ (2001: 100). 74 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 24. 75 Fasti 3.101–104. 76 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 26. 77 This ‘division’ of spheres of excellence was particularly emphasized in the colonial encounter. It has been argued that this is thus a Roman ‘division’ which only allowed for a limited sphere of excellence for the Greek way of life, and reserved the sphere most important for the conquest and control of an empire for themselves.

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our republic, that our ancestors have, beyond all dispute, formed on better customs and laws. What shall I say of our military affairs; in which our ancestors have been most eminent in valour, and still more so in discipline? As to those things which are attained not by study, but nature, neither Greece, nor any nation, is comparable to us; for what people has displayed such gravity, such steadiness, such greatness of soul, probity, faith – such distinguished virtue of every kind, as to be equal to our ancestors. (Tusculan Disputations 1.1.2)

Roman law, piety and military discipline formed the nexus of perceived superiority, which granted to the Romans in their self-perception the divinely ordained and approved grace and right to dominate the peoples around the Mediterranean. Reference to the mos maiorum – the traditions of the ancestors – was vital in public discourses of wide varieties. Examples of the high value attributed to orderly discipline can again be found in Cicero, who notes that the Roman tradition of assemblies required that the participants remained standing, and were clearly organized in groups according to military rank, whereas a Greek assembly would be held seated in, for example, a theatre, giving itself away to chaos or disorder.78 There is a general perception of Greek culture from a Roman perspective which considers the Greeks as very sophisticated in the ‘liberal arts’ but suggests that this in turn also rendered them rather weak and prone to deplorable practices such as pederasty. A major difference is perceived between the Greek gymnasium and the Roman baths, the latter often also considered as being something of a response to the Greek institution.79 The Greek gymnasium was exemplary for Greek self-definition in that it was not only the space for athletics and the training of young men for military purposes, but also the place where cultural skills were taught, a place for paidei/a. The Romans seem to have constructed their perception of the gymnasium as something typically Greek, associated with nudity and immorality incompatible with true Roman mores. Athletic activities in the gymnasium, as opposed to exercise in the open space, were criticized for promoting pederasty. Thus Cicero presents a discussion in De Republica which depicts such Roman abhorrence as a truly ancient tradition: how absurd is the exercise of young men in the gymnasia! How trivial the military training of ‘ephebes’! How free and easy are gropings and passions! Forget about the Elis or Thebes, where there is free permissive licence for lust of love of freeborn men. Take, Sparta, where they allow anything in the love of young men except the sexual act.80

For Pliny the Elder, Greek gymnastic activities were detrimental to Roman virtues; for example, he noted that: ‘Those parents of all the vices, the Greeks, 78 Cicero, Pro Flacco 15. 79 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 184. For the fundamental importance and difference between the Greek gymnasium and the Roman bath see also ibid., pp. 169–90. 80 Cited in Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 184.

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have diverted the use of olive-oil to serve the purpose of luxury by making it a regular practice in their gymnasiums’ (Natural History 15.5, also 29.26; 35.48).81 Caesar in Lucan’s Pharsalia mocks Pompey’s troops as ‘grais delecta iuventus/ gymnasii aderit studioque ignava palaestrae/ et vix arma ferens’ (‘youth picked from Greek gymnasia, idle in the pursuit of the palaestra and hardly capable of bearing arms’ [7.270–72]). It seems that although naked bathing was normal for the Romans, they had convinced themselves that nudity was alien to them and a Greek, that is, non-Roman, invention.82 This perception is important, as it was part of a general Roman view of the Greeks as prone to being soft, possibly weak. This is not to claim that the Romans did not embrace such ‘Greek’ customs; however, there was a continued and outspoken discourse which deplored such practice as non-Roman. The Greek critique of Roman customs after the conquest seems to have been more subdued. This should not come as a surprise given the power imbalance which dominated any discourse and relationship between Rome and its conquered peoples, including its relationship with the Greeks.83 It is evident that in the first and second centuries ce at the upper reaches of society, Greek and Roman elements were used but not fused.84 Plutarch’s Parallel Lives present us with a highly interesting account of perceived similarities and differences between Greeks and Romans from the early second century which may shed light also on Greek self-perception and their perception of Romans in the first century ce. Rather than being an example of a kind of Graeco-Roman uniformity, the work is evidence for the continuing ‘concern with Greek and Roman identities, and with the similarities and differences between Greek and Roman culture’.85 This applies also to chapter 5 of Plutarch’s Moralia, the section entitled Roman Questions, Greek Questions. Rebecca Preston argues that there are clear indications that point to the Greek viewpoint evident in this section of the Moralia. In terms of formality, she notes that often the answers to the Roman questions provide more than one option without coming to a conclusion, whilst there is mostly only one answer to a Greek question. This formal difference suggests that Roman culture is considered to be strange and difficult to explain.86 That this is a Hellenocentric perception is supported by the use of ‘they’ or ‘the Romans’ in the Roman questions, and that they are implicitly considered to be barbarians before having been in contact with, and benefited from, Greek culture (QR 22). To be ‘Greek’ or to be seen to behave in a Greek way could be conceived as the highest possible compliment for a Roman from a Greek perspective.87 Plutarch clearly depicts Greek identity as complex, and 81 Cf. also Nat. 29.26, 35.48. 82 Tacitus seems to attribute its introduction to Nero; cf. Ann. 14.20. 83 Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 38–70. 84 Gleason 2010: 126. 85 Preston 2001: 93. 86 Preston, 2001: 97. 87 Preston notes Plutarch’s comment in Life of Marcellus where the Romans are commended for having nothing barbarian (barbariko/n) or unnatural (e+kfulon) in their religious

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relates many aspects in a very differentiated way to particular local dimensions. Greek paidei/a is depicted as of central importance in a Roman world, all things Roman remaining foreign and distinct from the Greek world. Preston asserts that ‘in the Roman Questions, the Romans seem to be Hellenized barbarians, and to be some other, separate, but civilized kind of people’.88 Significantly the comparative focus in Plutarch’s work is on the past and there is a telling absence of mentioning anything related to the present context of the Roman Empire. Is this an example of ‘speaking’ through silence, of indicating the power imbalance in this discourse? And is Plutarch’s emphasis on Greek cultural superiority something of an implicit subversion of the superiority claims of the empire?89 His silence could be interpreted in that vein, particularly if recent interpretations of Aelius Aristides are considered. Although dating slightly later than Plutarch, he too is a prime example of the Second Sophistic. Two aspects of his work are important to consider here: one is his praise of Athens’ piety in the Panathenaic Oration; the other is significant omissions in his speech To Rome. In the Panathenaic Oration Aristides praises Athens’ piety (eu)se/beia) to the highest degree (Pan. Or. 21, 154, 155, 338, 341) much as Pausanias when he describes the Athenians as being ‘conspicuous not only for their humanity but also for their devotion to religion’ (1.17.1, also similarly 1.24.3). This outspoken emphasis could be heard as an implicit challenge to Roman claims to be the most pious nation and also to be the arbiter of all piety in the empire. To assert that Athens was the most pious polis one can find in the empire, Aristides actually questions the Roman claim and conviction to rule due to their particular strengths, that is, their military power and their piety.90 Kelly particularly notes the significance of Aristides’ emphasis on Athenian piety. Rather than being a mere rhetorical trope she considers this to be a ‘response to Roman claims to religious supremacy’.91 The function of the emperor as the protector and guarantor of the good relationship between gods and humans was combined with the claim of Rome as the most pious people, whose success in dominating such a vast area and so many peoples was evidence that they were favoured by the gods. Thus Sallust claimed that ‘Virtute ac dis volentibus magni estis et opulenti, omnia secunda et oboedientia sunt’ (‘through valour and the favour of the gods you are mighty and powerful, all things are favourable and yield obedience to you’ [Iug 14.19]); and Propertius writes ‘ Nam quantum ferro, tantum pietate potentes stamus, vitricis temperat ira manus’ (‘since our power is established by loyalty as much as the word our wrath restrains victorious hands’ [Prop. El. 3.21–22]).92 practices but rather ‘as behaving “Greekly” ( (Ellhnikw=v ) and mildly’ (2001: 101). 88 Preston 2001: 118. 89 A more explicit though still ‘coded’ critique of Roman domination is found in Plutarch’s Mor. 813D–F. Cf. the discussion in Harrison 2011: 306–308. 90 Kelly 2011: 51–52. 91 Kelly 2011: 51. 92 Translation A. S. Kline 2001 (www.poetryintranslation.com, accessed 2.7.13). Cf. also Livy 5.51.3–4; 5.9–10; Cic. Cat. 2.12.29; 3.8.21; Dom. 56, 143; Hor. Carm. 1.6.

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The Panathenaic Oration appears like a counter-claim to this Roman selfperception. This interpretation might appear slightly at odds with the praise and respect for Roman emperors and the benefits of the emperor throughout his writings, including prayers for the well-being of the imperial family. However, such praise may not indicate a full acceptance of Roman rule. Laurent Pernot has pointed to some more subtle tones in Aristides’ work which might be due to a more ambivalent attitude than previously assumed. Greek acceptance and cooperation with Rome need not be an expression of deep identification with the empire. ‘Some Greeks of the Imperial Era had mixed feelings towards the glorious Hellenic past and the Roman Empire.’93 Without being in direct opposition to or mounting confrontational attacks, reservations could be expressed in subtle ways. A dream Aristides recalls in his Sacred Tales can be interpreted in that way. Aristides narrates that he was in an audience with the emperor, and that according to court etiquette he should have kissed the emperor when introduced to him. In his dream Aristides refuses this gesture of honour and respect with the explanation that his dedication to the god Asclepios did not allow him to do so. He actually claims that the god had ordered him not to honour the emperor in this way. The emperor (in the dream) is surprised but accepts the explanation. In this narrative, Aristides provides a rationale, divinely ordained, for refusing to pay homage to the emperor as requested, which in my view cannot be seen as anything other than at least some form of distancing from, if not rebellion against, the empire. In this speech To Rome it has been noted that Aristides omits any reference to Roman history and culture, thereby declaring them as irrelevant. Rome is praised for its control of the Greek world but there is no mention of Rome’s achievement other than its governmental power. Although Aristides does not say that Roman rule was due to Roman force exercised against the Greeks, the power imbalance is not hidden at all. Aristides merely states the fact that Rome rules and Greeks are a subject people. Thus rather than saying anything else, Aristides implies that the Greeks have submitted ‘to the rule of the stronger without feeling and admiration of Roman civilization and culture’.94 The most significant part of this speech is what is not said, eloquent silence, a kind of figured speech which Quintilian considers appropriate in specific contexts.95 Pernot maintains that Aristides’ ambiguity rests on two reasons: ‘he was Greek and he was a 93 Pernot 2008: 177. 94 Pernot 2008: 190. 95 ‘It is figure in which we intimate, by some suspicion that we excite, that something is to be understood which we do not express, though not something contrary to what we express, as in the ei)rwnei/a (eironeia), but something latent and to be discovered by the hearer’s penetration. This, as I mentioned above, is almost the only mode of expression that our rhetoricians call a figure, and from its frequent use, certain pleadings have acquired the name of figurative ... It may be adopted for one of three reasons: (1) if it is unsafe to speak plainly, (2) if it is unbecoming to do so, and (3) if recourse is had to the figure merely for the purpose of ornament, and of giving more pleasure, through novelty and variety, than would be felt if a straightforward narration were offered’ (Inst. 9.2.65–66) (http://rhetoric.eserver.org/quintilian/9/chapter2.html#67, accessed 12.2.13).

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disciple of Asclepios … These two identities made him pull back.’96 The sense of belonging to a ruled people did not diminish his sense of linguistic, cultural, religious and historical superiority over those who only ruled because of their military power. To this one had to submit, but nothing more.97 The Athenian self-perception and perception of Roman rule thus replicated and subverted the imperialist ideology which had assigned ‘culture’ (art, music, literature, athletics) to the Greeks, and power to the Romans.98 Thus neither from a Roman nor from a Greek perspective were their respective cultural and linguistic differences subsumed under a blended or hybridized unity. Despite intrinsic knowledge by some members of the elite of their own as well as the ‘other’s culture, the awareness of the distinction between their ‘habitus’ nevertheless seems to have been maintained. Thus the durable aspect of a Greek or Roman ‘habitus’ was not blended into something else but was that aspect of the identity which provided the point of departure for engaging with the other. The recognition of difference cannot have been confined to Greece and Rome, but must have been prevalent between Greece and Rome and the subjugated peoples, as well as between the subjugated peoples themselves. 4.3.2 Local99 identities under Greek and Roman domination Obviously the eloquence in expressing differences between peoples and their cultures cannot be matched by any of the so-called ‘barbarian’ peoples of the Roman Empire, given the scarcity of written evidence which has come down to the twenty-first century. However, from the eclectic survey of evidence for the clear perception of difference between Greeks and Romans in their respective perspectives, for their ambiguity towards each other and for the reservations even of Greek admirers of Rome against the empire, it can be assumed that a similar awareness of cultural and ethnic difference of other peoples of the empire existed, possibly in some cases in even more pointed or antagonistic form. Significantly, the main known ‘barbaric’ body of literature emerged from Jewish tradition. I will come back to this important aspect below; it is evidently of high significance for the hypothesis advocated here, that Paul, like many Jews and peoples of the nations, was bilingual and bicultural.

96 Pernot 2008: 199. 97 For evidence of critique and mockery of Augustus’ rule and claims see also Harrison 2011: 177–85; 306–308. 98 Whitmarsh 2010: 9. 99 I take local here in a general sense as referring to peoples and cultures other than Greek or Roman; what can be defined as ‘local’ must always be seen in relation to an entity which claims beyond ‘local’ significance. As Whitmarsh notes ‘the idea of the local is … obviously created by supralocal perspectives … a phase of rapid globalisation will also see an intensification of consciousness of localism; and perhaps also an increased awareness of, even questioning of, the power dynamics between the local and non-local’ (2010a: 2).

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The traces of continued use of vernacular languages, although rare, nevertheless provide some insight into the continuing awareness of distinctive cultural features and ethnic self-perception among the nations under Rome. Such distinctiveness and self-perception is not necessarily tied to the use of a particular language; as I have demonstrated above, languages are adjusted according to context and needs, which means that Greek could well have been used to express cultural and ethnic aspects of identity that differed from Greek or Roman identity.100 The level or frequency of the use of the Greek language in a particular context is not the decisive factor for assessing the degree to which Greek (or Roman) culture would have been appropriated by other peoples during the first centuries bce and ce. 101 As noted above, the use of a language as lingua franca may alter the use of the language rather than the culture or traditions of the users.102 An interesting example in this respect is the brief travel narrative De Dea Syria, written by a ‘self-proclaimed’ Assyrian, Lucian, in the second or third century ce in the multicultural ambience of the Roman East. It presents an attempt to describe the Syrian town of Hierapolis and its holy site and cult in the linguistic and cultural vocabulary of the Greeks. The narrative is written from a non-Greek perspective but for a Greek audience, imitating a Herodotian stance with the claim of providing insider knowledge. This results in a project of ‘cultural translation’ involving three worlds: the Syrian domain of cult, the Greek linguistic and cultural discourse, and the Roman political frame. The author attempts to ‘translate’ the world of the Syrian town and its cult centre into cultural codes that would be meaningful to a Greek audience. For example, the deities are described as being like members of the Greek pantheon, but not quite.103 When the author attempts to describe a particular place between two statues in the inner space of the temple, he struggles to find an adequate Greek word for what is there. (‘Between the two there stands another image of gold, no part of it resembling the others. This possesses no special form of its own, but recalls the characteristics of other gods,’ DDS 33.) Not only the Greek language but the categories of perception, the Greek cultural code, is inadequate to express ‘the sacred identity of an entirely different world’.104 100 Cf. also Harland who refers to evidence for Syrian associations 2009: 104–106. 101 It has been noted that although the majority of inscriptions of the period in these regions are in Greek or Latin this cannot be taken as an indication of the degree of enculturation of the local population. Inscriptions are public displays of social and political stances and interests rather than reflections of the everyday use of Greek or Latin. Cf. Isaac 2009: 66. 102 See 3.3 above. 103 DDS 31–32: ‘In this shrine are placed the statues, one of which is Hera, the other Zeus, though they call him by another name. Both of these are golden, both are sitting; Hera is supported by lions, Zeus is sitting on bulls. The effigy of Zeus recalls Zeus in all its details – his head, his robes, his throne; nor even if you wished it could you take him for another deity. Hera, however, as you look at her will recall to you a variety of forms. Speaking generally she is undoubtedly Hera, but she has something of the attributes of Athene, and of Aphrodite, and of Selene, and of Rhea, and of Artemis, and of Nemesis, and of The Fates.’ 104 Elsner 2001: 137.

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The narrative clearly expresses the difficulties in ‘mapping’ the world of the Syrian Hieropolis onto the Greek symbolic universe, and thus indicates an awareness of the differences between these worlds, despite attempting to describe the former in the terms of the latter. Moreover, in emphasizing the significance of the Syrian sacred space and the pilgrimage associated with it, a distinctively ‘Assyrian’ communal and individual, that is, non-Greek and non-Roman, identity is affirmed. The text (whether by Lucian or not) is an example of cultural and ethnic negotiation of identity under Rome. Syrian cultural and ethnic distinctiveness is affirmed but expressed as far as possible in Greek ways. What is remarkably absent from the text is Rome. This may be interpreted in a similar vein to the silence in Aristides’ To Rome, where although Rome is mentioned, no cultural or historical value is attributed to it. The text of DDS may indicate a similar stance of silence, which creates the space for local self-assertion via close association of a cult to a distinctively different ethnic identity.105 It has already been noted that Palmyrene soldiers, unlike others who joined the Roman army, retained a strong sense of distinct identity which they expressed in bilingual inscriptions found in very different parts of the empire.106 It should thus come as no surprise that evidence for a distinctive self-perception can also be found in Palmyra itself. Michael Sommer has argued that although inscriptions name grammateis, agoranomoi, strategoi and members of the urban elite who boast in their euergetism, this cannot be taken as evidence that Palmyra actually was a Greek polis.107 Sommer maintains that these terms merely show that there were offices with Greek labels, but that the actual function of these offices is unclear. Ball maintains that ‘the mention of a boule does not suggest the existence of a Greek institution, and as often as not is simply nothing more than the new Roman colonial administrator’s translation of older, native institutions into a “language” that they understood’.108 Because Palmyra was part of the frontier between the Syro-Phoenician coast and Babylonia, it was located in the twilight zone where Greek and Roman influence was patchy as it was impossible for these powers to exercise firm and consistent control over such vast geographical areas. Sommer thus finds significant evidence for continuing tribal structures in the organization of Palmyra, which overlapped and coexisted with some civic institutions. He refers to evidence of civic institutions in Eastern cities such as councils and assemblies that consisted of tribal elders and kinship delegates.109 Such organizational particularities, taken together with epigraphic evidence from all over the empire, clearly indicate in my view an ongoing awareness and 105 Elsner 2001: 151. 106 See 4.2 above. 107 Sommer 2005: 286. 108 Ball 2000: 446. 109 Sommer 2005: 289. Sommer maintains that ‘Palmyra was no Greek city at all, it was a city of the Near Eastern steppe frontier, with a blinding, ingeniously “borrowed” Greek façade’ (294).

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conscious affirmation of a Palmyrene identity that differed from Greek and Roman identity. Such affirmation of identities considered barbarian in Greek and Roman perspective may well have implied ‘coded’ or explicit challenges to precisely this ideology. To affirm one’s ‘barbarian’ identity in a context of domination and denigration of difference amounts to a negation of precisely this claim, even if no explicit challenge to domination is expressed. Thus we see that the use of Greek or Latin terminology is not unambiguous evidence for acculturation to Greek or Roman practices. A similar caution has been voiced with regard to material culture, namely relating the use of particular kinds of pottery to the degree of acculturation of the users. What affected local communities was not the cultural impact but the political reorganization of a new ruling power imposing new territorial boundaries for military or tax collection purposes. The import of certain goods might also change in the process; the pottery and fine ware could now come from some ‘two thousand rather than two hundred miles away’.110 Moreover exchange of material artefacts need not necessarily be related to new rulers or acculturation, but may merely be evidence of trade. Thus, although an increase in evidence for Greek ceramics during the time of the Seleucid rulers in Palestinian coastal areas is certainly evidence of the presence of Greeks and of trade with Greek goods, it is no more than this and cannot be taken as evidence for the embracing of Greek identity by the local population.111 Terrenato emphasizes that the use of certain materials should in itself not be taken as an indication of a disruption of the local population’s perception of the world or a challenge to their identity.112 Prior to the establishment of Roman rule in Syro-Phoenicia and Judaea, further East in Babylonia there was a notable general lack of thorough Greek influence in cities such as Uruk, Kish, Nippur and Babylonia itself, despite the centuries of Seleucid rule. Greek influence seems to have been confined to administration. Occasionally, personal Greek names, in addition to Babylonian ones, seem to have been beneficial. Whilst earlier scholarship considered name changes to be a clear indication of a switch in culture and loyalty,113 it is now recognized that this on its own is merely an indication that people adjusted their language use without giving up any aspects of identity, and certainly cannot be taken as evidence for any degree of assimilation to another culture.114 Although Antiochus IV introduced a Greek community to 110 Terrenato 2005: 68. 111 Meyers and Meyers 2011: 4–7. 112 Terrenato 2005: 68. 113 Hengel 1980: 62; Tcherikover 1961: 346–47. 114 Sherwin-White and Kuhrt 1993: 151; also Ameling, who refers to the Egyptian practice (during the Roman and Ptolemaic periods) of one and the same person using an Egyptian or Greek name depending on context. He assumes that a similar practice existed among Jews. The predominance of Greek names on Jewish Greek inscriptions would indicate the perceived ‘Greekness’ of epigraphy rather than the ‘Greekness’ of the name-bearer. This is a reasonable assumption given that in the New Testament there are quite a few examples of people with such ‘contextual’ double-names, with Paul possibly being one of them (2009: 215–16).

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Babylonia, and structured it according to Greek tradition with its own Greek institutions, this did not transform Babylonia into a Greek po/liv. Babylonian and Greek institutions seem to have co-existed and the communities continued to have separate cultural lives with communication but not integration between them. 115 Since the Parthians were the chief inheritors of the Seleucids (Iran, Central Asia, Mesopotamia, Babylonia), whatever Greek influence there had been must have diminished by the first century.116 As noted above, frontier areas were particularly difficult to control, hence local identities and mutual trade and exchange necessarily involved the encounter of different peoples of different linguistic, cultural and ethnic traditions, thus raising awareness of, and sensitivity towards, such differences. Jewish communities lived not only in frontier areas (for which in a later period the Dura Europos synagogue is clear evidence), but also under the rule of different empires – Rome and Parthia – simultaneously. This will have rendered them particularly aware of the limitations of any empire and of cultural, cultic and other differences wherever they lived – in Judaea and Galilee, Alexandria, Rome or Babylonia. Rome was by no means the centre of the world from a Jewish perspective. I will elaborate on this in more detail below in chapters 5 and 6. Sherwin-White and Kuhrt also draw attention to the fact that Roman rule over Asia Minor and the areas of Anatolia, Cappadocia, Bythinia and Armenia was only completed to a certain extent towards the end of the second century bce. Before 128 bce Asia Minor was not under Roman control but only under Roman suzerainty, whereas the other areas retained a certain independence until quite some time later. Such independence (with Pontus, Cappadocia, Bythinia and Armenia being kingdoms in their own right) must have gone hand in hand with some kind of distinctive self-perception as people with their own traditions. In particular, traces can be found in inscriptions, the details of which there is not room to discuss here. But the awareness of such distinctive identities may be reflected in a passage like Acts 2.9-10, which indicates more than just the geographical range of Jewish pilgrims to Jerusalem. Apart from the evidence from Judaism, most evidence for distinctiveness under Roman (and previously Greek) rule comes from Egypt. Here I am following the work of Ian S. Moyer who has presented a thorough analysis of Egypt and the Limits of Hellenisation. He notes that, in reaction against the syncretism paradigm of Hellenism, Momigliano and others117 had postulated that the ‘hermetic character of the language and of the script … made the Egyptian-speaking priest – not to mention the peasant – singularly unable to communicate with the Greeks’.118 Moyer argues that this perception does not take into account the fact that although the language barrier did exist, it was not 115 Van der Spek 2009: 107–13. 116 Sherwin-White and Kuhrt 1993: 218. 117 Préaux 1978 had argued for a separatist development with limited interaction between Greeks and other peoples. 118 Momigliano 1975: 4.

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impermeable, as evidence for bilingualism demonstrates. Egyptians who were familiar with Greek were particularly important to the Ptolemaic dynasty who tried to present themselves as both Greek and Egyptian rulers. Most of these bilingual mediators were from the local/indigenous elite, that is, the priestly class. From the selection of examples Moyer presents I will focus here on his analysis of the work of Manetho, an Egyptian priest who wrote a history of Egypt in Greek, Aegyptiaca. It is particularly interesting when compared, for example, with Josephus’ Antiquities, although the incomplete character of the work, which is transmitted only in Christian fragments of the third and fourth centuries and in Josephus’ Contra Apionem, renders its assessment difficult. The most striking feature is nevertheless discernible: Manetho structured his work according to Egyptian king-lists, a fact in which Moyer clearly sees the adoption of a ‘historiographical strategy that was independent from his Greek predecessors in terms of both the structural principle itself and its chronological function in historiography’.119 Manetho communicated Egyptian history to a Greek-speaking audience in an Egyptian way. Narratives and comments are inserted in the list, thereby creating ‘an exegesis of kingship ideology, best located not in a stemma of Greek historians, but in the discursive space created between and by the indigenous elite and the Ptolemaic court’.120 Manetho seems to have been familiar with both cultural traditions, and highly aware of their differences. He structured his work very clearly in the Egyptian tradition – thus not accommodating to the Greek way of presenting history. He also clearly tells an Egyptian narrative – this is all about great Egyptian tradition. But the inclusion of some Greek traditions demonstrates that he is aware of these, which renders his choice of the Egyptian way of writing history even more significant. He seems to consciously play the game of communicating with the Ptolemaic court but at the same time affirming Egyptian tradition and identity.121 The DDS, the inscriptions and Manethos’ Aegyptiaca are eclectic and mainly literary examples of an awareness, and conscious negotiation and expression, of distinctive cultural and ethnic identity in areas under Greek and Roman rule, particularly in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Near East. They demonstrate that diversity and the conscious interaction with and between different peoples, cultures and languages were the norm rather than the exception. When shared aspects or superiority are advocated then it is precisely because of the acknowledgement of diversity. There is even a specific term for such particularity, in that local identity, tradition and practice are known and described as e)pixw/riov, probably informed by the use of this term in, for example, Thucydides. In Pausanias references to e)pixw/riov are frequent. He is indebted to Thucydides’ historiographical tradition in his Periegesis, where he describes the artistic, religious and architectural heritage of Greece, and thus reconstructs Greek cultural identity. He refers more than sixty-four times 119 Moyer 2011: 103. 120 Moyer 2011: 103. 121 Moyer 2011: 141.

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to examples of the locals using the word e)pixw/riov. Greek cultural identity in its diversity is mapped through this term.122 Although this is an example from the second century ce, the frequent reference to e)pixw/riov in an identity discourse summarizes neatly what I have tried to demonstrate in this section: awareness and negotiation of diversity against the all-encompassing Roman power (and previously dominating Greek influence), including its ideology, were present all over the empire. Linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity was at the core of the interactions of peoples under Greek and Roman rule. The ‘habitus’ in which peoples of diverse traditions were embedded was not something which was simply left behind under the influence of other cultures and traditions. As we have seen, the diversity of imaginative and creative interaction of different peoples, cultures and traditions does not lead to an undifferentiated mishmash in which any sense of belonging is lost. Consequently we do not find the majority of people, more or less ‘Hellenized’, interacting and communicating with each other. The Greek and Latin discourse, including the sharing of some practices and tastes was concentrated at the level of the elite. There certainly was an ‘elite’ culture of paidei/a, humanitas and luxury, with local elites aspiring to participate in the cultural practices promoted by the dominating powers, Greek or Roman. But this was confined to a marginal part of the population. The view that such elite behaviour would by default have trickled down to the ‘uneducated’ masses is an assumption that cannot be substantiated. It is also questionable whether local peoples, including parts of the elite, would necessarily have aspired towards such a ‘sharing’ of the dominating elite culture. The examples above show ambiguity, even when Rome is praised, and in some cases a clear distinction of and pride in local traditions. The assumption that the peoples of the Roman Empire may all have aspired to participate in elite Greek and Roman culture presupposes that the latter’s superiority claims were accepted or at least considered to be beneficial to one’s interest. This is an elitist imperialist perspective that assumes not only the inferiority of the subjugated peoples, but also that they would embrace their rulers’ contempt; it denies them the ability to have a positive perception and appreciation of their own local particular traditions. It is evident that peoples under Rome had a more differentiated approach to the denigration of their traditions and their identity on the part of the dominating power, although they mostly had little option to openly challenge this. However, submission and compliance where resistance is not possible are not the same as cooperation with, and embracing, the culture of a dominating power.123 This heterogeneity under Rome did not exist in a power vacuum or in a space of power symmetry but within the context of a stark asymmetry: from the slighter version of the Roman–Greek asymmetry, somewhat evened out by the Roman recognition of the Greeks as a civilized people, to the steep hierarchy between Rome and 122 Josephus frequently refers to Jewish tradition as e)pixw/riov. I will come back to the Jewish sense of belonging in Part II. 123 Cf. Rock 2012; Lim 2009; Lopez 2008.

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all its other subjugated peoples. Thus the non-recognition of these peoples’ humanity and the depiction of their characteristics as barbaric, effectively subhuman, did render them open to exploitation and contempt at every level of interaction with Rome. This may not have played itself out for non-Greeks and non-Romans in every moment of their everyday lives, but its reality hovered over them constantly and must have impacted on them throughout their lives in ways that could not be ignored.124 This power asymmetry created by Greek and Roman rule is the context within which many people, if not a majority, were familiar with more than one culture and language, and thus could be considered bilingual and/or bicultural in the sense argued in chapter 3. It cannot be assumed that they would easily or unnecessarily have switched their loyalty and everyday practice to Greek or Roman tradition – certainly not at the expense of loyalty to their own traditions. I have touched upon some evidence for this already and will look at evidence for bilingualism and biculturalism more specifically in the following section.

4.4 Bilingualism/Biculturalism: Negotiating Identity under Greek and Roman Domination Even as late as the fifth century ce, when linguistic diversity in the Roman Empire might have diminished to some extent, reference to biculturalism can easily be found. An example is Socrates Scholasticus’ discussion of the date of Easter: While therefore some in Asia Minor observed the day above-mentioned, others in the East kept that feast on the Sabbath indeed, but differed as regards the month. The former thought the Jews should be followed, though they were not exact: the latter kept Easter after the equinox, refusing to celebrate with the Jews; ‘for’, said they, ‘it ought to be celebrated when the sun is in Aries, in the month called Xanthicus by the Antiochians, and April by the Romans’.125

Interaction between aspects of Jewish, Greek and Roman culture, including linguistic diversity, is at play here, with the awareness of the distinctiveness of the respective traditions and languages clearly expressed. The Greek historian is aware that there are people of different traditions and that negotiation between them is necessary. That such negotiation is necessary seems to be viewed as a normal procedure even though the author has clear views on the appropriateness of one stance over another. The different names for months in different traditions are mentioned just as an aside. The people involved in this process must have been able to relate to more than one tradition; most likely they were rooted in one but had some understanding of others. This 124 For the effects of Seleucid rule see Portier-Young 2011: 140–75; for the Roman context Elliott 2008: 87–100; Lopez 2008: 26–55; Kahl 2010: 169–207. 125 Hist. Eccl. V.22.

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small passage is an example of bicultural negotiation. If such negotiation was still considered a normal necessity as late as the fifth century ce, how much more would awareness and continuing appreciation of cultural, ethnic and linguistic diversity have been the general pattern in the first century ce, with the implication that significant numbers of people must have been familiar with more than one cultural, ethnic and/or linguistic tradition? In the fifth century ce, after hundreds of years of Roman political and Greek and Roman cultural domination, some levelling of cultural and linguistic differences might be expected. If this was not consistently the case then, it can be assumed that in the first century ce, when some regions had only very recently been incorporated into the structure of the Roman Empire, the diversity of local traditions must have played at least as significant a role as in Socrates Scholasticus’ discussion. 4.4.1 Bilingualism/biculturalism among local elites Bilingualism/biculturalism under the conditions of Roman rule had different forms for different people, not just in terms of their ethnic and linguistic affiliation but also in terms of social class. Differences in the form and degree of bilingualism/biculturalism between the elite and a majority of the local population should be expected. As noted above, the provincial elite, in order to maintain or attain power positions in their respective city or province had to accommodate to the Roman way of government. They had to conform to Roman organization and law in order to enjoy the ‘benefits’ of Rome. To become a ‘friend of Rome’ was not a matter of emotional affiliation but one of elite legal status. Rome had set up certain legal requirements for office holders in city and provincial governments. Charters issued upon the annexation of a region and its transformation into a province encompassed regulations for the restructuring of provincial institutions. Through these a provincial ruling class conforming to Roman standards was created and it was not in the interest of the Romans that these local elites should identify too closely with their local communities. Their biculturalism was to be geared towards loyalty to Rome, and there seems to have been a policy which was intended to alienate local magistrates from their communities, often through the reward of Roman citizenship. This loose association with Rome freed them from certain local obligations and liturgies and thus distanced them from direct involvement in local affairs. Aelius Aristides refers to this process as ‘removal from the fatherlands’ (o(mou= th=v te patri/dov a)phlla/cate , Ael. Ar. Or. 26.75), and although he describes the uprooting of conscripts to the army, the effect on the provincial elite would have been similar.126 These biculturals were brokers of Roman domination, valuable to Rome because their ‘friendship with Rome’ was a secure means by which Rome could prevent any unified provincial activity or attempt at autonomy. It was also at this level that local elites copied aspects of the lifestyle of the Greek and Roman elite, leading to some shared 126 Ando 2010: 41.

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cultural features, as discussed above. Drinking parties were an expression of luxury alongside other forms of elite culture shared across the empire rather than a specifically ethnic – Greek – way of wining and dining.127 Not all biculturals were brokers of Roman domination but the literary evidence mainly refers to members of the elite who were familiar with more than one tradition. By the time of the Early Principate if not before, most male Romans of the elite could be considered bicultural and possibly bilingual to some extent, as they would have been educated according to Greek paidei/a. Whether all Greek members of the elite were bicultural is questionable, but certainly by the early second century a significant number of them would also have been conversant with Roman culture and possibly with Latin, as the movement of the Second Sophistic demonstrates. One particularly interesting example has been analysed by Maud Gleason (‘Making Space for Bicultural Identity: Herodes Atticus Commemorates Regilla’).128 Herodes Atticus was a central proponent of the Second Sophistic in Athens. Among other activities, Gleason draws attention to Herodes’ marriage to Regilla. They were a Greek– Roman bicultural couple who had built a Nymphaeum at Olympia.129 This fountain clearly represented both of their cultural traditions, for example in the wearing of the toga and the himation (pallium) respectively by the statues of the members of the family arranged around the fountain itself.130 The Greek and Roman halves of the family are placed on each side of a statue of Zeus: Herodes the Greek with his parents and sons, Regilla the Roman and her parents and daughters. The couple publicly presented themselves as bicultural without conflation or fusion of the elements. This was noted as quite an exceptional self-display at a time when it was customary for aristocrats to sponsor statues of the imperial family (which are part of this Nymphaeum as well) but not usual to portray themselves alongside. Although Herodes was a Roman citizen and his family had been associated with Rome over three or four generations, he clearly considered himself to be Greek, albeit one of the category of the super-rich who owned most of Attica at the time. As a Roman citizen his matrimonial choices were limited because citizenship was passed on through the female line; he thus had to marry a Roman citizen. He seems to have had problems making the right choice since rather late in life he eventually married young Appia Annia Atilia Regilla Caucida Tertulla from a Roman aristocratic family. This was unusual, as Gleason notes, in that ‘Aristocratic Greeks and Italians may have interacted as equals in politics and intellectual life, as houseguests and drinking companions, but in this period they did not intermarry.’131 The Nymphaeum Herodes and Regilla had built

127 Yntema 2009: 146, Wallace-Hadrill 2008: 315–55. 128 Gleason 2010. 129 Cf. Gleason 2010: 135–56, discussing also commemorative elements added by Herodes after Regilla’s death. 130 See the detailed discussion by Gleason 2010: 130–35. 131 Gleason 2010: 129, 160.

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together was only one example of their public display of biculturalism.132 Their biculturalism may have been exceptional in its grandeur and, as Gleason notes, in its use of the close association of marriage at this social level, but it is also evidence for the existence of a distinct awareness of cultural differences in contexts of close interaction which may have been more common than assumed by models of fusion. An interesting example of an aristocrat who is bicultural beyond Greek– Roman confines is Quintus Ennius, the father of Latin literature. He famously claimed himself to have three hearts, as Aulus Gellius reports: ‘Quintus Ennius tria corda habere sese dicebat, quod loqui Graece et Osce et Latine sciret’ (Noct. Att. XVII.17.1). The reference to the three languages seems to imply more than just linguistic skill, with the hearts referred to implying that his identity encompassed Greek, Roman and Oscan, that is, Salentinian, aspects. Clearly he considered himself tricultural as well as trilingual. Ennius was from an elite family of the Salento (southern Italy) where the local language Oscan obviously was the marker of local identity. Through paidei/a he became Greek and by the granting of citizenship Roman. It is evident that these three aspects were not considered mutually exclusive, nor in any way temporally arranged with one superseding the other. Although upon becoming a Roman citizen in 184 bce he celebrated that ‘Nos sumus Romanus qui fuimus ante Rudini’ (Fragm. 525), this was a contextual statement which in no way implied that he had now given up or lost the primary aspect of his identity. Ennius may well not have been an exception, as Yntema has argued with reference to a grave inscription of around 170 bce, which names the deceased of a noble family from the same region as Ennius’ hometown Rudiae, Salento, who is proud of his Greek paidei/a and of his links to the Greek world, indicating his biculturalism. Other examples from the same region during that time are discussed by Yntema, providing ample evidence for a tradition of synchronic biculturalism among a particular elite.133 Although language change on the Italian peninsula most likely led to the dominance of Latin in that area by the first century, the examples here demonstrate that biculturalism was not confined to Greek and Latin. With the incorporation of provinces all over the Mediterranean, with their variety of different linguistic, cultural and ethnic traditions, biculturalism and bilingualism must have been widespread by the first century ce. The display or salience of one aspect of identity may have been contextual and situational or a combination of both. The fact that Ennius referred to himself as Roman when he became a Roman citizen in Rome is an obvious example. In tombs found in Northern Africa, in the province of Lepcis Magna, the exterior inscriptions were in Latin for public display whereas the underground containers had Punic inscriptions.134 Inscriptions from the 132 For a detailed discussion of other monuments and poems commissioned by Herodes after Regilla’s death see Gleason 2010: 135–62. 133 Yntema 2009: 163. 134 Whittacker 2009: 200.

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cemetery of the Pisidian po/liv of Termessos (second to third century ce) show Termessians revealing diverse aspects of their identity. Whilst presenting themselves as loyal Roman citizens, they could also emphasize their Greek paidei/a and their roots in their local area and history with reference to their local ancestry.135 Public self-presentation occurred here in accordance with Greek style but the use of names indicates that this is not to be interpreted as the full identification of Termessians with either Roman or Greek tradition. Although all of the inscriptions at Termessos are in Greek, they also display Latin name elements, which point to the association of local elite families with the Claudian and Tiberian dynasties. The Roman elements did not imply that other aspects of identity were given up – Greek and local, Pisidian names could be presented in the inscription of one person, or could be combined with an additional supernomen.136 Depending on context, Termessians seem to have been able to emphasize different aspects of their identity; they could consider themselves loyal Romans, educated Greeks and strongly rooted in the traditions of their ancestors all at the same time.137 Different cultures were negotiated within one and the same individual, who was capabale of moving within and between them without losing their sense of being Termessians in Pisidia. These inscriptions, although not bilingual, are still evidence for the expression of the bicultural identity of many Termessians through names and ancestral affiliation. This is one example of the expression of a specific ethnic identity through the medium of Greek, with the language most likely serving as a lingua franca. Biculturalism need not be tied to language, as we have seen above (3.2.6) but the numerous bilingual inscriptions all over the empire and well into the fifth century ce certainly provide evidence for both linguistic diversity and for biculturalism. They have been found in every corner of the empire, in numerous languages – in Celtic (Gaulish), Celtiberian, Punic, Italic languages, Syriac, Palmyrene, Egyptian, Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, etc.138 Although caution must be advised against drawing direct conclusions from epigraphic evidence about the speech communities that might be associated with them, the fact that a language other than the language of domination was used in an inscription means that those who commissioned the inscription made a specific choice, and that this was the conscious expression of ethnic and/or cultural difference. For ethnic identity the vitality of the language itself is not the decisive factor, as we have seen above.139 However, the absence of epigraphic evidence for particular 135 Van Nijf 2010: 166. 136 Van Nijf 2010: 183–84. 137 Van Nijf 2010: 186. 138 For Greek-Demotic evidence from the Zenon archives see Evans 2012; for LatinCeltiberian examples, Simkin 2012; Neo-Punic-Latin in North Africa, Wilson 2012. 139 Wilson draws attention to this difficulty but notes that in the case of Neo-Punic, references from Apuleius’ Historia Augusta, from Augustine, and in addition late evidence for Latino-Punic demonstrate the continued use of the language well beyond its use in inscriptions. Thus the absence of epigraphic evidence cannot be taken as absence of biculturalism or bilingualism.

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languages cannot be taken as evidence of the absence of bilingualism and biculturalism in a region. The predominance of Greek inscriptions in the Near East is hardly evidence for the absence of, for example, Aramaic and Hebrew in the region. Most evidence for the presence and continued use of languages other than Greek and Latin actually comes from Syria-Palestine and Egypt, although it is not confined to epigraphic examples. 4.4.2 Bilingual and bicultural go-betweens The continued sense of ethnic and cultural difference associated with the continued use of vernacular languages seems obvious. Manetho’s history of Egypt is an example of biculturalism in that Manetho is able to communicate to a Greek audience but is careful in presenting the ethnic and cultural particularity of his own tradition in a clear way by structuring the history in the Egyptian way. In the case of Judaea/Palestine the scarcity of epigraphic evidence is not evidence for the absence of bilingualism and biculturalism.140 Jewish literary and epigraphic documents, whether written in Greek, Aramaic or Hebrew, are part of this bicultural/bilingual milieu, and as such conform to what is the norm rather than the exception in the areas under Greek and Roman rule and influence. Philo and Josephus seem to be in company with Manetho, ‘Lucian’ and others who try to convey to an outside audience aspects of their own tradition in cultural terminology intelligible to this audience. In all these cases it is obvious that this cultural translation process is not without obstacles, and understanding may be problematic as cultural codes and encyclopedias may cause misapprehension. Manetho, Lucian, Josephus and Philo, among numerous others, were cultural mediators, a role which must have been a necessity in a context of such complex linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity as the Mediterranean basin and the Near East under Greek and Roman rule. Greg Woolf has drawn specific attention to the role of such mediators or cultural translators in his analysis of ‘Cruptorix and his Kind’, albeit with a Roman inclination. He considers how a Roman historian like Tacitus (and perhaps, by analogy, like Herodotus or Thucydides) could have got all the information about, for example, Germania as presented in his Annales. He refers to some individuals from the peoples described by Tacitus who must have been to some extent familiar with Latin and Roman customs, and thus served as translators in the double spheres of language and culture. Woolf considers the hypothetical possibility that ‘one Cruptorix, once a soldier in our pay’ (‘Cruptorigis quondam stipendiari’, Ann. 4.74), might have been such a translator for Rome. Tacitus only mentions that he lived in the border zone between the empire and the tribe of the Frisians because his 140 Ball 2000: 446–47; the relevance of this with regard to Judaism has been critically discussed by Schwartz 2010 and Sorek 2010. Schwartz argues that the Jewish social ethos, which differed significantly from the imperial aspiration for public honour on the part of elite men, was one of the reasons for the absence for such inscriptions in Jerusalem and Judaea/Galilee. Research into the connection of Schwartz’s assessments with Paul’s guidance concerning the organization of the e)kklhsi/a could prove important here but cannot be pursued in this study.

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villa had been occupied by fleeing Roman soldiers. Woolf maintains that at the frontier there would have been different grades of exchange going on, and such cultural translation should be seen in the context of border zones where a culture of exchange already existed, an area comparable to the ‘middle ground’ of the American frontier. The example of native deities referred to in an act of intepretatio Romana as Castor and Pollux141 is seen by Woolf as instigated by the native go-between. However, Dench has pointed out that Tacitus’ text ‘is extremely interested in the transformation of Germany, the Germans, and German culture that signifies the encroachment of Roman rule. Tacitus’ ethnographic gaze surveys a natural and human landscape in flux, unshaped, lacking, and unattractive before experiencing the effects of Roman contact.’142 The scenario is culturally dominated by a Roman perspective and the categories of knowledge acquired are shaped according to Roman perception (inherited from Greek historiography), rather than being a native interpretation.143 Tacitus’ report and assessment is thus not an example of a translation process between equals. No insight is provided from the local or ‘native’ perspective as all the information provided has passed through a ‘Roman’ lens. Woolf’s analysis concerns a particular situation of cultural and, most likely, economic exchange beyond the borders of the empire. He points to the fact that these borders were not sealed zones of no-man’s land but areas of interaction, which was not always hostile. This is not the situation of cultural and linguistic interaction between biculturals with which we are primarily concerned in this study. The focus in Tacitus’ narrative is on the interaction between peoples at the borders of a dominating foreign power. I agree with Woolf that cultural translators must have existed in a context of such heterogeneity as that of the Roman Empire. Since biculturalism seems to have been the norm rather than the exception within the empire, bicultural translation and mediation must have been a frequent activity rather than an exceptional one. Although significant research has been done into the role and perception of translators in contemporary contexts, I am not aware of any significant studies that focus on the role and function of mediators and translators in and around the first century,144 but from this eclectic survey it becomes evident that this must have been a highly significant aspect of interaction and communication among the numerous and diverse peoples of the Mediterranean and the Near East. It is the thesis of this study that cultural 141 Tacitus Germ. 43.4. 142 Dench 2005: 81. 143 Pace Woolf 2010: 214, who maintains that the interpretation of two Germanic deities as Castor and Pollux must have come from the German informant. 144 Research into the role and function of mediators and translators, for example in medieval times, presents a rich image of the ambiguity often surrounding people who act in this role, oscillating between high esteem and deep suspicion. Cf. Burke 2007. The existence of interpreters/translators/mediators was noted for Sumer (eme-bal), Assyria and Babylonia (targumannum); the term found in the Aramaic targum (translation/interpretation) found its way into Turkish turguman and German dolmetsch. Caravan leaders of Southern Egypt who were instrumental in the trade with Africa had the title of ‘chief interpreters’. Cf. Assman 1996: 28.

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mediation and translation between different peoples and cultures played a significant part in the emergence of the early Christ-movement, with Paul and his team functioning as bilingual and bicultural translators and mediators – as go-betweens. Before I embark on an exemplary analysis of a few aspects of Paul’s and his co-workers’ role in this process, one more aspect of the heterogeneous context of their activities needs to be highlighted. If, as we have clearly seen, diversity rather than uniformity was the key characteristic of the Mediterranean and the Near East under Greek and Roman rule, how did these different peoples perceive each other? If group boundaries are drawn by differentiating between ‘us and them’, if the ‘other’ is part of self-definition, how do all these ‘others’ relate to each other and to ‘us’?

4.5 ‘Us and Them’: Networks and Stereotypes The heterogeneous conglomerate of nations ‘united’ under Roman rule in the first century ce responded to this rule, and related to each other in different ways. The negotiation of these relationships, whether collectively or individually, never happened in a neutral no-man’s land or in a power vacuum. Power asymmetry was a crucial factor which had an impact on all involved in these relational networks. Thus, cultural and ethnic identities could never be objectively perceived, and the self-perception and the ascription of peculiarities from outside represented specific perspectives and stances in particular contexts and circumstances. I have already mentioned how important it is to recognize the elite discourse of the provinces during the empire as an imperial discourse, and one which certainly served to replicate the superiority claims of Roman and Greek culture, including the replication of the claim of the right to rule on the part of the Romans. The potential clash of Greek and Roman superiority claims in terms of cultural achievements were resolved here not by negotiation but by Roman military power. Greek culture was recognized in its civilizing potential as elitist, but it was relegated to a secondary place, since only Roman law and order, including its morality, were able to secure the achievements of such ‘civilization’ and to spread it to the barbarians via their inclusion under Roman domination. This highest form of civilization was subsumed under the Roman concept of humanitas. By the first century, humanitas was the hallmark of the Roman elite. It could be achieved through education and loyalty to Roman domination to some extent; one could ‘become’ Roman through acquiring humanitas. As such this was an open concept, but since it included access to resources and networks of power, the hierarchy within the elite of the empire was not levelled. At the top of the hierarchy were the wellborn, wealthy and well connected. Inclusion and exclusion went hand in hand and ‘only a very small number of people within Rome, Italy and the provinces could achieve full Roman identity in the view of the

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imperial elite’.145 I have already demonstrated above that this had obvious implications for the relationship between Greeks and Romans and for the self-perception of Greeks under Rome. To be respected as human meant to accept the Roman concept of humanitas. The non-Roman aspect of one’s social identity was in a sense dehumanised;146 it could not be part of being Roman, although it obviously could remain part of one’s identity, as the example of Ennius demonstrates. Negative stereotyping was one powerful aspect of defining ‘us’ in relation to ‘them’, with the Greek–Roman and barbarian dichotomy being one of the strongest differentiations. The negative depiction of all non-Greek and non-Roman peoples clearly demarcated a line which divided peoples into civilized and uncivilized from a Greek and Roman perspective. Rome was the civilizing force which, through its military strength and discipline, was able to order ‘the disorderly’, standardize ‘the multiform’, correct or silence ‘the inarticulate’.147 It rendered it possible for Rome to legitimate conquest and subjugation in the name of the benefits of humanitas, a missionary attitude that served as a template for numerous subsequent colonial endeavours originating from Western Europe. Roman ethnographic information presents a clearly Romanocentric perspective, and does not reflect mere ethnographic interest in those who are different, but instead often served propagandistic purposes to legitimate violent conquest. Literary evidence was powerfully combined with triumphal parades and monumental evidence after Roman campaigns of conquest, where others who had dared to resist Rome were paraded in a dehumanizing way for all to see. Davina Lopez and Brigitte Kahl have presented powerful arguments for the significance of these perceptions and the reality of the life of conquered peoples for any interpretation of the Pauline letters.148 At this point it is sufficient to note, for example, that the negative literary stereotyping of Egyptians took place at a period when a specific political agenda was prevalent, which served Augustan propaganda.149 Vergil and Ovid contribute their image of Cleopatra and Anthony, as does Propertius, who characterizes the city of Alexandria as the breeding place of a ‘harlot queen’, and as ‘barking Anubis opposing Jupiter’.150 Two centuries later still this topos resonates in Dio Cassius, who has Augustus deliver a speech in which Egyptians are depicted as ‘slaves of a woman and adherents of outrageous rites like animal worship’.151 Polybius depicts the Celts as greedy and untrustworthy, as excessive drinkers and ‘notoriously fickle and 145 Hingley 2005: 64. 146 Cf. Lopez 2008: 166. 147 Farrell cited in Hingley 2005: 61. 148 Lopez 2008; with regard to Galatians cf. also Kahl 2010. A more detailed interaction with their work follows in chapter 5. 149 Verg. Aen. 8.688: Cleopatra is described as ‘Aegyptia coniunx’; 8.696–700. Also Ovid. Met. 185.826. 150 Prop. 3.11.33–42: ‘noxia Alexandria, dolis aptissima tellus … ausa Iovis nostro latrantem opponere Anubim, et Tiebrim Nili cogere ferre minas.’ 151 Dio 50.24.6–25.3, 50.27.1.

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unpredictable in their behaviour’.152 Positive traits could also be reported – their size and beauty, boldness and courage in battle – but such aspects, rather than being signs of positive appreciation, were depicted to render them enemies worthy of Rome. The negative stereotyping and power discourse often inherent in such perceptions, however, are only aspects of how groups were perceived. Even negative Roman views about Egypt can hardly be taken as ‘the’ perception of Egyptians by Rome; this has to be assessed taking into account not only the particular purpose of the literary evidence mentioned here, as well as other negative assessments of Egyptians’ traditions, but also the popularity of the Isis cult and the respect for Egyptian ancient traditions expressed in other contexts.153 Even the depiction of the Persians in Persiae by Aeschylus, sometimes described as the ‘invention of the barbarian’ in classical antiquity, Gruen claims, is not aimed at ‘trumpeting any inherent superiority of Hellenes over barbarians’.154 There is significant diversity with regard to the perception of the self and the perception of others – widely but not exclusively in terms of depicting such relations in kinship language.155 The implications of such language are variable, as Emma Dench has highlighted in her study Romulus Asylum, noting that ‘specifically claims of common kin certainly do not necessarily imply claims of common Greek identity, but can seem ethnically indifferent or neutral’.156 Claims to common kinship served a number of purposes and were not the only means by which self-perception/identity as a separate group of people was perceived. These different ways of circumscribing self-perception and identity are analogical and contextual, in some instances cumulative, but we should be careful not to perceive them as if they represented philosophical or sociological definitions or systems.157 Through foundation myths Greeks could see themselves linked to the Medes, Achaemenids, Persians, Armenians and Scythians. Egyptians could claim that the Macedonians descended from them, and that Babylonian cult practices actually stemmed from Egypt. Rome claimed Trojan ancestry, and Abraham, the Jewish ancestor, was a ‘wandering Aramean’ from Ur. Such ancestry claims, of course, do not display appreciation of others in terms of equality. Such dependency claims often went hand in hand with respective superiority claims, in that ancestry and respect and honour were intertwined. Foundation myths and kinship links between peoples were often part of the same discourse. Thus peoples could depict 152 Gruen 2011: 142 referring to Polyb. 2.7.5–6, 2.19.3–4, 2.32.7–8, 3.79.4, 3.78.2. 153 Gruen 2011: 111–14, referring to Plutarch’s De Iside et Osiride, where it is obviously noted that the Egyptian practices and beliefs were different from Greek and Roman traditions. Nevertheless, the emphasis is on comparable and analogous aspects of their culture and traditions despite these differences. 154 Gruen, 2011: 11. 155 See the excellent and detailed discussion by Gruen 2011: 223–307. 156 Dench 2005: 236. 157 Cf. Jones 1996: 315.

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themselves as related in numerous ways to others; the genealogies of the Hebrew Scriptures are a telling example of this shared tradition which stressed affiliation rather than distance within a context of diversity and difference. Emma Dench notes ‘“family trees” have the potential to be used primarily either in an “aggregative” way, to write peoples into the world of the beholder, or with more of an eye to the consequences of inclusion or exclusion’.158 Definitional clarity or homogeneous purity do not seem to have been concerns when it comes to describing group identity in antiquity whether from an emic or from an etic perspective. In that sense ‘hybridity’ seems to have been the norm rather than the exception. But rather than leading to a blurred sense of belonging to the respective kinship groups, these were seen as connected or related to each other in their distinctive identities.159 Although literary and material evidence demonstrates that negative stereotyping formed part of group interaction in antiquity, and was certainly not confined to the Romans, this is only one side of the coin and one aspect of group interaction. Another common thread of circumscription of group identities was that they were not seen as ‘hermetically sealed’ nor merely requiring distancing but rather as including also the tendency to emphasize ties with other groups and peoples – locating oneself within the context of a network of others. Neither existence in a vacuum nor in glorious isolation seems to have been a desirable way to perceive one’s own group or people.160 Antagonism, indifference and friendly and familial bonding to various degrees were obvious options in relating to those who were not considered part of one’s own group.

4.6 Conclusions The areas around the Mediterranean and the Near East were a ‘polyglot and entangled universe’ in which distinctive peoples, tribes and classes embedded in a multitude of traditions and languages interacted with one another at numerous levels. Although some of these peoples at times gained the power to dominate others and impose aspects of their ways of life on others, far from resulting in uniform ways of living under Greek or Roman rule, diversity remained the norm with regard to everyday existence in terms of languages, cultures and ethnic identification. This diversity also implied a diversity of responses to domination, Greek or Roman, with those who were not part of, and not willing to become part of, the dominating discourse being far more than mere victims of violence and domination. Although power asymmetry and dominating force and violence formed a cloud over all those peoples and classes who were not part of the elitist imperial discourse, they reacted and acted in numerous ways as agents of their own communities and traditions. Thus 158 Dench 2005: 236. 159 Cf. Gruen 2011: 355–60. 160 Cf. Gruen 2011: 223, 249, 251.

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interaction, communication and translation must have been a constant feature of life not only for Greek and Roman officials but also for members of the different ‘conquered nations’. There must have been bilinguals and biculturals who could relate not only to Greek and Roman ways of life but also to the ways of life of ‘others’ under Rome. Little evidence for such interaction has been transmitted. The most significant body of literature that provides insight into such processes from the perspective of the non-dominating cultural and political elite is the corpus of Jewish writings of the Second Temple period. This is ‘barbarian’ literature161 and has the potential of providing insight into processes and perspectives otherwise known only through the lens of Greece or Rome. Located in the sphere of influence of Greece and Rome, this literature cannot but be affected by, and interact with, these powers.162 However, as was the case for the other peoples in these circumstances, this does not mean that the Jews lost their distinctive tradition and sense of particular identity in the process. Biculturalism and bilingualism might have been as normal for Jews as for others under Greece and Rome. And in as much as neither Greeks nor Romans would have conflated or confused their respective identities, nor would Jews (or Palmyrenes, Celts, Lycaonians, Lybians, etc.) have confused their identity in processes of interaction with, and mediation between, different peoples and cultures. Paul and his co-workers were part of this particular tradition. It is the thesis of this study that they embarked on a mission which included the mediation/translation of an alternative to the dominating imperial discourse rooted in the Jewish alternative tradition that had developed over centuries of interaction with others.

161 Dench 2005: 346. 162 Cf. Satlow maintains that ‘Many Jews in antiquity maintained their ethnic distinctiveness, but they were physically indistinguishable from, and socially integrated with, their non-Jewish neighbours’ (2008: 46).

Part II

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Chapter 5 Mapping Paul In the context of the enormous cultural and ethnic diversity of the Roman Empire where should Paul be located? Where on this multicoloured map can he be found? What trajectories of traditions, cultures, peoples and languages can be traced through his letters? Since Paul does not operate as a lone traveller but is firmly part of a team1 these questions pertain to the team as much as to Paul. Apostles and other co-workers in Christ were travellers on the roads of the empire, and most likely beyond its borders in the South and the East. The focus here is on the activity of Paul as one of the apostles and other workers in Christ among people of the nations in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire. But it should be kept in mind, despite some assertions to the contrary, that this empire was not the limit of the horizon for these peoples; certainly not for Jews, but most likely not for many other subjects of Roman domination either.2 As such, Paul and his colleagues were prone to influences from diverse contexts as most subjects of the Roman Empire would have been. It is thus no surprise that some scholars find traces of numerous traditions in the Pauline letters, ranging from Stoic to Sophistic, from Pharisaic to Essene, from sapiental to apocalyptic, etc., and combinations of these, whilst others consider none of these influences really relevant since they argue that in Christ ‘worlds are obliterated’.3 But since, as we have demonstrated in the previous chapter, the cultural, ethnic and linguistic diversity of the Roman Empire did not lead to an undifferentiated fusion of diversity, Paul, other apostles and co-workers should not be considered a confluence of ideas, an amalgam of so-called Hellenistic and Jewish influences, or hybrid Jews. In the vein of the paradigm of biculturalism we need to consider carefully what the presence of diverse traditions might indicate about Paul and his colleagues, as well as about the processes of interaction and communication between groups of people with particular and divergent identities. Although I consider Paul to be part of a team rather than a lone individual, in the following analysis I will have to concentrate on aspects of his identity in particular. There are certainly aspects which are shared between apostles and co-workers but this, as well as differences between them, would require 1 2 3

Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 37–53. Cf. below 5.2.2. Gaventa 2007: 68; cf. also Campbell’s critique of this stance 2011: 51.

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a detailed analysis of each of them, which is beyond the scope of this study. Nevertheless, it should be kept in mind throughout this study that the Pauline letters are seen as the result of the collaboration of a team rather than the work of just Paul.4 In this chapter I will focus on Paul and map him in the landscape of the cultural, ethnic and linguistic diversity (which inherently includes the political, and cultic dimension) of the empire. He was one of those travellers in Christ who acted as go-betweens not only between the communities he had founded and others like Jerusalem and Rome, but also between the different traditions, cultures and peoples who came together in these e)kklhsi/ai in various cities of the empire. Paul’s role will be investigated first by trying to locate him in his social identity on the map of the collective identities of different peoples and traditions, and considering the implications this has for his activities as apostle to the nations. As a founder and guide of e)kklhsi/ai, his own location on this map has decisive implications for the guidance provided to them, as well as for the understanding of the symbolic universe/s within which Paul and the e)kklhsi/ai engage with each other. Such implications will be explored in relation to the narratives within which the Christ-movement emerges (chapter 6), and in relation to cultic practice in its identity-forming and meaning-generating dimension (chapter 7). The social identity and location of Paul and the collective identity and location of the e) kklhsi/ai are considered to be inherently intertwined, mutually impinging on each other. Thus, rather than being a one-way process of someone in a superior position exercising power over an inferior group, the relationship between Paul, his team and the e)kklhsi/ai is seen as one of mutual influence in an ongoing communication process. Although the relationship is asymmetrical, it is neither static nor one-dimensional.5 Many if not most issues mentioned in the Pauline letters are rooted in, or clearly related to, the particular addressees; they are thus documents which provide glimpses of insight into theologizing as communicative practice in the space between community leaders and communities, between peoples of different contexts and affiliations, between different cultures and traditions.

5.1 On the Map of the Imperium Romanum: Israel and the Nations Two aspects of Paul’s social identity to which he repeatedly refers himself are of key relevance here: the e1qnh on the one hand, and his own people, his own ge/nov on the other. Paul also uses pairing terminology for groups such as )Ioudai/oi and 3Ellhnev, peritomh/ and a)krobusti/a, and in one instance 3Ellhnev and ba/rbaroi. Attention has been drawn to this pairing language, arguing that Paul might have inscribed an undifferentiated, universalizing dualism into his discourse which ignored the diversity of the e1qnh, 3Ellhnev, 4 Cf. Schottroff 2013: 18. 5 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 35–62.

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a)krobusti/a, ba/rbaroi, lumping them together under a generalizing umbrella term.6 Stanley has critically assessed such arguments and demonstrated that Paul’s use of this terminology is not monolithic despite his preference for ‘binary modes of categorization’. He notes that Paul’s language is ‘creative and varied’, ‘complex and situational’.7 Thus we need to ask more specifically who are these collective entities that seem to be of decisive significance for Paul’s social identity and perception of the world? One entity is stunningly absent from his letters, at least in explicit terms: Rome. We considered the significance of Roman imperial domination to linguistic as well as to cultural and ethnic aspects in general in the previous chapter. In my view it is almost inconceivable that this all-permeating power should not have left traces in the Pauline discourse. Although it might not be as direct and explicit as Horsley and others have argued, Neil Elliott, Davina Lopez, Brigitte Kahl, Ian E. Rock and most recently James Harrison have demonstrated that traces of implicit and at times coded interaction with Roman ideology can be found throughout the Pauline letters. There seems to be a ‘silence’ in Paul’s letters which has similarities with Plutarch’s and Aelius Aristides’ ‘silence’ concerning the contemporary imperial context, and might cohere with Quintilian’s arguments for figurative speech or silence in situations and contexts where explicit speech was either not advisable or not possible.8 Thus although not explicitly mentioned, Rome is considered to be present providing the fore- or background context of the communication and interaction of the people we encounter in the Pauline letters. Paul appears on the scene of history at a time and in a geographical area where the Roman Principate was firmly established, as was the claim of Roman rule around the entire Mediterranean basin. The internal Roman power struggles were settled, more or less, and the Julio-Claudian dynasty firmly established in its power. The Augustan programme of peace and justice (pax et iustitia), supported by the introduction of a number of laws (leges), was officially hailed as the inauguration of an age of salvation for all peoples, a Golden Age of prosperity. At a formal and military level there were no substantial internal challenges to the system of Roman domination, although in specific contexts and at the boundaries of the empire things of course would not look as settled as at and from the centre.9 This military and political domination, accompanied by its respective ideological underpinnings, could not and did not intend to, as demonstrated above, override or eradicate diversity in cultural, ethnic and linguistic terms.10 Roman domination and the wide-ranging diversity under its rule, as well as the multi-layered negotiations between these dimensions, are the decisive context of the early Christ-movement in general and of Paul and 6 Marchal 2008: 48–57, 76–79. For a critique of this assessment cf. Stanley 2011b: 118–20. 7 Stanley 2011a: 120. 8 Cf. discussion above 4.3.1. 9 Cf. e.g. Josephus Bell. 1.5, who mentioned the Gauls as causing trouble for Rome. 10 Cf. sections 4.2–4.4.

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his colleagues in particular.11 This was not an encounter between equals, but one between those who ruled and those who were ruled. As we have noted, even the encounter between Romans and Greeks, despite some recognition and admiration of Greek traditions and practices by the Romans, was never an encounter of equals, certainly not from a Roman perspective. All other traditions and peoples under Rome and beyond its borders were beyond the ‘benefits’ of civilization, that is, barbarian. The world of Greece and Rome was divided into two categories: civilized and uncivilized. Although it was not a hermetically sealed world and the boundaries could be crossed, this was only possible if one was willing to become like them, that is, civilized according to Greek and Roman perception. Paul was not one of ‘them’. He was one of those others – ruled, but not really civilized despite speaking Greek. According to the perspective of the civilized, Greece and Rome, Paul, like all other members of peoples who were not part of the latter, was part of a non-civilized nation. He was a member of a barbaric people, as Josephus’ reference to his own people from a Roman perspective discloses.12

5.2 Ta _ E 1 qnh in Roman Perspective The division of the world from a Roman (and Greek) perspective into ‘us and them’, despite the recognition of diversity, emerged according to criteria which were not negotiated between peoples but dictated by those in power. There was no negotiating of status for conquered peoples. Although the Romans could grant different status to different conquered peoples, as colonia, amici or confoederati, they could also be enslaved, and none of these designations turned the conquered nation into an equal partner of Rome.13 Any status attribution was granted by the mercy of Rome. There could be misunderstandings in moments of surrender due to linguistic and cultural translation problems, such as those referred to by Polybius on the surrender of the Aetolians to consul Manius Acilius Glabrio in 191 bce. The Aetolians asked for pardon and handed themselves over ‘ei)v th_n Rwmai/wn pi/stin (‘to the trust/loyalty of the Roman people’). Deditio in fidem in Roman terms meant unconditional surrender, whilst the Aetolians believed that this would leave room for negotiating ‘a more complete pardon’.14 Glabrio dictated the terms of their surrender and, upon Aetolian protest that his demands were not ‘Greek’, Glabrio replied ‘Are you still going to run around acting Greek 11 For the impact of imperial ideology and domination see Elliott 2008; Rock 2012; Horsley 2000; 2004. 12 Josephus Bell. 1.3. Evidence for this perception can still be found in the third-century writings of Clement of Alexandria who refers to part of the Christian tradition as the ‘barbaric philosophy’; see Osborn 2005: 92–93. 13 Dmitriev 2011: 260; cf. Strecker 2005: 236–39; also section 6.6.3. 14 Ando 2008: 48.

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(e1ti ga_r u(mei=v e(llhnokopei=te) even after you have given yourselves ei)v th_n pi/stin? I will throw you all in chains if I want to’ (Polybius 20.9–10).15 There was nothing to be negotiated here under Roman domination. As noted above, the Greek perspective was dominated by a dichotomy between Greeks and barbarians, barbarians originally being those who did not speak Greek, but eventually this was specified to refer also to those who had no Greek education (paidei/a).16 The Roman perspective focused on a dichotomy between civilized and uncivilized, civilized being defined partly by Greek education (paidei/a) and predominantly by Roman law and humanitas. The options available to those included under Roman rule by conquest were either, if you were part of the provincial elite, eventually to join them in becoming ‘civilized’ or to submit, the latter being the only option available if you were not a member of the elite. Submission was required in economic and military terms even where partial autonomy in civic and cultic affairs might have been granted. Cultural, military, economic and cultic domination were intertwined. But whilst cultural domination affected mainly the local elite who aspired to maintain, regain or gain powerful positions through collaboration with Rome, economic, military and cultic domination affected the people of conquered nations at all levels. The power asymmetry in the relationship between Rome and the provinces should not be underestimated. Rome’s territorial expansion and domination was built on military violence even where the mere threat of such violence achieved its goal. To become part of the empire was not a democratic process but involved ‘intrusion, exploitation, violence, and coercion’.17 The provincial voices we know of are mostly those of the elite ‘who had aligned themselves with Rome and had taken their place in delivering Roman government and justice’.18 But even those voices would not be able to claim equal standing with the Roman elite during the first century ce, much as they might have aspired to such recognition. They were representatives of conquered peoples, accepted as useful tools of Roman power.19 This context needs to be taken into account when Roman descriptions of other nations are considered. They are not the result of neutral observation (if such a category ever existed), rather they are contextualized statements, often formulated either in the preparation of conquest or serving to legitimize Roman domination. The Roman elite literary discourse contributed to the justification of the subjugation of other nations, and thus facilitated colonial violence.20 Mattingly even argues that: ‘Much of what we learn from Roman 15 Cf. discussion in Ando 2008: 48–49. 16 Cf. above 4.3.1. 17 Mattingly 2011: 94. This is the case even when the initiative for a treaty came from the non-Roman side as in the example of the Jews. Cf. also Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 9, and Baltrusch 2002: 137–41. 18 Mattingly 2011: 26. 19 Cf. Tacitus’ description of the adoption of Roman practices by elite Britons referred to above in chapter 4. 20 Mattingly 2011: 215; Hingley 2005: 61.

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ethnography about neighbouring peoples is thus of highly dubious value since its prime purpose was to dehumanize the enemies of Rome and make their slaughter and enslavement more straightforward.’21 Thus he cautions against reading the ethnic structures presented in these works at face value, since they emerged mostly after violent contact between Rome and the people described.22 Although, as mentioned above, these rhetorical purposes and contexts should not be generalized as the only perception of others in antiquity, they were a strong ideological tool in support of the exercise of Roman domination.23 Jews were regularly mocked for their peculiar practices, such as abstaining from pork, but worst of all for not participating in the regular rituals which guaranteed the well-being of the po/liv urbscolonia, urbs and the imperium as a whole. Although Greek and Roman authors demonstrate significant knowledge of the diverse peoples, tribes and clans in the Roman Empire, this knowledge consists of mostly curious traditions and practices. As already noted, sometimes the strength and courage of other people is recognized, and partly even admired, though not in recognition of their equal standing with Rome but, exclusively, in order to enhance the grandeur of the respective Roman conquest. These nations are subsumed under the category e)qnh/gentes, a term specifically used in relation to the corporate dimension which applies to all of them from a Roman perspective: they are subjugated, uncivilized peoples who now benefit from the ‘civilizing’ power of Rome.24 Davina Lopez has, in my view, convincingly demonstrated that the e1qnh in Roman propaganda and ideology were those peoples conquered and now ruled by Roman power. A dualistic dichotomy between the civilized power of Rome ordained by the gods to rule the world eternally25 and those destined to be subjugated and ruled over permeates Roman perception of others. They were e1qnh/gentes, characterized by disorder and strange practices, dangerous and unpredictable. In contrast with these e1qnh//gentes, the Roman people were the populus Romanus, structured and well-organized now under the leadership of the princeps, who incorporated in himself all the virtues and values Rome stood for. The Roman populus in the ‘incarnation’ of the princeps had brought order, peace and piety to the world, thus having ‘saved’ the world from chaos and destruction. The e1qnh/gentes together with the Romans live in the world as it is known to Rome, but particularly they are those who have been integrated by force under Roman domination. They are ‘united in their status and relationship to Roman rule’.26 And although the Romans and Greeks could refer to links between themselves and other peoples through fictive kinship ties, Lopez has 21 Mattingly, 2011: 215. 22 Mattingly 2010: 292. 23 Cf. chapter 4. 24 Lopez 2005: 116; cf. also chapter 4, p. 99. 25 Cf. Harrison’s excellent discussion of the perception of Augustus’ and Nero’s reigns as the return of the Golden Age of Saturn (2011: 101–108). 26 Lopez 2005: 145.

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drawn attention to the fact that despite such ‘connecting’ discourses among Greeks and Romans, Roman imperial ideology did not present any narrative of common ancestry with the subjugated peoples in the first century. These peoples were seen as a threat to Rome, a danger which could only be eliminated by taming them through subjugation, described as providing them with the gift of civilization. These peoples are related to each other and to Rome only through Roman conquest, in that the princeps was the pater patriae, ruler of them all. 27 Lopez presents an analysis of numerous visual representations of the e1qnh/ gentes in Roman art, from the late Republic to the Early Principate. The Gauls had grown into enemies of Rome on an almost mythological scale after having destroyed Rome in 387 bce, and as such they figure prominently in Roman literature and visual art. This has been excellently discussed by Brigitte Kahl in her Galatians: Re-imagined.28 Roman imperial ideology depicted them as lawless barbarians, haters of humanity, plunderers, sacrificers of men, even children, etc.29 This mythical enemy was joined later by the numerous other peoples who were conquered by Rome. The Sebasteion of Aphrodisias is one of the many examples of the depiction of Roman violent triumph over e1qnh and provides us with an idea of the scale and of the ideology transmitted by the visual representation. The e1qnh are represented by about fifty female sculptures and include Egyptians, Andizeti, Arabs, Bessi, Bosporans, Dacians, Dardani, Iapodes, Judeans, Callaeci, Piroustae, Rhaeti and Triumplini. The islands of Crete, Cyrene and Sicily are included in this range, which has led to the hypothesis that this portico represents to some extent the world as conquered by Augustus, thus serving to promote Augustan ideology in a similar vein to the Res Gestae.30 It is thought that these representations are modelled on the simulacra omnium gentium on the portico ad nationes in Rome referred to by Servius31 but actually they represent only a limited number of the tribes and peoples attributed to Augustus’ conquests. Lists of Dio, Tacitus and Strabo provide the impression that they must have been in the low hundreds with Dio and Strabo only mentioning the major peoples rather than all peoples and tribes who had come under Roman domination.32 Smith is of the view that a full list of the conquered peoples would have been held at Rome.33 An image of nations united under Roman control is evoked; they are united in their defeat, and in their status as enslaved, marginalized others.34 This was the case even when peoples had themselves taken the initiative to enter 27 Lopez 2005: 153. 28 Kahl 2010: 51–75. 29 Kahl 2010: 72. 30 Smith 1988: 57–58. It needs to be noted, however, that Dacia and Arabia were not under Roman domination at that time. 31 Servius Ad. Aen. 8.721 discussed by Smith 1988: 71–72. 32 Smith 1988: 74 notes that ‘the Gauls were represented by sixty ethne at the Lugdunum altar of Augustus’. 33 Smith 1988: 74. 34 Lopez 2008: 172.

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a formal link with Rome, and the relationship was not hostile throughout, as in the case of the Jews.35 Significantly, the visual representations at Aphrodisias and elsewhere, as well as literary evidence, are careful to emphasize the difference of the conquered peoples through specific attributes such as dress code, hair style and artefacts. Thus Dio refers to Augustus’ funeral procession including ta/ te e1qnh pa/nq’ o3sa prosekth/sato e0pixwri/wv sfi/sin w(v e3kasta a)ph?kasme/na e)pe/mfqh (‘images of all the ethne that he had acquired, each represented individually with some local characteristic’).36 While this clearly indicates awareness of ethnic and cultural diversity on the part of the Romans,37 the reasons behind depicting and emphasizing such diversity hardly implied a recognition or even appreciation of these peoples in their particularity, but rather served to emphasize their difference from the ‘civilized’ people of Rome (and to a lesser extent Greece). They were precisely depicted as diverse in their inferiority thus legitimizing Roman conquest as a civilizing mission according to Roman ideology. Unity between these peoples could only consist in unity under Rome, in submission to Roman law and order. Recognition as truly human could only be attained through humanitas, that is, by becoming Roman, accepting the pater patriae as their father and embracing Roman ideology.38 Any unity between these e1qnh/gentes that would have emerged from their own initiative and based on their self-perception as peoples distinct from Rome was considered to mean trouble for Rome and must be prevented,39 as Tacitus’ comment illustrates: ‘May the nations retain and perpetuate, if not an affection for us, at least an animosity against each other! since, while the fate of the empire is thus urgent, fortune can bestow no higher benefit upon us, than the discord of our enemies’ (‘Maneat, quaeso, duretque gentibus, si non amor nostri, at certe odium sui, quando urgentibus imperii fatis nihil iam praestare fortuna maius potest quam hostium discordiam’ [Germ. 33.2]). Paul’s letters are predominantly addressing people from these e1qnh, and he himself refers to his calling experience as a commissioning to proclaim good news among the nations (Gal. 1.16). This includes the call for unity and solidarity in Christ among conquered peoples in clear contradistinction to the discord between them advocated by Rome. Although from a Roman perspective, Paul himself is clearly a member of one of these subjugated e1qnh, he himself does not refer to his own people using this term (except in citations from the LXX) but differentiates between his own people and those e1qnh he addresses. His world, like the world of the Romans is categorized according to ‘us and them’, although along very different lines of distinction.

35 Cf. n. 17 above. 36 Dio Cass. 56.34.3. 37 Satlow 2008: 47. 38 Pace e.g. Thorsteinsson who refers to Seneca, Clem. 1.11.12; cf. also p. 65 n. 8. 39 Cf. also Lopez 2008: 110 and discussion in chapter 6, pp. 154–60.

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5.3 Paul and his Ge/nov Paul clearly identifies himself with his own people, one of these conquered e1qnh depicted on the Aphrodisias portico. As noted above (4.1, p. 64), it is from this particular subjugated people that a significant body of literature exists. Dench has drawn attention to the fact that this literature is actually extraordinary, not only in its existence, but also in its extent. She is of the view that the ‘very persistence of literary languages other than Greek and Latin, most notably Aramaic and Hebrew, despite the extensive use of Greek in other contexts even among Jews in Palestine, underlines the significance of self-consciously independent theological, historical, and literary traditions’.40 This ‘barbaric’ body of literature provides insights into the self-perception of the Jewish people in interaction with, and distancing itself from, either Greek- or Roman-centred perspectives. In addition to their homeland Judaea/ Galilee, members of this people lived all over the Roman Empire, Josephus even claiming that they lived in every city of the empire, but significantly also beyond its borders, with a substantial community living in Babylonia under Parthian rule. In my view this is of higher significance than generally acknowledged in New Testament scholarship. Although the Roman Empire, and the Greek-speaking part of the Roman Empire, is the main context of New Testament literature, it was not the only focus of life and worldview for the Jewish people in the first century. Ongoing contact, communication and interaction were not focusing towards the West only, but possibly as much to the East, if not even more so. They not only travelled West, they also travelled East.41 Although Roman and Greek influence could obviously not be ignored, the inhabited and ‘civilized’ world in the perception of Jews was not limited to, and did not end at the borders of, the Roman Empire and Greek paidei/a. For them there literally was a world beyond these borders. Not surprisingly, Josephus reports that at the onset of the revolt there had been expectations that the Jewish communities in the East would provide support for the uprising.42 Jewish life in the first century thus accommodated to various contexts, in the Diaspora of the Roman and Parthian empires, as well as in the homeland. Arye Edrei and Doron Mendels have drawn attention to the significance of, and 40 Dench 2005: 346. 41 Oppenheimer 2005; on Roman–Parthian relations generally cf. Ferguson 2005. 42 It is interesting that Josephus in Bell. 1.5 mentions Jews, Galatians and Celts as the peoples causing trouble for Rome: ‘e0peidh\ 'Ioudai=oi me\n a#pan to\ u(pe\r Eu)fra&thn o)mo/fulon suneparqh/sesqai sfi/sin h1lpisan, 9Rwmai/ouv de\ oi3 te gei/tonev Gala&tai pareki/noun kai\ to\ Keltiko\n ou9k h9re/mei, mesta_ d' h]n pa&nta qoru/bwn meta_ Ne/rwna, kai\ pollou\v me\n basileia~n o) kairo\v a)ne/peiqen, ta_ stratiwtika_ de\ h1ra metabolhvv e0lpi/di lhmma&twn: (‘or the Jews hoped that all of their nation which were beyond Euphrates would have raised an insurrection together with them. The Gauls/Galatians also, in the neighbourhood of the Romans, were in motion, and the Celtae were not quiet; but all was in disorder after the death of Nero. And the opportunity now offered induced many to aim at the royal power; and the soldiery affected change, out of the hopes of getting money’).

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difference between, the Diasporas of the East and the West, arguing that the distinction between these have mostly been blurred in scholarship ‘explicitly or implicitly assuming that knowledge about one diaspora could inform the other’.43 They note that before the destruction of the Temple, Jerusalem and the Land of Israel provided the link between the two Diasporas and were a ‘unifying force’ in the Jewish world prior to 70 ce.44 But they emphasize that there was a significant difference between these Diasporas prior to 70 ce which in my view is evidence for the awareness of such differences in political, social and cultural context on the part of the Jews of both Diasporas to some extent at least. The world of Rome was certainly not the only world Jews of the Western Diaspora would have been aware of. But it was not only due to geographical movement that the Jews were aware of alternative perspectives; inherent in their own tradition was a critical stance against any absolutist power claims on the part of humans, be this internal or external.45 Their loyalty to one God only and exclusively, inherently bound up with a particular way of life based on the covenantal relationship with their God, and between each other, decisively marked their collective identity as a people and distinguished them in their self-perception from others. This selfperception could be expressed in different veins, even in the vein of Greek philosophical categories as in the case of Philo, or in a vein that had significant similarities with Greek historiography as in the case of Josephus. However, these forms of expression did not diminish the perception of the identity of the traditions and events thus described as undoubtedly Jewish. As Barclay has emphasized, Jews were ‘cultural negotiators’, and the key question is not so much of what origin the forms and material they used were, but to what end they were using them, and what interests they were pursuing.46 They more often served assertive interests than merely apologetic ones. The use of Greek forms and ways of arguing ‘was not a matter a free cultural choice’47 but a matter of negotiating identity in the context of subjugation by dominating powers. In a context where anything non-Greek or non-Roman was regarded as ba/rbaron by the dominating power, in attempts to be heard, and to assert one’s own identity one had to submit to some extent to the cultural forms of expression of that very same power.48 Josephus, for that matter, positions his historical accounts clearly within the context of other known historiographical traditions. It is noteworthy that he not only mentions Greek historiography but also refers at considerable length 43 Edrei and Mendels 2007: 92. 44 Edrei and Mendels’ article focuses on the implications of the loss of this central link between the Diasporas after the destruction of the Temple and notes that particularly the language difference caused what they call a ‘split’ in the Jewish Diasporas with far-reaching consequences for emerging Rabbinic Judaism and early Christianity (2007 and 2008). 45 Cf. Rajak 2009: 176–209. 46 Barclay 2002: 16–17. 47 Barclay 2002: 17. 48 Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 11; Barclay 2002: 21.

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to Egyptian, Phoenician, Ephesian and Chaldaean records in support of the antiquity claims of his own people. It is intriguing that he only refers to Greek evidence in support of these claims after having presented the details of the evidence from the ‘barbarian’ records, and he explicitly mentions that he does so in case some might find ‘barbarian’ records to be not reliable enough, noting: Dei= d' a1ra kai\ tw~n a)pistou/ntwn me\n toi=v barba&roiv a)nagrafai=v mo/noiv de\ toi=v 3Ellhsi pisteu/ein a)ciou/ntwn a)poplhrw~sai th\n e0pizh/thsin kai\ parasxei=n pollou\v kai\ tou/twn e0pistame/nouv to\ e1qnov h9mw~n kai\ kaq' o4 kairo\v h]n au0toi=v mnhmoneu/ontav paraqe/sqai e0n i0di/oiv au)tw~n suggra&mmasi (‘But now it is proper to satisfy the inquiry of those that disbelieve the records of barbarians, and think none but Greeks to be worthy of credit, and to produce many of these very Greeks who were acquainted with our nation, and to set before them such as upon occasion have made mention of us in their own writings’ [Ag. Ap. 1.161]).

The hierarchy of credibility is thus not Josephus’ but clearly that of those personified in the fictitious addressee Apion. Since Josephus is writing for a Greek-speaking audience and is concerned with the recognition of his people as of ancient tradition, he has to present the evidence in a vein which fits Greek historiography.49 But the significant use of ‘barbarian’ historiography in support of the antiquity of the Jews ‘helps to establish the distinctiveness of his own authority and perspective by complicating the historiographical tradition within which his own work is to be read and with which it is competing in its “corrections”’.50 In Against Apion in particular, Josephus emphasizes the distinctiveness of his people. There are a number of aspects Josephus mentions as marking out Jews as distinct from all other peoples, with an implicit hint at their actual superiority51 (similarly to Philo). Two of the most significant characteristics mentioned are the Jewish poli/teia and piety (eu)se/beia). While obviously buying into the poli/teia discourse of Greek philosophy, Xenophon’s Constitution of the Lacedaemonians and Plato’s Republic, Jewish politei/a is presented as being superior to all of these in its nature as a theocracy (Ap. 2.165). In addition, against the argument that the Jewish law is unjust and that Jews are lacking in piety (eu)se/beia), which is the reason for their enslavement by numerous powers, Josephus seems to hint at a temporal limitation of Roman domination. Although he does not mention Rome, he notes that even pious people have been subject to others, which could include Rome for those who wish to hear it in that way (2.126; 131).52 Although overall Josephus seems to be trying to demonstrate that Jewish tradition coheres well with Roman virtues and piety, at the core of this piece of literature is a strong emphasis on the 49 Dench is of the view that it is Josephus who upholds the hierarchy here, which in my view is clearly not the case. But Dench also notes that the mentioning of these ‘barbarian’ historiographies is exceptional since these would not be granted any attention by Greek historiographers (2005: 356). 50 Dench 2005: 357. 51 Cf. Dench 2005: 358–61. 52 Cf. Dench 2005: 360–61.

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Jews’ distinctiveness as a people in their own right and tradition, despite their inferior status as a subjugated people in Roman perspective. Traditions are a decisive aspect of collective and social identity and the implications of this for Paul’s theologizing will be discussed below. Here it is sufficient to note that the exemplary positive self-perception of the Jews as a distinct people, as evidenced in the few examples from Josephus, sufficiently demonstrates their rejection of Greek and Roman perceptions of them as inferior people, and challenges their respective superiority claims. Whilst the distinctiveness of them as a subjugated people was recognized by Rome, as negative stereotyping as well as the sculptural evidence from Aphrodisias demonstrate, the values attributed to this distinctiveness could not differ more. In various contexts Paul explicitly refers to himself, to his own social identity, an identity which in his perception is, without any reservations, Jewish. There seems to be a wide-ranging consensus among scholars about Paul’s Judaism prior to his calling experience. The debate concerning in what sense he still considered himself, or was considered by fellow Jews, to be part of Judaism, however, is ongoing. Many arguments which see Paul as estranged from his roots or from parts of them,53 or as being considered an apostate by fellow Jews,54 focus on Paul’s activities and guidance in relation to those from the e1qnh, not always clearly differentiating between Paul’s identity and that of his addressees. Paul, however, does clearly distinguish between these not just by direct statements such as ‘Now I am speaking to you gentiles’ (Rom. 11.13), but also in his terminology: he refers to non-Jews who joined the Christ-movement as e1qnh, 3Ellhnev ba/rbaroi, a)krobusti/a whilst when referring to his own people he uses ge/nov or gen-related terms, as well as 0Ioudai=oi, 0Israhli/tai, peritomh/ and even spe/rma 0Abraa/m. Terms like 9Ebrai=oi, Farisai=oi, fu/lh Beniami/n, rather than denoting alternative terms, seem to indicate specific aspects of Jewish identity but cannot be separated from it.55 Significantly, Paul does not use the term e1qnh to refer to his own people nor does he ever use any of the latter terms to refer to members of the Christ-movement from the nations.56 Thus, in terms of terminology Paul clearly distinguishes between ‘us and them’, but he uses a terminology and perception of the world which obviously differs from the prevalent Greek and Roman versions. The centre of this world is neither Rome nor Athens, but Jerusalem (Rom. 15.16). I will discuss 9Ebrai=oi, Farisai=oi, fu/lh Beniami/n later in this chapter (5.6) and e1qnh, 3Ellhnev, ba/rbaroi in 5.4, and focus here on 0Ioudai=oi, 0Israhli/tai, ge/nov or gen-related terms.

53 Dunn is of the view that Paul was seen as freeing promise and law for a wide range of recipients, freed from the ethnic constraints which he saw to be narrowing the grace of God (1991). 54 Barclay 1996: 89–120. 55 For a more detailed discussion of gen-related terminology and its translation see my article ‘Paul, his People and Racial Terminology’ (2013). 56 Israel in Gal. 6.16 refers to actual Israel, the Jewish people. Cf. Campbell 2006/2008: 49, 52; Eastman 2010.

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Although the terms e1qnov and ge/nov are often used interchangeably in Greek and Roman discourses,57 Paul uses them in clearly distinctive ways. Due to the meaning of ge/nov as related to ‘origin’, ‘birth’, ‘descent’, in addition to ‘kind’, it is often rendered ‘race’ in English translations. As I have argued elsewhere, I consider this to be an unfortunate and misleading translation58 and will either leave the term untranslated or use ‘descent group’ as proposed by Esler.59 The fact that Paul uses this term and compound words only when referring to his own people lends support to the notion that he intended to refer to some special bonds between those who are part of this ge/nov in terms of shared origin, and descent, that is, kinship ties. It clearly indicates a special bond and relationship which Paul does not call into question at any point. Whenever he refers to his people using this term it is a factual or positive relationship that is indicated; neither competition nor severance are in play; and even where he refers to them with regard to difficulties that they caused for him, as in 2 Cor. 11.26, no further comment about them is made. In his probably most emotional reference to them in Rom. 9.3, he refers to them in addition as his brothers for whom he has great sorrow and unceasing anguish in his heart. This concern is current, not past, thus indicating that the bond, the special relationship, is neither a thing of the past nor a romantic relic of an inconsistent apostle,60 but something he would never loosen or give up. He would rather ‘cut himself off from Christ’ than loosen his special bond with them. Clearly the term ge/nov indicates his close ties to and ongoing solidarity with his own people.61 The use of the terms 0Ioudai=oi and 0Israhli/tev respectively has led to hypotheses concerning positive and negative identification on Paul’s part along these terminological distinctions. I will not reiterate the discussion here since in my view, although the positive connotation of Israel and Israelites is evident in Paul, a specifically negative connotation cannot be attributed to the term 0Ioudai=oi. The use of both terms for his own people is striking and it is difficult to trace a specific rationale for this in his letters. Goodblatt recently argued that there was a distinctive use by Jews of the terms according to linguistic categories.62 In Hebrew texts of the period the term 0Israh/l is predominantly used. When this term is found in Greek writings these have been authored by Jews. The term is used exclusively by Jews, and Goodblatt notes that ‘the ethnonym “Israel” is totally absent in pre-Christian, non-Jewish writings and inscriptions’.63 If the term 0Israh/l is found in Greek writings 57 Jones, 1996. 58 Ehrensperger 2012. 59 Esler 2003: 55. Martin argues that ‘“race” is a more misleading term when used of the Greco-Roman world than is ethnicity, though obviously neither modern term completely captures what we would consider the corresponding ancient categories’ (2009: 107–108). 60 Dodd 1932: 43; cf. discussion in Ehrensperger 2004: 43–44. 61 For the more specific implications in terms of traditions see below chapters 6 and 7 and Ehrensperger 2013. 62 This is a revision of Kuhn’s distinction of an emic/etic use of Israel/Ioudaios (TWNT 1938). 63 Goodblatt 2012: 17.

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these are exclusively written by Jewish authors. The term 0Ioudai=ov is used by non-Jews, but also to some extent by Greek-speaking Jews. Goodblatt argues that the latter may have been adopted by Greek-speaking Jews possibly via the Aramaic term ‘Yehudi’, a usage which the Hasmonaeans then replicated by referring to themselves as 0Ioudai=oi. Goodblatt asks the hypothetical question concerning which term Jews of the Second Temple Period would have used for themselves, and is of the view that it possibly would depend on the language spoken. He does not attribute any inherent difference to the terms as such. Thus Goodblatt affirms that there is a difference along emic/etic lines in that the term ‘Israel’ is never used by outsiders; but this is as far as he concurs with Kuhn.64 0Ioudai=oi is not exclusively an outsider term, nor is there any negative tone associated with it. If this is the case, then Paul’s use of both terms may be an indication of his bilingualism. If we were to discern some pattern in his use it could be argued that 0Israh/l-related terminology is used in contexts where Paul strongly identifies himself with his people. In more general statements and arguments, when Paul is not as immediately involved as, for example, in Rom. 11.1, 2 Cor. 11.22 and Phil. 3.4-5, he uses the term also used by outsiders. The key point in Goodblatt’s argument is that there is no inherent distinction in the use of the term in Second Temple Judaism; hence it is difficult in my view to introduce such a distinction specifically geared towards the Pauline use since there are not respective indications in his letters. Although Paul’s Jewishness is now widely acknowledged, the question as to what extent and in what sense he remained Jewish continues to be discussed controversially.65 Statements such as 1 Cor. 9.19-23 are interpreted as evidence that Paul under certain circumstances would not be Torah-observant any more. Mark Nanos has demonstrated, convincingly in my view, that interpretations which argue for Paul only pretending to be a Jew to Jews and a non-Jew to nonJews are inconsistent and would render Paul completely untrustworthy from all sides, to Jews as well as non-Jews. His arguments would have been compromised among Jews if he had given up kashrut when among non-Jews, and among nonJews if he adhered to kashrut when among Jews. For someone who argued for a supposedly law-free gospel, and thus had left Judaism behind, such behaviour would be compromising the very message he was supposed to embody.66 Paul’s arguments against circumcision for Christ-followers from the nations are also seen as arguments against circumcision per se, which may be tolerated for Jews for the time being, but which is actually an obsolete practice with the coming of Christ for all, Jews and non-Jews alike. Similarly, the urge to the ‘strong’ in Rome to accommodate to the ‘weak’ in terms of food consumption has been interpreted as a temporary concession to Jewish Christ-followers.67 64 Cf. Goodblatt’s discussion of Kuhn (2009: 86–88). 65 Cf. e.g. recently Sechrest 2009. 66 Nanos 2010: 119–23; cf. also Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 102–16 and 186–91. 67 I have critically discussed such perceptions and presented arguments against them in more detail in Ehrensperger 2004: 181–89 and 2010: 105–109. Cf. also Campbell 2006/2008: 104–20 and 2011.

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Such practices would be overcome once they had matured enough in faith to understand that kashrut laws as well as circumcision, indeed everything which rendered the Jewish way of life Jewish, had been overcome in Christ and was thus rendered obsolete or indifferent.68 Prior to focusing on Paul’s activities among, and guidance for, Christfollowers from the nations, we need to consider carefully what precisely Paul states about himself in relation to his own people beyond the mere fact that he is one of them. Looking at the brief narrative of his calling experience, Gal. 1.13-17, we find references to 0Ioudaismo/v (Jewish way of life), to his ge/nov and to tw=n patrikw=n mou parado/sewn (the traditions of my fathers). It is evident that Paul did live a Jewish way of life and considered his peers to be of the same ge/nov. Zh=lov for the traditions of the fathers seems to have been considered a significant characteristic of this ge/nov and Paul mentions that he even exceeded his peers. Whether this zh=lov for the traditions of his fathers is implicitly connected to the persecution of the e)kklhsi/a is not obvious in my view. Certainly, as Nanos has demonstrated, the possessive pronoun here indicates that Paul has not ceased to regard these ancestors as his fathers after his calling experience.69 However, with regard to Gal. 1.13 a number of details have been interpreted as indications that Paul here refers to an affiliation which he has left behind after his calling experience. Whilst some scholars, for example Alan Segal, maintain that this experience initiated a reorientation of affiliation within Judaism,70 others consider the severance from his affiliation to be so fundamental that it actually meant that Paul had left the Jewish tradition behind entirely.71 These interpretations are, among other things, based on a link between po/te (former) and 0Ioudaismo/v (v. 13). This link is considered to be general, referring to 0Ioudaismo/v as such. The comma which modern editions of the Greek New Testament (Nestle-Aland 27th and 28th edition) set after pote e)n tw?= )Ioudaismw?=, however, is misleading in that it suggests a pause between the latter phrase and what follows. It might well be that there is no such pause and Paul here qualifies the ‘former’ not with regard to 0Ioudaismo/v as such but with regard to the intense persecution of the e)kklhsi/a. Whether the ‘former’ extends to Paul’s way of life among his peers, and beyond that to the zeal for the traditions of the fathers, is an open question in my view. What is evident, however, is that the ‘former’ refers to a specific aspect of 0Ioudaismo/v, which had led him to be involved in an intense dispute about the e)kklhsi/a, rather

68 Engberg-Pedersen 2008: 34–37; Gaventa 2007: 68. 69 Nanos 2010: 142. On zh=lov see Ortlund 2013. 70 Segal 1990: 6–7. 71 Sanders 1977: 552; as Barclay appears to say, cf. 2002b: 139–40. Similarly Dunn who maintains that ‘Gal 1.13–14 certainly points us to the conclusion that Paul was converted from “Judaism” as ‘Pharisaic Judaism’ which is considered an ethnocentric form from which Paul distanced himself (2005: 353).

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than to 0Ioudaismo/v per se.72 What this dispute was actually about is difficult to discern, as Paul does not provide any further details about this period of his life.73 I will come back to this aspect below (5.5). Paul considers himself, like Kephas, a Jew by birth (Gal. 2.15), and refers to his identity as being as much and as undoubtedly Jewish as that of others who consider this to be a decisive credential for the trustworthiness of leaders within the Christ-movement (Phil. 3.5-6). William S. Campbell has argued in a detailed analysis of Phil. 3.7-8 that it is not his Jewishness that Paul considered as refuse here, as has been argued in numerous interpretations of the passage. Rather, Paul makes a comparative, not an absolute, statement which emphasizes how important being in Christ is for him now that the age to come had begun to dawn. He can only make this comparison in relation to that which is at the core of his social identity and thus of highest appreciated value to him. Campbell argues that ‘Paul’s examples may seem to be anti-Jewish because Jewish practice is part of the actual comparison he creates. But this is only incidentally so, since he, as a Jew, necessarily refers to what is most cherished by him in his Jewish tradition.’74 He cannot be exemplary in any other way than by his own identity as a Jew. The Christ-followers from other nations must draw implications from this with regard to their own ways of life, which are different from Paul’s and other Jewish Christ-followers’. Paul clearly identifies with his own people, the Jews, and he is rather clear that there is a distinction between his ge/nov and others. He is embedded in the symbolic and social universe of his ge/nov, which in Bourdieu’s terms implies that he embodies this particular universe in durable form, and activates this 72 Cf. also Nanos 2010: 141–43. 73 A number of hypotheses have been proposed which focus on the emphasis Paul puts on his persecuting activity through the addition of kaq' u(perbolh_n. Thus e.g. Lopez argues that Paul had formerly been ‘reproducing the very same power structure that the Roman metanarrative portrays as natural. He was persecuting and ravaging those who differed from him ... Paul was behaving as a proper Roman man according to imperial ideology: dominating others, policing boundaries, and employing his right of imperium’ (2008: 133). Lopez argues that it is from this ideological stance that Paul was converted to a different way of relating to those who were different but subjugated by Rome like the Jews. The calling experience led to a ‘shift in consciousness’ and ‘results in a different configuration of knowledge about the world and results in a renunciation of his previous affirmation of the power relations made natural and inevitable by Roman imperial ideology’ (2008: 137). Similarly Kahl 2010: 234. They both consider this not to imply any separation from Judaism but a reorientation within it. Whilst I consider the focus on the alternative power relations within the Christ-movement highly important (cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009), I think the link between Paul’s persecution of the e)kklhsi/a and Roman imperial ideology is more complex than proposed in Lopez’ and Kahl’s approaches. Also violent language is not completely absent in Paul’s letters after his call experience as 1 Cor. 5.5 and Rom. 16.20 demonstrate. Nanos considers the threat Paul saw as the Jewish and gentile members of the Christ-movement being on an equal par without the latter becoming Jews, thus ‘celebrating a kind of messianic banquet expected in the age to come within the midst of the present evil age.’ The problem thus was that they were neither guests nor proselytes (2010: 145). Frey imagines this to reflect an inner-Jewish struggle concerning the preservation of the Torah (2007: 291). 74 Campbell 2011: 56.

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‘habitus’ in his interaction with diverse ‘fields’ from within this contextual and particular Jewish tradition. As we have seen in 3.1.2, this does not mean that Paul’s ‘habitus’ would have been immutable, and although the ‘imprint’ would not have changed with his calling experience, its actualization in the context of existing social and cultural ‘fields’ would have allowed for creative interactions between tradition and new situations. Thus Paul’s sense of belonging and solidarity extended to people from the nations in light of the Christ-event insofar as these abandoned ‘idolatry’ and joined in worshipping the God of Israel. But this ‘extension’ in no way implied that he turned his back on his ge/nov. Although Paul’s distinction between ‘us and them’ appears similar to the distinction made in the Roman and Greek perception of the world, the distinction is not drawn along the same lines. It is to the Jewish perception of those who are ‘not us’, shared by Paul, that we must now turn, since this is the core and primary context of Paul’s perception of non-Jews, although interpreted through messianic actualizations in light of the Christ-event.

5.4 Ta_ E 1 qnh in Jewish Perspective Paul refers to those who are not suggenei=v (fellow Jews) with a number of terms such as e1qnh, 3Ellhnev, a)krobusti/a or in one instance ba/rbaroi (in the sense of people).75 The most frequently used term is the summarizing e1qnh (used thirty-four times in Paul’s own words, eleven times in LXX citations), with 3Ellhnev figuring much less prominently (twelve occurrences). There clearly seems to be a contextual dimension to his use of ba/rbaroi in Rom. 1.14, possibly referring to the linguistic aspect as is the case in 1 Cor. 14.11, although an allusion to the educational dimension cannot be excluded. There seems to be a rather clear pattern in the use of   3Ellhnev and e1qnh respectively; the former term, except for a reference to Titus (Gal. 2.3) and the one paired with ba/rbaroi (Rom. 1.14), is otherwise always paired with 0Ioudai=oi, whilst the latter mostly stands on its own (except in Rom. 3.29; 9.24; 1 Cor. 1.23; Gal. 2.15). Paul seems to use the pair 0Ioudai=oi kai_ 3Ellhnev (or ba/rbaroi) to indicate the shared aspects of their being in Christ, or in sin, indicating inclusion and commonalty in difference. They can be used to refer to individual members of a group as in ‘to the Jew first and also to the Greek’ (Rom. 1.16) or ‘there is neither Jew nor Greek’ (Gal. 3.28). Interestingly, Paul, although Greek-speaking himself, differentiates I0 oudai=oi kai_ E 3 llhnev and never includes I0 oudai=oi in the category of   E 3 llhnev; at least in his vocabulary there are no ‘Hellenistic’ Jews. Whoever he means and is included in the category of E 3 llhnev, they are not Jews. Only rarely does Paul refer to other nations with particular labels, as with Ga/latai (Gal. 3.1), and Makedo/nev (2 Cor. 9.2, 4). 75 In 1 Cor. 14.11 the emphasis is on speaking a foreign language rather than on not being Jewish.

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What is most likely indicated with the labels for different peoples, and with the pair 0Ioudai=oi kai_ 3Ellhnev in particular, are different ways of life based on different traditions of belonging. Neither of these terms has a negative connotation attributed to it by Paul. Since e1qnh is a term which exclusively refers to a collective similar to the English term ‘nation’,76 it cannot be paired with a term which indicates both: individuals when used in the singular, and a group when used in the plural. Hence the major non-Jewish group Paul seems to be familiar with are Greeks or Greek-speaking people. The translation of e1qnh as ‘gentiles’ (or similarly in German translations as ‘Heiden’) obscures this difference and gives the impression that it could refer to a single gentile person rather than a collective, which is not conceivable for the Greek term. It has been noted that there are actually no people who are ‘gentiles’ in this sense; there are only nations, a term which in its grammatical plural inherently implies diversity. Some scholars have argued that by using the collective term e1qnh for all those who are not ‘us’ Paul seems to replicate the dominating Roman use of the term. This is seen as an indication that Paul has a very undifferentiated image of non-Jewish peoples and universalizes them in a structurally similar way to the Roman use of the term, obscuring the diversity of peoples he must have encountered on his journeys.77 But as we have seen above, the Romans did not generally obscure the diversity of conquered peoples, either by the use of the term e1qnov/ e1qnh or in their visual representation of these peoples.78 Rather, the diversity served to prevent unity among the conquered nations, a possibility the Romans feared, as Nero’s nightmare vividly demonstrates.79 A unity of those referred to as e1qnh was not desired by Rome; hence it is difficult to argue for a sameness discourse in Paul which would have mimicked a Roman discourse. In my view, the collective character of the term itself refers to a plurality of people whether the term is used in the singular or, as mostly by Paul, in the plural. It clearly refers to those who are not part of Paul’s own people, that is, to non-Jews, and thus includes an aspect of a shared distinction in relation to Judaism. But as in the Roman perception, where the one aspect all the e1qnh share is their inferior status as conquered peoples under Rome, the difference between Jews and e1qnh is only one of many aspects of their relationship and does not exclude diversity. For the Romans, the emphasis on the diversity of ta_ e1qnh supported their strategy of divide et impera. Whether Paul was aware of the diversity of the identity of the peoples he refers to as e1qnh is difficult to ascertain. But we need to be cautious here not to take the absence of evidence for the evidence of absence. The fact that Paul, when he has particular members of other nations in view, refers to them as Greeks, and differentiates, at least 76 See 1.4 above. 77 Cf. Stanley 2011a: 119–20 for a critical discussion of such views. Stanley argues that Paul’s use of ethnic labelling, although binary, is more complex. 78 Cf. above 5.2.1. 79 Referred to by Lopez 2008: 1–4.

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in one instance between Greeks and barbarians, and is aware of Macedonians and Galatians, seems to point to some awareness and recognition of diversity among these non-Jewish nations.80 Moreover, when Paul refers in his letters to the various assemblies as the e)kklhsi/a tou= qeou= … e)n Kori/nqw? (1 Cor. 1.2), e)kklhsi/ai th=v A ) si/av (1 Cor. 16.19), e)kklhsi/ai th=v Makedoni/av (2 Cor. 8.1), e)kklhsi/ai th=v Galati/av (Gal. 1.2), and addresses pa=sin … e)n R ( w/mh? a) gaphtoi=iv qeou= (Rom. 1.7), this indicates awareness of differences among ta_ e1q2 nh despite summary references such as e)kklhsi/ai tw=n e)qnw=n (Rom. 16.4).81 An indication for differentiation within summary terms such as ‘Greeks’ and ‘barbarians’ can be found in Philo, who mentions ‘participation existing not merely between the Greeks and the barbarians, or between the barbarians and the Greeks, but also between the different tribes of each of these respective nations’ (Jos. 30). ‘Greeks’ and ‘barbarians’ thus function as terms similarly to contemporary terms like ‘British’, which encompasses but does not eradicate the difference between Scots, Irish, Welsh and English.82 The same applies to I0 oudai=oi and I0 srah/l, where Paul can refer to internal differentiations such as the tribe of Benjamin or the group of the Pharisees. Thus these overarching terms cannot be taken as an indication for a perceived eradication of difference, or a universalizing tendency in Paul’s use. Terence Donaldson discusses the Jewish terminology for non-Jews, and is of the view that ‘gentiles’ is an accurate way of translating ta_ e1qnh . However, he continues that non-Jews would not have referred to themselves in this vein except possibly when they were in some contact with Jews. This assumption is based on the translation ‘gentiles’ rather than on the term ta_ e1qnh as there is ample evidence that Greek or Roman authors could refer to their own people as e1qnh, as did also Josephus (e.g. Ant. 11.123;11.184; 11.270).83 But it is a term significantly used in Second Temple literature to refer to non-Jewish nations as for example pa/nta ta_ e1qnh (T. Zeb 9.8), kai_ e)leh/sei pa/nta ta_ e12qnh e)nw/piov au)tou= e)n fo/bw (Pss. Sol. 17.34). The clear terminological distinction between ta_ e1qnh as non-Jews, and ge/nov as referring only to his own Jewish people is obviously not shared by all Jews, although we cannot be sure that it was a Pauline peculiarity. However, whatever terminology was used, in Jewish perception the major organizing principle of the world consisted in a differentiation of peoples between ‘us and them’.

80 /(Ellhni and barba/roi seem to have been a kind of standardized pair as the terms’ use by Josephus and Philo indicates. The latter mostly does not seem to carry a particularly negative connotation in these texts but simply refers to those peoples who are non-Greek-speakers. Cf. Josephus Ant. 1.107; 4.12; 8.284; 11.299; 15.136; 16.176; 18.20; Bell. 5.17; 6.199; Ag. Ap. 1.16; 1.201; 2.282; Philo Creat. 128; Cher. 91; Plant. 67; Ebr. 193; Mut. 35: Abr. 136; 267; Mos. 2.27; Decl. 153; Spec. 1.211; 2.165; 4.120; Prob. 98; Contempl. 48; Legat. 8; 83; 145; 162; 292; Conf. 6 and 190 specifically refer to the linguistic dimension of the terms. 81 Cf. Scott 1995: 125. 82 Similarly, the use of terms like European, American, Swiss, etc. 83 Donaldson 2007: 5.

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This differentiation is not inherently hostile or negative. The assertion of one’s own identity necessarily includes differentiation. In as much as alterity can have a negative connotation and can be in danger of establishing a superiority discourse, as for example in the case of its use in imperial domination ideology, or patriarchal perpetuation of gender stereotypes, the ‘otherness’ of the other is also importantly the point of contact, relationships and community.84 As noted above, Gruen has drawn attention to the diverse discourses of the other in the literature of antiquity, which includes narratives of relational networks between peoples who are different, woven through numerous fictive kinship ties.85 It is particularly important to keep these traditions in mind when talking about the Jewish division of the world into ‘us and them’. Although negative stereotyping of non-Jews is part of this tradition and can be as problematic as in, for example, Roman tradition and its triumphalist superiority claims, these are not the only images of non-Jews in Jewish tradition. Gruen presents a comprehensive overview of traditions of vivid networks between Jews and other nations, ranging from the inclusion of their immediate neighbours, like the Moabites, or more distant neighbours, like the Arabs, into their narratives, to incorporating the Spartans and Herakles in the ancestral line.86 Donaldson has also drawn attention to the wide-ranging tradition of positive perceptions of other nations in his survey of numerous literary and epigraphic texts, including Josephus and Philo.87 The non-Jews are evidently not seen as merely those who do not know God, as idolaters and sinners, but also as those who have wisdom, laws, are skilled, etc. (Philo Mos. 1.23). Particularly since so many Jews lived in all parts of the world, among these nations, interaction with the people amongst whom they lived must have been normal, and ways of negotiating life in the Diaspora could hardly build on negative stereotyping only.88 Rooted in a tradition which considered their God as the creator of all humankind, which in a sense implied that all peoples were seen as somehow related to each other through their creator, such positive images were part of the ancestral traditions on which relationships in the present could be built. This is not the place to present detailed evidence. I here follow the work of Gruen and Donaldson in particular, who have drawn attention to the trajectories of these traditions in Second Temple Judaism. What we additionally need to take 84 See Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 139–42, also Ehrensperger 2007b. 85 Gruen 2011. 86 Gruen 2011: 297–307. 87 Donaldson 2007. 88 Cf. Rosman who argues that: ‘Perhaps the metaphor for Jewish–Gentile cultural interaction should not be that of two magnetic fields coming into contact with each other and influencing or distorting each other; but rather a metaphor of recombinant DNA that originates from a widely available repertoire of building blocks, but achieves a unique character by virtue of the combining process. Put differently, it is a kind of intertextuality that defines Jewish culture, not the degree of purity of origins of the “texts” themselves. Authenticity is not dependent on the pedigree but on practice’ (2002: 119). Although I find the image of ‘building blocks’ or ‘bricolage’ inadequate for the processes in question, the assertion that ‘purity of origin’ should not be a category used in identity discourses is well formulated here.

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into account is the fact that these Jewish traditions, together with those of negative perceptions of non-Jews, are the traditions of a subjugated people. These are not the traditions of those who dominate the ‘world’ and who have the power to conquer those whom they depict in negative images. This is a decisive difference to the power of negative images which contribute to the violent conquest and subjugation of those so depicted.89 The character of Jewish literature as the literature of a subjugated people must be taken into account for the period in question even when subsequently these images were used, predominantly in Christian tradition, in a triumphalist way. 90 What needs to be noted here is that interaction between Jews and non-Jews in the Diaspora must have been the norm rather than the exception. But rather than this leading to a fusion between Jewish, Greek and other traditions, it meant that most Jews, as most likely many of their neighbours in the Diaspora and in Judaea/Galilee, were, if not bilingual, then bicultural to some extent in the vein defined above. Linguistic and cultural translation processes within Jewish communities, as well as with their non-Jewish neighbours, most likely were not exceptional, and people who would have been able to communicate and interact in more than one ‘world’ would have been a necessity for most people under Rome. Jewish literature of the period allows a rare glimpse into such communication and interaction. Philo and Josephus may represent one end of a spectrum of Jews who were educated in the Jewish as well as the Greek tradition on the one hand, and Jews who were embedded in their own tradition but with only occasional contact with non-Jews on the other. Philo and Josephus present attempts to render Jewish traditions intelligible to Greek and Roman audiences, thus expressing Jewish traditions in a non-Jewish framework of understanding.91 They clearly are engaging in a process of cultural translation, and are thus examples of cultural go-betweens who were familiar with, and educated, at least to some extent, in the traditions of their own people and Greek paidei=a. Philo also seems to show familiarity with, or has at least awareness of, not just Jewish and Greek tradition but also Egyptian and what he calls Assyrian and Chaldaean tradition as well.92 Both Philo and 89 See 5.2 and 4.4 above. 90 This is of course not to justify negative stereotyping of any kind, but the hermeneutical presuppositions in the interpretation of such texts must take into account the respective context and actual life situations, including the potential to act according to these stereotypes. Otherwise the Jews become violent and dominating oppressors of the same kind as the Romans, which is dangerously anachronistic and has distorting effects for understanding theologizing in the context of the Christ-event. Cf. also Lopez 2008; Elliott 2008. 91 I am not debating the issue of the intended audience of Philo’s and Josephus’ work, as either internal Jewish or external non-Jewish. The point I wish to make is that the format and style in which they presented their work would have been intelligible for a Greek and Roman elite audience. 92 Cf. Philo’s praise of Moses’ skills and education: ‘Accordingly he speedily learnt arithmetic, and geometry, and the whole science of rhythm and harmony and metre, and the whole of music, by means of the use of musical instruments, and by lectures on the different arts, and by explanations of each topic; and lessons on these subjects were given him by Egyptian philosophers, who also taught him the philosophy which is contained in symbols, which they

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Josephus provide evidence that they were consciously aware of the potential and difficulties of translation processes at the cultural level, although Philo idealizes the possibility of providing accurate translations between Hebrew and Greek.93 I will deal with this in more detail below in chapter 6. That such a translation process was undertaken in the first place indicates that communication with non-Jews was not just not avoided, but was actually considered desirable, if we do not assume that these works were exclusively addressing fellow Jews. At the level of everyday life such interaction must have taken place possibly without necessarily involving self-conscious reflection about them. Although evidence for such everyday interactions is rare, inscriptions give us at least some information. What appear to be votive offerings placed at polytheistic temples by Jews, and dedications to synagogues by non-Jews, are indications of interactions and contact zones which are rather surprising.94 The reference in Acts 2 to the diverse language traditions of Jewish pilgrims to Jerusalem may well reflect the embeddedness of these Jews in the language traditions of the places where they lived; thus there were not only Greek-speaking Jews but also ‘Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes Cretans and Arabs’ (Acts 2.9-11). Some of those listed here may have been Greek-speaking but certainly not all of them. Such linguistic diversity among Jews from the Diaspora means that even if they were not bilingual, they most likely had to negotiate their own Jewish tradition in the contexts of their respective local traditions. The Jewish traditions emerging from Babylonia in the Parthian Empire point to such negotiation processes outside the realm of Greek and Roman influence.95

5.5 Between Israel and the Nations: God-Fearers and Sympathizers The attraction of non-Jews to Jewish traditions, which led to sympathizers of Judaism of various degrees, is another trajectory which demonstrates that, despite mutual negative stereotyping, positive interaction was possible. There can be little doubt that such non-Jewish sympathizers actually did exist, although it cannot be discerned whether these were actually clearly defined groups that were associated with synagogue communities.96 Donaldson’s exhibit in those sacred characters of hieroglyphics, as they are called, and also that philosophy which is conversant about that respect which they pay to animals which they invest with the honours due to God. And all the other branches of the encyclical education he learnt from Greeks; and the philosophers from the adjacent countries taught him Assyrian literature and the knowledge of the heavenly bodies so much studied by the Chaldaeans’ (Mos. 1.23). 93 Cf. chapter 6. 94 For a more detailed discussion see chapter 7. 95 Cf. Oppenheimer 2005: 394–99; Edrei and Mendels 2008. 96 The synagogues or proseuche were the only places where Jewish tradition would have been studied on a regular basis, if we can trust Philo and Josephus. Woyke draws attention to Philo’s

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careful assessment of available evidence concludes that neither a clear terminology, nor clearly defined groups or requirements for being considered a ‘sympathizer’ can be found.97 However, non-Jewish as well as Jewish writers know of non-Jews who were associated with Jewish communities: ‘There can be little doubt about the phenomenon itself … recognized not only by Jews themselves but also by outsiders.’98 Thus Seneca complains: ‘Meanwhile the customs of this accursed race have gained such influence that they are now received throughout all the world; the vanquished have given laws to the victors.’99 Whilst Josephus claims ‘The masses have long since shown a keen desire to adopt our religious observances and there is not one city, Greek or barbarian, not a single nation to which our customs … have not spread’ (Ag. Ap. 2.282), Josephus refers to the ambiguous status of sympathizers as ‘in some measure incorporated’ (Bell. 7.45), and distinguishes between 0Ioudai=oi and 0ioudai^zontev, implying that the latter were actually not Jews (Bell. 2.462–63). Epigraphic evidence supports such literary statements, as Chester in his recent critical analysis of numerous inscriptions affirms.100 Donaldson notes that there obviously was rather clear awareness of ‘the difference between what we are calling Gentile sympathizers and those who take the necessary steps … to become full converts’, but it is very difficult to ‘identify any line of demarcation at the other end, some set of minimum requirements that a Gentile would need to fulfil in order to belong to a specific class existing somewhere between pagan outsiders and full converts’.101 There is little evidence for an interest in categorizing the status of these sympathizers from a Jewish perspective. Some of them at least continued to participate in non-Jewish cult practices thus worshipping not only the God of Israel but other deities as well.102 Reynolds and Tannenbaum describe the characteristics of God-fearers as including attraction to Judaism to a degree that they attended synagogue gatherings to learn more; imitating the Jewish way of life to whatever degree assertion: ‘Nach Philo Alexandrinus lassen sich die mit dem Diasporajudentum sympathisierenden Heiden in drei Gruppen einteilen, nämlich erstens die durch Beschneidung formal zum Judentum übergetretenen Proselyten, zweitens “Gesinnungsproselyten” mit monotheistischer Anschauung und monolithischer Praxis (beide QuaestEx 2,2) und drittens Sympathisanten des sog. JethroTypus (vgl. Ex 18,11; Num 10,29f), die den von den Juden verehrten All-Schöpfer innerhalb eines monarchischen Polytheismus oder eines synkretistischen Monotheismus verorten (Ebr 33–40)’ (2005: 157). 97 Donaldson 2007: 474–75. This has been taken as an argument which doubts the existence of such sympathizers altogether. Cf. e.g. Kraabel 1981. 98 Donaldson 2007: 475. 99 On Superstition, cited in Augustine, City of God 6.11. 100 For some recent discussion see Reynolds and Tannenbaum 1987; Trebilco 1991: 145– 66; Levinskaya 1996: 51–126; Koch 2006; Rajak 2009: 118–19; for an analysis of evidence from inscriptions see Chester 2011: 415–26. He affirms that from epigraphic evidence the existence of ‘Godfearers in the sense of Gentiles with an obvious interest in and attachment to Judaism’ can be stipulated (424). 101 Donaldson 2007: 479. Chester also cautions that ‘we do not know much in detail about them: the inscriptions do not provide us with a great deal of information at all’ (2011: 424). 102 For examples see Donaldson 2007: 473; also Reynolds and Tannenbaum 1987: 48–66.

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they deemed appropriate for themselves; adhering possibly to short moral codes to regulate behaviour without being required to do so; giving up polytheistic cult practices but not being required to do so; having the option to go all the way to conversion to Judaism but not being required to do so.103 The question whether exclusive loyalty to the God of Israel was expected of God-fearers is discussed controversially. Donaldson suggests that overall sympathizers to Judaism were seen in a positive light by Jews as long as they worshipped the God of Israel exclusively, recognized the law as divinely ordained and adhered to a Jewish way of life to some extent.104 But there appear to have been inner-Jewish debates concerning this, and it seems evident that such exclusivity was not a generally agreed requirement. Josephus’ narrative of the divergent views of Eleazar and Ananias in the context of Izates’ conversion is a telling example of this inner-Jewish debate. Both Eleazar and Ananias agree that exclusive worship was required, although Eleazar was of the view that this was only one step on the way to full conversion, whereas Ananias considered this to be sufficient for a sympathizer to Judaism (AJ 20.38–48). Josephus’ narrative seems to be an idealized conversion narrative, rather than a narrative about a sympathizer. Whether such monotheistic purity could realistically be expected from a non-Jew is questionable since, in my view, the dissociation from normal cult practices would have been an enormous step for a non-Jew with major social and family-related implications. To dissociate from key social and cultural networks without unambiguous association with, and embeddedness in, another such network would have been almost inconceivable. I will discuss this issue in more detail in chapter 7. In my view, Donaldson underestimates the problem of withdrawing from normal cult practices in a non-Jewish context. The epigraphic evidence indicates that some association with Judaism, practised alongside the worship of other deities, is more likely to be the widespread reality for such sympathizers. The Jewish literary ideal obviously had to uphold the exclusivity of adherence to the God of Israel, but everyday life seems to have been more ‘muddy’ than this ideal. Exclusive loyalty to the God of Israel required dissociation not only from cult practice but from social networks including clan and family. Such dissociation would not have been pursued lightly. Thus it is rather likely that, alongside their affiliation with Jewish communities, most God-fearers would at the same time have continued to be integrated in their social and symbolic universe including their ‘houses’ and families, and thus have continued to participate in cult practices in relation to deities which were integral to everyday life. They lived lives of multiple loyalties as was normal from a non-Jewish perspective. Loyalty claims especially of gods against humans were cumulative rather than exclusive among the nations, with imperial loyalty claims being added to, rather than replacing, any existing allegiances as long as hierarchy was maintained in this respect. Only when the superiority claims of the empire 103 Reynolds and Tannenbaum 1987: 65. 104 Donaldson 2007: 481.

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(in the incarnation of the emperor) were challenged would Roman authorities intervene. This is possibly an issue with which Paul had to wrestle. It may also have some bearings on his persecuting activity before his call. As we have noted, Paul was aware of the diversity of ta_ e12qnh and as a Diaspora Jew he also most likely was communicating and interacting with non-Jews on a daily basis. However, Paul’s perception of people from the nations who are not members of the Christ-movement is on the rather negative side. The most important problem for him is their worshipping of deities other than the God of Israel: in his words, their idolatry. From this cardinal distortion in their lives all the other issues follow. Thus, as long as someone does not ‘turn away from idols’ (1 Thess. 1.9), there is no way to ‘salvation’. As non-Jews and non-Christfollowers they ‘do not know God’ (1 Thess. 4.5), they ‘do not have the law’ (Rom. 2.14), ‘they do not pursue righteousness’ (Rom. 9.30); more generally, they are sinners (Gal. 2.15; 1 Cor. 5.1; et al.). The problem with other nations for Paul is not their ethnic and cultural difference from Jews. He continues to affirm their identities as members of different tribes, nations and language groups, as we have seen above. The problem with them is that they do not recognize the God of Israel as the God of all Creation and thus also as their God (Rom. 1.21-23). Thus ethnic, linguistic and cultural diversity is not an issue in Paul’s perception as long as this core issue is accurately observed. Numerous problems he addresses in his letters have to do with idolatry and I will look at some of these in more detail below (chapters 6 and 7). It is difficult to envisage that Paul would have been lenient towards Godfearers/sympathizers who would have continued to adhere to multiple loyalties, to the God of Israel and other deities. Thus the acceptance of God-fearers who were loyal to multiple deities by at least some Jewish communities of the Diaspora most likely would have been considered highly problematic by Paul, not only after his call experience but also before. This could have been a reason for Paul’s persecuting activity before his call if he suspected Christfollowers of accepting non-Jews into their communities without requesting full conversion. It would explain his question to the Galatians whether he is still preaching circumcision (Gal. 5.11) since for him loyalty to the God of Israel was only possible in the form of exclusive loyalty, which prior to Christ necessarily meant full conversion including circumcision for men.105 Paul’s concern before and after his call experience had not changed in that respect. Any association with other deities threatened the holiness of God and the people Israel; thus, for him, loyalty to the one God of Israel and continued loyalty to other deities were a non-negotiable incompatibility. Non-Jewish sympathizers of Judaism who adhered to Jewish Torah as little or as much as they chose to, but who at the same time continued to participate in non-Jewish cult practices were nothing but idolaters in Paul’s perception. 105 This would be the position of Eleazar in AJ 20.44–45, who urges Izates to go the full way to conversion, in distinction to the position of Ananias.

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Although Paul never explicitly mentions God-fearers, this is the category of people most likely initially addressed by him.106 There are some hints that may be implicit references to God-fearers, as for example in Rom. 7.1: ‘for I am speaking to those who know the law’. Such people, familiar to a certain extent with Jewish traditions, would have had a framework to which they could relate the message of Paul. However, being used to operating in multiple contexts without this creating a conflict of interests, these non-Jewish sympathizers and God-fearers who joined the Christ-movement would possibly have found strange Paul’s claims that this implied exclusive loyalty to the God of Israel. Although they would have been familiar with this idea as pertaining to Jews, to apply this exclusivity to them, and at the same time having argued so strongly against them becoming Jews when joining the Christ-movement, could have caused confusion for them to say the least. As, according to Philo (Spec. Leg. 2.165), proselytes mainly came from the wider population rather than the educated elite, where some had distanced themselves from the superstitio of the masses, such confusion might have been a particular problem. What pertains to proselytes to Judaism most likely also applies to sympathizers. They would not have been from among philosophers like Seneca or other members of the elite who adhered to some kind of ‘monotheism’ and thought philosophically about the nature and existence of gods.107 ‘Monotheism’ thus may not have been a core concern in the motivation to join the Christ-movement. God-fearers were betwixt and between, a category of people who did not belong to Judaism, but whose partial association with Jewish communities threatened the latter’s integrity and holiness in Paul’s view. They adhered to the law partially, whereas in Paul’s and other fellow Jews’ perception one could only adhere to the Torah of Israel fully, that is, in exclusive loyalty to the one God of Israel and following the whole of the Torah – either becoming a Jew or not at all. In that sense, Paul’s perception of the world was dualistic. There were those people who were loyal to the God of Israel, including adherence to the Torah, and those who were not. There was no ‘third kind’ in his perception. There were those who were circumcised and those who were not. In addition to the terms 0Ioudai=oi kai 3Ellhnev or e12qnh Paul frequently distinguishes between peritomh_ and a)krobusti/a, a terminology not often found elsewhere in Jewish literature of the first century ce or before. Unlike, for example, Josephus, Paul never distinguished between born Jews and proselytes. There are only two categories of people in that respect: circumcised and uncircumcised. On this matter, he lumps the people from the nations all together without any further differentiation. Through Christ there was now the 106 Cf. Zetterholm 2010: 249. 107 However, I consider it very likely that there were possibly more educated Christfollowers from the nations in the communities than previously assumed, as slaves or former slaves might have got some education for the benefit of their owners, much as those Egyptian boys trained to serve as interpreters mentioned above. Epictetus may have been an exception in terms of his achievements, but he most likely was not unique. The status inconsistency this may have caused could have drawn them to a tradition which was associated with a strong wider education ethos (Judaism).

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possibility for those from the a)krobusti/a to join Israel in glorifying their God apart from the Torah. It could well be that Paul uses the pair peritomh& and a(krobusti/a to avoid a differentiation within Judaism which otherwise might have contributed to further confusion about being a non-Jewish member of the Christ-movement. As we have said, there was no ‘third kind’ in the Christ-movement for Paul. There were Jews and people from the nations (in their diversity and particularity), those of the peritomh& and those of the a0krobusti/a in Christ, but no mixture between them. Paul’s stance in this respect is not radically different from his stance before his call. What changed was his perception of how people from the nations could become associated with the God of Israel and his people: through Christ they had turned away from ‘idols to the true and living God’ (1 Thess. 1.9); through him they were now purified, had become holy, and as such together with Israel could come near the Holy One of Israel without becoming Jews. The ‘already’ of the beginning of the age to come was now understood by Paul as the beginning of the incoming of the nations in their particular identities, rendered possible, without fear of contamination, through Christ. The negative perception of other nations in the Pauline letters is confined to those outside the Christ-movement who worshipped deities other than the God of Israel. Those who joined the movement and had given up worshipping such deities, including practices which were intertwined with such activities, were affirmed in their identities as Christ-followers from the nations. These practices must have included aspects of their ways of life, behaviour and traditions that did not clash with values and convictions in Christ. Paul relates to such aspects of their identities and encourages them to draw on previous experiences and knowledge without suggesting that they might be unacceptable because these were the practices and traditions of ethnically different peoples. As these were peoples who were raised and socialized in traditions different from Jewish traditions, in order for it to be intelligible to them, the message of Christ and its implications must have related in some vein to their previous experiences, knowledge, practices and understanding, that is, their ‘habitus’. This was also the case if they already had some knowledge and understanding of Jewish tradition prior to their joining of the Christ-movement. Having located Paul on the map of the Roman Empire as part of a conquered people whose call as an apostle of Christ related him in particular to other conquered nations, we now need to consider aspects of cultures and traditions which came into contact with each other in the Christ-following groups/e)kklhsi/ai through Paul's activities as a go-between.

5.6 Between Cultures and Traditions: the Bicultural Go-Between Members of the diverse nations and of the people of Israel who came together as e)kklhsi/ai were diverse not only in names and the external, Roman or Jewish, perception of their particular characteristics. They also spoke different

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languages, as I have demonstrated above, and they followed different cultural practices and traditions. Most of the information for the conquered nations has been transmitted through the filter of Greek, Roman or Jewish presuppositions and ideologies, and thus allows only for a limited understanding of their traditions and practices in their own right. Josephus provides an indication of some recognition and appreciation of the specific cultural strengths of Egyptian, Chaldaean and Syrian historiography (AJ 1.93–95), whereas Philo is aware of the knowledge of the Chaldaeans (Migr. 187), the literature of the Assyrians, and the specific philosophy of the Egyptians (Mos. 1.23). The Pauline letters belong to the literary documents of the first century ce that provide direct access to a discourse from within a perspective other than the dominating Greek and Roman elite discourse. They are part of the body of Jewish literature, literature from the margins rather than from the centre perspective of the empire. They provide some insight into the self-perception of Paul in terms of his own tradition, and of some aspects of different traditions as far as they came into view in issues discussed in the letters. This only allows for a limited view into cultures and traditions of ta_ e1qnh and is a problem which impinges on the extent to which the interaction and translation process between Paul’s tradition and those of the e1qnh can be traced. In addition, with Paul locating himself clearly within his Jewish tradition, the perception of non-Jewish traditions and cultural trajectories are seen from within this perspective. Nevertheless, I am confident that at least some indication for such translation processes can be identified through the lens of the paradigm of biculturalism. Despite Paul’s clear location in, and solidarity with, his Jewish people the debate about the extent of this identification and its significance is ongoing. The debates arise particularly around the extent to which he continued to consider himself a Jews after his call experience (a radical Jew, a marginal Jew, a former Jew, an apostate, etc?).108 Related to this debate is the question whether and to what extent Paul was educated in that respective tradition and context.109 If we follow Paul’s own line of argument here, then in his perspective, one is either a Jew or one is not. There is no further distinction in that sense between ‘us and them’ and even where he reports significant disagreement, as with Kephas in Gal. 2.15, he refers to their shared Jewish identity. The same applies to 2 Cor. 11.22, where a competition for Jewish credentials seems to be going on. The one thing that Paul does not do in these instances is challenge the Jewish identity of those he disagrees with, and there is no evidence that Paul’s Jewish identity was challenged either. Categories such as marginal or apostate Jew did not exist in the period in question, and I cannot see any reason why Paul’s selfidentification with his own people should be doubted. He asserts his Jewish identity again and again, and the symbolic and social universe he is embedded in, and within which he operates, is primarily Jewish. Of course he operates 108 109

Cf. Nanos 2010. Cf. Ehrensperger 2004: 125–29.

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predominantly in a Diaspora context, that is, in a context which is dominated by non-Jewish ways of life, which has far-reaching implications for everyday life. The necessity to negotiate life as a minority involves cultural translation processes on a frequent basis. The more or less formal agreement between Rome and Judaism that allowed the Jews to offer prayers and sacrifices for, rather than to, the genius of the emperor or his deified ancestors is only one result of negotiations that involved cultural translation processes. Those involved on both sides must have had some understanding of the respective traditions, and were surely bicultural in that sense. Whether Paul was born and raised in Tarsus or not, he was a Greek-speaking Jew, possibly from Asia Minor, familiar with more than one cultural tradition and able to navigate quite vast areas of the Roman Empire on his journeys, which must have involved communicating and interacting with a diversity of people on an everyday basis.110 He was rooted in the strong and self-confident tradition and communities of the Jewish Diaspora of Asia Minor where adherence to exclusive loyalty to their God and way of life would have been the hallmark of everyday life.111 How far identification with the customs and practices of these diverse peoples went is another question. We have seen above that speaking a language is not an indicator of the enculturation of the speaker/ user into the culture of this language. Thus one of the key aspects which has been used to claim significant acculturation on the part of Paul with Greek, or Hellenistic culture, are predominantly based on Paul’s use of the Greek language, including Greek rhetorical paradigms and speech conventions.112 However, as noted above, the use of a language as a lingua franca or as an appropriated language in contexts of colonial conquest has to be differentiated from its use as the language of a people/nation.113 Paul’s use of Greek should be seen in this vein – as the use of a lingua franca that was used because it was the language of a dominating power. I have argued elsewhere that Paul’s use of Greek cannot be taken as a sign that he replicated the discourse as well as the language of the dominating power.114 There can be little doubt that Paul had received some kind of formal education, and it seems that this is what he implies when he refers to ‘exceeding his peers’ in Gal. 1.14, and possibly also in his reference to being a Pharisee in Phil. 3.5. The fact that he could write, including his capacity to dictate letters, most likely included the ability to read. Thus there can be no doubt that he had had a Jewish education. Whether Paul did actually get a formal education in the Greek and Roman sense of the word, however, is a controversial issue. As 110 Sanders notes: ‘The mere fact that Paul was a Greek-speaking Jew, probably from Asia Minor, tells us that he relates both to Judaism and the Greco-Roman culture in some way’ (2009: 75). 111 Cf. Frey 2007: 294; also Hurtado 2003: 79–154. 112 For a differentiated discussion of the issues with regard to Romans see Jewett 2007: 23–46. For 1 Corinthians see e.g. Mitchell 1993: 1–19. 113 Cf. 3.3 above. 114 Ehrensperger 2012a.

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a Greek-speaking and writing Jew, he must have known some strands of Greek and Roman culture reasonably well. Some scholars argue that his skilled letter writing attests to some primary education in Greek. However, some familiarity with certain rhetorical tropes need not, in my view, be attributed to a formal Greek education since familiarity with speech patterns and other aspects of Greek and Roman culture could have been acquired at a general popular level. As Johannes Woyke has argued: Die Ausführungen etwa zur primordialen Gottesahnung (vgl. Rom 1,19-21), zur Allmachtsformel (vgl. 1 Kor 8,6) oder aber zur Antagonie des Göttlichen und Dämonischen (vgl. 1 Kor 10,20) stellen keine Spezifika einer bestimmten philosophischen Schulrichtung dar, sondern werden von den antiken Autoren selbst als popularphilosophisches Allgemeingut ‘von alters her’ charakterisiert, so dass diese für einen Diasporajuden mit einer gewissen Grundbildung bekannt gewesen sein müssten.115

Jerome noted that if ‘he was also educated in the wisdom of this world’, this was not to perfection (‘licet non ad perfectum’). Linguistic studies have demonstrated that Paul’s Greek is ‘not stylistically grand’,116 that his vocabulary is not that of an average rhetorician or philosopher,117 and that he does not show any knowledge of Greek literature or philosophical discourse, although there are sections in his letters where a quotation from such literature could be envisaged.118 If he did have even a standard or basic Greek education this would have involved the memorization of significant parts of Homer, Euripides and other classics; not to find any traces of such memorized traditions renders such an education very unlikely.119 But as a Greek speaker he certainly did have, as mentioned above, general knowledge of and some familiarity with the Greek and Roman world/culture within which he operated before and after his call. Interestingly, unlike Josephus, when referring to his own identity Paul never refers to any Greek aspects but exclusively to Jewish dimensions.120 He twice refers to Hebrew as an aspect of his identity (2 Cor. 11.26; Phil. 3.5).

115 Woyke 2005: 445; also Ehrensperger 2004: 90–92. 116 Barclay 1996: 383. 117 Anderson 1999: 281. 118 Sanders 2009: 80. 119 Sanders 2009: 78–79. 120 The comparison with Josephus here is illuminating in that Josephus does refer to his formal education in both Jewish and Greek traditions, but giving clear priority, temporally and in terms of significance, to his Jewish education, noting that his dual education was actually an exception. Even if he is numerically overstating his exceptionality, his claim indicates that Jews with a formal Greek education were certainly not the norm (AJ 20.263–65). Cf. Milikowsky 2002: 161–62. Although Josephus shows pride in his achievements in Greek education, he notes that even after twenty years in Rome he has only a partial grasp of all things Greek including his mastery of the language .

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Does this suggest that he knew Hebrew and that his family did so as well?121 What was his relationship to that language? It is rather unlikely that he was brought up speaking Hebrew since there is no clear evidence for the language still being an everyday means of communication. However, there are some indications that Paul may have known more than one language.122 Timothy Lim has argued that: ‘Paul spoke Greek and most probably Aramaic … it is also likely that he could read biblical texts in the original Hebrew … The implication of this poly-lingual background is that Paul would have been well aware of the difficulties in translating scripture from Hebrew to Greek.’123 He suggests that he knows more than one language, is bilingual at least, is able to accommodate to people of different cultural contexts, and can write/dictate and hence communicate in Greek. But the reference to a Hebrew of Hebrews may indicate more than a language affiliation. It could refer to a specifically close link to the geographical area of Judaea/Galilee. An inscription from a Jewish catacomb in Rome dated between the second and the fourth centuries ce reads ‘Alypius of Tiberias and his sons Justus and Alypius, Hebrews, with their father lie here.’ David Noy considers this to refer to the geographical affiliation of the three rather than to their mother tongue.124 Another dimension worth mentioning here is the fact that possibly during the Maccabaean revolt, and certainly during the two revolts against Rome, a revival of Hebrew served more than just linguistic purposes, namely clearly to set a mark of distinction against dominating Greek cultural practices in establishing a link between language and identity.125 Such emphases, possibly in a combined form, may have been considered relevant in the first century by some Jews, and the fact that Paul emphasizes that he is rooted in a family or clan tradition, labelled by himself as ‘Hebrews’, might explain why he would have been educated in Jerusalem. It could also imply that his education encompassed some learning of Hebrew. The Jewish education of Paul is a matter of debate only with regard to the language in which he received this education. Was it Greek or Aramaic/ Hebrew? Sanders has recently argued for a Greek Jewish education, since he cannot find any ‘signs of a distinctively Palestinian Pharisaic education’.126 Since Paul was able to quote the Greek Bible and was an ‘expert in the argumentative use of the Bible’,127 he must have memorized and studied this version intensively. Others find traces that point to the knowledge of different

121 Cf. Frey sees this as an indication ‘that he was not a normal Diaspora Jew, but grew up in a family in which Palestinian traditions and probably Hebrew and/or Aramaic language was preserved’ (2007: 291); cf. also Niebuhr 1992: 106–107. 122 Cf. Dochhorn 2007. 123 Lim 1997: 163. 124 Noy 1995: 43. 125 Schwartz 1995: 26–28; 2005. 126 Sanders 2009: 77. 127 Sanders 2009: 82.

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languages and their use in the study and interpretation of the Scriptures.128 It has been noted that Paul calls himself ‘a Hebrew of Hebrews’ (Phil. 3.5) and consistently ‘calls Peter by his Aramaic name Khfa=v in his letters’.129 According to Hogeterp, this seems to indicate some bilingual orientation which extends to ‘the Semitic scriptural culture’.130 Hogeterp has also demonstrated, convincingly in my view, that the Pharisaic education which Paul claims (Phil. 3.5) could only be acquired in Jerusalem, as no traces of Pharisaism have been found outside Judaea/Galilee of the time.131 It can thus be affirmed that Paul’s expertise in, and arguing with, Scripture clearly indicates his primary socialization in the social and symbolic universe of Judaism132 and serves as more than merely supplying the vocabulary for the Christ-movement. The Jewish social and symbolic universe provides the thought patterns, cultural codes and encyclopedias, that is, ‘the principal categories of Paul’s brain when he thought about time and history’.133 In his use of Greek, whether this was his mother-tongue or an early acquired second language, Paul was part of a long-established tradition of Jewish Greek discourse which provided an alternative to the symbolic universe of Greece and Rome;134 this was what was durably imprinted on Paul’s ‘habitus’ in providing meaning of life and a sense of belonging to a particular people and its traditions. Taking into account that Jewish education, as did education in antiquity generally, consisted in the memorization of significant parts of the tradition, the significance of this inherent resistance to imperialistic claims through the Greek text of the LXX cannot be underestimated. Greek Jewish education in particular would have equipped learners by default with a narrative and poetic discourse of resistance to imperial/hegemonic claims of domination. If Paul did get a Greek Jewish education, which I consider very likely in light of the above and, for example, Sanders’ arguments, he would have been embedded in this alternative discourse. In addition, with his explicit claims to the Hebrew aspect of his identity, he was certainly bilingual, and the possibility that he knew more than two languages and was involved in a polyglot tradition of interpreting Scriptures is quite likely.135 Paul provides further indicators for his own identity: being Jewish means that he himself is of ‘the circumcision’; this is clearly expressed in his reference to his own circumcision on the eighth day (Phil. 3.5). In his Torah observance he follows Pharisaic tradition with a blameless track record (Phil. 3.5), his zeal led him to persecute the e1kklhsi/a. The latter is the only aspect which he clearly locates in the past, but only for the persecuting part of it, as zeal 128 Dochhorn 2007. 129 Hogeterp 2006: 254. 130 Hogeterp 2006: 255. 131 Hogeterp 2006: 255; also Tiwald 2008: 180–82. 132 Sanders 2009: 86–88. 133 Sanders 2009: 86. 134 I will discuss this in more detail in chapter 6.2 and 6.3 below. 135 Cf. Ehrensperger 2008.

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in itself is a characteristic which retains its commendable dimension as Rom. 12.11; 1 Cor. 12.31, 14.12, 14.39; 2 Cor. 7.7, 7.11, 9.2, 11.2 demonstrate.136 He is a member of the tribe of Benjamin and in more general terms he refers to himself in insider language as an Israelite.137 So far we have found in Paul a Jew who is bilingual and embedded in the alternative Greek discourse of his people (ge/nov). As for his familiarity with the cultural traditions of the e12qnh, the indications in his letters are less evident. It has been argued that his way of arguing involves Stoic or Sophistic elements or perceptions of the world.138 Others see Paul as engaging directly with Roman imperial ideology.139 I consider both approaches viable to some extent. Paul seems to be aware of the dominating power of Rome, but whether he saw it directly challenged through the message of the gospel is another question. I have argued elsewhere that I am of the view that he did consider the message of the gospel to be an alternative to the dominating powers but in an implicit rather than an explicit way. Embedded in an already existing discourse of at least partial resistance to dominating and totalitarian power claims, this certainly is a dimension of Paul’s message for those who are able to hear. I will come back to this below in chapter 6. As for allusions to philosophical stances of the day, as noted above, I do not think that they pertain to a particular Greek education on Paul’s part. That traces of popular philosophy in Paul’s letters might have resonated with his audience is very much to be expected. Those from the nations whom Paul addressed would, at least at a popular level, through public speeches, and possibly through education, have been familiar with some aspects of these schools of thought.140 Paul might have picked up certain aspects of such philosophical and rhetorical traditions through their presence in the ‘market square’. The cultural and political conditions most likely rendered it normal for Jews to negotiate aspects of their identity in the cultural forms that were prevalent in the public sphere. Paul was no exception to this. Jews in the first century expressed aspects of their own traditions in such forms, were involved in an ongoing negotiation and translation process, but far from diluting their particular identity, this was done in support of the strengthening of their own traditions and in solidarity with fellow Jews.141 136 I disagree with Frey on this issue, who is of the view that Paul’s attitude towards the Torah is characterized as Pharisaic, and that the zeal by which he had persecuted the enemies of the law is also part of the Palestinian-Jewish tradition since the Maccabaean crisis (2007: 291). Similarly Hengel and Deines 1991: 70–72. This is a rather restricted assessment of the role and function of ‘zeal’ which does not do justice in my view to the differentiated and varied use of this characteristic in Scriptural tradition. Cf. also Ortlund 2013. 137 Cf. discussion above. 138 Winter 2002; Engberg-Pedersen 2000; Welborn 2005. 139 Horsley 2000; Rock 2012; Elliott 2008; Pillar 2013. 140 Thorsteinsson has recently argued that the members of the elite and other inhabitants in ancient cities would have lived very close to each other. In his view this meant that the spread of philosophical knowledge would not have been confined to the elite (2010: 81–85). 141 Cf. Barclay 2002: 24.

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5.7 Conclusions Successful negotiation and translation between the dominating cultural patterns and their own identity rendered knowledge of the former a necessity for Jews. Indications of Paul’s familiarity with traditions of the e1qnh should not be confined to traces of thought traditions. There are indications of an awareness and familiarity on his part at numerous levels. As with other issues Paul addresses in his letters, the traditions and practices he mentions are contextual. He responds to problems and questions that arise in a particular community rather than setting out a programmatic overview of how joining the Christ-movement affects each and every aspect and situation of the life of Christ-followers from the nations.142 Paul provides guidance and advice but also encourages the communities to discern what is appropriate according to guidance already provided: ‘test everything, hold fast what is good, abstain from evil’ (1 Thess. 5.21-22), and ‘whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things’ (Phil. 4.8). The only clear and universally applicable norm is that the worshipping of other deities is ruled out. The first commandment is absolute and no compromise is possible in this respect. This clarity is far from settling the issue as what kind of activities do or do not constitute idolatry is not as evident as it might seem from a contemporary perspective. Significant time and space are spent by Paul in trying to clarify further implications of worshipping for his e1kklhsi/ai. This includes head-covering and who should speak during assembly meetings, etc. There are issues of leadership and group relations, and Paul seems well aware of the norms and practices of dominating leadership patterns that seem to start influencing leaders within the communities.143 The importance of shared tables, that is, common meals, is in view, as are more ‘private’ issues of family relationships and marriage. Some of these trajectories of intercultural interaction, and the translation process in which Paul is involved as a bilingual and bicultural apostle to the nations will be analysed in more detail in the following chapters. More research into this area is certainly required and, in this study, I can only provide some examples and point out aspects which I think would need to be researched further. But what we have found in Paul so far is the image of a first-century Jew who, although firmly embedded in his own tradition, is bilingual and bicultural, and thus able to navigate between peoples, cultures and traditions. He is able to act as a go-between, as someone who in Greek tradition could be described as a e(rmeneu/v, a mediator who tried to transmit a message from one world to another.144 From within a Jewish framework of understanding, 142 Campbell 2006/2008: 9–11. 143 Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 102–11. 144 Cf. Passoni Dell’Acqua 2010: 325. Since the transmission of messages from the world of the deities to the world of humans was the key role of the Greek god Hermes, the misconception

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prophets or visionaries were the ones who acted as such mediators between worlds and it is more in tune with the latter that Paul describes his own role, for example in his version of his calling experience.145 Paul sees himself as commissioned to transmit a message not only from the divine realm to that of humans but also from the Jewish social and symbolic universe to the world of the nations. He can thus refer to himself not only as a dou=lov Xristou= but also more specifically as a dia/konov qeou= (2 Cor. 6.3), mediating the message of the gospel to the nations. Jörg Frey has noted: ‘His skillful use of the Greek koine, his intimate knowledge of the Septuagint and his familiarity with motifs and forms of Hellenistic-Jewish preaching also originate in this context. Only Paul’s diaspora-Jewish background can explain that he was able to cross so many ethnic and cultural boundaries in his later missionary work.’146 Paul is and remains firmly rooted in his own tradition. This is exactly why he is able to embark on a way of life that resembles a journey with occasional stays in tents rather than living a life settled in one place. Because he is rooted he is able to travel to others in an attempt to ‘trans-late’ and mediate the message of the gospel from the Jewish social and symbolic universe to the world of the nations.147 As such Paul is well equipped to follow God’s call as apostle to the nations. In the following chapter we will consider aspects of this translation process in relation to the narrative framework of the message of the gospel, that is, the Jewish Scriptures and their interpretive traditions as the ‘world’ (social and symbolic universe) which decisively shaped the understanding of the Christevent for Jews as well as for Christ-followers from the nations.

of Paul as Hermes in the narrative of Acts 14.12 is not that far from what Paul actually tried to do when considered from within a Greek framework of understanding. 145 Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 81–97; Sandnes 1991: 60–63. 146 Frey 2007: 294. 147 Cf. Cronin 2006: 11–12.

Chapter 6 Scripture and Tradition: Translating the Narrative In the previous chapter we located Paul on the map of the Roman Empire as a Jew, firmly rooted in the traditions of his ancestors. Because this tradition had longstanding experience in relating to the diverse traditions, peoples and cultures of their neighbours, particularly in the Diaspora, Paul’s roots encompassed this experience, including some knowledge of these other traditions. Paul was most likely accustomed to living with and relating to his neighbouring nations as part of his embeddedness in his own tradition. However, such familiarity prior to his calling experience was probably confined to everyday encounters. His calling experience presented him with the challenge of translating the message of the gospel, rooted in Jewish tradition, into the symbolic and social universe of his neighbours from the nations. In this chapter I will trace the trajectories of this process, focusing on the role of the Scriptures and their interpretation; in chapter 7 the focus is on issues of cultural translation that concern the practice of cult and rituals.

6.1 The Primacy of Scriptural Tradition and the Challenge of Translation It has been noted (in response to Cohen’s question ‘how do you know a Jew when you see one?’) that what rendered fellow Jews recognizable to each other was practice rather than ideas.1 Whilst I am broadly in agreement with this assessment, it isolates practice from the narrative tradition within which it is embedded. Jewish practice in everyday life, festivals and Temple cult is inconceivable without the all-permeating narrative tradition transmitted in the Scriptures in tandem with their continuous interpretation. Thus it is not practice per se nor the performance of this or that ritual as such that would render Jews recognizable to one another, but practice in its embeddedness in the narrative of the God of Israel with his people. Belonging to the God of Israel was powerfully expressed in the narrative traditions of the Scriptures and enacted and interpreted by Jews in everyday life, whether in the land of 1 Barclay 2002: 23–24; Cohen 1999: 25.

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Israel or in the Diaspora. Jewish belonging and identity and this narrative and practice are inseparable. Belonging to the God of Israel and this narrative are inherently intertwined.2 The earliest Christ-followers could not understand the life, death and resurrection of Christ without this tradition. Entirely embedded in it, this event is inseparable from this tradition. There was no other tradition from within which the Christ-event would have made sense.3 It was never seen as something separate from the traditions of the God of Israel, that is, from Jewish traditions. It was not the narratives of the Aeneid, the Iliad or the Odyssey that provided the framework within which the Christ-event and its significance were embedded. These Roman and Greek narratives and the symbolic world they depicted had no framing or interpretive function in relation to the understanding of the Christ-event as transmitted in the Pauline letters. Neither the Capitoline Hill nor Mount Olympos resonate through Paul’s writings as relevant to understanding the activity of Israel’s God in Christ. This is not to deny that narrative and philosophical topoi of the Greek and Roman social and symbolic worlds did actually resonate with aspects of this narrative framework, and with specific terminology and concepts presented within it. However, the framework and content through which the Christ-event is transmitted and interpreted is scriptural, i.e. Jewish.4 The numerous assertions in New Testament writings that this or that event, this or that understanding was ‘according to the Scriptures’ clearly indicates the context, primacy and authority attributed to this tradition. Admittedly, these traditions and their understanding are diverse; they are living traditions rather than monolithic and static. They did not emerge and develop in isolation but in communication and interaction with traditions of other peoples, reacting and responding to these in specific ways and integrating elements and motifs from them into this narrative and its ongoing interpretation. But in and with this interaction these traditions nevertheless were and remained decisively Jewish.5 To understand an event in the present in light of events or traditions of the past is nothing new, but it is part of this same tradition. That the God of Israel had been faithful to his people despite adverse circumstances, that he gave confirmation of the promises, and that hope was strengthened through remembering past salvation, all of this was part of this tradition. The narratives of Genesis and Exodus and their remembrance in the Psalms and the Prophets provide ample inner-biblical evidence for this. To experience and understand an event as an unanticipated, decisive confirmation of God’s faithfulness to his promises to his people and beyond is not as surprising as some Pauline scholars consider

2 Ehrensperger 2008: 302–307. 3 Cf. Ehrensperger 2008: 318 n. 95. 4 Cf. e.g. Eisenbaum 2009; Nanos 1996, etc.; Zetterholm 2010, 2007; Fredriksen 2010; Ehrensperger 2007 and 2008. 5 Stegemann notes concerning Jewish apocalyptic language: ‘Texts of (“apocalyptic”) Jewish tradition presaging an oriental universal ruler are to be found among the expectations of Rome’s enemies and are mirrored also in Roman literature’ (2010: 7).

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it to be.6 That Paul’s letters are permeated with direct scriptural references and scriptural language, motifs and concepts, including the respective interpretive Jewish traditions, has been demonstrated in numerous recent publications.7 I will not reiterate the evidence they provided here, but only note with Roy Ciampa that beyond direct identifiable quotations, ‘It seems clear that various aspects of the Jewish understanding of God (e.g. sovereignty, jealousy, power, role in creation, faithfulness, wrath against sin, intention to restore/redeem Israel and save Gentiles) are reflected in Paul’s thought.’8 Scriptural influence obviously does not end with the understanding of God but is seen by Ciampa in all core aspects of Paul’s theologizing.9 This permeation is not confined to the use of individual elements of this tradition; it is not that Paul would have used Jewish tradition by picking the elements that suited his argument then to construct his own understanding of the Christ-event in the form of a ‘bricolage’. The framework and content of his entire theologizing is embedded in and permeated with Jewish traditions.10 Whether and how the addressees of his letters could have recognized this is an issue to which I will return below. Here I only wish to affirm my perception of the authorial intention which I think permeates the Pauline letters. The embeddedness of Paul’s theologizing within the Jewish tradition was the given of his perception of the world. This perception was entrenched in traditions laid down in the Jewish Scriptures, and Paul is someone who ‘appear(s) to live with “texts-in-the-mind” – that is, with texts (or traditions) which provide the imaginative matrix for evaluating the present, for conceiving of the future, for organizing reality … for providing the shared symbols and language of communication’.11 This also includes his perception of time in the context of the Christ-event, as Loren Stuckenbruck has recently demonstrated in an exemplary analysis of Jewish apocalyptic texts such as 1 Enoch and Jubilees. He notes that ‘The “already” of evil’s defeat principle and the “not yet” of its manifest destruction was an existing framework that Paul could take for granted … there were pious Jews who understood themselves as living in an eschatological tension, inspired by confidence of concrete moments of divine activity in the past.’12 The challenge Paul and his co-workers were facing is the translation and interpretation of this Jewish narrative, including, and in the light of, the Christ-event into the social and symbolic world of Christ-followers from the nations. Through the experience of the effects of the Christ-event, that is, the confirmation of the promises, which were understood as extending blessing also 6 See Stuckenbruck’s excellent discussion 2012b. 7 See e.g. Stanley 2004; Wagner 2002; Porter and Stanley 2008. 8 Ciampa 2008: 55. 9 Ciampa lists numerous examples of key concepts that require further detailed analysis cf. 2008: 55–56. 10 Ehrensperger 2008. Most recently Schottroff 2013: 9–12 and throughout her commentary on 1 Corinthians. Ciampa and Rosner have argued a similar stance for 1 Corinthians (2006 and 2010), although coming to conclusions that differ from mine. 11 Fishbane 1989: 435. 12 Stuckenbruck 2012b: 9.

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to the nations, those called from these nations/e1qnh now were joining Israel in worshiping the God of Israel. They were ‘swept up … into Israel’s redemptive history’.13 Everything that concerned this history and the relationship with this God was transmitted through the Jewish Scriptures and their interpretive traditions. To relate to this God meant to relate somehow to this scriptural tradition and practices associated with them.14 But how was this narrative and the guidance provided through it to relate to people of the nations in Christ? How was their belonging to be expressed? What did it imply since they were to maintain their distinction from Jews/Israel as Paul insisted? How was it possible to remain as you were when called, i.e. as a Greek, Scythian, Lydian, Celt or other kind of barbarian, in Christ, together with Jews? How did the Jewish narrative of belonging relate to them? Although there were traditions of the role and status of ‘righteous gentiles’, in Paul’s understanding something had changed with the Christ-event, and the ‘righteous gentile’ tradition did not seem to provide sufficient guidance or clarity concerning these Christ-followers from the nations.15 The Pauline letters provide fragmentary evidence of a dual process of translation and interpretation within a communal communication process in which the non-Jewish members of the e)kklhsi/ai were seen as having become part of this narrative without becoming part of Israel. The existence of a Greek translation of this narrative facilitated and complicated the process. It facilitated the communication between people of different language traditions. But as the tradition of a particular people, it carried a specific encyclopedia of meaning, of perceiving and understanding life, that was not necessarily shared between Jews and non-Jews.16 The translation process was a challenge not so much in terms of language but in terms of the symbolic universe and of the encyclopedias associated with the terminology that provided the framework of meaning and understanding.

6.2 The Significance of the Greek Translation of the Narrative: the LXX As we have seen above17 Paul was probably not only well embedded in the traditions of his ancestors but also, and more specifically, in the Greek Jewish 13 Fredriksen 2007: 32. 14 Cf. Campbell 2006/2008: 57–67; Ehrensperger 2008. 15 Donaldson 2007: 493–506. 16 On encyclopedias see Nicklas who notes that ‘Die Schriften der LXX formen ja nicht nur wichtige Intertexte für die Texte des Neuen Testaments … je nach Herkunft bieten sie auch einen entscheidenden Hintergrund für die “Enzyklopaedie” der Autoren wie auch vieler frühchristlicher Leser bzw. Hörer der neutestamentlichen Schriften.’ ‘The texts of the LXX are not only important intertexts for the texts of the New Testament … depending on their origins they also provide the decisive context of the “encyclopaedias” of the authors as well as of many of the early Christian readers and hearers of the New Testament writings’ (2011: 205, ET mine); also Eco 2003: 32–61. 17 See 5.3 above.

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tradition of this narrative, including the interpretive discourse associated with it. He himself also considers another linguistic tradition to be relevant for his self-understanding, and there is evidence that he was actually part of the polyglot Jewish interpretive tradition of the first century.18 This implies that he would have been immersed in different linguistic contexts with divergent cultural encyclopedia permeating the narratives transmitted in different language traditions. The difficulties of translation were actually already noted by, for example, the grandson of Ben Sira in the Greek introduction to his grandfather’s work: ‘For what was originally expressed in Hebrew does not have exactly the same sense when translated into another language.’19 He was not unique in noting such difficulties. Philo of Byblos claims that due to ambiguities in a Greek translation from Phoenician, the Greeks misunderstood significant aspects of Phoenician history.20 And Josephus says that it was a more or less common practice for bilingual Jews to have ‘corrected’ Greek translations of the Scriptures based on their knowledge of their version of the Hebrew text.21 Whether or not emendations of the Greek text of the Scriptures were as much a free-for-all as supposed by Josephus, he too indicates that awareness of difficulties in translation were common, and that tensions and ambiguities in the translation processes were certainly felt by those who were bilingual/bicultural.22 Josephus also reminds us that the stability of the Scriptures was not a concept in the first century. Although the traditions and narratives of the Scriptures were held in high regard, the main cultural means of storing and transmitting tradition in oral cultures was memorization, and thus variations were the norm rather than the exception.23 However, Philo provides a different assessment of the accuracy of the translation. He asserts that ‘the appropriate Greek words rendered the appropriate Chaldaic words, optimally adapted to the things that had to be explained’ (Vit. Mos. 2.38). He attributes this accuracy to divine inspiration at work in the process of translation. However, it has been pointed out that Philo’s emphasis may be on the accuracy of meaning, and thus on the authority of the translated version of the Scriptures, rather than implying a literally understood accuracy as such.24 Thus, irrespective of the awareness of the difficulties (or miraculous accuracy) of the translation, the LXX was decisively at the core of Greek Jewish identity and sense of belonging. Diversity in practice and interpretation cannot 18 Cf. Ehrensperger 2008: 312. 19 Cf. also Passoni Dell’Acqua 2010: 323–24; and Eco 2003. 20 Although only transmitted in fragments in Eusebius’ perparatio evangelica, Philo’s Phoenician History is now considered to encompass information of some historicity. Cf. Baumgarten 2002b: 17 n. 6; Baumgarten 1981: 2 21 AJ 12.108–109. Cf. Baumgarten 2002b: 18–19. 22 Baumgarten 2002b: 30. 23 Ehrensperger 2008 and 2013a. 24 Van der Louw 2007: 50–51. To what extent the difference in the writing system had implications for the translation process cannot be known, but Passoni Dell’Acqua is of the view that this was certainly a complicating factor as it involves a more complex process of transculturation (2010: 324).

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obscure the core importance of the Scriptures across different Jewish groups, including different language communities. It is interesting that although there is evidence for divergent practices and interpretations, there is no evidence for debates about what does or does not constitute Scripture among Jews of the first century ce. It seems that the authority of its traditions was not tied to a particular textual form or to a specified content. As Emanuel Tov notes: ‘we should realize that ancient Jewish Greek Scripture is a very diverse and unplanned collection’.25 Although the earlier assumption that the unusual Greek style of the LXX was an indication of a Judaeo-Greek sociolect spoken among Jews in the Greek Diaspora is now considered unlikely, the peculiarity of the style is not disputed. Thus Joosten notes: ‘we know from the Church Fathers’ polemics against them that Celsus, Porphyry, Hierokles and Julian deplored the “pedestrian” quality of the biblical writings. These pagan philosophers found the Septuagint essentially un-Greek.’26 A number of theories have been proposed for the roughness of the translation,27 but there is no doubt that ‘Compared to contemporary literary works, the Septuagint is remarkably unpolished … It is a vagrant text, circulating in the Greek world, yet not wholly part of it.’28 Although it is not a different form of Greek, but koine Greek through and through, the terminology of the LXX diverges to a high degree from its usage in other Greek texts. This not only applies to actual neologisms for which no Greek equivalent existed, but the translators also used terms very specifically to designate particular Jewish traditions and customs. I will come back to this terminology and its relevance for Paul below. The language itself could only be fully understood within the context of, and by people who were familiar with, the narratives, poems and legal texts presented in this language.29 The LXX is an attempt to say Jewish things in Greek, and thus provides a unique partial insight into the struggle of the translators to ‘navigate between two cultural domains: the one that produced the religious ideas formulated in the Hebrew Bible … and the Hellenistic culture’.30 The LXX is a product of and witness to an immense intercultural translation process. The translators ‘were convinced of the importance of translating, to transculturate biblical books for Greek-speaking readers’.31 The specific use of the lingua franca of the region is a challenge and at the same time a source that can provide insights into the cultural translation process. It is evident that in this peculiar use of the Greek language, the translation process involved much more than accurate linguistic renderings, and the challenge to understand the world of these scriptural traditions reaches far beyond linguistic issues. The 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

Tov 2010: 19. Joosten 2011c: 11; 2011a: 6. Cf. Joosten 2011a: 13–15. Joosten 2011c: 21; cf. also Usener 2011: 81. Joosten 2011a: 2. Joosten 2011a: 2. Passoni Dell’Acqua 2010: 330.

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fact that the translators tended to use a single Greek word either rarely used in Greek or not used in a similar context in a Greek text to translate a Hebrew word or root contributed to the emergence of peculiarly Jewish meanings of Greek words within the respective context. The use of the Greek word diaqh/kh, which normally does not carry the meaning of treaty or covenant, for tyrb is an example of the latter imprinting its meaning on the former.32 The use of eu)loge/w for any xrb-related terminology is another example of the particularly Jewish use of Greek. Joosten has drawn attention to the foreignness of such a notion as to eu)logei=n a deity in Greek tradition as that which is expressed through the Hebrew xrb common in Jewish tradition. Again the latter imprints its range of meaning on the former when used within this tradition rather than vice versa. A major Jewish Greek tradition which significantly impacts on the Pauline letters is the discourse of a3giov. Rajak maintains that ‘the striking production of neologisms such as hagiasmos … and hagisma suggest that there is much more at stake than a simple requirement for the suitable equivalent for the Hebrew qadosh. A new web of meaning was being forged.’33 This does not come as such a surprise in the light of the recent studies in the use of English in diverse contexts noted above.34 Translation processes primarily require understanding and interpretation of the content in its source context in order to ‘transfer’ it into a different linguistic and cultural context. The Greek of the LXX demonstrates that it does not provide a translation into the thought world of Greece (or Rome for that matter). ‘As a literal translation, the Septuagint openly admits its foreign origin. Readers are reminded that this is not a Greek text but a Hebrew one in translation.’35 It carries with it the cultural encyclopedias of the Jewish symbolic universe in its diversity, including its traditions and practices of interpretation. The style of the LXX is most likely intended to create an alienating or distancing discourse in a Greek-speaking context, as Rajak and others have argued. The use of Greek by first-century Jews in Alexandria and elsewhere draws on some two to three centuries of acquaintance with the Greek language and Greek traditions. Nevertheless, the use of Greek among Jews of the Diaspora (and to some extent also in Judaea/Galilee)36 was diverse and in most cases did not lead to the abandonment of their affiliation with their traditions or to widespread appreciation of formal Greek education, paidei/a, and certainly not at the expense of cherishing their own tradition. With regard to the character of the Letter of Aristeas, Barclay notes that ‘Aristeas paints a world in which Jews confidently negotiate their way through Hellenistic education, intellectual debate and court protocol, without any loss of their distinctive identity.’37 Here paidei/a 32 Cf. e.g. Joosten 2011a: 7; also Joosten 2011b: 14. 33 Rajak 2009: 165. 34 See 3.3 above. 35 Joosten 2011c: 14. 36 Cf. Stuckenbruck 2012a. 37 Barclay 2002: 20. I am here not concerned with the historical accuracy of the information provided in the Letter of Aristeas but rather in the political and ideological drive of the narrative presented in it. Cf. below n. 43.

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is seen as being used in support of Jewish tradition and practice. Similarly, it is quite telling that Josephus, although he claimed to have had an excellent Jewish education, obviously did not get any Greek education before arriving in Rome. Only then did he make great efforts to achieve excellence in learning Greek. This indicates that although Josephus did know some Greek prior to his arrival in Rome, such knowledge was actually not related to a Greek paidei/a and to having been immersed in Greek culture. Josephus even acknowledges that his mastery of the Greek language is limited due to his ‘foreign tongue’. He acknowledges this having lived in Rome for twenty years.38 A similar pattern to that found in the LXX (although in more polished Greek) has been identified for Philo’s use of Greek. Naomi Cohen notes that in continuity with the LXX translation the Jewish Greek interpretive and narrative discourse had developed a use of Greek with decisively Jewish connotations. Hence when used by Jews in a Jewish context in relation to a Jewish subject, Greek words were used with a specifically Jewish meaning. The existence of such a Judaeo-Greek discourse ‘lends an entirely different dimension to Philo’s writings’.39 To argue for the existence of such a JudaeoGreek discourse is not the same as arguing for a specific dialect. As noted above, the language used is koine Greek not a special form of the language, but the way in which it is used is context specific, i.e. it transmits Jewish codes of meaning or Jewish encyclopedias of knowledge and experience. Thus Philo used his Greek paidei/a ‘insofar as he could use it for the benefit of Jews themselves and not at the expense of his solidarity with, and leadership of, the Jewish community as a whole’.40 Although the Jewish interaction with all things Greek was generally not confrontational, it was ambiguous in many aspects. Frey maintains that the location of Jewish communities in the Diaspora did not lead to assimilation with the surrounding culture but ‘the awareness of the religious otherness and the cultivation of a strong Diaspora-Jewish identity were decisive for the climate in which young Paul grew up and got his primary education’.41 The LXX is an example of this ambiguity in that it is evidence for the perceived necessity to translate the Scriptures into the dominating language, and at the same time provides an indication of a kind of reluctance in relation to the use of this language. If this translation had served the purpose of rendering Jews and their tradition as a showcase of the best Greek literature, it might have been presented in polished classical Greek. But creating a translation which respects the peculiarity of the source language built a bridge between cultures that connected and separated at the same time. The translation was a means ‘to play and not to play the game’.42 Jews living in the Greek-speaking 38 Cf. C. Milikowsky, who notes that ‘even after approximately twenty years in Rome, he is still acutely aware of how haphazard is his grasp of Hellenistic culture’ (2002: 173). 39 Cohen 1995: 178; cf. also Cohen 2002: 31–61. 40 Barclay 2002: 22. 41 Frey 2007: 294. 42 Rajak 2009: 7, also Joosten 2011b: 9.

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Diaspora could hardly avoid communicating their own tradition in this language. This was not a matter of choice, it was rather a matter of necessity.43 In translating the Scriptures, which are at the core of their identity, they are playing the game of acculturation. By ‘creating’ a special type of Greek that expresses the respect for the source language, in other words by foreignizing the translation, the translators of the LXX are actually distancing themselves and their tradition from the game. Effectively, this type of translation is a powerful assertion of the distinctiveness of Jewish identity, a form of ‘selfprotection against imperialism’.44 The language is used in a particular way and hence serves as an assertion of ‘communal independence’ and as such ‘as a vehicle for quiet cultural resistance’.45 This use of Greek in a specific vein to serve their own needs, and to express rather than to assimilate their particular identity on the part of the Jews, has similarities with the example of the use of English by Australians discussed in chapter 3. It is evidence of the specific use of a lingua franca in a way that safeguards the particular identity of the users rather than imposing the symbolic universe of the foreign language on them. As in the Australian and other contemporary examples, and as is confirmed by sociolinguistic studies, it is the language which adjusts to the cultures and traditions which use them rather than the other way round.46 Thus the Greek of the LXX and the use of Greek by Philo are clear evidence of such a process and it is vital to take seriously the cultural encyclopedias associated with the tradition that transmits itself through the use of a language in any analysis and interpretation of texts of this tradition. The Pauline letters are examples of exactly this Jewish Greek tradition of ‘playing and not playing the game’, infused with the cultural encyclopedias of the Judaism of the first century ce. Implications of this for the translation of this world into the world of the Christ-followers from the nations will be discussed by way of examples below. But first we need to turn to another aspect of Jewish tradition that I consider to have significant implications for this translation process, namely Jewish apocalyptic literature. Although this is not the place to present a comprehensive and detailed analysis of this literature and tradition in relation to its relevance for the translation process of Jewish traditions to the nations in the Christmovement, it is important to note here that the resistance tradition, identified in the linguistic and ‘traditionsgeschichtliche’ dimensions of the Jewish Greek 43 Possibly indicated by the myth of the translation of the LXX in the Letter of Aristeas, cf. Rajak 2009: 62–63; cf. also Wasserstein who argues that the Letter actually does not represent the history of the Greek translation but rather attests to its existence and the importance given to it. In his view it may have been part of Jewish pro-Ptolemaic propaganda. But he does not deny that the creation of the Septuagint certainly responded ‘to an existing Jewish need’ (2006: 16). Also Passoni Dell’Acqua 2010: 324–25. 44 Rajak 2009: 154. Joosten also emphasizes the assertion of a distinctive Jewish identity through this translation (2011b: 6). 45 Rajak 2009: 156. 46 See 3.3 above.

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discourse, is complemented not only by the narrative content and tradition of liberation and redemption of the scriptural narratives and concepts, but also by traditions of later Jewish apocalyptic traditions.

6.3 Reclaiming Identity in the Face of Violence and Totalitarian Ideology: Apocalyptic Tradition The specific Jewish use of Greek to serve their own needs should be seen as part of Jewish ‘reaction’ and ‘interaction’ with foreign domination over several centuries bce. It is part of the Jews’ adaptation and resistance, their creative way of negotiating their particular identity in contexts and under circumstances that to various degrees constrained such attempts. Paul was not the first to have notably used language which could be seen to resonate with, if not openly challenge, imperial ideology. In as much as the Jewish Greek tradition as a whole predates Paul, so does the Jewish tradition of interaction with empires predates him. Ekkehard Stegemann emphasizes that ‘the discourse-formation of domination and empire predates Paul’s participation in it and the cultural concept of Jewish (apocalyptic, messianic) traditions predetermines it’.47 The reality of empires was a varying but constant context for the Jewish people. Over the centuries survival and the struggle for the negotiation and retention of their own identity led to interaction with various empires that had dominated them. One strand of tradition emerging from interaction with Seleucid domination in particular, transmitted in apocalyptic writings, formulated narratives of distancing from, and resistance to hegemonic domination. Against the seeming reality of all-pervasive power claims of dominating rulers, apocalyptic narratives claimed to unveil and expose the hidden structure of these claims as ‘visible negations of life’ that ‘were neither necessary, nor eternal, nor truthful, but invented, finite, and deceptive’.48 These narratives, although integrating traditions from those who ruled over them, were firmly embedded in Jewish scriptural traditions. The narrative of Israel, that is, the narrative of their covenant relationship with God – who had redeemed them from slavery, had called them into the wilderness, was committed to them in the covenant with them, and reaffirmed his faithfulness to the promises again and again, through crisis and deliverance – was the discursive and identity-shaping context of the counter-imperial discourses emerging in these apocalyptic writings. They witness to an existing tradition of engaging with the effects of empires, eventually also of the Roman Empire, which imposed their power claims through violence as well as ideological totalitarianism. Even if the aim was not to dissociate local populations from their own traditions, the effect of asserting control over decisive aspects of life under 47 Stegemann 2010: 7; cf. also Stuckenbruck 2012b. 48 Portier-Young 2011: 168.

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Antiochus IV, and later under Rome, was considered by Jews as transgressing the boundaries of respect for their ancestral traditions. Measures such as the collection of tax as economic income generation by the rulers, and insisting that the pax deorum had to be guaranteed for the benefit of the entire empire through the request to pay tribute and respect to the deities of the dominating power, crossed boundaries that were too sensitive for Jews to tolerate.49 Violent suppression of attempts at self-assertion was directed against them, as the reports from military actions against subjugated peoples and respective visual representations demonstrate only too well.50 Domination and control were exercised not only through terror and violence but also, particularly in the case of the Roman Empire, through the accompanying ideological discourse represented in respective narratives, cultural institutions, systems of patronage, social networks and structural practices.51 A hegemonic discourse: asserts as normative and universal what are in fact particular and contingent ways of perceiving the world, mapping the universe and humanity’s place in it and defining poles of opposition. This cosmology demarcates inside from outside, center from periphery, normal from aberrant. Its logic legitimates claims about truth and morality, but this logic can become so invisible as to resist questioning.52

Both violence and totalizing ideological claims have traumatic effects for subjugated people. Portier-Young has drawn attention to the relevance of trauma research for envisaging the effects of violence in Judaea during the second century bce, and the relevance of this for understanding the significance of apocalyptic literature as resistance literature. The effects of trauma at the individual and collective levels result in trying to forget; thus traumatic experiences are banned to the unconscious. This effectively traps victims in the scenes of past terror, which intrude on the present again and again. Traumatic experiences are recorded in the memory of victims not in the form of language; thus they are rendered speechless, since there is no framework or narrative within which the horror can be located or to which it can refer. The memory becomes fragmented and disconnected from the self, and this leads to a sense of disorder and loss of identity. Unless language is found to express the experience, allowing it to become part of one’s narrative of identity, traumas tend to continue to terrorize victims and leave their world in a state of disorder in which past, present and future are disconnected. Repetition of the horror 49 The Jews were certainly not the only ones who reacted against domination during the period. Their traditions were part of movements across the regions that tried to negotiate local identities against and in relation to dominating powers. But Jewish literature provides by far the most extant body of literature witnessing to this available. Cf. Portier-Young 2011: 27–31. 50 Cf. Lopez 2008: 56–118; Kahl 2010: 42–75 51 Cf. Portier-Young 2011: 11 who refers to Gramsci’s concept of hegemony and the manufacture of consent which he developed in his Prison Notebooks differentiating between domination understood as ruling through force and ideological rule, which aims at achieving consent from those dominated (1971). 52 Portier-Young 2011: 12.

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can only come to a halt when the experience can be placed into some sort of narrative order that allows for some kind of ‘understanding’.53 Portier-Young is of the view that, similar to the experience of individuals, entire peoples can be traumatized through the experience of terror and violence. Thus they can become disconnected from their own sense of identity by losing the capacity to formulate their identity-shaping ‘story’ in relation to the violence experienced. When combined with totalizing ideological claims that attribute ‘humanity’ only to those who adopt the perception and way of life of the dominators, a traumatic loss of identity can easily be envisaged for numerous conquered peoples under Rome.54 Portier-Young is of the view that here, in this identity-threatening rupture caused by violence and totalizing ideology, apocalyptic narratives emerge and constitute a powerful means for the conquered Jewish people to regain language and meaning in the midst of terrorizing disorder. They ‘unveil’ the true nature of the claims of empires as: a deceptive and monstrous negation of life … These writers chose to speak the unspeakable, answering destruction and loss with lament and answering fear with a vision of hope. They developed new symbols and language to transform memory, resisting fragmentation of self and time through a new visionary form that reconnected the past, present, and future in a narrative governed by divine providence. In these ways apocalypse intervened in the logic of terror and so countered the empire’s deadliest weapon.55

This insight is not restricted to the second century bce; it may also be applied to the situation of the first century and the conditions of Jews under Roman rule. This is the context of Paul’s theologizing at the crossroads of cultures. He is not only embedded in the Jewish Greek discourse of ‘playing and not playing the game’ under domination, but also in the narrative tradition rooted in the Scriptures, interpreted again and again according to the needs of new situations and contexts. The narrative tradition of resistance to imperial claims, enforced through violence or the threat of it, and legitimated through ideological claims, did not emerge with the Christ-movement; rather, the Christ-movement is part of this existing Jewish resistance tradition. Paul is not the one who begins to use scriptural traditions in a counter-imperial vein; he is embedded in a tradition which has done this for centuries before him. Like his fellow apostles, he is trying to come to terms with and understand the meaning of the life, death and resurrection of Christ within this existing narrative tradition. This tradition of coming to terms with traumas of violent 53 Herman 1997: 39. Holocaust survivors’ narratives tell of such losses in the context of horror as do others who had endured traumatic experiences. Cf. e.g. Wiesel 1958; Krüger 1992; Wirz 1989. 54 As e.g. in the case of the Roman genocide on the Dacian people. Cf. also Lopez 2011: 81–92. 55 Portier-Young 2011: 175.

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identity-threatening disruptions of life had previously helped his people to survive, and to find themselves and their identity affirmed by the faithfulness of their God. Apocalyptic traditions of ‘unveiling’ totalitarian power claims, together with the Jewish Greek tradition of ‘playing and not playing the game’, form the bedrock/framework of the Christ-event in the Pauline letters. Only from within and as part of these scriptural and scriptural-related traditions of the Jewish people can the Christ-event be understood. Paul was called to embark on a journey to transmit its implications to the nations.

6.4 The Addressees and the Framework of Understanding The appropriation of life in Christ required careful discernment concerning which aspects of their former life as members of the nations were in tune with the ethos of the movement and which were not (as in 1 Thess. 5.21 and Phil. 4.8). But in order for ‘Greeks and barbarians’ to join the Christ-movement as ‘Greeks and barbarians’, for which he strongly argued, Paul must have recognized aspects of their former life as compatible with life in Christ. This implies that he was not only aware of such aspects to some extent but also that, in order for him to be understood, that features of the message of Christ must have resonated for his addressees with features of their former lives. Harrison maintains that this involved not just chance resonances but that ‘Paul must have given some thought as to how his Jewish soteriological and messianic language intersected with similar motifs in the imperial cult’.56 I think this is not confined to resonances and intersections with the imperial cult, but to other dimensions of the ways of life of the nations as well. That individual elements of the scriptural narratives and the gospel may or may not have resonated with elements of the Greek and Roman world has been widely demonstrated.57 However, in addition to such resonances with specific topoi, understanding requires a framework of meaning to which to relate such elements. There has to be the possibility to relate what is new to previous experiences and existing categories and paradigms. In terms of the narrative, that is, the entire framework of understanding, this may have caused more difficulties than the identification of this or that familiar element from popular philosophy, rhetorical patterns, or cult metaphors and practices. The Jewish traditions, despite attempts to see them linked to traditions and narratives, such as those of the Spartans, or to see parallels between Platonic notions and Moses, were generally rather different when compared with the prevalent Greek and Roman traditions or traditions of the nations. The most significant difference was that respect was provided only to one God, the God of Israel. Others, such as the adherence to the Sabbath, were equally strange, as were customs like abstaining from pork (it 56 Harrison 2011: 25. 57 Cf. Paul and Empire studies (e.g. Elliott 2008; Rock 2012; Horsley 2004), Paul and ancient philosophical traditions (e.g. Engberg-Pedersen 2000; Thorsteinsson 2010; Winter 2002).

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was not food laws per se that were considered strange but only some of these). Their rhythm of life followed their own festive calendar with festivals which differed from those of the majority cultures. Their narratives were in general unfamiliar to the nations, as the law as a whole would have been. But again the existence of law as the basis of the community (poli/teuma) would not have been considered strange, as this was seen as constitutive for a civilized people, and law-givers like Solon (Athens) and Numa (Rome) were revered in these roles. Cult and associated practices were familiar areas that could provide some points of contact for the cultural translation process required for Christ-followers from the nations, although again not without difficulties.58 The translation of the narrative into the world of the conquered nations thus provided a significant challenge for Paul, despite the shared language in which he and the communities addressed could communicate. It seems almost inconceivable to me, as noted above, that the members of Paul’s communities could have been recruited in their majority from people other than those who had already had some association, however loose, with Jewish communities and tradition. Through participation in some synagogue activities such people would have been to some degree familiar with the Jewish scriptural tradition and thus would have had at least a partial, if not a comprehensive, framework to which they could relate the message of the gospel. However, even for such former sympathizers loosely associated with Judaism, understanding a message so entirely embedded in the Jewish narrative and interpretive tradition as the one Paul tried to transmit to them might not have been without hurdles. It is not difficult to envisage that in the process of transmission ‘loss and gain’ in translation might have occurred.59 To analyse the Pauline letters in detail based on the presuppositions argued here is a major endeavour that requires further research. Within the limitations of this study, I can only present a few examples of possible implications of this cultural translation process. I will focus here on the major thematic discourse of the unity of the nations, and on the semantic discourse of pi/stiv, and will present explorations into the cultural encyclopedias and their respective narratives that might have resonated with those involved in the communication process between Paul and the addressees of his letters. With regard to the latter, these explorations are not primarily linguistic, although some linguistic aspects will be covered. I am also not embarking on a ‘Humboldtian’ exercise in order to establish an inherent meaning to words apart from their semantic, discursive and cultural contexts. As emphasized above, there emerged a specific use of Greek for specific purposes among Jews of the Greek Diaspora. This use of the language of their conquerors cannot be reduced to an analysis of the terminology in isolation from its semantic and discursive, that is, narrative contexts. James Barr’s warnings are still valid 58 See chapter 7. 59 Cf. Eco 2004: 32–61.

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and ‘the absurdities and the hazards of the kind of approach to the study of meaning which reads group mentality into the histories of individual words’ are well pointed out by Rajak.60 I fully agree with her and others’ assessments of the TDNT in this respect.61 As far as the issue of the unity of the nations is concerned, this thematic analysis is based on the presupposition of cultural interaction between Jewish and other traditions, as exemplified with regard to apocalyptic literature. This interaction does not necessarily mean the adoption of respective stances or respective values from one cultural, ethnic or community context into another. In his ‘Prolegomenon to the Study of Jewish Cultural History’ Moshe Rosman notes that ‘it is a kind of intertextuality that defines Jewish culture, not the degree of purity of origins of the “texts” themselves. Authenticity is not dependent on the pedigree but on practice.’62 In conjunction with its narrative context I will explore whether, or to what extent, the ‘unity of the nations’ advocated by Paul resonates with the cultural contexts involved here.

6.5 Israel and the Nations: Unity with a Difference In order to begin to understand the cultural translation process Paul and his colleagues were involved in, the Jewishness of the discourse they were trying to transmit must be taken seriously in all its dimensions. Of course, the question of how this related to and could resonate with the social and symbolic world of the addressees from the nations needs to be considered with the same seriousness. It would be strange to assume that Paul paid no attention to, or was not concerned with, the reception of his message and letters. As we have seen in chapter 5, as a Diaspora Jew he must have had some familiarity with the social and symbolic world of his addressees. If he had only been concerned with the ‘sending’ of the message rather than its ‘reception’, he could hardly have written advice such as ‘pa/nta de_ dokima/zete to_ kalo_n kate/xete’ (‘But test everything, hold on to what is good’ [1 Thess. 5.21]) and ‘o3sa e)sti_n a)lhqh=, o3sa semna/, o3sa di/kaia, o3sa a(gna/, o3sa prosfilh=, o3sa eu1fhma, ei1 tiv a)reth_ kai_ ei1 tiv e1painov, tau=ta logi/zesqe (‘whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things’ [Phil. 4.8]). Similarly, he could also hardly have claimed for himself that he ‘became all things to all people’ ('toi=v pa=sin ge/gona pa/nta' [1 Cor. 9.22b]) without having any knowledge of the world and way of life of his addressees. The enormous challenge he and his colleagues were facing with this task should not be underestimated. In as much as understanding in the process of communication cannot be taken for granted, but needs to be acknowledged as 60 Rajak 2009: 163. 61 Cf. Rajak’s discussion 2009: 163–65; also Heschel 2008: 186–89; Meeks 2003; Tov 1999: 257–69. 62 Rosman 2002: 119.

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the challenge of all communication, the existence of Paul’s letters witnesses to exactly this challenge inherent in the endeavour: they communicate both his and his colleagues’ concerns and struggles in their attempts to succeed in the translation process and to get the Christ-followers from the nations to understand what the gospel implies in their lives. Already their association with the God of Israel as such is entirely part of the Jewish tradition of hope for life in and beyond the constraints of destructive powers and domination. The relationship between Israel and the nations is perceived from a Jewish perspective of the world, and so is their association with the God of Israel in and through Christ. This aspect of the gospel does not emerge out of nowhere with the advent of Christ. The association of the nations is interpreted from within existing Jewish traditions. It is not novel to or inconsistent with Jewish tradition whose narrative begins with God’s creation and humankind as a whole as part of it. In this narrative all peoples, rather than only a few, are seen as related to each other, through their common descent from Noah. This is a perception that in its universality is not shared with traditions of other peoples.63 Thus, it is feasible in this tradition to see the election and particularity of one people, Israel, in conjunction with openness to other nations. As Donaldson notes: ‘Israel’s story is thus set within the universal story of God’s dealings with the whole human race, rather than over against it.’64 The particular relationship of God with this people, through election, covenant and guidance through the Torah, and the perception of ‘the other’ as nevertheless part of God’s creation and divine economy are not in contradiction to this tradition. Donaldson has affirmed ‘Jews could not tell their own national story without reference to the other nations, and if perhaps it was possible to narrate the story in such a way that the nations functioned simply as a foil for Israel, the story itself contained at least latent questions about the relationship between these other nations and the God who created them.’65 There are numerous trajectories which envision non-Jews, rather than joining Israel – a socio-ethnic group – through conversion, joining themselves to the Lord as ‘others’. Examples occur in Isa. 56.6. where we read ‘and the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants’, and in Zech. 2.1112: ‘Many nations shall join themselves to the Lord on that day, and shall be my people; and I will dwell in your midst. And you shall know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you. The Lord will inherit Judah as his portion in the holy land, and will again choose Jerusalem’ (similar traditions can be found in Isa. 2.3; Mica. 4.2; Ezek. 47.22-23; Ezra 6.21; Tob. 14.6-7).66 These people are not seen as becoming part of Israel, but they worship God as foreigners because God’s house is now a 63 Scott 1995: 2–3; 5–56. Lopez notes that ‘The Jewish construct of the nations, particularly in Genesis and prophetic literature, presents them as different but interconnected through their creator’ (2008: 135; cf. also 22–25). 64 With reference to Genesis 1–11 (2007: 477). 65 Donaldson 2007: 2. 66 Donaldson also refers to the narratives of Ruth and Jonah, Solomon’s prayer 1 Kgs 8.23-53, Psalm 96 and as a peculiar example Naaman, 2 Kgs 8.15 (2007: 478). Cf. also Crüsemann 2011: 201–2004, also 1994.

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house of prayer for all peoples (Isa. 56.7).67 There are traditions in these narratives which envision non-Jewish peoples joining in the worshipping of the God of Israel without becoming members of the people Israel, that is, without becoming like them. Their alterity is preserved.68 The distinctions between and the diversity of nations is maintained and so is their specific way of life and of relating to God. We cannot discern precisely which specific traditions of this narrative were influential in Paul’s understanding of his call to the nations, but it can hardly be denied that these traditions were of decisive importance in his living his call. His understanding of the Christ-event, including the implications this had for the relationship between Israel and the nations, was embedded in and infused with the cultural encyclopedia of such traditions. These traditions of a unification of nations jointly to worship the God of Israel in itself presents an alternative scenario to the scenario of empires.69 Admittedly not all of the Jewish traditions envisage a peaceful relationship between Israel and the nations. Some do not present an alternative but merely suggest inversions of the domination-subjugation scheme with the non-Jewish nations now being subjugated under the rule of the God of Israel.70 Paul is drawing on those traditions which do not envisage the unification of the nations by force but through responding to the call to serve the God of Israel in the vein seen by Tobit in his blessings before his death: kai\ pa&nta ta\ e1qnh e0pistre/yousin a0lhqinw~v fobei=sqai ku/rion to\n qeo\n katoru/cousin ta\ ei1dwla au)tw~n, kai\ eu)logh/sousin pa/nta ta\ e1qnh to\n ku/rion (‘And all the nations will turn to the Lord God in truth and will turn away from their idols and all the nations will praise/bless the Lord’ [Tob. 14.6]). The earliest Christ-followers saw this call actualized in and through the Christ-event, that is, in the implications of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In the first century ce, to envisage a non-violent unification of the nations actually presents a powerful alternative to the notion of their unification under the ‘civilizing’ force of Rome. Rome claimed to have united the conquered nations under its dominion, thus securing pax et iustitia for all under its rule, but this pax was enforced by violence and the iustitia was what benefited the conquerors. Although ending the murderous civil war, which had dragged allies from all sides into battle against the different Roman parties and against each other, must have had a somewhat positive impact on the economy and living conditions around the Mediterranean, the peace mainly benefited the Roman and some local elites. Achieved by violence, it was secured by ideological claims and notions of assimilation to the Roman way of life for those who sought respect

67 Kaminsky is of the view that even a text like Lev. 24.22, which refers to ‘one law for natives and resident aliens’, implies ‘that the group boundaries remain intact’ (2011: 20). 68 On alterity see Lévinas 1969: 194–219; 1995: 24–55; also my discussion of Lévinas and Paul in Ehrensperger 2007b. 69 Harrison 2011: 36; Kahl 2010: 242–43. 70 As e.g. Isa. 14.2-9; 29.5-8; 34.1-4; 60.11-16; Jer. 10.25; 25.31-38.

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and acceptance from the Roman elite. Barton is of the view that after a century of intermittent civil war, the Romans most likely understood that: the pax Augusta … was not simply a state of tranquillity … The Romans’ celebration of the pax Augusta indicated their willingness to accept submission – to go from being citizens to being subjects – and to live at the indulgence, the mercy of the king. The peace of Augustus, like the peace of the gods, seemed worth the price.

But Barton also notes that for many ‘beneficiaries of this pax Romana (like Tacitus’ British chieftain Calgacus) that peace was costlier than the ideology would make believe’.71 The unity of the conquered nations was a unity of control, with Rome having developed its notion to dominate according to the slogan divide et impera. Unity and solidarity among the nations was feared, as the passage by Tacitus referred to earlier demonstrates: ‘Maneat, quaeso, duretque gentibus, si non amor nostri, at certe odium sui, quando urgentibus imperii fatis nihil iam praestare fortuna maius potest quam hostium discordiam’72 (‘Long may last, I pray, and endure among the nations, this – if not love for us – at least hatred for each other; since now that the fates of empire drive it on, Fortune can guarantee us nothing better than discord among our enemies’ [Germ. 33.2]).73 The unity was a unity for the sake and benefit of Rome, and consisted in the enforcement of recognizing the Caesars as their pater patriae, as the only legitimate link between them. What the nations shared was conquest, capture, and enslavement displayed in Roman triumphal processions, arches and propaganda, rather than creation and solidarity as siblings.74 Moreover, as we have seen above (5.2), to be recognized in the first century ce if not as equal then at least as ‘civilized’ and ‘human’ was only possible on the condition that those from conquered nations accepted this ‘civilizing’ force and turned ‘human’ according to the Roman concept of humanitas, that is, became the same by copying the Roman way of life. Of course, some upward mobility was possible, as examples like the rise to fame of the former slave Epictetus demonstrate. And although this did not mean, as we have seen in chapter 4, that previous traditions and aspects of one’s identity had to be abandoned, there was no room for these other traditions within the ‘civilized’ life and discourse of the Roman elite. Acceptance into this circle was only possible through assimilation, through becoming ‘Roman’, embracing Roman traditions, values and virtues.75 It included integration into the Roman patronage system, and an understanding of strength and power in 71 Barton 2007b: 252. 72 http://thelatinlibrary.com/tacitus/tac.ger.shtml#33, last accessed 28.1.13. 73 Nero had nightmares concerning the unity of the conquered nations, as Lopez has noted; cf. 2008: 1–4. 74 Cf. Lopez 2008: 24. Cf. also p. 112 above. 75 For an analysis of Iustitia, Clementia, Pietas and Virtus as tools of imperial ideology see Elliott 2008.

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a dominating sense.76 Difference (alterity) was noted, as mentioned above, mostly as a curiosity, with the courage of defeated nations being seen to enhance the bravery and grandeur of Roman conquest, but it had no value in itself – it was tolerated rather than respected or accepted. If anything, it was the unity of hegemonic sameness to which Rome aspired. The scriptural traditions of the nations joining Israel in glorifying their God do not presuppose such assimilation; in these visions the nations are not required to become the same, that is Jews, in order to do so, nor must Israel become like the nations in this process of united glorification of God. It seems evident that Paul is drawing on such visions of the unification of the nations and Israel. For him the ‘already’ of ‘the world to come’, seen as revealed in the Christ-event, actualizes such visions. Based on these, the envisaged unity presupposes and actually supports the diversity and particularity of the nations and of Israel. The nations are specifically not to become the same as Jews and not to convert to Judaism, and Israel is not to become like the nations. The paradigm of sameness promoted by imperial power is exactly what these people from the nations were not to follow as followers of Christ. They were to join Israel in the worshipping of God as the nations. The distinction between circumcision and uncircumcision is to be maintained. Unity is not achieved by the eradication of cultural and ethnic distinctions, but by affirming their validity and value in Christ.77 This is of important significance theologically, as Nanos has demonstrated, in that the understanding of God as Creator and thus as God of Israel and the nations is at stake.78 Paul’s strong arguments in 1 Corinthians 7,79 in Gal. 5.2, as well as in Rom. 14.1–15.14 in favour of respecting people in their difference set out an alternative discourse to the Roman imperial ideology of sameness. Recognition by Rome even of members of the provincial elite presupposed their assimilation. There was no equality between those who were and remained different on Roman terms, even among the elite. Galatians 3.26-28 is a call to unity and equality, not to sameness, as William S. Campbell has convincingly demonstrated,80 and as such it is a challenge to the prevalent Roman paradigm. It is evident from Paul’s way of arguing that this was not easy to understand. To translate this alternative understanding of unity among the nations and between Israel and the nations into a social and symbolic world permeated by the universalizing unification ideology of the empire implied a steep learning curve on the part of Christ-followers from the nations, and perhaps also for some Jews. Traditionally, those with whom Paul is arguing have been identified as ‘Judaizing’ opponents, and in the main they were considered to be Jewish Christ-followers who preached circumcision. Although there may have been 76 On dominating power see Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 16–22. 77 Cf. also Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 22–24. 78 Nanos 2012; also Schottroff 2013: 10. 79 Campbell 2006/2008: 91; 2011: 42–46. 80 Campbell 2006/2008: 149; 2014.

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Christ-followers who understood the implications of the Christ-event in this way, the issue of ‘opponents’ is more complex than a dual dichotomy of Paul and ‘Judaizers’, as has been convincingly demonstrated by Jerry Sumney.81 Mark Nanos has proposed scenarios which include the possibility that nonChrist-following Jews would have advocated that ‘gentiles’ who wished to worship God on a par with Jews must convert to Judaism, as they did not see the messianic visions of their inclusion as gentiles actualized in Christ. As noted above, this may actually have been Paul’s stance before his call.82 On the other hand, there may have been non-Jewish Christ-followers who understood unity and equality in Roman terms as being possible only through full assimilation, that is, conversion to Judaism, as the paradigm they were accustomed to. The struggle with the former would have arisen because of different perceptions and interpretations of what had happened in Christ, in other words, in the context of an inner-Jewish debate. The struggle with the latter, on the other hand, had more to do with issues of cultural translation. Paul has to try to explain that the imperial paradigm of unity and equality was very different from the envisaged unity of life in Christ. Rather than presupposing the overcoming of difference, this unity was based on lasting diversity. The ethos of living together required recognition and respect for the other, for whom Christ also died. No Christfollower was ever ‘to put a stumbling block in the way of another’ (Rom. 14.13). Paul’s request of the strong to accommodate and respect (not tolerate) the needs of the weak reverses the imperial pattern of assimilation. His call to imitate him in as much as he imitates Christ implied the recognition of responsibility towards the other (Phil. 2.1-11),83 and the request to remember the poor calls for a bond of solidarity beyond the confines of those who are the same. Longenecker argues, in my view convincingly, that: ‘For Paul, remembering the poor was to lie at the heart of the eschatological identity of communities he had founded, and was itself a practice integral to an embodied proclamation of the good news.’84 Paul advocates the necessity of the retention of Jewish identity in Christ in as much as he advocates the retention of the diverse identities of the nations (1 Cor. 7.17-24).85 Unity of the nations in their diversity, with all its implications, is one of the key identity markers that distinguishes the e)kklhsi/ai tou= qeou= from the imperial sense of the unity of nations. The unity of diversity is not enforced by violence, but those joining have responded in trust to the call of God through one who had been a victim of imperial terror and yet vindicated by God. Although those called from the nations may have had similar experiences of conquest, violence and humiliation to those suffered by Jews, for them to relate to this alternative tradition must have been challenging. We do not know of alternative discourses to imperial ideology from other conquered nations at any level of detail similar to what is known of the Jewish tradition. Hence it is 81 Sumney 1999. 82 Nanos 1996: 179–201. See above 5.5. 83 Cf. Brawley’s excellent article (2010). 84 Longenecker 2010: 154. 85 Campbell 2006/2008: 86–103; Tucker 2011: 115–35.

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not possible to discern whether there would have been a possibility that they may have been able to relate some of Paul’s message and guidance to their own diverse traditions, which might have differed from the dominating imperial ideology of Rome.86 The only detailed tradition with which to compare the Pauline discourse is the Greek and Roman elite literature and some epigraphic evidence. We cannot exclude the possibility that similarities between traditions of the conquered nations and Jewish tradition existed as far as inherent resistance to imperial ideology and practice is concerned. However, Greek and Roman literary, epigraphic and visual material of the period presented the image of a different, imperial unity of nations, and this leads to the conclusion that this message of the gospel, embedded in Jewish traditions of resistance, and of ‘playing and not playing the game’, must have been difficult to grasp for people from the nations. To come to an understanding of a unity of the nations and of Israel, an understanding that differed so fundamentally from the imperially enforced unity, would have been a major challenge for both the apostle and his addressees, although its actualization had liberating and empowering potential.

6.6 The Pauline Discourse of Pi/stiv Pi/stiv is a term frequently used by Paul and has triggered a significant reception history in subsequent theological debates, not least in its role as a decisive theological concept in the Reformation debates about grace and law, where it featured centre stage in expressions like sola fide. I am not primarily concerned with these theological debates and their aftermath, but rather wish to explore the analogies and differences of this terminology in the contexts that concern us here: the Jewish, Greek and Roman perception of what pist-related terminology encompassed. ‘Loss and gain’ in the cultural translation process may nevertheless also contribute to respective theological debates, for example the pi/stiv Xristou= discussions. The high prominence of pi/stiv and related terminology in the Pauline letters has recently been complemented by the recognition of the significance of the Roman fides discourse which is seen in parallel with, or as resonating with, the Pauline discourse, albeit in Greek translation. 6.6.1 The LXX discourse of Pi/stiv There is a wide consensus that the pi/stiv discourse of the Jewish Greek tradition provides the primary context for the New Testament, and particularly 86 Brigitte Kahl draws attention to the prominence of the Gauls/Galatians as the enemies par excellence of Rome, but most of the information about them, as about other conquered nations and their traditions, is mediated through Roman literature (2010: 42–51). Harrison has drawn attention to the gap in scholarship about ‘anti-imperial propaganda during the Julio-Claudian period’ (2011: 42 n. 188), but such anti-imperial stances hardly challenged the system of empire as such, but rather the respective Caesars and their ways of handling power and domination. It remained a mainly elitist discourse.

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the Pauline use of this terminology.87 Since the LXX consistently translates hnm)-related terminology with pist-related terms, the Jewish Greek understanding of this discourse is of decisive relevance here. Based on this context, the primacy of the notion of faithfulness, trust and loyalty is lexically evident, and the meaning of ‘belief’ in a contemporary religious sense in my view does not directly impinge on the LXX meaning of pi/stiv. Elliott notes concerning the translation of u(pakoh_n pi/stewv as ‘obedience of faith’ that this is ‘language that implies that Paul meant primarily the trusting assent of his listeners to his message (his gospel) or their acceptance of his theological propositions about the way God saves. This translation has proven serviceable to a tradition eager to contrast salvation by faith in Jesus with works-righteousness it has attributed, wrongly, to Judaism.’88 It is interesting to note that pist-related terminology and its Hebrew equivalent hnm) in the LXX/Hebrew Scriptures is most frequently translated as faithfulness, loyalty, trust or a related term in English Bible translations, whereas when it comes to pist-related terminology in the New Testament, the translations mostly use faith and belief-related English terms except where the pist-related terminology concerns God’s own activity. As Elliott has noted, specific theological presuppositions seem to impinge on the translation process here. However, this difference in translations of the Hebrew Scriptures/LXX on the one hand and the New Testament on the other is striking, and I will confine my analysis to some select examples here, focusing specifically on the compound of a)koh_/u(pakoh_ pi/stewv and its narrative context in the scriptural tradition. There is a specific pi/stiv discourse in the Jewish Greek tradition which awaits detailed analysis, but there can be hardly any doubt that this terminology, although it does not exclusively refer to the relationship between God and human beings, is significant for the understanding of precisely this relationship. In order to get a sense of the relationship it is not sufficient to consider parallel uses of the terminology in the Greek and Roman symbolic and social worlds. As noted above, if there was inherent in the Jewish Greek tradition a notion of distancing, even of resisting, the dominant discourse of the Greek and Roman social and symbolic universe, then a discourse as important as that expressed with pi/stiv and related terminology must also have been part of this implicit ‘playing and not playing the game’. Loyalty, trust and faithfulness were core to Israel’s exclusive relationship with God and with one another, as opposed to being relevant in any way to the deities of other nations. The primacy and exclusiveness of this relationship had significant implications for the understanding of loyalty, trust and faithfulness within the community and between leaders and the community. However, nothing could diminish the importance of primary loyalty to and trust in God. This is evident, for instance, in the ambivalent role kings play in the respective narrative traditions of the books of Samuel and Kings. The reservations of Samuel on the request of the people to anoint a king for them 87 E.g. Mutschler 2010: 63; Strecker 2005: 226–28; Nanos 1996: 223–26; Campbell 1995: 278–82; Stowers 1994: 195–202; Brandenburger 1993: 265–88; Lindsay 1993. 88 Elliott 2008: 45.

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(1 Samuel 8) are a narrative expression of the inherent limitations of, and the critical stance over against, a ruler who is subject to the same guidance as the people, the guidance provided by God through the Torah that permeates the entire scriptural tradition. Any leader’s power is thus seen to be limited by, and subject to, the sovereignty of God.89 This implies that loyalty, trust and faithfulness were considered to be relevant to kings and rulers only in a secondary sense, and only where necessary. This is evident from the critical stance of prophets who challenged the leadership of kings, paradigmatically exemplified in the dramatic narrative of Elijah, Ahab and Jezebel (1 Kgs 17.1–2 Kgs 2.13), and prophetic warnings to leaders and kings who did not listen ‘to the words of the Lord’ (Jer. 37.2; cf. also Amos 6.1-7; Hos. 5.1; Ezek. 34.1-10). Such criticism was obviously also voiced against oppressive foreign rule, but it should be noted that not all foreign power was considered in this way, as the appreciation of Persian rule demonstrates. Apocalyptic writings of the Second Temple period were indebted to these critical traditions, although aspects of resistance to imperial power from other traditions certainly informed notions such as the sequence of four or five kingdoms (Dan. 2.31-45 and 7.1-14).90 The key dimension of the assessment of rulers and leaders, both native and foreign, was their ‘walking in the ways of God’ or ruling in a way which respected the Jewish people’s ‘way of life’ as loyalty to their God, that is ‘walking in the ways of the Lord’ guided by the Torah. They were dependent on God and entrusted with leadership by him. Any arrogance or self-inflation would provoke God’s anger.91 To be entrusted with leadership in this tradition encompassed inherent responsibility for the other, compassion and support for the weaker and vulnerable members of the community. Concern for the poor and needy was not an additional option for the people Israel and its leaders. The frequent admonition to remember that ‘that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there’ (Deut. 24.18), or that ‘you were aliens in the land of Egypt’ (Exod. 22.21) in contexts where widows and orphans or foreigners are concerned, are not additions but core to the relationship with God characterized in the LXX by pi/ stiv and related terms. To hear the word of the Lord called for action. To trust 89 Although rulers/kings in Roman, Greek and other nations’ perspective were also subject to or representatives of deities, and Augustus preferably depicted himself in the role of the pious pontifex maximus, the conflation of the role of ruler and priest prevented a critical and distancing discourse in relation to the ruling power as it is found in Jewish scriptural tradition from the very beginning of the narratives about kings and prominently also in prophetic traditions. This is not to say that no critical stance against certain Caesars was raised. On the contrary, the banning of Ovid and other poets and philosophers indicates that they had fallen out of grace with the emperor precisely because they dared to criticize him. The deadly internal rivalries within the elite, political and military circles also indicate that emperors could not exercise their power uncontested. These criticisms and murder conspiracies are evidence of power struggles between the powerful themselves rather than actually providing evidence for a fundamental ambiguity in the system itself – at least when it comes to the first century the principate is firmly established in Rome. Cf. also Elliott 2008: 34–40. 90 Cf. Portier-Young 2011: 27–31. 91 Cf. Rajak 2009: 176–209.

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in the Lord meant to act according to the God who had called them. Isaiah 58.610 refers clearly and explicitly to what constitutes an accurate response to the call of God: Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?

Such traditions were also transmitted into the Greek-speaking Jewish context. The adaptation of the language to the tradition of the community rather than the other way around is obvious here.92 The notion of loyalty, trust, and faithfulness and its implications was core to the Jewish tradition and should be located and understood from within the narrative web of its Scriptures. This is also the core reference point for understanding the Pauline pi/stiv discourse. In terms of terminology which expresses the relationship between God and humans, and relationships within the community the pi/stiv discourse needs to be seen in conjunction with other terms that express similar aspects of this relationship: e.g. a)lh/qeia, e1leov, dikaiosu/nh, paraklh/siv and oi)ktirmo/v. The pi/stiv discourse is part of a wider semantic web that needs to be kept in mind when focusing on the individual term.93 All of these words are relational, expressing in a nuanced way characteristics of the relationship of God with his people or with an individual, and between members of his people. The reasons for the choice of one term over another are not always evident, as a Hebrew term may be translated into different Greek terms depending on literary context, preference of the translators, or a temporal difference in translation.94 This is further reason to avoid a lexically driven focus on one term only without taking into account the whole semantic web of which it is a part. Pi/stiv and pistrelated terms are used more or less consistently for hmn), tm) and related terms in the vast majority of cases when the human side of the relationship is in view. Thus Abraham’s pi/stiv is in view in Gen. 15.8, Moses is concerned about the people’s pi/stiv in him in Exod. 4.1, 5, 8, 31, and the lack of Moses’ and Aaron’s pi/stiv is the reason for God not entrusting them to lead the people Israel into the land of milk and honey (Num. 20.12).95 Pi/stiv and pist-related terms refer to the expected, actual or lack of trust, trustworthiness, faithfulness and loyalty to God in response to his faithfulness or in some cases between humans (Moses and the people). It is interesting that these Greek terms are only 92 See chapter 3 above. 93 Cf. similarly Breytenbach (2009) in his excellent discussion of xa/riv and e1leov; also Tov 1999: 93–94 for a discussion of sa/rc, do/ca, a)de/lfov, e1qnh and their equivalents in Hebrew. 94 Cf. Joosten, who notes ‘The factors leading the translators to adopt a given Greek word in translating a given Hebrew word in a given passage can never be established beyond doubt. The translators’ workshop is a black box’ (2011a: 5). 95 For further examples cf. LXX: Gen. 15.8; Exod. 4.1, 5, 8, 31; Num. 14.11; 20.12; Deut. 1.32; 9.23; 32.20; 1 Sam. 2.35; 22.14; 26.23; Pss 26.13; 77.22, 32; 100.6; 115.1; 118.66; Prov. 2.12; 12.17; 12.22; 25.13; Hos. 2.22; Isa. 1.21, 26; 7.9; 8.2; 17.10; 28.16; 43.10.

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very rarely used when God’s faithfulness is in view despite the use of hmn) and tm) for both God and humans. A few passages use pist- related terminology as characteristic of God’s activity. Thus it is said o3ti pisto/v e0stin o( a#giov Israh_l, kai\ e0celeca&mhn se (Isa 49.7), kai\ gnw&sh| o3ti ku/riov o( qeo/v sou, ou[tov qeo/v, qeo\v pisto/v, o( fula&sswn diaqh/khn kai\ e1leov toi=v a)gapw~sin au)to\n kai\ toi=v fula&ssousin ta\v e0ntola\v au)touv ei0v xili/av genea\v (Deut. 7.9). And in the Song of Moses the people Israel are reminded that qeo/v, a)lhqina\ ta\ e1rga au)tou=, kai\ pa~sai ai9 o(doi\ au)tou= kri/sei qeo\v pisto/v, kai\ ou)k e1stin a)diki/a, di/kaiov kai\ o3siov ku/riov (Deut. 32.4).96 But mostly the LXX seems to make a terminological distinction when God’s attitude and activity are in focus by predominantly translating the semantic field of hmn) and tm) with a)lh/qeia, a)lhqino_v and related terms. Thus the pair tm)wdsh is rendered almost consistently with e1leov kai a)lhqino_v (Exod. 34.6; 2 Sam. 2.6; 15.20; Pss 24.10; 25.3; 39.11; 56.4; 60.8; 84.10; etc.; steadfast love and faithfulness in the NRSV). In a few cases (Gen. 24.27; 32.10; Jos. 24.14; Isa. 38.19) we find the same pair translated as dikaiosu/nh kai_ a)lh/qeia. Mxr and related terms are translated with a range of words such as oi)ktirmo/v, paraklh/siv, e1leov. All of these terms together, like their Hebrew equivalents, form the semantic web with which the Scriptures circumscribes key notions that should characterize relationships in the realm of the God of Israel. We need to keep in mind Emanuel Tov’s emphasis that: ‘if a certain Greek word represents a given Hebrew word in most of its occurrences, it has become almost by implication a mere symbol for that Hebrew word in the translation’.97 In addition to recognizing this, these words should neither be considered in isolation nor detached from the narrative or poetic contexts in which they are embedded. Together with narratives, hymns and prophetic writings they form the cultural encyclopedia which resonates in their diverse uses within the Scriptures and beyond in interpretive traditions. The terminological differentiation in the Septuagint between the faithfulness, loyalty and truthfulness of God on the one hand and the response expected from those called on the other is nevertheless noteworthy.98 Although Paul uses the entire range of this terminology and in his letters the pi/stiv discourse is intertwined and resonates with all these characteristics of God, he mostly follows the LXX pattern and in the vast majority of cases uses pi/stiv and pist-related terms when he talks about the Christ-followers’ activity or attitude in relation to God, rather than about God. Whether or not this was a conscious choice, in my view this parallel in the use of pi/stiv and pistrelated terms is a clear indication that there must have been overlaps of shared tradition, including in the cultural encyclopedia of the Greek Jewish tradition of which Paul, as noted above, was part. 96 Cf. also Jer. 39.41; 49.5 97 Tov 1999: 90. 98 This is a field for further study as a more detailed analysis of this remarkable differentiation and its variations, and its implications for the New Testament than can be provided in this study is required here.

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6.6.2 The faithful response of those called In prominent sections of Romans Paul refers to his call as a commission to bring about the u(pakoh_n pi/stewv among the nations (Rom. 1.5; 16.26). It has been argued that this implies a self-understanding of Paul as the authoritative figure requesting submission under his personal authority. I challenged such readings of u(pakoh_n pi/stewv in my Paul and the Dynamics of Power and argued that this notion should be interpreted in the context of the Hebrew Scriptures’ notion of hearing and responding to God’s call.99 I argued that, rather then being a call to submission under Paul’s unquestionable authority, u(pakoh/ should be seen in the context of (m#^ discourse, which clearly refers to the topos of ‘call and response’ in the sense of a hearing of the call with the implication that ‘to hear’ includes acting in accordance with what has been heard. In the scriptural context such ‘hearing’ is not enforced but expected to emerge out of a choice to trust and commit oneself to the relationship with God into which the people Israel understood themselves called.100 The people Israel are called not into a realm of domination, but into a realm of trust. Trust in God who is compassionate for those who are vulnerable cannot be enforced by a request to submission. It can only grow through free response in order for the relational bond of interdependence and mutual trust to be strengthened.101 Significantly, the close connection between ‘hearing’ and ‘trust’ is found at decisive points in the narrative of Exodus, more specifically in the commissioning scenes of Moses that involve conversations between Moses and God. Upon Moses’ doubting that the people of Israel will trust him as being commissioned by God to lead them out of Egypt, God repeatedly assures Moses that ‘they will hear and trust’ (Exod. 4.1-9). A similar connection between ‘hearing’ and ‘trust’ is found in other core passages such as Exod. 4.31 (although here the specific combination is found only in the Hebrew text), and also in Deut. 9.23 and Isa. 53.1. The Pauline commission to bring about the u(pakoh_n pi/stewv of the nations resonates with such well-known notions from the scriptural narrative, and from the Exodus narrative and the role of Moses in particular, and relates it to those from the nations who through Christ join Israel in glorifying God. This association of people from the nations with Israel is hoped for in the prophetic and other traditions (e.g. Isa. 14.1; 2.2-4; 25.3-10; Mic. 4.1-4; Tob. 14.6-7) as something expected to happen in messianic times. Such times had been inaugurated by the Christ-event according to the earliest Christ-followers. The semantic web of u(pakoh_n pi/stewv as such is thus not new. It was not created by Paul but he sees this scriptural tradition now applicable also to people from the nations, in that ‘Whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by the steadfastness and encouragement of 99 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 155–78. 100 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 162–63. Elliott has argued similarly with a focus on Romans that ‘Throughout the letter, Paul sets a willing and consenting obedience over against its opposite, an obedience characterized by compulsion and submission’ (2008: 52). 101 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 164–66.

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the scriptures we might have hope’ (Rom. 15.4). They are now also called to hear, that is, to respond to the message of the gospel, to be response-able to the call of God through Christ.102 As in the case of Jews, their response ought to consist in trust in the God of Israel expressed in exclusive loyalty, and this includes mutual loyalty towards each other in the e)kklhsi/a as well as respect for and solidarity with the Jewish people. That this does not imply that they have to convert to Judaism is an issue Paul has to clarify in several of his letters;103 it seems to be part of the difficulty of the cultural translation process involved in Paul’s transmission of the message of the gospel into the world of the nations. In the compound u(pakoh_ pi/stewv, pi/stiv is the response expected of those who are called (Rom. 1.6). But the semantic web of pi/stiv and related terms referring to the characteristics of God are the basis for the pi/stiv of humans. Whoever the actor may be in Israel’s narrative tradition, what is expressed in pi/stiv terminology has to do with loyalty, trust and faithfulness. This is not merely a ‘holding for true or real’ state of mind, but something that clearly is only actualized in concrete activities. God has been reliable again and again in Israel’s history, and the narrative, poetic and prophetic traditions remind the people Israel, even in times of trouble and sorrow, of God’s unwavering loyalty and faithfulness to them, including his steadfast love and compassion (Exod. 36.10-13; Isa. 54.10; Ps. 85.11-14; etc.). In the Pauline discourse this also emerges as being of decisive significance as he interprets the Christ-event as consistent with, and actually as, further confirmation of God’s pi/stiv. God, who is faithful, has called not only Jews but also people from the nations into community with Christ (1 Cor. 1.9); in his faithfulness he will support them and enable them to get through their difficulties, Paul assures the Corinthians (10.13). His truth and faithfulness provide assurance of the confirmation of these promises (2 Cor. 1.18), and even though the people Israel have time and again broken his trust, this never calls into question the faithfulness of God, Paul assures (Rom. 3.3). In the immediate context of 2 Cor. 1.18, in addition to the confirmation of the promises (v. 20) as an aspect of God’s pi/stiv, Paul refers in the opening of the letter to the compassion and comforting of God (o( path_r tw=v oi)ktirmw=n kai_ qeo_v pa/shv paraklh/sewv, v. 3) in terminology strongly entrenched in the semantic web of the characteristics of God in the LXX and Hebrew Scriptures. In Romans the pi/stiv of God (3.3) is complemented by reference to the a)lh/qeia tou= qeou= (v. 7), again a term from the semantic web with which God is frequently described in the LXX and the Hebrew Scriptures. At the heart of this terminology lies the assurance of the reliability of God in his relation to his people despite their ambivalent trust and wavering. It is the loyalty and faithfulness of God that is core to this relationship, not the agency of humans. God’s faithfulness, his e1leov and a)lh/qeia, his dikaiosu/nh and 102 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 166–72. 103 On this see especially Campbell 2012b. Also Nanos 1996: 184–85; Zetterholm 2010: 254; Fredriksen 2005; Eisenbaum 2009: 171, 197–207.

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xa/riv, call for a response by those whom he calls into a relationship with him. Like the people Israel before them and now also with them (‘not from the Jews only but also from the nations’, Rom. 9.24), the nations are now called through Christ without preconditions to hear and respond to God’s loyalty, steadfast love, faithfulness, truth, mercy and compassion with exactly the same attitudes towards others in their difference and uniqueness. They are called to hear and respond in trust, that is, to ‘be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God’ (Rom. 12.2b).104 This includes not only love for brothers and sisters in the community but extends to hospitality towards strangers; and maintaining peace with neighbours should also be extended to ‘enemies’ (Rom. 12.13, 20). This is what u(pakoh_ pi/stewv implies. This is the response Paul sets out to evoke in Romans. It also asks that those ‘called from the nations’ maintain and are in solidarity with the Jews, another conquered people, whether they are part of the Christ-movement or not. God’s faithfulness includes his patience and endurance in the face of breaches of trust on the part of those called, in the face of sin. Paul and other Christ-followers saw this faithfulness confirmed and the covenant promises renewed in the Christ-event. Part of this confirmation included the calling of people from the nations to follow ‘in the ways of the God of Israel’. The life, death and resurrection of Christ as embedded in and interpreted from within the Jewish scriptural tradition provide the relevant guidance as ‘they were written for our instruction’ (1 Cor. 10.11b); the Scriptures provide the template for the way of life for people from the nations also. Christ was the embodiment of this message, the one to imitate (1 Cor. 4.16; 11.1; Phil. 3.17; also Phil. 2.1-11).105 The bringing about of the u(pakoh_n pi/stewv e)n pa=sin toi=v e1qnhsin, to which Paul saw himself commissioned, included responding with action shaped according to the Scriptures and in relation to Christ crucified and resurrected as interpreted from within this tradition. It represented an alternative to the dominating imperial discourse and its claim to more or less total submission, in military terms, as well as economically and ideologically. Elliott has drawn attention to the resonance the Pauline discourse here has with the submission to the loyalty claims of the empire requested from the conquered nations.106 The empire requested loyal obedience to its ‘legitimate and divinely sanctioned’ rule and it can hardly be denied that this Roman discourse would have resonated in the hearts and minds of the addressees with what Paul was trying to transmit to them. 6.6.3 Pi/stiv and Roman Fides The strong Jewish tradition of expressing their relationship with God in pi/stiv and parallel terminology quite likely resonated for the addressees with the Greek concept of pi/stiv, and the core Roman concept of fides in particular. 104 Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 155–78. 105 On imitation see Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 137–54. Also Brawley 2010. 106 Elliott 2008: 45–47, 51–52.

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To be considered trustworthy and faithful was of course not a prerogative only of Jewish tradition. The significance of this was recently highlighted by Neil Elliott in the Arrogance of Nations and more extensively by Christian Strecker in ‘Fides – Pistis – Glaube: Kontexte und Konturen einer Theologie der “Annahme” bei Paulus’.107 I will focus here on the Roman discourse of fides as opinions concerning whether the Greek understanding of pi/stiv differed from the Roman concept of fides vary significantly. Given the prominence and geographical extent of the Roman concept by the first century, it is possible that the Greek term had attracted aspects of the Roman understanding, especially in relation to the conquered nations.108 This does not rule out that in specific cases and contexts misunderstandings could occur, as the example of the Aetiolians’ surrender in fidem mentioned above demonstrates.109 Although it has been noted that it is difficult to arrive at a precise semantic definition of the notion of fides, there seems to be a broad consensus that it has something to do with relationships and commitment in relationships. Whether it was merely a more or less ‘neutral’ term that denoted something like firmness or guarantee in a context of exchange, or whether it ‘originally’ included a virtue is not of decisive importance here. The core aspect of commitment, trust, trustworthiness in human relations as well as with regard to deities seems confirmed.110 The importance and familiarity of pi/stiv/fides in both Greek and Roman society certainly resonated with the addressees of Paul’s letters. It was regarded as a core aspect in the public realm – something that was required in dealings between people. In fact it became such an important dimension that the core ‘sin’ of the Carthagians was seen to be their lack of fides. Punic perfidy became a firm notion some time after the Punic wars.111 Fides was central to Roman life and ideology. Ideally, commitments among Romans as well as between Romans and other nations, and between humans and the gods were characterized by fides. It was central to the political and social system of law and order, and was at the heart of the Roman value system.112 As Liebschütz noted: ‘The virtue of Fides had always been held in 107 Strecker 2005. 108 For further discussion cf. Strecker 2005: 238–39. Gruen maintains that ‘The Greeks did not need Rome to explain such matters to them. Paternalistic pronouncements, protection of the lesser powers by the greater, expression of mutual loyalty … none of this was foreign to the Hellenistic world’ (1984: 175). 109 Cf. above chapter 4; also Dmitriev makes a strong case for significant differences in the understanding of pistis and fides. ‘The mere use of the words pistis and fides in the same or similar situations ... does not allow us to hold the meanings of these words identical, nor can we postulate that the Greeks and the Romans treated those who willingly surrendered to their mercy similarly’ (2011: 241), and further ‘Because surrendering to Roman fides offered no guarantees to the dedictii but only established Roman potestas over them, the Aetiolians correctly described their prospective new position as “slavery”, since to be in ones’s potestas was to be non-free.’ He refers to Polyb. 20.9, 11–20; 10.8; Liv. 36.28.4, 38.1–2, 36.27.8 (Dmitriev: 2011: 266). 110 For a more detailed discussion of different positions see Strecker 2005: 232–33. 111 Gruen 2011: 132–37. 112 Pöschl 1980: 3; Strecker 2005: 229.

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very high esteem at Rome. Indeed it was, in a sense, the keystone of Roman morality.’113 The Romans were passionate about fides. Strecker even described it as an identity marker of Roman culture and domination.114 He refers to significant Roman writers who praise this virtue in the highest possible terms. Aulus Gellius praised the consistency with which the Romans adhered to fides in their dealings with other nations, but also in patron–client relations as well as in business matters: Restat, ut ei, quod de sectione partitioneque corporis inmanissimum esse tibi visum est, respondeam. Omnibus quidem virtutum generibus exercendis colendisque populus Romanus e parva origine ad tantae amplitudinis instar emicuit, sed omnium maxime atque praecipue fidem coluit sanctamque habuit tam privatim quam publice. (Noctes Atticae 20.1.39)115

Roman success and power are seen as based on fides. Polybius compared Greek and Roman management of office and concluded that: The consequence is that among the Greeks, apart from other things, members of the government, if they are entrusted with no more than a talent, though they have ten copyists and as many seals and twice as many witnesses, cannot keep their faith; whereas among the Romans those who, as magistrates and legates are dealing with large sums of money, maintain correct conduct just because they have pledged their faith by oath. Whereas elsewhere it is a rare thing to find a man who keeps his hands off public money, and whose record is clean in this respect, among the Romans one rarely comes across a man who has been detected in such conduct. (Historiography 6.56.13–15).116

The significance of fides was prominent during the Early Principate and Horaz.117 Vergil118 wrote praises which clearly served the purpose of hailing Augustus as the one who brought peace based on fides, whilst Livy’s historical work Ab urbe condita is permeated by the concept of fides.119 The significance 113 Liebschütz 1979: 175. 114 Strecker 2005: 230. 115 http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Gellius/20*.html, last accessed 27.1.13. 116 http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Polybius/6*.html, last accessed 27.1.13. 117 ‘Iam fides et pax et honos pudorque
priscus et neglecta redire virtus
audet adparetque beata pleno
copia cornu’, Carmen saeculare 57–60, http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/horace/ carmsaec.shtml, last accessed 27.1.13 (‘already Loyalty and Peace and Honor and Ancient Modesy and neglected Virtue have courage to come back, and blessed Plenty is seen with full horn’). 118 ‘Cana Fides, et Vesta, Remo cum fratre Quirinus,
iura dabunt; dirae ferro et compagibus artis
claudentur Belli portae’ (Aen. 1.291), http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/vergil/aen1.shtml, last accessed 27.1.13 (‘White haired Trust, and Vesta, Quirinus with his brother Remus will make the laws: the gates of War, grim with iron, and narrowed by bars, will be closed’). 119 Strecker 2005: 231.

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of the virtue is also evident in the fact that the temple of the goddess Fides was prominently placed on the Capitoline hill. She was depicted on coins, in a long dress and with attributes such as a cornucopia, fruit bowl and grain spike. Her right hand is always stretched out, an indication of her role as guarantor and protectress of oaths and agreements. Contracts between Rome and other nations or cities were placed in or near her temple. This and the placement of statues donated by cities such as Ephesus and Laodicaea to the temple indicate that Fides was the goddess of the inclusion of conquered nations into the Roman Empire. This is confirmed by a note of Valerius Maximus in the first half of the first century ce claiming that ‘posita uenerabile fidei numen dexteram suam, certissimum salutis humanae pignus, ostentat. quam semper in nostra ciuitate uiguisse et omnes gentes senserunt’ (‘now the venerable Fides stretches out her right hand, this most reliable pledge of human salvation. This has always been prominent/strong in our polity/community and is now felt by all the nations’).120 Elliott draws attention to the frequent reference of Augustus to amicitia and fides in the Res Gestae in the context of reports of conquest, claiming that subjugated peoples like the Gauls, Parthians and others had sought the amicitia of the populus Romanum. Augustus further boasts that a ‘Plurimaeque aliae gentes expertae sunt p. R. fidem me principe quibus antea cum populo Romano nullum extiterat legationum et amicitiae commercium’ (‘While I was the leading citizen very many other nations have experienced the good faith of the Roman people which had never previously exchanged embassies or had friendly relations with the Roman people’ [Res gestae] 32).121 Rome’s use of the concept of fides in relation to its dealings with conquered nations is revealing here. It was supposed to be the means of guaranteeing the rights of subjugated peoples (ius gentium) and to protect them. To surrender in fidem implied that those conquered were accepting Roman domination in exchange for protection from outside aggression. Although as a minimum such deditio in fidem was supposed to guarantee the protection of the life and freedom of the conquered, in reality it meant that those who surrendered were entirely at the mercy of the Roman conqueror. Far from establishing a bond of loyalty between equals it was established and maintained by violence and the continued threat of violence on the part of the imperial power. Protection was granted under the condition of a complete surrender under this power enforced by violence. It established a hierarchical relationship of domination and subjugation between strong and weak with total power in the hands of the conqueror. As Strecker has noted, despite the benevolent rhetoric of fides and amicitia, to surrender in fidem did not establish a bond (foedus) based on legal commitment but was clearly ‘outside the juridical realm’.122 The actual meaning of fides in the relationship between the empire and the 120 Mem. 6.6, http://thelatinlibrary.com/valmax6.html, last accessed 27.1.13. 121 http://www.the latinlibrary.com/resgestae.html#5, last accessed 27.1.13. Cf. the list of nations (gentes) Res gestae 5.26, 29, 30. 122 Strecker 2005: 236, quoting Gruen 1982: 54; also Josephus, Bell. 4.94–96.

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conquered nations is evident, for example, in the depiction of the goddess Fides on one side of a dinar from around 47 bce while the other side shows the brutal dragging of a member of a conquered nation by a Roman soldier. The inherent correlation between fides and brutal force and violence is revealing here.123 Elliott notes that the exercise of this highly praised virtue in this violent way was not considered problematic by the Roman elite, but rather that this was seen as the natural right of the populus Romanus based on their evident capacity to dominate (rule). Cicero maintained repeatedly that dominion was granted by nature to everything that is best, to the advantage of the weak: ‘Rome gained her dominion over all lands by defending allies; her imperium is not only just but natural, for superior peoples will govern their inferiors to the advantage of the latter’ (De. Rep. 3.35–37).124 Elliott, referring to Cicero, notes that: ‘both shame and fear were necessary to instil public decorum in two classes of people respectively: those who accepted proper standards of honor (and thus could feel and respond to shame) and the lower classes, who responded only to force and terror’.125 Such justification of domination by a small elite not only denied humanitas to lower classes within Roman society, but significantly also to the majority of the population of the conquered nations. Livy had noted that this did not find easy acceptance on the part of the non-elite of conquered nations, that is, the vast majority of the population.126 Elliott thus comments that: ‘Of necessity … Roman hegemony relied upon the judicious combination of persuasion (for the elite) and force (for everyone else).’127 The act of submission due to Roman force did not end with the establishment of pax et iustitia in a province. The exploitation of the subjugated was continuously enforced, not necessarily by violence but merely by threat of violence. Submission to such exploitation was described as the fides of such nations, whereas any attempt at resistance would have evoked the intervention of Roman force against such perfidia.128 Fides was not only important in the relation between Rome and conquered nations, it permeated all aspects of Roman society. The patronage system depended on fides in that the client was granted protection and certain favours by the patron and in turn owed the patron unconditional fides. Loyalty and trust in these relationships were neither an affair of mutuality nor merely voluntarily as most free non-elite people depended on patronage relationships as a matter of survival. The service the client was expected to render to his patron was a mere officium and did not establish any equality between them. 123 Cf. Strecker 2005: 237. 124 Cf. also Pro Flacco 1–16. 125 Elliott 2008: 32. 126 Ab urbe condita 37.3.15–17. 127 Elliott 2008: 32. 128 Cf. MacMullen’s discussion of Egyptian papyri which provide evidence of the ‘physical outrage … beatings, maulings, and murders’ which were used by Romans and their tax collectors to get out of ‘the provincial peasants all that could economically be extracted’ (1974: 10–11).

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The notion of in fidem was based on or established fundamental inequality, so that Polybius could maintain that for the Romans in fidem and in potestate esse were one and the same thing (Polyb. 20.9.12). Far from being a virtue that was understood as guaranteeing fairness or equality between those involved in the relationship, fides was a euphemism for domination and exploitation. It secured the dominating power of imperial Rome and enabled them to denounce any non-conformity to their conditions of rule as infidelity/perfidy, that is, insurrection that legitimized violent intervention on their part. Roman capacity to successfully establish and enforce ‘lawful’ order over conquered nations was seen to be confirmed by the deities. The success of their expansion of rule and control through military force and violence was viewed as being consented to by the gods – as confirmation by the deities of their right to dominate. Their rule was divinely ordained, as its success proved, thus expressing a circular rationale for violent Roman domination.

6.7 Pi/stiv, Fides and the Unity of the Nations The cultural encyclopedia resonating with the semantic web of fides could not differ more from that resonating with the Jewish semantic web of pi/stiv.129 When considered at the structural level, it might appear as if there were not much difference between them. As we have seen, they are both relational terms that focus on trust, trustworthiness and loyalty to which all involved are supposed to be committed. In some sense both also display a power asymmetry. If this were the whole story then the two encyclopedias would have significant overlap, and it might justifiably be said that Paul was replicating the imperial pattern of dominating power. I am not denying that there might be aspects that render such a reading of the Pauline discourse possible, and in subsequent centuries this is certainly how parts of his letters have been read: as contributing to the perpetuation of dominating and oppressive power structures, not in the name of Rome but in the name of a triumphalist, universalizing Christendom. However, in my view, a comparison at merely structural level is insufficient. With regard to both traditions involved, it seems essential to pay attention to and take seriously the contents of their respective wider cultural encyclopedias. These could not be more different. As I have demonstrated above, cultural encyclopedias do not travel easily between languages and traditions. There is no automatic imposition of an ‘official’, elite and dominant discourse on the traditions of subjugated peoples, as discussed above in relation to contemporary examples as well as the Jewish Greek discourse of ‘playing and not playing 129 Campbell notes that ‘The translation of a Semitic faith into the Hellenistic culture may have allowed the Romans to miss some of the content pi/stiv normally carried for those of Jewish background, familiar with the Septuagint’ (1995: 285).

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the game’. The Roman request for ‘obedience in fidem’ (u(pakohn_ pi/stewv) from the nations was based on violent conquest, economic exploitation and, in order to gain a minimum of respect from their conquerors, on assimilation to the Roman image of humanitas, that is, on becoming the same for members of the local elites. The Pauline call for u(pakohn_ pi/stewv from the nations could not have been more different: in terms of structure, there was no army or economic power that could have coerced those called into the relationship with the God of Israel through Christ; and in terms of content instead of a request to become the same there was the opposite. Those called from the nations were not to become like those who had been entrusted with ta_ lo/gia tou= qeou= (Rom. 3.2), i.e. the Jews. As a core dimension of the gospel, they were called as people from the nations in all their particularity and diversity. Only what was incompatible with a way of life that should be guided by Christ (not copied) had to be given up. Amongst these incompatibilities were loyalty to other deities (I will come back to this in chapter 7), disregard of the vulnerability of their brother (sister) and putting a ‘stumbling block in the way of another’ (Rom. 14.13; also 1 Cor. 8.9). There could be no room for dominating and often exploitative relationships like those between patrons and their clients, masters and slaves, men and women, Rome and the conquered nations. Not that there were no hierarchical, asymmetrical relationships in the Christmovement, but these had to orient themselves on the One in whom they trusted – God, in his mercy and faithfulness, his compassion and commitment; and on Christ crucified and his servants, who had been guiding the people Israel as was transmitted in their Scriptures.130 These leaders were vulnerable and not infallible, and Christ had died a horrific death at the hands of the imperial power but was vindicated by God. Vulnerability was not a cause for contempt but for compassion. Paul’s own leadership is formed in this tradition. For him to be a true mediator of the gospel he had to live it, to embody it. He was vulnerable himself: not a great rhetorician nor an impressive, manly man. There was no coercive power with which he could have dominated those called from the nations, but only the power of the example of his life, his guidance and his letters. The immediate reception of and response to his letters is unclear. Paul is firmly embedded in every aspect of his life and message in the narrative tradition of his people. This narrative encompasses a very different cultural encyclopedia from the encyclopedia of Rome. The Christevent is part of this tradition; it could only be made sense of in relation to this tradition. The frequent reference to ‘according to the Scriptures’ does not mean in the first instance to interpret the Scriptures in light of the Christ-event. It is the other way around: the life, death and resurrection of Christ must be interpreted with the help of the Scriptures. There is no other tradition, no other way by which the earliest disciples could have begun to understand; Luke’s narrative about the Road to Emmaus (Luke 24) very accurately summarizes 130 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 196–200.

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the process. Inherent to the idea of finding meaning in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the Greek Jewish tradition of resistance against any totalizing, dominating power and ideology. Only from within this already existing tradition could the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ begin to be understood. This is what Paul is trying to communicate to the people from the conquered nations. The message of the gospel invites them into a symbolic universe, which affirms that the totalizing, dominating ideological and political claims of the imperial power are not absolute and ultimate. This subjugating, violent power was not all there was, and this was not the only perception of the world – it was actually a distorted one, and the imperial claims of divine empowerment were flawed. One did not have to adopt the Roman ideal of humanitas to be respected and cherished in one’s integrity. In this symbolic universe the diversity of peoples was cherished, their integrity as human beings reflected in mutual respect for each other’s difference. The unity of conquered nations, so feared by Rome, was celebrated in Christ, not by coercive force or assimilation to sameness but by liberation from the crippling power of sin, which prevented people and nations from seeing each other as part of the human family, created by God in diversity. Pi/stiv, with all it encompassed in the Jewish social and symbolic universe, was the bonding response to the call of God through Christ, not Roman fides. As I said at the beginning of this chapter, this had implications for more than the perception of the world. All aspects of everyday life were affected by this reorientation of life in Christ. Thus practice was evidently affected, and although Christ-followers from the nations were not supposed to adopt practices pertaining to Jewish identity, issues such as their loyalty to deities through cultic practice were a matter of concern. It is to such aspects that we will turn in the following chapter.

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Chapter 7 Identity Formation by Doing: Cult Practice and the Translatability of Rituals People from the nations prior to joining the Christ-movement would have been embedded in meaning-generating narrative discourses at diverse levels and in diverse contexts. Even if some of them had previously had some affiliation with Judaism, joining the Christ-movement involved a substantial reorientation and learning process on their part, as we have seen in the previous chapter.1 It was a learning process not only and possibly not even primarily at ‘intellectual’ level, but one which included the practice of everyday life. This included social relations, meal traditions, gender relations, trade and production, etc. All of these aspects had identity-shaping dimensions and were related in various ways to the realm of the gods. In conjunction with respective identityshaping narratives, ‘Greeks and barbarians’ were embedded in particular ways of relating to divine powers, which for them guaranteed life and well-being at all levels. Gods were the source of life, through the growth of crops, of young animals, and the granting of children. They were everywhere, and impinged on all activities of everyday life. The gods were the major players, and the nations had their specific longstanding relations with them. But there were other kinds of beings between heaven and earth, not human and not quite divine: spirits, demons, restless dead, angels, ancestors, nymphs and satyrs. The issue with all of these co-inhabitants of the world was not whether or not they existed, but that one could not know when and how they would act, what they wished and how they ‘felt’.2 The people of the nations would have known the divine world not only through narratives but also, more importantly, would have related to it on an everyday basis through cult practice, that is, the performance of rituals through which deities were honoured, given what they were due, praised, consulted concerning particular events, asked for favour or protection and blessing in childbirth, travelling, illness, before important decisions, etc. Entrenched in the ‘habitus’ of ‘Greeks and barbarians’ was the perception that each and every aspect of life required the appropriate relationship, at the right time in the right place, that is, respective cult practices to specific deities. Although not being the only means to relate to deities, and not the only 1 Cf. also Campbell 2012b; Fowl 2007; Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 117–36. 2 Stowers 2011: 39–40.

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rituals performed, the particular rituals of sacrifice played a central role in much of everyday life and were the core means of maintaining and nurturing the relationship between humans and deities.3 Those addressed in the Pauline correspondence certainly were embedded in Roman and Greek official cult practices in the first instance but more localized and domestic cults would also have played highly important roles. Their ‘habitus’ was formed by and contributed to forming this all-permeating practice, whatever the particular narrative that provided its framework. The transformation of the ‘habitus’ of Christ-followers from the nations not only at the narrative level, in terms of their meaning-generating symbolic universe, but also at the practical level, with regard to cult and associated rituals, required a learning process of challenging magnitude. In order for this transformation process to be successful it must have involved a cultural translation process at the practical level that related to aspects of the existing ‘habitus’ of Christ-followers from the nations in order to make sense for them. Language related to cult and ritual would have been well understood by Jews and by people from the nations since it was an all-permeating aspect of life for all of them.4 It was all-pervasive in the public realm through the presence of temple buildings and sacred shrines, statues and festivals; Jews as much as people from the nations would have been familiar with this ‘world’, although their stance toward it would have been different. For Jews the actual performance of rituals of sacrifice was limited to the Temple in Jerusalem. This meant that for Diaspora Jews participation in sacrifice rituals was rare and exceptional. Nevertheless, it was a dimension which even they would have taken for granted as a practice that was evidently part of their own tradition. Cult practice through ritual was a ‘common language’ in the Roman Empire and beyond.5 The fact that Paul uses cultic language relatively frequently, as recent studies have demonstrated, should therefore not come as a surprise.6 Metaphorical use of cult language is attested in the LXX as well as in Greek and Roman literature, and so Paul could certainly expect that his addressees would have some understanding of his references and allusions to cult. The two dimensions of cult practice and cult metaphor are not mutually exclusive but inherently related, and the metaphorical use of cult terminology is only possible in relation to its actual practice, not to mention its positive appreciation.7 Paul’s use of metaphorical cult language should be seen in this tradition: in order for these metaphors to have any positive meaning for the addressees – i.e. that they are klh/toi a3gioi 3 Kurek-Chomycz 2011: 131; Eberhardt 2011: 32. 4 Vahrenhorst, in his excellent study on cult language, notes that: ‘Wenn Paulus sich dieser Begrifflichkeit bedient, dann begibt er sich damit auf eine Ebene, auf der auch seine nichtjüdischen Adressaten ihn unmittelbar verstehen können’ (2008: 8). 5 Cf. e.g. DeMaris 2008: 37–56. 6 E.g. Vahrenhorst 2008; Hogeterp 2006. 7 As is evident in Philo e.g. Spec. Leg. 2.148; De Prov. 2.64. Cf. Vahrenhorst 2008: 54–56.

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(Rom. 1.7), that they have been kaqari/zein, and thus are now h9giasme/noi, that they should give themselves as a qusi/an zw=san (Rom. 12.1), and that they are compared to the nao_v qeou= zw=ntov (2 Cor. 6.16) – a positive relationship to this world is a requirement.8 The terminology and practice touch on both Jewish and non-Jewish social and symbolic universes, and as such offer themselves as a means to ‘translate’ the message of the gospel from the Jewish symbolic universe to those of ‘Greeks and barbarians’.9 Vahrenhorst argues that although Paul thinks and writes entirely from within a Jewish ‘world’, he also relates to the non-Jewish world of cult practice, thereby enabling direct understanding without the mediation of Jewish scriptural tradition.10 Whether this perception is actually feasible is questionable in my view. Even where the cult terminology of Jews, ‘Greeks and barbarians’ is identical, the associated codes and encyclopedias might be worlds apart. The fact that the LXX translators chose the specific word a3giov to denote holiness and avoided i(ero_n when referring to the Jerusalem Temple indicates a difference here despite the obvious fact that holiness was also a key concept in the non-Jewish world.11 Issues of purity, far from being a Jewish peculiarity, would also not have been foreign to Greeks and barbarians in that approaching any sanctuary or performing rituals related to the divine realm required purification through various kinds of ritual.12 What Paul’s audiences would associate with such metaphors is another question. But in this chapter I am not concerned with Paul’s metaphorical use of cultic language per se but with some aspects of actual cult practice addressed by Paul. Similar to metaphorical language, the realm of cult practice as such would have been familiar to all of those involved in the conversation. However, this may not have guaranteed mutual understanding, as an analysis of particular passages in the Corinthian correspondence, which address problems arising from issues of cult practice within the Christ-following communities, will demonstrate. Cultic practice involves rituals; hence what Klingbeil notes with regard to rituals generally applies to cultic practice as well: ‘The interaction dimension of ritual is deeply rooted in the social interaction of individuals and groups within the context of acquired social behaviour … ritual activity constitutes a learned activity that is transmitted by processes of socialisation in a particular cultural context.’13 Attention has also been drawn to the fact that gestures, ritual and given practices do not have any inherent meaning in and of themselves. They do not speak for themselves but only as embedded in 8 Contra a long tradition in Christian interpretation which considered Paul’s metaphors as implying a spiritualization of cult practices and as evidence for a critical stance against cult per se. Cf. discussion in Vahrenhorst 2008: 10–11. Also Stegemann 2000: 191–216. 9 Klawans 2000 and 2006; Bendlin 2007; Parker 1983. 10 Vahrenhorst 2008: 338. 11 Cf. Rajak 2009: 165–66; Schwartz 2000; Harrington 2001: 15; Vahrenhorst 2008: 81–86. 12 Cf. Ehrensperger 2010: 93–97; also Cohen 2008: 77; Klawans 2006: 56–60; Fredriksen 2005: 205; Eisenbaum 2009: 153–67. 13 Klingbeil 2007: 209.

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and interpreted through particular given cultural contexts. Gane cautions that this should keep us from ‘unjustifiably importing meaning from one context to another because we incorrectly assume that the function of identical actions must be the same’.14 This is precisely what seems to have caused the problems Paul addresses in 1 Corinthians 8–10. The familiarity of Christ-followers from the nations with the language and practice of cult may have led to the assumption of an easy and direct transfer of meaning from their social and symbolic universe into the realm of Christ.15

7.1. Cult Practice – Pietas/Piety in Action In a world which was populated not only by humans but also by an infinite number of deities and spiritual beings (Cicero, Leg. 2.26),16 and to relate to these in the appropriate ways was a core aspect of everyday life as well as of special days and festivals, Greek, Roman and other cult practices were considered vital for the well-being of all aspects of life, at individual as well as at community/po/liv level, and for the empire as a whole. The pax Romana and the pax deorum were considered inseparable, as noted above. Both Greeks and Romans attributed the highest significance to their own piety (e)use/beia or pietas) and attributed success in the expansion of their territories and, in the case of the Roman Empire in subjugating other peoples, to their being favoured by the gods because of their piety.17 Piety was not expressed primarily in doctrine or belief but in practice, i.e. ritual. Relationship with the gods in thanksgiving, petition, vows and oaths took place through physical action and accompanying prayers and hymns. This was a dimension shared across cultures and nations, though the deities involved, the actual practices, their performance and their interpretation were clearly differentiated by the

14 Cf. Gane 2005: 5. Cf. also Smith who notes that ‘Jewish translatability enjoyed relatively little currency especially in Judea … there are no clear cases of cultic or even literary translatability’ (2008: 305). Cf. also chapter 6 above. 15 Some problems in Galatia seem also related to this realm (Gal. 4.8-10). 16 Cf. also Petronius: ‘Vtique nostra regio tam praesentibus plena est numinibus, ut facilius possis deum quam hominem invenire’ (Sat. 17.5). Jewish perceptions were similar. Cf. Philo, Plant. 14: ‘In the air, he made the winged animals capable of being perceived by the external senses, and other powers which can by no means be comprehended in any place by the external senses; and this is the company of incorporeal souls arranged in order, but not in the same classifications. For it is said that some are assigned to mortal bodies, and are again subjected to a change of place according to certain defined periodical revolutions; but that others which have received a more divinely prepared habitation, look down upon the region of the earth, and that in the highest place, near the other itself, the purest souls are placed, which those who have studied philosophy among the Greeks call heroes, but which Moses, by a felicitous appellation, entitles angels; souls which go as ambassadors and messengers of good from the ruler of all things to his subjects, and messengers also to the king respecting those things of which his subjects have heard.’ 17 See 4.3.1 above.

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ancients.18 In his discussion of the details of sacrifices in Palmyra, their similarities and differences from Greek and Roman practices, Kaizer notes that: ‘Not just the cultural background and “origin” of the rituals involved is what matters, but more so their place and functioning in the society from which our evidence comes.’19 Cults retained their particular local characteristics but with the Roman presence in subjugated regions there emerged a need both to get to know the respective local deities and to work out how Roman deities had to be honoured away from Rome. This did not so much lead to a practice of ‘translating the gods’ or, from a Roman perspective, to an interpretatio Romana; the issue at stake was rather one of naming. One needed to know with whom one was dealing in a particular place. By invoking the name of a deity its superiority and power were acknowledged.20 Ando refers to Cicero, who discusses the problem of the need to render barbarian cults ‘intelligible to the educated elite of the Mediterranean basin’; this was done by ‘eliding problems of cultural and theological difference altogether’ (46). Cicero asks: Do you really think that the gods are everywhere called by the same name by which they are addressed by us? But the gods have as many names as there are languages among humans. For it is not with gods as with you: you are Velleius wherever you go, but Vulcan is not Vulcan in Italy and in Africa and in Spain. (Nat. deor. 1.83–84)

Ando notes: ‘The problem of identification thus lies not with language per se, but in recognizing and theorizing the identity of gods across landscapes and linguistic and iconographic traditions.’21 The solution to this problem was neither straightforward nor easy and certainly did not imply, as so often assumed, an identification of diverse deities from different cultures or different peoples.22 It was necessary to ‘address the very god in a position to provide aid’, that is, one needed to know which god to address and by which name they needed to be called. This was particularly difficult in foreign lands. As a result, the Romans tended to ‘worship the gods of those lands by the names they held there, or even by such generic titles as genius or praesides huius loci’.23 After careful investigation they might consider the deity of a province to be the ‘incarnation’ of a Roman god; thus a certain ‘Romanization’ might take place under certain conditions. Whether this actually led to the fusion of a provincial with a Roman deity is doubtful. On the one hand, the Romans were careful to indicate that this was the localized presence of the Roman god; on the other, it remains an open question whether the local population would have worshipped a deity in the Roman form or continued to worship it as their 18 Cf. the example of DDS referred to above 4.3.2. 19 Kaizer 2008: 19. 20 Belayche 2007: 280. 21 Ando 2008: 44. 22 Ando 2008: 43–58. 23 Ando 2008: 56.

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native god.24 A good example of the complicated issues of getting to know a deity is presented by Tacitus, who contemplates the origins of Serapis as follows: ‘deum ipsum multi Aesculapium, quod medeatur aegris corporibus, quidam Osirin, antiquissimum illis gentibus numen, plerique Iovem ut rerum omnium potentem, plurimi Ditem patrem insignibus quae in ipso manifesta au per ambages coniectat’ (‘Many identify the god himself with Aesculapius, because he heals the sick; some with Osiris, a very ancient divinity of those peoples; many again identify him with Jupiter, for his power over all things; but most identify him with Dispater, from the emblems that are manifest in him or through arcane reasoning’ [Hist. 4.84.5]). The identification and naming of deities in different cultures was a difficult endeavour, and the process was uncertain as there were no absolute indicators as to what would enable certain differentiation of one deity from another by appearance or power. Gods did not translate easily and did not usually cross cultures in different guises. They did not fuse into new ‘hybrid’ deities. Certainly, this is not how the ancients perceived the gods. The difficulty of getting to know the identity and name of a deity significantly complicated the issue of the pietas/eu)sebei/a owed to the gods. 7.1.1 ‘Holding the world together’: aspects of Roman cult and domination My focus here will be mainly on Roman cult practice rather than on the diversity of cults all over the empire. This is justified by the fact that Paul’s letters are all addressed to e0kklhsi/ai in Greek cities which are either Roman colonies (Thessaloniki, Corinth, Philippi) and have a strong Roman presence (Galatia), or to Rome. Since Roman colonies were designed as replicas of Rome, all official aspects of these communities were Roman, with Latin being the official language and cult institutions mirroring those of Rome.25 The rhythm of life was dictated by the official Roman calendar with its respective festivals, as is indicated by copies of Roman calendars that have been found in cities near Rome from the time of Augustus and Tiberius and, although from a later period, in Dura Europos.26 Even Corinth, a city with a rich history and tradition prior to its eradication by Rome, from its re-foundation as a Roman colony in 44 bce was organized and dominated by Roman patterns of life in every aspect. Material finds from the Roman forum in Corinth indicate that: ‘the cults in the forum are nearly all closely tied to the Roman state. Therefore, we can assume that ceremonies and sacrifices pertaining to the state cults were performed at the same time and in the same way as in Rome.’27 Evidence of the cults of Fortuna, Neptune, Clarion Apollo, Venus, Mercury, Diana and Bacchus has been found. The imperial cult seems to have been present in the city already during the first century ce. As a Roman colony the rhythm of life in Corinth clearly followed the Roman calendar in all aspects of its official 24 For a ‘Greek’ version of such a process see the example of Hera and Zeus at Hierapolis discussed above, chapter 4, n. 103. 25 Bookidis 2005: 157. Cf. also Beard et al. 1998: 315, 329; also Hingley 2005: 57. 26 Beard et al. 1998: 322, 35. 27 Bookidis 2005: 152.

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structure.28 Cult rituals were performed in the Roman manner in the official temples, organized and supervised by the ordo decurionum, the city council.29 Valerius Maximus (during the reign of Tiberius, 14–37 ce) described Roman cult practices as follows: ‘Our ancestors desired that fixed and formal annual ceremonies be regulated by the knowledge of the pontifices; that sanction of the good governance of affairs be marshalled by the observation of augurs; that Apollo’s prophecies be revealed by the books of the seers’ (1.1a–b).30 Thus Roman cults would have played a significant role in the coloniae of Corinth, Philippi and Thessaloniki, although of course Greek cults, and in Galatia local cults most likely continued to be practised alongside them.31 Diversity in cultic practice continued in the provinces as the Romans did not suppress local cults and traditions generally; the exception would be if they were considered to be the focus of resistance to Roman domination. They were considered relevant for the well-being of the empire as long as they were performed in acknowledgement of Roman rule. Rome thus inscribed itself into the local tradition and rendered it an instrument of power assertion. Supervision of cultic practice increased, with the requirement that ‘all people attached to sanctuaries had to be registered from 4 bc onwards; from the mid first century ad onwards temple property and dues owed to the state by the temples also had to be recorded’.32 This meant that Roman ‘tolerance’ was entirely dependent on submission to Roman domination.33 Roman financial support for the restoration of a Greek temple, for instance, meant that although it was recognized as Greek the temple’s cult practice was integrated into the system of Roman domination. Diversity was acknowledged but only on Roman conditions. The practice of Roman cults meant that Roman gods or gods with Roman names were present everywhere in the empire. Their presence being the presence of the cult of the city of Rome and of the empire clearly directed the focus to the very centre of the empire.34 Concern for the well-being of the empire and concern for the well-being of the gods became two sides of the same coin. With pietas being declared the hallmark virtue of the Roman Empire under Augustus, the visual representation of piety, particularly of the piety/ pietas of the princeps took centre stage in Rome as well as in the provinces. 28 Bookidis 2005: 157. 29 Woolf 1997: 224–25. 30 Similarly Cicero Nat. deor. 3.5: ‘The entirety of the religio of the Roman people is divided into rites and auspices, to which is added a third thing, namely whatever warnings the interpreters of the Sibylline books or haruspices issue for the sake of foreknowledge on the basis of portents and omens.’ 31 For the significance of local cults for the identity of conquered nations as a limited sphere of autonomy see Kelly 2011; also Beard et al. maintain that ‘religion and culture may always work against imperialist power, in reasserting the distinctiveness of native traditions against the forces (whether military or cultural) of occupation’ (1998: 314). 32 Beard et al. 1998: 340. 33 Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 9. 34 Beard et al. 1998: 314.

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In his role as pontifex maximus Augustus embodied Roman pietas. Although there was no active marginalization of other Roman or local cults, the image of the emperor as ‘supreme actor at sacrifice’ contributed to elevating the cult of the city of Rome to the status of cult of the Roman Empire. The eventual worshipping of the emperors or of their genius was only an additional step in a process that had long been under way. The ideal of pietas permeated not only the public stage but all aspects of life. Augustus’ emphasis on and re-ordering of family life was an expression of pietas manifesting itself in appropriate family relations and domestic cult practice, thereby designating the domus/oi1kov as the essential social and cultic unit to sustain the empire. Family and household-related cults of lares, penates and genius framed every aspect of everyday life and provided orientation and meaning at all levels of society.35 Small neighbourhood shrines, shrines at crossroads and fountains, and altars at the entrance of houses were scattered throughout every ancient city/po/liv. House shrines were an important expression of this, and were found not only at the hearth. Thus cult practice, whether in the official Roman form, in the less official form of Greek and other cults or more ‘privately’ expressed, permeated all aspects of life. It was impossible to imagine life without continuous interaction between humans and gods. Any activity, public or private, had to be preceded by a cultic ritual in order to ensure that one was acting according to the will of the deity concerned, had their blessing and did not offend them through lack of thanksgiving. One had to take care to give the gods their due wherever one was: in the house, in boroughs or associations, in cities or in the country, at sea, in military camps or in cemeteries.36 Such common everyday cultic acts were not always spectacular. Belayche notes a law from 392 ce which lists forbidden cultic practices, among them: ‘to venerate his lar with fire, his genius with wine, his Penates with fragrant odors; he shall not burn light to them, place incense before them, or suspend wreaths for them’.37 The all-important necessity of caring for the gods is also evident in Cicero’s characterization of a private house as the place which encompasses ‘his altars, his hearths, his household gods, his religion, his observances, his rituals’ (Cic. De domo sua 109). It was a comprehensive system, or system of systems, which claimed to encompass everyone in the Roman Empire, and was intended to create a cohesive bond between gods, emperor, the elite and ordinary people. The focus on the emperor, and eventually the imperial cult, was the key to unification, and in fact the only cultic practice that spanned the entire empire. The emperor embodied the hegemonic claims of his empire; he was the ‘incarnation’ of the all-encompassing system that held ‘the world’ together. It was a system that had to be enacted by ‘the doing of the right thing’, that is, pleasing the gods by giving them what they were due and acting according to their guidance. Keeping ‘the world’ stable and in order was a very serious business and 35 Cf. Foss 1997; Stowers 2011a: 111. 36 Belayche 2007: 279. 37 Quoted in Belayche 2007: 275.

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required knowledge, the scientia colendorum deorum (Cic. Nat. deor. 1.115–16). This knowledge could only be acquired by precise observation of which cultic acts had been most successful, and this in turn required them to be replicated with precision. Pietas consisted in the precise and exact replication of successful cult practice as the means of pleasing the gods. Appeasement seems to have been the core aim of public cult according to Cicero: ‘I have persuaded myself that Romulus and Numa laid the foundation of our state by establishing the auspices and rites respectively, and that our state could never have become so great without the greatest appeasement of the immortal gods’ (Nat. deor. 3.5). 7.1.2 The role of sacrifices Sacrifices played a significant part in cult practice but were of course not the only way to relate to the divine realm. As noted above, prayers were as important as sacrifices in that no cult practice, including sacrifice, would have been performed without prayers. Pliny the Elder was of the view that ‘a sacrifice without prayer is thought to be useless and not a proper consultation with the gods’ (Nat. 28.10). Just as sacrifices had to be performed in the correct way prayers had to be said in a specific format in order to be effective.38 Sacrifice was the exemplary form of Roman pietas, underwriting ‘all the traditional values of Roman society’,39 but it had to be accompanied by prayer in order for the divine recipients as well as the human participants to understand what was happening.40 Although animal sacrifices were important, there were many other types of sacrifice such as vegetarian offerings in the shape of wheat or barley cakes, libations of wine, burning incense and offering wreaths, either on their own or in combination with one another or the offering of an animal. Significant for our purpose is the view that ‘Roman sacrifice was to the ancient eyes, first and foremost a banquet’.41 Whether it included eating with the gods is a controversial point of discussion, but it is important to note here that the term ‘sacrifice’ does not refer to the act of killing an animal designated for this particular purpose. In fact, the act of killing does not feature particularly highly in ancient descriptions of sacrifice. Significantly, there is no word either in Greek or Latin for what in English is referred to as the victim. The terms used for sacrifice, qu/siv and qu/ein, mean to ‘make smoke’, and ‘sacer facere’ means ‘to render sacred’; they do not refer to killing or slaughter. Sacrifice consisted in a range of ritual activities which included purification, public procession including dance and music, the dedication of an animal and/or frugal substances, the killing or, significantly, the offering of the ‘material’ to the deity through burning their share (the exta, the noble parts, i.e. the vitalia – vital organs), and thereby transmitting it to 38 Rüpke 2007 refers to an incident reported by Livy (41.16.1) where a magistrate forgot to mention the people of Rome at an annual festival whereupon the ceremony had to be repeated. There seems to be a slight similarity to the need for President Obama to repeat his oath of office after the public inauguration ceremony in 2009. 39 Rüpke 2007: 137. 40 Rüpke 2007: 247. 41 Scheid 2007: 270.

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them via smoke, followed by the ‘releasing’ of the ‘sacred meat’ through a ritual of touching, thus rendering it profana, that is, fit for consumption by the cult participants.42 Stowers has noted that: ‘members of sacrificing cultures view the slaughter of the animal only as an unremarkable necessary prelude to what is important about the sacrifice. Greeks seem to have thought that the meaning of communion sacrifice was primarily in the distribution, cooking (including the god’s portion), and eating of meat.’43 Thus sacrifices have nothing to do with ‘domesticated violence’ or ‘the legitimation of killing through ritualization … They are food offerings to the gods, pure and simple.’44 Whilst it seems uncontested that for ancients meat was a rare addition to their diet and mostly restricted to participation in public meals in sacrificial contexts or through sacrificial meat bought in the marketplace, there are diverse views as to whether the common meal is actually the focus of the cult ritual and whether or not the gods were actual participants in the meal, i.e. whether they shared the table with humans or not. It has been argued that the key focus of the entire sacrificial ritual including the offering of the deity’s share, and the distribution and consumption of the meat among the participants, was the acknowledgement of the superiority of the deities and submission to them, rather than the establishing of community among the participants. The latter is then a side aspect but not the focus of the sacrifice. Whether or not the meal shared between gods and humans was the centre of the sacrifice or not, sacrifices were considered to open up channels of communication between humans and the deity; they were moments of close contact between two worlds. In the case of an animal sacrifice, the animal acted as the mediator between these worlds.45 It has recently been doubted that the meat released by the deity for human consumption was distributed to a large number of people in a mass feeding at which people of all classes would participate. If entire communities could not be fed because no one sacrifice would generate sufficient meat, then participation in the meal may have been confined to the few ‘elect’: priests or priests and magistrates, that is, the elite. The sacrificial meal would then have had an exclusive rather than an inclusive function, with meat consumption in this context being an elitist affair that reproduced social hierarchy rather than solidarity among the worshippers. Scheid asserts: ‘every time one slaughtered, drank or harvested, the hierarchy of being was performatively commemorated by giving the gods the first place, signifying the inferiority of mortals’.46 Worshippers and gods communicated regard for each other – the 42 Rüpke 2007: 144; Eberhardt 2011: 29–30; also Scheid 2007: 267. 43 Stowers 1995: 297. 44 Parker 2011: 135. This insight marks a significant shift in the perception of sacrifice in numerous recent publications which depart from the long-held view in the wake of Meuli and Girard that sacrifice was a ritual act of killing, and domesticated violence, and involved guilt on the part of humans, or the necessary destruction of the victim in the process of enabling communication between the sacred and the profane (Mauss, Hubert). Cf. Knust and Varhelyi 2011: 7–9. 45 Parker 2011: 133. 46 Scheid 2012: II.4.

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worshippers through offering, the gods through accepting the offering – but all in the appropriate hierarchical order as was due to the gods. The hierarchy was replicated, particularly in the context of Roman sacrifices, by maintaining the social hierarchy among the human participants that the Romans also otherwise were so keen to cement. Concerning the joint participation of gods and humans in the sacrificial meal, Rüpke is of the view that in Roman cult practice, unlike in Greek perception, the gods did not share the table with humans but held separate banquets as difference in status would require.47 Scheid, on the other hand, argues that any food distribution in Roman perspective included the sharing of food with the gods because: ‘manger était, à Rome, une activité éminemment religieuse’.48 If a difference between Greek and Roman views existed in this respect, it seems from Paul’s discussion with the Corinthians about sacrificial meat that he was of the view that ‘demons’ were somehow involved in the table shared on these occasions. The other question which has been discussed controversially in recent scholarship – who actually participated in a ‘temple meal’ – is also interesting when we consider the Corinthian debate; meat eating at the temple might then have a socially divisive impact on the e)kklhsi/a, an issue Paul challenges explicitly in 1 Corinthians 11 with regard to the Lord’s supper. I will come back to this aspect below. In addition to the general significance of cult practice and that of sacrifice in particular, a key function of public sacrifices, certainly from the Early Principate onwards, was to secure the well-being of the empire (and its embodiment the emperor). Failing to participate in this ‘order of the world’ and its maintenance was not merely considered anti-social, but viewed as an actual threat to the very existence of ‘this world’ by exposing it to the risk of chaos.49 This is precisely what the Jews were seen to be doing in the eyes of many of their neighbours. Although there was an agreement between them and the empire to offer a twicedaily sacrifice for the well-being of the emperor in the Temple in Jerusalem, their refusal to participate otherwise in what all human beings normally did and were expected to do was considered an expression of their hatred of humankind, of their a)se/beia, irrational and offensive because in Seneca’s assessment ‘it was the religion of a defeated people’.50 Whilst this refusal to participate in ‘normal’ human practice was considered odd, Josephus’ account that the cessation of the sacrifices for the emperor actually instigated Roman intervention at the outset of the Jewish War is quite conceivable, as such an act would not only have broken the agreement with Rome, and thus be seen as an act of rebellion, but would also have been perceived as a threat to the ‘order of this world’ (Bell. 2.409, 197; Cont. Ap. 2.77). It is worth nothing that Paul never actually uses eu)se/beia, the Greek equivalent of pietas, in a positive sense in his letters. Given the prominence of this concept in the first century this may have been more 47 Rüpke 2005: 234; 2007a: 143–44. 48 Scheid 2005: 286. 49 Beard et al. 1998: 361. 50 Elliott 2008: 135.

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than just casual omission. It may have been the conscious act of distancing the e)kklhsi/ai from exactly this highly valued Roman virtue, including its sacrificial maintenance and all its implications, and replacing it with the discourse of pi/stiv discussed above.51

7.2 The Role of Cult and Diaspora Judaism For non-Jews cultic practice, in order to maintain the pax deorum and the pax Romana and to promote well-being in every aspect of life, was part of their everyday existence and ingrained in them as their ‘habitus’. For Jews, in contrast, decisive cultic practice, sacrifice and other major communal rituals were performed exclusively at the Temple in Jerusalem. For Jews of the Diaspora these rituals were performed at a place a significant distance from where they lived. This did not render this practice less important, as Philo’s and Paul’s high esteem for the Temple and practice related to it clearly demonstrates. Philo refers to the importance of the practice of sacrifice, and describes it as an expression of human aspiration to relate to the Divine, to seek blessings and to compensate for failures of virtue. He emphasizes that sacrifices are a medium of prayer and thanksgiving for the sole purpose of rendering honour to God exclusively for his own sake, and to obtain blessing from him (Spec. Leg. 1.195). Moreover, he asserts that there is one factor that unites all Jews, whatever they call their fatherland: ‘they hold the Holy City where stands the sacred Temple of the most high God to be their mother city’ (Flacc. 46). There can be no doubt that the Temple was the centre of Judaism, ‘whether as a divisive or unifying symbol of God’s continual covenantal relation to Israel … whether as a contested reality or romanticized ideal, or as a complex intersection of the two, the Jerusalem Temple stood at the center of Jewish national, ethnic, and religious self-understanding’.52 In and with this central appreciation, the geographical distance to their Temple meant that the practice of cult in every day life had a different meaning for Diaspora Jews compared with its significance for their non-Jewish neighbours. The majority of them would probably never have seen the Temple.53 It seems that even in the Land of Israel only a minority would have participated regularly in the cult at the Temple. Nevertheless, this must have been a deeply meaningful experience. Most Jews would have known the Temple and its cult practices only through scriptural narratives and interpretations. This means that ‘the Jerusalem Temple at the center of Jewish collective identity was much more a powerful idea than a regularly and directly lived experience’.54 Distance and non-active participation in no way diminished its centrality for Jewish identity, but we are left with the question as to what the rituals were that guided and marked the rhythm 51 This coheres with Judge’s stance that the e)kklhsi/ai did not compete with cults (2003). I will return to this aspect below in 7.4. 52 Fraade 2009: 240; also Herr 2009: 230. 53 Fraade 2009: 241. 54 Fraade 2009: 263.

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of everyday life for Jews. We know little about everyday practices surrounding important moments in life such as childbirth, death, guarding the hearth, healing and the assurance of health, but Jews, especially in the Diaspora, must have developed rituals that enabled them to adhere to their distinct way of life, their social and symbolic universe, despite the fact that the cult centre of that tradition was hundreds or thousands of miles away. There is some Jewish evidence, though from slightly later than the first century ce, of ‘incantations, votive rites, amulets to assure health, love or success or to counter the malevolent wishes and spells of others’.55 In addition, they must have developed practices which did not require a Temple cult, if only faute de mieux, and there are some indications that the focus was on the oi1kov/domus as an important centre of Jewish practice together with the synagogue/proseu/xh, where they existed, or a combination of both.56 The house and the synagogue were the places on which community life focused, where Jewish identity could be nurtured and asserted, familial and ethnic bonds deepened, historical and narrative traditions shared, practice and customs adhered to, and ties with the Temple in Jerusalem maintained. This was where communal fellowship was strengthened and their relationship with God nurtured. They had the right to assemble in synagogues; they met there on the Sabbath to study the Scriptures and to pray. They also collected funds to be sent to the Temple in Jerusalem and settled their own affairs, and there is some indication that common meals were held there.57 There is epigraphic evidence for the manumission of slaves in synagogues as well.58 Communal meals seem to have been an important part of community life in synagogues and in this way they resembled Roman and Greek associations of various kinds. Not much is known, however, about the specific practices associated with these meals. Weekly communal readings of the Torah and from the Prophets, possibly at some later stage, played an important and unique role,59 but there are also some significant indications that Torah scrolls had a particular function in that they were considered to be sacred in a somewhat similar way to statues of deities in the temples of their neighbours. Reports by Josephus and the depiction of a scroll on the Arch of Titus clearly support such an interpretation.60 In addition to these readings, teaching and perhaps interpretation of the texts read formed part of Sabbath activities. Whether communal prayer was an element at the time of Paul is debated, but it seems that the term proseu/xh indicates that at least some praying of a more ‘official’ kind took place there, obviously in addition to individual prayer as understood from the Scriptures and other sources.61

55 56 57 58 59 60 61

Lightstone 2007: 361. Levine 2005: 127–34; Claussen 2003: 161. Claussen 2003: 157; cf. Josephus, AJ 14.235, 260. Levine 2005: 127. Levine 2003: 19. Cf. Levine 2005: 147. Levine 2005: 162–69.

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All of these activities were recognized by Rome62 and were seen by Jews themselves as integral to their lives in the Diaspora. But none of these activities had any similarity with the cultic activities so important in the non-Jewish world surrounding Jewish Diaspora communities,63 whether in their Roman imperial guise as an instrument of control and domination, or in their manifold native variations with their potential for resistance.64 This certainly does not mean that the cult in the Temple of Jerusalem was considered irrelevant or to be rejected. The absence of cult practice in the everyday life of Diaspora Jews had nothing to do with a critical stance towards cult – on the contrary, as the collection of money for the Temple clearly demonstrates. But their absence had a significant impact on how they were perceived by non-Jews, in whose perspective their non-participation in any cultic activities was evidence that they really were a)se/beiov and a1qeov.The only analogy to cult-related activities as known by their neighbours would have been prayers, as these played an important role in all cult practices. But because for Jews they were not part of a ritual offering or sacrifice, their prayers would most likely not have been regarded as in any way equivalent to ‘normal’ cult practice. In that sense, Philo’s depiction of Judaism as a kind of philosophy, and of Jewish gatherings as comparable to philosophical schools, can be considered reasonably accurate, particularly when we consider what kind of categories were available at the time. This self-depiction may also have reflected the perception non-Jews might have had of Jews, and was possibly a dimension that not only caused antagonism but would also have attracted sympathizers. To be a member of a philosophical school and to participate in a number of different cults would have been considered rather normal for people of a certain educational standard (including possibly educated slaves and freedmen/women). To be only a member of a philosophical school and not to participate in cults as well, however, would have been most abnormal, even for philosophers who raised criticism against some cult practices and perceptions of the deities.65 There was a clear discrepancy between Jewish and non-Jewish participation in cult practice despite a shared perception of the centrality of cult. That cult practice was a central and powerful ‘contact zone’ between humans and the divine was acknowledged by both Jews and non-Jews across cultural and ethnic differences. But the non-participation of Jews in any cult practice opened a wide gap of ‘losses in translation’ between their respective everyday practices and potential understanding of cult practices. 62 Josephus claims that Augustus in writing to Jews in Sardis in Asia Minor referred to their ‘sacred books’ and ‘sacred monies’ (AJ 16.164 also 14.260–61). This passage also refers to eu)xai_ kai_ qusi/ai, which has led to debates as to whether this implies actual sacrifice taking place there, whether this is a misunderstanding on the part of Augustus or whether this might refer to the collection of money for the Temple in Jerusalem. Cf. discussion in Levine 2005: 141, n. 33. 63 Cf. also Judge who asserts concerning the characteristics of the e)kklhsi/ai that: ‘Both historically and in terms of leading ideas the most influential sources stemmed from the synagogues. From those arose the fostering of a complex textual tradition, and its outworking in daily life, partly at odds with that of the civil community’ (2003: 520). 64 Kelly 2011. 65 Woyke 2005: 150.

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It should not come as a surprise then that this overwhelmingly dominating aspect of life constituted a significant problem of cultural translation for Paul in his attempts to support people from the nations in their ways of ‘learning Christ’. It is in this context that we will now consider the problems that arose around issues pertaining to eating meat and questions concerning table fellowship in Corinth.

7.3 Cult Practice and the Table of the Lord Disputes in Corinth are prominent and not all of them have to do with issues around the table. But tables do play an important role and are hotly disputed in the Corinthian community since they have written to Paul about them.66 The significance of these tables has been intensively discussed in scholarly debates about these passages ever since. The passages in question are usually discussed under headings like ‘Idol Food in Corinth’,67 ‘Food Offered to Idols’68 and ‘Dangerous Food’.69 Although it is true that these passages are related to issues concerning idolatry and food consumption, I would like to propose that Paul actually addresses three different matters around the table in chs 8–10. They have to do with three different contexts and situations, and they are all connected with cult practice and loyalty to other deities or, in Paul’s words, with idols: 1. First Corinthians 8.1-13 addresses the participation in public meals at a sanctuary. 2. First Corinthians 10.14-22 addresses issues concerning communion at the table. 3. First Corinthians 10. 23–11.1 addresses issues concerning meat in the marketplace and in the private house of a polytheistic host.

All of these passages address issues about meat consumption in the context of cult practice related to sacrificing to Greek and Roman deities, although in different contexts and with different issues under scrutiny, and not all of them are actually concerned with the food on the table. I will explore first why problems concerning the consumption of food offered to other deities, and participation in cultic practices of non-Jews, might have arisen in the first place, then analyse the identity of those among the Christ-followers who seem to have had questions concerning such participation, followed by an analysis of the arguments Paul presents against participation in temple meals in Corinth, and of questions related to the practicalities of everyday life and meat consumption.

66 As indicated by peri_ de (1 Cor. 8.1). Cf. also Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 368. 67 Cheung 1999. 68 Fotopoulos 2003. 69 Gooch 1993.

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7.3.1 What is wrong with meat? One may wonder why the whole problem of eating ‘idol’ meat emerged in the first place. Actively to participate in cult rituals of the nations, including to eat food which had been consecrated in such contexts, was in principle out of the question for Jews, and consequently also for Christ-followers from the nations. It is inconceivable that Jews would intentionally have eaten anything that was contaminated by involvement with sacrificial rituals to deities, as this would have jeopardized their unique loyalty to the One God. With God being the God not only of the Jews only but also of the e1qnh, loyalty to any other deity, i.e. idol worship, threatened the holiness not only of the people but of the earth, God’s creation, and caused its defilement70 (Jer. 2.7; 32.34; Ezek. 20.7, 30-31; 23.38; Jub. 22.16). Those from the nations who had formerly been ‘enticed and led astray to idols who cannot speak’ (1 Cor. 12.2), but who now by joining the Christ-movement had ‘turned to God from idols’ (1 Thess. 1.9), could not have anything to do with these idols anymore. There was no compromise with regard to this demand, nor could there be. It seems that such a fundamental consequence of becoming a member of the Christ-movement would have been rendered clear beyond any doubt by Paul upon his founding of the community and his initial teaching when he was in Corinth. If the Corinthian Christ-followers had already learned that they could under no circumstances participate in cult practices related to other deities, which included eating at a temple table, why would a controversy arise at all? The fact that the Corinthians do have questions concerning this is evidence that this issue, which seems very clear in principle, was not as clear-cut in practice as it might appear. What actually did constitute idolatry – worshipping and serving a deity other than the One God – was, if not a matter of debate, certainly a practical issue of blurred boundaries even for some Jews living in the Diaspora.71 At a cognitive level, a certain openness towards other religious traditions can be found, for example, in the Letter of Aristeas, where in section 16 Aristeas says that: ‘the God who is overseer and creator of all things whom they (the Jews) worship is he whom all humanity worship, but we, O king, call differently as Zeus and Dis’ (to_n ga_r pa/ntwn e)po/thn kai_ kti/sthn qeo_n ou=9toi se/bontai,o4n kai_ pa/ntev, h(mei=v de/, basileu=, prosonoma/zontev e(te/rwv Zh=na kai_ Di/a72). The perception here is that the One God of Israel is the same in Jewish and in Greek tradition, simply called by a different name. Philo in a remarkable passage states that Greeks and barbarians actually worship the same God as Jews: ‘the father of gods and men and the maker of the whole universe’.73 He concludes therefore that they should refrain from inventing new deities. A Jewish inscription from Gorgippa at the Bosporus dated 41 ce (CIJ 690) refers to the manumission of a slave with what seems to be a clear reference to 70 On defilement in Jubilees see Werman 2000: 168–73. Cf. also Wis. 14.12, 27. This is also Paul’s perception of the state of the ‘world’ in Rom. 1.18–2.11. 71 Cf. Horrell 2007: 124–25. 72 Let. Aris. 16. 73 Spec. 2.165.

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the One God (‘qew=i u(yi/stwi pantokrat/ori eu)loghtw?=?’ ‘to God the most high, almighty, blessed’), but what follows is a polytheistic juridical formula (‘u(po_ Di/a, Gh=n, 3Hlion – ‘under Zeus, Earth, Sun’). The dedication notes that it is made in the proseuxh/, which has been demonstrated to be an exclusively Jewish term.74 There is further inscriptional evidence that Jews did visit the temples of other deities, for example from near the temple of Pan in Edfu in Upper Egypt (dated between the second and first centuries bce). Although the inscriptions do not suggest worshipping activities of the Jews named there, it is worth noting that they placed their dedication of thanksgiving within the compound of another deity.75 When it comes to the manumission of slaves, Jews in the Diaspora seem to have adopted the recognized practice that manumission required a deity to act as a broker, with the actual manumission a handover of the slave to the deity. An inscription from Delphi (CIJ no. 711, 119 bce) mentions that someone called 0Ioudai=ov (Ioudaios) sold his slave 0Amu/ntav to Apollo, a sale which would be actualized upon the death of 0Ioudai=ov. Whether these examples provide a glimpse into exceptional or common practice among Diaspora Jews is difficult to assess. Nevertheless, they clearly indicate that at least in some instances the boundaries between what was considered faithful adherence to the traditions of the ancestors, including loyalty to the One God, and idolatry were blurred. Hence the boundary between what was considered idol worship and merely shared common practice seems to have been a matter of local and perhaps individual perception. Such variations in the perceptions of these boundaries could have contributed significantly to the problems Paul feels he needs to address in his letter. Since the perception of what did and did not constitute idolatry was not as clear-cut as it seems, Paul has to clarify the perception or ‘nature’ of other deities for Christ-followers from the nations. Paul seems to refer to aspects of previous teaching, perhaps repeated in the letter sent to him, when he states in 1 Cor. 8.4: ‘ou0de_n ei1dwlon e0n ko/smw~| (‘there are no idols in the world’) and ou0dei_v qeo_v ei0 mh_ ei[v (‘there is no God but one’).76 By referring first to the artefact representing the deity he states a perception also common among non-Jews; it is not the statue or the image which actually is the deity, rather these represent the deity, and the deity may inhabit the statue or image in the moment of communication between them and worshippers.77 However, popular perception and practice may have differed from this cognitive perception. Paul then changes the reference to the deity as such and stresses that there is actually only one God. The reference in v. 5 to ‘so-called gods in heaven and on earth’ and ‘many gods and many lords’ seems paradoxical as it is unclear whether Paul simultaneously acknowledges and denies the existence 74 See Horbury and Noy 1992: 14; also Levinskaya 1996: 207–25. 75 Horbury and Noy 1992: 211–12. 76 This may be a quotation from a letter sent to Paul by the Corinthians; if so, this would strengthen Paul’s emphasis on shared knowledge. 77 Von Ehrenkrook 2011: 55.

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of other deities. It could be that the ‘many gods and lords’ should be put in quotation marks, indicating that this also refers to ‘so-called gods’.78 It could be an ironic statement, or it may be that the idea of deities was not a matter of clear-cut boundaries even for Paul. He was most likely not a monotheist in the modern sense.79 With his Jewish and gentile contemporaries he may have shared the perception that the heavens and earth and every sphere in between were populated, if not by numerous deities, certainly by numerous spiritual beings referred to as demons.80 For Paul this seems to have meant that such beings existed but that they were part of the created world; thus to worship them as deities was an issue of category confusion or distortion in that ‘they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator who is blessed forever, amen’ (Rom. 1.25). Whether this was the view of Jews generally cannot be ascertained, and another possible interpretation might be that Jews acknowledged the existence of other deities but restricted their loyalty to their one and only God. In some ways Jews were no different from their polytheistic contemporaries. The difference was that their loyalty was to only one God, with all other spirits, demons, etc. either being relegated to a lesser order or considered not to be for them. In one sense there was nothing strange about a deity belonging to a particular e1qnov/people; this was a key aspect of the normal role of deities, in as much as families or clans were loyal to their particular clan gods. To be part of a people and worshipping a particular deity were inseparable aspects of what in antiquity formed a unity (as seems to be indicated in Mic. 4.5 ‘For all the peoples walk, each in the name of its god, but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever’). The Romans incorporated deities of conquered nations into their pantheon via interpretatio Romana or adoption (e.g. Magna Mater), and loyalty to deities was not exclusive but could be combined in innumerable ways.81 The exclusive loyalty claim of the God of the Jews was irrational and incomprehensible from a non-Jewish perspective. However, in as much as Jewish exclusivist loyalty claims were considered odd, at times even bordering on treason, these were tolerated and to some extent even acknowledged as ancient traditions (mores), a concept which in Roman perspective had to be respected, as long as the twice daily offerings for the emperor and the empire continued in the Temple in Jerusalem, as we noted above. It was precisely this strange and odd exclusivity that was required from Christ-followers from the nations when they joined an e)kklhsi/a. This was a non-negotiable aspect of their association with the God of Israel through Christ. Since Paul, like his fellow Jews, was not a monotheist in the modern sense, it is unlikely that he expected the Corinthian or any other Christ-followers to 78 Ciampa and Rosner argue that: ‘Since Paul had already referred to the things worshipped by others as so-called gods in v.5a it seems appropriate to place gods and lords in quotation marks in v.5b’ (2010: 381). 79 Fredriksen 2003: 46. 80 Fredriksen 2010: 232–52. 81 Cf. above p. 179.

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become monotheists. Such a concept seems to have been inconceivable for the period in question.82 However, Paul did expect that the Christ-followers would show and be seen to show loyalty, pi/stiv, to the One God of Israel only and exclusively. Acknowledging that there are other deities or lords who claim loyalty, Paul emphasizes that a)ll’ h(mi=n ei[v qeo_v o( path/r … kai_ ei[v ku/riov (‘for us there is one God … and one Lord’, 8.6a). This exclusive loyalty to one God and one Lord affects the whole of life, in that the whole of creation is God’s, and the community is supposed to be exclusively shaped by its relation to God. Although this knowledge is shared at the cognitive level by Paul and the Corinthian Christ-followers, it is not necessarily embraced by all in the community in practice. From Paul’s way of arguing in 8.5-6 it could be that the conclusion some of the Corinthian Christ-followers have drawn from their knowledge was that because their ‘real’ loyalty was only to the One God of Israel, and the other deities were actually only subordinate gods or demons, they were free to participate in certain activities related to polytheistic cultic practices, including public meals at Corinthian temples,83 since they would not consider the food on the table as ‘really’ offered to a deity.84 Another possible reason behind the confusion might be the fact that the worshipping practice of the e)kklhsi/a oriented itself on the pattern of the synagogues – even if they were not fully part of them where they existed, or assembled as sub-groups of synagogue communities.85 Either scenario is conceivable, but what happened in synagogues on the Sabbath did not remotely resemble any cult practice of a sacrifice.86 If we follow Philo’s and Josephus’ claims, the synagogue gatherings had more resemblance to philosophical schools, and certainly no animal or vegetal sacrifices were offered.87 With teaching, study and prayer being at the heart of synagogue gatherings, with shared meals, hospitality and the collection of money as additional activities, the template for the gatherings of the e)kklhsi/ai seems more or less given. When Paul mentions the gathering of the e)kklhsi/a in Corinth he refers to quite a variety of activities, such as prophesying, speaking in tongues, prayers, and the sharing of bread and wine at the Lord’s table (trape/za kuri/ou). He gives advice concerning the appropriate dress code for men and women (1 Cor. 11.2-16), but it is evident that, as in Jewish gatherings, nothing remotely similar to a sacrificial ritual took place there.88 82 Fredriksen 2003: 12, 49. 83 Cf. Lim 2009; Tucker 2010: 95–100. 84 Horrell 2007: 126; Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 386. 85 As Nanos argues for the situation in Rome (1996: 30–40); cf. also Levine 2005: 140, and Judge 2003: 520. Cf. n. 62 above. 86 Cf. Levine who asserts that ‘Sacrifice was unknown in a synagogue setting … as was the public reading of a sacred text in a Greco-Roman temple’ (2005: 131). Cf. also 7.2 above. 87 Cf. 7.2 above. 88 This is indicated, in my view, by the head-covering debate as it is related to the issue of sacrificing. The rejection of the caput velatum is a clear reference to the Roman practice of the principal offerand of the sacrifice veiling his head with the toga. The depiction of Augustus

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The gatherings of the e)kklhsi/a thus had no recognizable similarity with rituals of sacrifice so this might have provided further reasons for Christfollowers from the nations not to see any problem with continuing to participate in such events at the temples of the city as they used to do. Given that such participation was most likely restricted to members of the elite or possibly some clients associated with them, this may not only have been an issue about deities but also one which may have been about the e)kklhsi/a and the social relations of members of different status. This brings us to the question: who are ‘those who have and those who do not have knowledge’? 7.3.2 To have or not to have knowledge Whether ‘those who have knowledge’ were Jewish or non-Jewish Christfollowers or both, Paul implies that they were potentially or actually ‘reclining in an idol’s temple’ (1 Cor. 8.10). As we have noted above, there seem to have been debates among Jews about what actually should be classified as idolatry and the boundaries were blurred to some extent, but to participate in a temple meal was a public display of a non-Jewish cultic practice and it seems difficult to see this as anything other than an act of idolatry.89 Interestingly, at this point (8.7-13) this is not the reason why Paul strongly argues against such participation. He does not argue at the level of cognitive perception nor does he present a definition here of what constitutes idolatry. Jews did under certain circumstances participate in public meals, visit pagan temples, contribute financially to a temple building or become involved in the manumission of slaves in the temple of a deity, as we have noted above.90 The theoretically very clear rejection of idol worship and the sharp criticism of participation in any cultic practices related to idolatry by writers such as Philo and Josephus do not cover all the issues which did arise in the context of a daily life entirely permeated with polytheistic cultic practices.91 Jews obviously would have had to negotiate the practicalities of their lives in relation to this all-pervasive presence, and it seems that at least some Jews did not consider all activities related to temples in the Diaspora to be actual participation in polytheistic cultic practices and thus equivalent to worshipping the respective deity. It in particular in that pose as pontifex maximus and thus guardian of pietas is exemplary here. No man in the Christ-movement shall imitate this gesture, since no sacrifice is performed here, nor is there any intention to identify with or contribute to the maintenance of the pax deorum expressed through this gesture. Paul clearly requests male members of the movement to distance themselves from this imperial practice. They are not to comply with a gesture which expresses Roman claims to being blessed by the gods to dominate and subjugate others, be those conquered peoples, slaves or women and children; they are thus liberated from a gesture that denotes humiliating consent by the nations to their own submission. The issue of women being expected to veil their heads whilst actively participating in the community gathering may have similar reasons, but this cannot be pursued further here. Cf. the excellent discussion in Schottroff 2013: 195–211; also Gordon 1990. 89 Tomson 1990: 153–63. 90 Phua 2002: 180–83. 91 Phua 2002: 89–120.

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seems that one of the guiding parameters was that of intention or what in Pauline terminology is called sunei/dhsiv. The situation discussed in 8.7-13 seems to be part of the pragmatic boundary-negotiating discourse in which Diaspora Jews would have been involved, possibly on a daily basis, rather than a discussion of idolatry per se. Hence one possible group who ‘have knowledge’ could be Jewish members of the Corinthian community in whose identity and practice of life in the Diaspora loyalty to the One and exclusively One God was inherent. As Jews were accustomed to negotiating the practicalities of life in a Diaspora context, it would theoretically have been possible to find someone who would not classify participation at a temple meal as idolatry since the meat distributed had been ‘released’ by the deity for human consumption. Although I find such a possibility unlikely, since such meals were public events it cannot be entirely ruled out. A more likely scenario in my view involves former God-fearers who claim to have knowledge (something Paul actually confirms), and others whom Paul sees as lacking it (ou0k e)n pa=sin h( gnw=siv, 8.7). An indication for the identity of those who are lacking in knowledge is found in 8.7b where Paul describes them as tine_v de_ th?= sunhqei/a? e3wv a1rti tou= ei)dw/lou (‘some who are until now accustomed to idols’), which clearly refers to former polytheists rather than Jews. No clear indication for the identity of those ‘who have knowledge’ can be found in the text. However, there are a few indications which also provide hints to their identity: the absence of any reference to the purity of the food involved; the public nature of the practice under discussion. The reference also resonates with the knowledge/scienta so important in dealing with Roman deities.92 The address ‘all of us have knowledge’ seems a slightly strange assertion if directed to fellow Jews who would have had long-standing experience in negotiating the practicalities of Jewish life in the Diaspora. The reference to knowledge instead seems to be directed at people who are proud of their newly embraced knowledge with regard to the God of Israel and who are now keen to demonstrate that ‘they know’ how to practise their new loyalty. I conclude that the key addressees here are most likely non-Jews, former polytheists from the nations, some knowledgeable and others lacking in knowledge.93 If we envisage a scenario where such God-fearers had joined the Christ-movement, they would already have knowledge of the Scriptures, the law (‘for I am speaking to those who know the law’, Rom. 7.1; ‘this was written for our instruction’, 1 Cor. 10.11, etc.), but the exclusivist claim of Paul’s gospel would have been alien to them. They would have known that this claim was non-negotiable for Jews, but Paul had specifically said that ‘Greeks and barbarians’ who joined the Christ-movement should under no circumstances become Jews. Nevertheless, without becoming Jews these Christ-followers from the nations were required to adopt the exclusivist practice of being loyal 92 Cf. above p. 183. 93 This is supported by the direct address in 12.2: ‘You know that when you were “nations”, you were enticed and led astray to idols that could not speak.’

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only to the One God. This might have caused some confusion to say the least among these new Christ-followers. If they were not supposed to become Jews why then could they not continue to practise their previous loyalty rituals? Since religion and ethnicity were inseparable, to do so would have seemed to be the logical conclusion. A non-Jew by definition is someone who is loyal to the deities of his respective people and clan/family, or else he/she becomes a Jew. Paul in his demand for exclusive loyalty to the One God, and in his emphasis that people from the nations must join the Christ-movement without becoming Jews, seems to combine aspects which are inconceivable both from a Jewish as well as from a non-Jewish perspective.94 I think the problem arose because of what had seemed previously acceptable practice to God-fearers who had now joined the Christ-movement who did understand that they did so as people from the nations and hence were ‘in Christ’ on the same terms as Jews without becoming Jews. These former Godfearers, although they may have been familiar with some aspects of Judaism, and may also have had some understanding at a cognitive level that there was a requirement to abstain from idolatry as Christ-followers, were not embedded in the practice of negotiating boundaries of loyalty to the One God familiar to Diaspora Jews. Hence the implications of this command, which might have made sense in principle, were less obvious to them in practice. To renounce participation in public meals at a temple seems to have been one of the consequences of joining the Christ-movement, something that was not immediately clear to them. 7.3.3 To be or not to be at the table: 1 Cor. 8.7-13 and 10.14-22 Paul’s guidance should be seen in this context as part of the boundarynegotiating practices of Diaspora Jews in the first century ce. To envisage such a context for Paul’s way of arguing in the passages in question provides a rationale for the tension perceived by some interpreters between the principle stated in 8.4-6 and the seemingly contradictory guidance given in relation to eating food that had been involved in polytheistic cult activities in the passages which follow. Whilst in 1 Cor. 8.7-13 and 10.14-22 Paul provides two different reasons why the Corinthians should abstain from any involvement in table fellowship that involved offerings to deities of the nations, he seems to give contradictory advice in 10.23-30. Paul provides two different rationales in 1 Cor. 8.7-13 and 10.14-22 as to why Christ-followers should stay away from temple meals, whilst 10.23-30 has some affiliations with 8.7-13 in that both passages are concerned with someone’s sunei/dhsiv. Before we analyse 1 Cor. 8.7-13 and 10.14-22 in further detail, it is worth noting that the issue in neither passage involves the impurity of food, that is food laws. The fact that the food on the table might not be ‘permitted, i.e. impure (a)ka/qartov) for Jews, does not play any part in this discussion of whether or not to eat. This clearly indicates that there are no Jewish purity/ 94 See also 5.5 above.

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impurity issues concerning food at stake here. If meat were involved (which is not the only option) the issue is not from which animals the meat intended for consumption comes, nor whether the food is produced according to the food laws. Paul also does not mention table fellowship between Jews and nonJews here (significantly the issue concerning table fellowship at the Lord’s table in Corinth has to do with social hierarchies rather than concerns of community between Jews and ‘Greeks and barbarians’). But the issue is also not whether a Christ-follower could share the table with a polytheist. This is obviously presupposed as an uncontested option in 1 Cor. 10.26-11.1, where it is considered ‘normal’ that a Christ-follower might be invited to the house of a polytheist, and that he/she would accept the invitation. The host cannot be Jewish since the issue that might cause a problem in such a situation is food offered as sacrifice. The problem is not that it had been sacrificed but that in Corinth this could only imply that it had been offered to deities of the nations. Paul is not formulating any critique of temple sacrifices as such. Temples are a given, and the Temple in Jerusalem is at the centre of the Jewish symbolic universe in the first century ce, including sacrifices offered there and meals shared. It is inconceivable that Paul would have challenged this Jewish practice.95 Now that we have established that no issues concerning specific Jewish dietary laws are involved in the particular problems around the table in Corinth, a detailed analysis will be given of the two reasons Paul provides for strict non-participation of Christ-followers in polytheistic temple meals. Paul is seen here in his role as a negotiator in a cultural translation process at the level of practice, which requires a differentiated handling of the different ‘worlds’ involved in an attempt to render the implications of the gospel of Christ intelligible for those from the nations to whom Paul was sent. 7.3.4 To be seen at a temple table: 1 Cor. 8.17-22 Paul argues in a pedagogically exemplary way in this passage. Rather than beginning his reply to the question of the Corinthians by telling them that they are mistaken in what seem to have been their conclusions from his teaching, he begins with the positive acknowledgement that those who asked the question actually do have knowledge. However, he questions their understanding of the significance of this knowledge. Paul here seems to refer to different aspects of knowledge. The aspect he refers to in vv. 4-6, and the allusions he makes in vv. 2-3 reflect two different dimensions of knowledge. The latter possibly resonates with the idea of ‘knowledge’ in the sense of hdy, i.e. knowledge that is confined to the cognition of certain facts, such as how properly to perform a cult act or prayer to a deity as in Roman worship but intrinsically encompassing something which we might today refer to as emotional empathy/intelligence. Paul reminds the Corinthians that knowledge without deep empathy or compassion is not true 95

Cf. Schottroff 2013: 190.

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knowledge in Christ. He acknowledges that their knowledge concerning the existence and relevance of other deities in vv. 4-6 is accurate at the cognitive level. Their loyalty to the One God is not questioned here, but their real understanding and thus their true knowledge are being questioned. In Paul’s view the knowledge of ‘those who have knowledge’ has not yet reached the mature stage he had hoped for; he has to explain that knowing the facts is not enough (‘I fed you with milk, not solid food; for you were not ready for it; and even yet you are not ready’, 1 Cor. 3.2-3). Knowledge is not the recognition of facts, nor is it confined to and beneficial to an individual only. The decisive question is how such ‘knowledge’ in the realm of Christ is translated into practice, how it affects the life of a community. Although knowledge in Roman understanding involved ‘doing the right thing in the right way’ in relation to a deity, this was not the key aspect of knowledge in Christ. In this realm the ‘brother or sister for whom Christ died’ is the testing ground for knowledge. In relationships with others it becomes evident whether knowledge is ‘true knowledge’ or mere recognition of facts. In principle, Paul acknowledges that the conclusions of ‘those who have knowledge’ are not entirely wrong. The existence of other deities, if not absolutely denied, is certainly declared irrelevant, so what happens at a Corinthian temple is not really relevant to those who are exclusively loyal to God. From this it seems to be a short step to concluding that there is no reason not to enjoy a free meal and socialize with others, possibly friends, at the temple outside the Christ-following communities. Paul does not directly question this conclusion and does not question that for those who think that they have knowledge this might be an appropriate conclusion. Significantly, Paul does not classify participation at a temple meal or the actual eating as idolatry per se; this is merely referred to as e)n ei)dwlei/w? katakei/menon (‘eating/reclining in the temple of an idol’, 1 Cor. 8.10). The key aspect is how others, in this case fellow Christ-followers, perceive such participation. Even though from the perspective of those who have knowledge this might not mean participation in worshipping the deity, others may perceive it differently. This is Paul’s concern here: not that ‘those who have knowledge’ commit idolatry but that Christ-followers who do not have such knowledge (8.7), may be oi)kodomhqh/setai ei)v to_ ta_ ei)dwlo/quta e)sqi/ein ((‘encouraged [“built up towards”] to eat food sacrificed to idols’ [8.10b]). For those who do not ‘know’ that other deities are nothing, this would mean that they were actually eating the temple meal as ‘idol food’ and hence they would be committing idolatry. It is thus not the participation of the knowledgeable at the temple meal that is classified as idolatry and sin but rather the effect this might have on other Christ-followers. To cause a brother or sister to commit idolatry is classified as sin by Paul. Although committing idolatry is a serious issue, the target of Paul’s argument is the sin of seducing someone to commit idolatry. Such an act amounts to destroying the brother/sister and this threatens the integrity of the community. The key point in the argument here is not the act of idolatry but concern for the other. Out of concern for

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brothers and sisters ‘in Christ’, participation in a public temple meal is out of the question.96 To illustrate the importance of this, Paul refers to his own practice and explains that he himself abstains entirely from eating meat, implying that he is not so much concerned that he might commit idolatry by doing so but that he does this so no occasion could occur which would confuse a brother/sister into committing idolatry. It has been emphasized that ethical concern for the brother/sister ‘in Christ’ is the core of Paul’s admonition, and this is certainly a core aspect in that knowledge has to be infused with concern for the well-being of brothers/ sisters.97 However, this is not the only focus of Paul’s argument. Paul’s special concern is the holiness of the community.98 Holiness is a ritual category. The ethical concern is inherently intertwined with ritual concern. In order to come near and associate with the divine, one has to fulfil certain purity requirements.99 What is important to note with regard to the passage discussed here is that this holiness may be threatened by immoral actions against someone else. To hurt a brother/sister, i.e. to cause another to misconceive the requirement for exclusive loyalty to the One God, would actually threaten their status in Christ and put them in danger of a)po_llutai ga_r … e)n th=? sh?= gnw/sei (‘finding destruction in your knowledge’, 8.11).100 This concern is similar to that expressed in Rom. 14.15, although the situation is significantly different in that in Rome the issue has nothing to do with participation in Roman temple meals.101 But in both cases the concern for the brother/sister is centre stage and has decisive implications for the community as a whole. The point is that unethical behaviour conveys impurity to the community and threatens its holiness.102 Purity and holiness are key characteristics of the e) kklhsi/a. The purification of people from the nations is related to the Christevent, but this is only a precondition for them to ‘come near’ into the realm of the Holy One. They are ‘called to be holy’; this is not a status which is conferred on them, it is a call which asks for a response through their lives.

96 Nanos has argued that the brothers and sisters in view here might be polytheistic members of the nations (not Christ-followers), people who are potential Christ-followers who are not yet convinced. They should not be tempted to come to the wrong conclusions concerning this new movement, but be given a clear picture of their identity (2009). 97 Cf. e.g. Horrell 2007: 128–30. 98 As Ciampa and Rosner have outlined in a recent article (2010: 205–18). 99 This perception is shared between Jews and polytheists. Certain purity regulations had to be adhered to when approaching the deity, and such regulations were by no means unique to Jews. It was not only inappropriate to approach the deity in a state of impurity, or as profane; it could actually be dangerous. Cf. also Vahrenhorst 2008: 17–104. 100 Cf. Thiselton 2000: 653 (I find his argument for an ‘active’ translation of a9po/llutai quite convincing). 101 For a detailed discussion of this issue in Romans 14 see Ehrensperger 2010: 90–109; also Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 371. 102 Cf. Klawans 2000: 29–31.

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To be called to be holy is an obligation, and it is the Christ-followers’ task to respond through ‘offering their bodies as a living sacrifice’.103 Significantly, according to Paul’s argument here, it is not the association with so-called deities (which do not really exist but are lesser beings) presents the biggest threat but ‘Sinning against your brothers/sisters and wounding their conscience’ (v. 12); this is the major problem and is actually seen as sinning against Christ. The clear implications of sinning against Christ may be open to debate, but significant indications throughout the letter render it plausible that this is a reference to the corporate dimension of Christ,104 to the Christfollowing communities as the ‘body of Christ’ (cf. 12.27). Thus the ‘sinning against the brother/sister’ would be a sinning against the community ‘called to be holy’ (1.2).105 Earlier in the letter (3.16-17), concern for the holiness of the community is formulated by Paul using the metaphor of the community as God’s Temple.106 To cause a brother/sister to ‘find destruction’ would bring destruction to God’s Temple, including the instigator of this negative process.107 In Paul’s argument, concern for the well-being of the brother/sister in Christ is inseparably intertwined with a theocentric concept of holiness. 7.3.5 Participation in Christ or with demons: 1 Cor. 10.14-22 Paul returns108 to the issue of idolatry (10.1-13) and participation in public meals at Corinthian temples (10.14-22) using the example of the golden calf incident. The narrative serves as a reintroduction of this topic and is used to exemplify the impossibility of participating in worship of other deities and 103 See above 6.6.2. Also with regard to Israel’s call to be holy Schwartz argues that ‘Priestly thought perceives Israel’s holiness not as an historical event but as a dynamic process, always taking place’ (2000: 55) and ‘the Israelites are not told to be holy like God; rather they are commanded to be holy because he is holy. Their holiness cannot be like his, it can only be analogous … their holiness consists of their loyal obedience to him’ (2000: 57). This applies analogically also to the e)kklhsi/a. 104 Cf. Schottroff 2013: 11. 105 Indications for this can be found throughout the letter. The scope of this study does not allow for a detailed analysis here, hence a few references must be sufficient: in the opening of the letter the addressees are named h(giasme/noiv e)n Xristw=? I9hsou= … kltoi=v a(gi/oiv (‘sanctified in Christ Jesus … called to be saints’, 1 Cor. 1.2); they are reminded that they are God’s temple, which is holy o( ga_r nao_v tou= qeou= a3gio/v e)stin oi3tine/v e)ste u(mei=v (1 Cor. 3.17); the body is a temple for the Holy Spirit to_ sw=ma u(mw=n nao_v tou= e)n u(mi=n a(gi/ou pneu_mato_v e)stin (1 Cor. 6.19); the focus on the community as the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12). Since polytheists are impure and profane, Paul is very concerned that those ‘who have turned away from idols’ and who have been sanctified through Christ do not attract impurity again. 106 Vahrenhorst 2008: 157–75. 107 Paul’s athletic metaphor passage (1 Cor. 9.24-27) is another way of referring to the implications one’s own behaviour towards others eventually has on oneself. 108 The two passages discussed here are significantly separated but also linked to each other by chs 9.1–10.13, where Paul refers to his own decision not to claim his right to support from the Corinthians as an example of renouncing one’s freedom in Christ. He thereby actually confirms the perception of those who claim ‘knowledge’ to some extent, but takes them on a pedagogical journey via his own example including his ‘teaching method’ passage in 9.19-23. Paul thus seems to have confirmed to those who have knowledge that their knowledge is accurate,

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of the God of Israel through Christ at the same time. Paul here provides a second and notably different argument against the participation of all Christfollowers, even those who are knowledgeable, in public temple meals. The admonition in v. 14 is clear and non-debatable. Again, the implications of this and what constitutes idolatry are less obvious. As in ch. 8 Paul does not imply that mere eating at a temple table constitutes an act of idolatry. In 9.19 he repeats the perception of 8.4 that neither idols nor food sacrificed to idols are important. The issue is not the eating of the food (or drinking from a cup). The key element that renders participation in a temple meal impossible is the sharing of the table. Although Paul here repeats his denial of the existence of other deities, he is nevertheless of the view that there are spiritual powers, i.e. demons, that although they are not on an equal level with God are worshipped by polytheists as deities. This means that these second-tier spiritual beings are treated with the respect that only the One God of Israel deserves.109 The way Paul builds up the argument here could be seen as an example of cultural translation in practice. He refers to two practices of ritual, in Jewish and in non-Jewish culture respectively, and compares these with the Lord’s table. The point of comparison here is not the sacrifice itself. Paul does not compare Jewish and polytheistic temple sacrifices on the one hand with the cup and the bread on the other.110 He emphasizes, however, that when Jews participate in a temple meal (which can only happen in Jerusalem), they participate in the altar, which means they are in community with God and their fellow Jews. Part of what is offered to God in the sacrifice (through burning and smoke)111 is given back by God to the community; he is in the role of the host of the Temple meal. This table is God’s altar , and by participating in the sacrificial meal, communion with God and fellow participants is established. The sacrifice also in Paul’s understanding is a point of close contact between God and humans and reaffirms the bond between them. There is not a hint of critique in this reference to the nature of Jewish Temple worship, sacrifice and temple table fellowship;112 it is a mere statement of what is constitutive of temple meals in Jewish perspective. It is a positive reference to what is perceived as an important aspect of the animal sacrifice which made a temple meal possible. Through the sacrifice that is, the offering, table fellowship and communion between the participants and God is established. Paul then moves into the cultural world of polytheists; although he denies the existence of other deities, he considers demons to be although their understanding of how such knowledge should translate into the practice of real life is not. At the end of ch. 9 the issue of freedom in Christ and how it should be lived in relation to others in the community seems clarified and Paul moves back to the issue of idolatry. 109 Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 379. 110 Contra e.g. Thiselton 2000: 771–72. 111 Eberhardt draws attention to the fact that ‘through fire and smoke, materials offered by humans, be they animals or vegetal substances, are transformed and transported to God’ (2011a: 29); cf. also Naiden 2013. 112 Contra Thiselton 2000: 771–72. For a detailed discussion see Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 477–78; now also Schottroff 2013: 189–91.

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real. However, as noted above, to worship them as deities is confusing their status. Thus, the cult practice at Corinthian temples is compared in terms of structure with the cult practice at the Temple in Jerusalem. Structurally they invoke the same: the sacrifice offered at a polytheistic temple, although in Paul’s view not offered to a deity, nevertheless involves a being Paul would call a demon, which effectively makes such a demon the host of the public meal at the temple. Community between the ‘demon’ and the participants and among the participants is established and celebrated at the table of a demon. The understanding of the effects of the ritual of a sacrifice and the following temple meal is thus translatable between Jewish and non-Jewish tradition and can establish some commonality between them even though the deities and possibly the diet involved may have been different. Participation in the table of demons is seen to challenge the exclusivity of participating in the table of the Lord.113 The logic seems clear, but to understand the table of the Lord as the table of Christ in terminology that resonates with temple worship, including sacrifice, is a bold move on Paul’s part. (I will discuss this further below.) The alien issue of participating in one cult only (from a non-Jewish perspective) is complicated by the fact that the Jewish Temple cult was only practised in Jerusalem. Although people from the nations could participate in Temple rituals in Jerusalem up to a certain point (prayer in the outer court), full participation was not possible for them. It should be noted that such restricted access to foreigners was not a Jewish peculiarity, as some inscriptional evidence from Delos demonstrates. The six-foot-long inscription from an Apollonian temple in Delos reads: ‘It is not lawful for a foreigner (xe/nov) to enter.’114 To draw separating lines between cult participants was nothing extraordinary, certainly not something peculiarly Jewish, as is sometimes claimed. This is cultural practice familiar amongst numerous nations under Rome. Participating at the altar of the God of Israel was not an option for the Corinthians for a number of reasons and may have been an additional cause of confusion amongst these new Christ-followers. Since in Corinth there was no Jewish ritual comparable to the temple rituals of the other diverse deities and participation in Temple worship in Jerusalem would have been very restricted for them as Christ-followers from the nations, it could be imagined that these Corinthians did not consider their participation in Corinthian temple meals as being in competition with any cultic involvement with the God of Israel. Participation in synagogue assemblies and coming together for the Lord’s Supper may not have been thought of by the Corinthians as comparable to participation in cult practices in the temple and at public temple meals. This is possibly where Paul’s comparison of the temple tables and the table of the Lord is of decisive significance. In order to render comprehensible 113 Whether this refers to the Lord God or Christ is open to debate. Ciampa and Rosner refer to Mal. 1.7, 12 (LXX), Ezek. 41.22, 44.16 as examples of references to the altar as the Lord’s table (2010: 482), in addition see also LXX Lev. 8.16; 1 Kgs 7.48; Neh. 5.17; 1 Macc. 4.51; Isa. 65.11 and Asen. 8.5; 12.5; Philo Contemp. 81. 114 Cf. Fredriksen 2002: 62.

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his demand that they all abstain from participating in polytheistic temple meals whether they were ‘full of knowledge’ or ‘weak in consciousness’, Paul had to formulate his reasoning in a way that made sense to them within their own cultural encyclopedia and their own cultural coding system. As regards the structure of cult practice, some similarities between Jewish and non-Jewish coding systems existed. Other aspects, such as the narratives of their respective symbolic universes, certain ways of social interaction, and the cultural encyclopedias associated with terms and narratives, may have been quite different. In order for Paul to be able to communicate something and expect to be understood, he had to refer to aspects of life in which similarities were prevalent. It seems that the realm of cult provided a dimension that had the potential to enable successful communication. Being embedded in very different social and symbolic contexts on the other hand, this dimension was all the more prone to ‘losses’ or ‘misunderstandings’ in translation. By requiring these former polytheistic people from the nations to abstain completely from food offered to ‘demons’, and thus dissociate themselves from the ritual religious, cultic and social occasions of offering to and receiving from deities, Paul required them to dissociate themselves from core aspects of their former self-understanding. This meant a change in their participation in a core social field with their ‘habitus’ possibly required to stretch beyond what could easily be envisaged.115 Although the language used by Paul certainly resonated with familiar notions, the encyclopedias associated with the terminology differed. Not to have anything to do with offerings at any temple must have been very strange from a Jewish as well as from a non-Jewish perspective irrespective of its economic and social implications. The Temple in Jerusalem, although it was at the centre of Paul’s Jewish symbolic and social universe, could not move into the vacancy for these Christ-followers from the nations. As mentioned above, although as people from the nations they could participate in aspects of the Jerusalem Temple cult to some extent, they could not be involved in the same way as Jews would have been. This has nothing to do with a negative perception of the Temple and its rituals, but the implications of this need to be further explored. Did the geographical distance of the Jerusalem Temple add to the sense of a vacancy of sacred space for Christ-followers from the nations, or did it prevent difficult complications for non-Jewish worshippers of the God of Israel? Paul seems to recognize the difficulty of the ‘empty sacred space’ to some extent, and argues that in sharing the cup and the bread at the Lord’s Supper they actually do participate at a table, at the Lord’s table. This implies that they have fellowship with him and amongst each other in a similar way to the participants at a temple meal whether they are non-Jewish or Jewish. Because the Jerusalem Temple cult cannot fill the space formerly occupied by polytheistic temple cults and temple meals, and because it seems to have been inconceivable to leave this space vacant, Paul argues that the Lord’s table 115

Cf. 3.1.2 above.

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be moved into this ‘empty’ space for the Christ-followers from the nations. Paul here seems to instigate something of an improvised change of ‘habitus’ within the limits of the world known to them. He could not just ‘invent’ a new practice without any connection to their ‘habitus’ as related to the social and symbolic fields of polytheistic cult practice.116 Participation in Christ is established not by sharing food sacrificed to God but by sharing in the cup and bread as the body of Christ. Paul thus tries to relate the new practice to the known practice of table fellowship in the context of cults. He argues that the table of the Lord establishes fellowship for these Christ-followers from the nations in the same way as the table fellowship they had to give up in conjunction with polytheistic temple cults. Since a function is attributed to the Lord’s table similar to that of the temple tables as of the tables of demons, it is ruled out that Christ-followers from the nations can take part in both. This is a clear argument against participation in polytheistic temple cults because this is a distorted practice, but it is not a critique of the Temple cult in Jerusalem. It is evident that Paul must have been familiar enough with the significance of this realm for their everyday lives in order to meaningfully relate to it in his explanatory arguments. Although he is not part of their traditions of cult practice, his knowledge and awareness enable him to negotiate the meaning of the Lord’s table in its exclusivity by both relating it to and distancing it from their world simultaneously. He introduces them to the practice of ‘playing and not playing the game’. In addition, the Lord’s table is here seen as adopting not only the cultic function of the table of demons (or so-called deities) but also the function of providing actual nourishment for the participants, as can be seen from the discussion in 11.17-34. But unlike the meals at Corinthian temples, which were exclusivist, elitist and thus re-inscribed social hierarchies, the Lord’s table was supposed to break up these hierarchies by rendering all participants equal. Violating brothers/sisters by humiliating them through an assertion of status hierarchies is a threat to the community as a whole – it is sin and thus also ‘profanes’ the holiness of the community (1 Cor. 11.27). Paul here presents an argument for exclusive participation of Christ-followers from the nations at only one table – the table of the Lord – by establishing a parallel between the Lord’s Supper and the temple tables of Jews and non-Jews respectively. By creating this parallel he provides a clear argument for exclusive fellowship with the host of this table – the Lord (whether this refers to Christ or God). The vacancy in the sacred space is filled, hence there can be no doubt for Christfollowers where fellowship is established and where their identity is primarily rooted. However, Paul does not here discuss the implications of the Lord’s table for Jews, whether in Christ or not. There is no indication given here that he would have considered this exclusivity to apply to Jews in Christ as well. The Temple cult in Jerusalem is not substituted for the Lord’s Supper, only the 116

Cf. 3.1.2 above.

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tables of demons are substituted. Participation in the altar in Jerusalem and in the table of the Lord is complementary as, decisively, the God of Israel is honoured at both. 7.3.6 Pa/nta e1cestin: 1 Cor. 10.23–11.1 Having established by way of a double argument that participation in temple meals is impossible for Christ-followers, Paul turns to aspects of everyday life in which questions concerning food offered to idols might arise. Ciampa and Rosner note that the ‘two particular contexts he discusses are the two easiest and most innocent ways to come into contact with idol food’.117 Commentators are in wide agreement that the issues addressed here were raised by the Corinthians, and that the phrase pa/nta e1cestin is a slogan quoted by Paul.118 The slogan may not even have been created by the Corinthians but it may well be a phrase located in the context of Greek or Roman sacrifices at the point where a priest, through touching the offered meat left over after the deity has had its share, declares it profanum, which means the deity has released it for human consumption.119 Whatever the precise details, the guidance Paul provides here relates to situations that are even less clear than those related to participating in public temple meals. The passage creates some difficulties in that Paul here seems to contradict himself in allowing what he seems to categorically have forbidden in chs 8 and 10.14-22.120 The question is whether Paul here actually does argue that Christ-followers are in principle free to eat idol food, as seems to be implied by some interpreters, and that only the sunei/dhsiv of the ‘other’ restrains his/her liberty to do so.121 This includes the question (as in relation to 1 Corinthians 8) of whether the main focus of the argument is concern for the well-being of the other (in this case it would be a polytheistic shopkeeper or host122) as Ciampa and Rosner argue.123 Although this seems to be implied by v. 24 and later again by vv. 32-33, the fact that the ‘other’ here is a polytheistic/gentile host raises some questions. The slogan pa/nta e1cestin is commonly translated as ‘All things are lawful.’ This suggests that inherent to this term is a critique of or even a reference to freedom from the law generally. Although Thiselton notes that the term does not explicitly indicate this, he still confirms that this is an adequate translation since it implies ‘that which the law no longer prohibits’.124 However, there is no reference here to the law – the term should rather be 117 Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 487. 118 For references cf. Thiselton 2000: 461; Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 484. 119 Cf. above p. 000. 120 Cf. e.g. Räisänen 1983: 2–5. 121 Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 493. 122 Arguments to perceive the informer to be a polytheist have been advocated by Origen, Contra Celsum 8.21 and Chrysostome, 1 Cor. Hom. 25.2; cf. Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 492. 123 Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 485. 124 Thiselton 2000: 461.

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read as the equivalent to the Latin ‘licet’– so it is more appropriate in my view to translate it as ‘everything is allowed’, everything is permissible (which is actually the German translation in the revised Zurich Bible). Rather than making an assertion in relation to the Jewish law as such, Paul links the slogan with the citation of Ps. 24.1 in 10.26. The whole of creation is the Lord’s, whatever the perception of others (polytheists) might be. For a Christ-follower this is the decisive perception of everything in creation. Everything is part of God’s good creation. There is thus nothing inherently negative in any food or animal, etc., nor (one might infer) in the societies or cultures of the nations. Paul here presents an open door to the acceptance of non-Jewish identity (including cultural practice) in Christ. Traditionally this slogan and Paul’s confirmation of it have been seen as evidence of a so-called law-free gospel. This interpretation is based on a number of presuppositions, one of which is the perception of the envisaged addressees. If, as I have argued above, the key problems addressed arise from issues that emerge for former God-fearers who have now joined the Christ-movement, then Paul does not here confirm a universal slogan for all Christ-followers, but a slogan which emerged in a particular context in relation to specific issues of life-changing behaviour for Christ-followers from the nations. Jews, whether in Christ or not, accustomed to live in a non-Jewish context, would have been embedded in Jewish culture and accustomed to negotiating their specific identity in the practicalities of life within this context. Former polytheists, including God-fearers, would have been in quite a different position. Abstaining from activities involving polytheistic cult practices would have been difficult to negotiate for people whose former life was permeated with them. These practices, formerly part of their ‘habitus’, now constitute problems for them as Christ-followers, and they have to learn the subtle negotiation of boundaries between worshipping the one God and what now is perceived as idolatry. (The freedom referred to in 10.29 rather than being a freedom from the law in my view actually refers to freedom from the power and bondage of idols.) There are obviously situations in which these boundaries are not clear. Peter Tomson proposes reading this passage as dealing with issues of idol food in doubtful cases. He argues that the most likely scenario is ‘food of unspecified nature in a pagan setting’.125 Whilst chs 8 and 10.14-22 deal with situations in which there is no doubt as to whether or not the food involved would be considered consecrated to a deity (although Paul emphasizes that the Christfollowers’ perspective would classify such food as offered to demons), the situations envisaged in 10.23-11.1 are decisively different. Whether or not the food is to be considered as consecrated to a deity or not is a matter of discernment in each of these cases. Tomson points out that Paul’s way of arguing is similar to some later Rabbinic traditions concerning situations that are not specified by a particular Torah regulation. This is where arguments for the respective situation need to be developed. Examples of such procedures are also found 125

Tomson 1990: 208.

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in the Church Fathers, as in a case pointed out by Tomson. The issue of idol food was still an issue in the fourth and fifth centuries as polytheistic cults were the common cultic context for both Judaism and emerging Christianity in the Roman Empire. Augustine discusses the example of a hungry Christian traveller who finds food along the road in the vicinity of the statue of a deity. If it is obvious that the food has been involved in cult as an offering, ‘Augustine rules, it is better to die a good Christian than eat and sin’.126 But particularly when the status of the food is unclear, Augustine maintains that it ‘may be eaten out of necessity without any scruple of conscience’ (‘Si ergo certum est esse (sc idolothytum) melius Christiana virtute respuitur. Si autem vel non esse scitur vel ignoratur, sine ullo conscientiae scrupulo in usum necessitatis’ [Ep 47.6]).127 Significantly, Chrysostom advocates an almost identical stance. Despite his strong anti-Judaizing polemic, he maintains the prohibition of the consumption of blood, strangled meat and idol food. At the same time he allows for the consumption of food that is not explicitly declared to have been involved in sacrificial practice if bought in the market or offered in a private home. What renders the food non-consumable in such cases is not the food itself but the awareness in the mind of someone selling the food or participating in the meal.128 These two examples from the Church Fathers indicate that in a context which had some similarities to the Corinthians’ in terms of the provenance of food sold in the marketplace and in relation to living among a polytheistic majority, this Pauline passage points to an interpretive practice and application similar to those found in early Rabbinic literature. These are strong indications that Tomson’s proposal is very plausible. After having clearly established that Christfollowers cannot eat idol food and hence have to abstain from participating in temple meals, Paul needs to clarify the application of this principle in doubtful cases: ‘what should a Christian who subscribes to the prohibition of idol food do with food of which he does not know the status in a pagan environment?’129 Paul’s short answer is ‘[D]o not ask.’ This sounds a bit like the German slogan ‘Was ich nicht weiss macht mir nicht heiss,’ and could be understood as turning a blind eye. However, Paul’s reference to the thoughts of either the shopkeeper or the host clearly indicates the heart of the problem: involvement in polytheistic cultic rituals does not relate to the nature of the food itself; it remains what it is – food emerging from God’s good creation, hence God is the only one who should be addressed in thankfulness before consuming the meal. The food as such is not inherently affected or contaminated by the ritual in which it was involved, so it can be consumed in a non-sacrificial context provided the blessing over the food is offered to the One God. But when it is declared as food that has been involved in polytheistic cultic rituals, consumption is excluded for Christfollowers whether they are Jews or from the nations. 126 127 128 129

Tomson 1990: 184. Quoted in Tomson 1990: 185 n. 189. Tomson 1990: 182. Tomson 1990: 209.

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Paul is careful to clarify that this knowledge does not of course change the perception of the food for the Christ-follower (for whom idols do not exist, but are at the most lesser demons that are wrongly worshipped as deities) but would affect how the Christ-follower is seen by the shopkeeper or the host. Although the food itself is still not the problem, the awareness of the shopkeeper/host changes the situation decisively. The Christ-follower, in buying or eating food which had been explicitly declared to be idol food, would be seen to be buying or eating it in full awareness of this, and hence consenting to the respective cult practice. To be seen as participating in or consenting to a cult by eating food that had been declared as offered to a deity is the decisive step that constitutes the crossing of the boundary to idolatry. The argument here is actually coherent with the argument in chs 8 and 10.14-22: to be seen to be participating causes others, ‘weaker’ brothers/sisters or polytheistic shopkeepers and hosts, mistakenly to consider such practice as acceptable for Christ-followers. The confusion in the impression others get from this or that behaviour causes the problem. Thus it is not the intention of the practitioner but the effects his/her activity has that are decisive here. For an individual knowingly to participate in such practices, at the temple table or in more private contexts, would have implications for the wellbeing and holiness of the community. In the first instance, the public temple context outlined above, this is an insider issue because a brother/sister would be harmed; in the second, it is an insider/outsider issue because non-Christfollowers, non-Jewish or Jewish, would get a distorted view of the e0kklh/sia as not exclusively devoted to loyalty to the One God. The e)kklhsi/a is called to live in all aspects of their lives to the honour and glory of God. As in Greek and Roman cult, the key aspect of the communicative act of sacrifice is honouring the deity as the giver of life and well-being. For polytheists, this implied honouring numerous deities who were responsible for diverse aspects of life and well-being. For Jews, and now also for Christ-followers from the nations, such honour was due only to the God of Israel. It is this exclusive loyalty that matters most as Paul summarizes ei1te ou)n= e)sqi/ete ei1te pi/nete ei1te ti poiei=te pa/nta ei)v do/can qeou= poiei=te (‘So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God’, 10.31). The guiding parameter in relation to e1cestin is the do/ca qeou=. The members of the e0kklh/sia tou= qeou= have to negotiate what exactly this entails within the cultural contexts in which they live. This includes aspects of Greek and Roman and other ways of life that do not challenge the do/ca qeou= and the exclusive loyalty demanded of Christ-followers. Hence the liberty of the Christ-followers in the contexts assumed here is not constrained by the shopkeeper or host; as Paul notes ‘Why should my liberty be subject to the judgement of someone else’s consciousness?’(10.29). The limitation of freedom is set by the do/ca qeou=. The concern in this passage is not the shopkeeper or host but the do/ca qeou=. Relationships with outsiders are important in as much as they impinge on this central concern (10.32-33). The concern for the other, who in this passage is an outsider, has to be seen not as an independent ethical concern but as clearly rooted in the concern for the do/ca qeou=. The shopkeeper and host are primarily relevant for their perception of the e0kklh/sia. The life

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of the community should be seen as to honour the do/ca qeou= in holiness. The template to follow (not copy) is Christ himself.130 7.3.7 Centre stage: the glory of God In the three passages I have chosen to discuss here, Paul’s different ways of arguing were analysed in detail. Whereas in 1 Corinthians 8 the focus of Paul’s argument against participation in public temple meals is the concern for the brother/sister who might draw wrong conclusions and be tempted to perceive him/herself as actually eating food offered to idols, Paul in 10.14-22 provides an additional argument, which this time clarifies that even though the ‘knowledgeable’ are correct in their perception that there are actually no other deities, there is still no way that they can participate in temple meals. Although there is agreement between the knowledgeable and Paul that there are no ‘idols’, and hence their participation in temple meals cannot be classified as straightforward idolatry, Paul considers fellowship with demons, if not in the same category as idol worship, nevertheless a ‘category’ confusion in that lesser beings are worshipped as deities, something that is ruled out when one participates in the table of the Lord. The line of argument is different in both cases but the focus of the argument is identical in my view: in both Paul is concerned with the effects an action has on others. These effects have direct implications not only for the individuals concerned but for the integrity of the community as the body of Christ and its holiness. This is also Paul’s key concern in 1 Cor. 10.23–11.1: the Christ-follower’s perception of the food from the marketplace or at the table of the polytheistic host is of minor significance compared to the view outsiders might get through the action (not the conviction) of a member of the e0kklhsi/a; this would impinge on the perception not of this individual but of the community as a whole. Paul links this perception clearly to the glory of God. The e0kklhsi/a’s reputation is seen as threatened not by wrong convictions but by ambiguous practice, whatever its rationale. Hence Paul’s summary of the detailed exemplary advice in 1 Cor. 8, 10.14-22 and 10.23-11.1 about practices rooted in the culture of the nations focuses on the e0kklhsi/a tou= qeou= and its role at the dawn of the age to come. It is not the conviction or inner self awareness of the individual Christ-follower that is the decisive parameter for life in the e0kklh/sia, but the community as a whole in its internal and external relationships. The identity of Christ-followers from the nations can only emerge as a communal identity negotiated within their existing cultural context clearly centred around the do/ca qeou=, the glory of the God of Israel. Which aspects of the cultures of the nations contribute to the glory of God has to be negotiated and evaluated in each case in relation to the Jewish perception of this glory in the light of the Christ-event. Although this clearly links the nations’ identity in Christ to the Jewish symbolic and social world, value is attributed to the cultures of the nations in so far as their practices do not stand in opposition to but contribute to the glory of God. 130

Cf. Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 137–54.

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7.4 Cult Practice: ‘Loss and Gain’ in Translation The all-permeating presence of cults rendered cultural translation in this realm and language difficult for the cult-less e)kklhsi/ai of God in Christ. Although the practice of cults and their rituals provided an aspect of life with which all living under Rome were very familiar, and thus seems to be an ideal ‘bridgebuilding’ area, this is only the case in a limited sense. The language of cult and ritual, including concepts of purity and holiness, would of course have been very familiar to the addressees of Paul’s letters. However, the call to Christ led to the formation of e)kklhsi/ai, which were in no way set up in competition with cult groups as Edwin Judge has convincingly demonstrated.131 These communities were called to dissociate themselves from any cultic activities that related to deities as they had known them, and to which Jews like Paul referred to as idols or demons. Whilst this rendered them similar to Jews, who also did not participate in any such cult activities (although the definitions were not always as clear as it might seem), the relationship of these people from the nations to the Temple cult in Jerusalem was unclear to say the least. This was a focal point for Jews living in the Diaspora, to which they contributed financially in support of the cult practice there, thus participating if only indirectly in the cult, and which in their narrative continued to play an important role, even if they were not able to integrate related practice into their everyday lives. Jewish everyday life in the Diaspora was certainly permeated with some forms of thanksgiving and ritual gestures and prayers, but nothing seems to have come close to the function cult practice had for their polytheistic neighbours. This was rendered easier by two aspects that were part of their tradition already – their narrative enabled them to remember a time when they were far away from the cult centre of their lives, in Babylonian exile, and nevertheless had not been forgotten by their God; and the fact that cult practice in the form of sacrifices was only supposed to be performed at the Temple in Jerusalem distanced such practice from everyday life in most places in Judaea and Galilee. Thus, without being cult critical, Jewish everyday life was organized primarily in remembering rather than in performing cult practice. Centred around teaching and learning, prayer and communal meals, it thus provided the template of community life for these e)kklhsi/ai tou= qeou=. This was a strange world for former polytheists, who possibly had some understanding of associations of all kinds, including philosophical schools, but hardly any analogy from within their contexts that would easily have enabled them to understand the implications of being loyal to only one God. The issue of cult was important and all-permeating as we have seen above. It left an enormous vacuum in their lives. Paul’s arguing in 1 Corinthians, especially in 10.14-21, appears to be an attempt to help these Christ-followers to come to terms with this strange situation. I have not been able to draw out here the implications this had for them in terms of kinship and other social relations. To fill this 131

Judge 2003.

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enormous gap with any association with the Temple cult in Jerusalem would not have been straightforward, and seems to have been of great concern for Paul. It is evident that the centre of Paul’s world was Jerusalem (Rom. 15.19) including its Temple, and he seems concerned to establish or maintain some bond between Jerusalem and the e)kklhsi/ai he had founded. His collection for ‘the poor among the saints in Jerusalem’ appears to serve that purpose and is mainly interpreted as a fundraising exercise in support of people in need, to alleviate poverty. As such it certainly would have been an important act and sign of solidarity with Jerusalem. I wonder whether this interpretation takes the issue of the cult vacuum for Christ-followers from the nations seriously enough. Could it be that Paul’s use of cultic language in Rom. 15.16, and the enormous emphasis he puts on this issue in the Corinthian correspondence, had something to do with an attempt to establish a link for these e)kklhsi/ai from the nations with the centre of the cult for the God of Israel, the Temple in Jerusalem? This would have caused problems at various levels, although most likely not so much with Jews, Christ-followers or not. Longenecker has demonstrated that Paul could not have been concerned with the reception of the collection by the Christ-followers in Judaea since according to Gal. 1.10 it was actually agreed that Paul would get the e)kklhsi/ai from the nations to ‘remember the poor’. There could have been issues with non-Christ-following Jews who might have rejected financial contributions from outsiders, but this was not generally considered a problem, as the financial support of non-Jews to synagogues and possibly also to some activities in the Temple demonstrates. Although non-Jews could not finance an offering directly, they could contribute to or sponsor a sacrifice offered by a Jewish person.132 However, financial transactions related to cult and temples were under Roman control and any attempt to transmit funds to an institution unauthorized by Rome would have been considered illegal and suspicious. If Paul had any link with the Temple in mind, his anxiety (Rom. 15.31) would become more understandable. I can only raise the question here without being able to pursue it further in this study, but the lack of any link to Temple cult would have constituted a significant issue for Christ-followers from the nations before 70 ce. The argument that cult-related language and practice would have provided Paul with an ideal means of ‘cultural translation’, in that it would lead to immediate understanding of what he intended to communicate, has proven to be more complex than is generally assumed. Although it was a realm permeating the lives of all peoples under Roman domination, the implications of specific practices were diverse, and it is questionable whether community formation was among the effects of cult practice. Many cult practices certainly perpetuated social and political hierarchies and many cults, particularly those of the dominating Roman power, reinscribed dominating structures and were 132 Cf. discussions about the possibility of non-Jewish participation in the Temple cult. I consider Schwartz’s argument that direct participation for non-Jews was not possibly convincing; however, this does not rule out some indirect involvement, as noted above. Cf. Schwartz 1992a; in contrast Krauter 2004.

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used in support of imperial power. Judaism did and did not fit into this realm. There is a similarity here with the notion of the translation of their Scriptures into Greek. Similarly, they did and did not play the game of their imperial rulers with regard to cult practice. They did offer sacrifices in their Temple on behalf of the emperor and his family, but this was done on their terms not Rome’s. Given the absence of cult practice in most of their everyday lives, over the centuries Jews had developed identity-shaping practices that differed from those of their neighbours. They were not embedded in these all-permeating practices that reinscribed hierarchies socially and ideologically in terms of those in power. This distance from the cult practices of their neighbours, together with their alternative narrative, provided Jews with powerful means of maintaining their particular identity within overwhelmingly different power structures and ideologies. The Christ-followers from the nations were called into this socially distinct and symbolically alternative world through Christ. The cult practices they were accustomed to and embedded in, rather than being helpful, most likely complicated the understanding of the implications of the gospel for them. In trying to build a bridge for them Paul possibly contributed to significant confusion in the e)kklhsi/ai he founded, assuming they might understand what for Diaspora Jews was self-evident, that it was perfectly possible to live everyday life in the realm of the God of Israel without daily cult practices as these were performed on behalf of all Israel in the Temple in Jerusalem. The e)kklhsi/ai, being modelled somehow on the template of Diaspora synagogues, could thus in no way have been perceived by Paul as alternatives to cult groups or to any form of cult practice. However, it seems that he had not quite taken into account what a radical step was requested from these Christ-followers from the nations. To leave them without any connection to any cult practice was almost inconceivable, certainly from a pre-70 perspective. Paul seems to be aware of this to some extent. At least he tries to provide some translation of this radical step in the world of these Christ-followers from the nations via his explanation of the incompatibility of the table of the Lord and the tables of demons. Significantly, he does not draw a parallel between the altar in Jerusalem and the table of the Lord. There is no parallelization of sacrifices here, but only of the table fellowship that takes place after the offering to the divine is completed. Only this aspect of the cult practice is relevant to Paul’s explanation here. The Lord’s table is thus not a substitute for the sacrifice on the altar in the Temple in Jerusalem. Paul does not address the implications this might have had for Christfollowers from the nations here. Spiritualization of cult practice was a very unlikely option in a context where the relationship to the divine was not merely a dimension of the ‘inner man/woman’ but required some kind of ‘contact’ zone through offerings, be it at as remote a place as Jerusalem. The process of cultural translation, the negotiation of meaning in this realm seems to have been difficult to say the least. Paul tries to be helpful, but whether the communication was successful from his perspective remains

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uncertain. In the rapidly changing context after 70 ce, the spiritualization of cult language seems to have become the preferred option of interpreting Paul’s letters. The interpretation of the Christ-event in cultic terms certainly was nurtured through this change of circumstances. All who related to the God of Israel had to come to terms with the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and the cessation of any cult practice. But as with the destruction of the First Temple, this did not fundamentally affect their trust that their God had not forsaken them. For Jews, and for Jews of the Diaspora in particular, the Temple cult in Jerusalem had been and now continued to be an issue of text-related imagination, and now in hope of its restoration. Although the loss of the Temple was significant, in terms of everyday practice possibly little had changed.133 For Christ-followers the challenge was similar and different. If the relation to the Jerusalem Temple for those from the nations had not been clarified before 70 ce, this most likely added to their ambiguity in that respect. Paul’s cultic language and guidance with regard to cult practice might have contributed to the eventual substitution theology. With the loss of the actual connection to the Temple cult in Jerusalem, a ‘loss’ in translation might have been stimulated, which Christ-followers eventually might have seen as their ‘gain’. Thus circumstances and subsequent interpretation of Pauline texts in relation to particular contexts possibly contributed to ways that parted rather than a vision of Paul which saw such separation as the result of his call to be an apostle/go-between to the nations. In his activities and letters he tried to relate the worlds of Israel and the nations to each other as he does with his guidance in terms of cult practice. The table of the Lord was thus not a substitute for the altar in Jerusalem. The linking tie was Christ, who in Paul’s vision united Israel and the nations in a peace nurtured by mutual empowerment rather than imperial domination, not for the glory of one or the other people, or one or the other way of life, but in, with and through their diversity, for the glory of God.

133

Cf. the contributions in Levine and Schwartz 2009: 163–265.

Chapter 8 Theologizing in the Space-Between In exemplary form we have sketched out implications of reading the Pauline discourse in the light of contemporary theories of bilingualism and biculturalism. It has been demonstrated that Paul can be seen as someone who was familiar with more than one cultural, ethnic and linguistic world. In this he was not unique. The diversity of peoples and cultures interacting and communicating with each other in the first century ce in the context of the Roman Empire rendered this a widespread normality for many people.

8.1 Biculturalism, Bilingualism and Diversity in the First Century ce Informed by recent insights in sociolinguistic and sociological studies into bilingualism and biculturalism, I argued that such interaction and communication across cultural, ethnic and linguistic boundaries did not lead to a diminished awareness of differences between cultures, or a fusion of ethnicities and languages in the vein proposed by the paradigms of Hellenism or, more recently, hybridity. This does not imply that cultures, peoples and languages are sealed entities, immune against mutual influence or impact. Such influences are considered normal; actually they are the default setting where cultures, peoples and languages are in contact over a period of time of any length. Although paradigms of fusion appear to be ideal tools for analysing such interactions, it has been argued that they are actually of little heuristic value for an analysis of intercultural interaction in antiquity (chapter 2). The acknowledgement that cultures, peoples and languages influence each other where they are in contact does not provide any significant insights into issues pertaining to identity formation and belonging, or into the context and meaning of the respective influence. The material and literary evidence for bilingualism and biculturalism in antiquity encourage the exploration of the potential of the paradigm of biculturalism/bilingualism for an analysis of intercultural interaction in general, and with regard to the early Christ-movement in particular. It has emerged in this study that a number of insights from contemporary research into bilingualism/ biculturalism are of specific importance in this respect. It has been demonstrated that one person is able to master more than one language and similarly to a

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vast extent more than one culture without fusing or confusing these in their peculiarity and difference (3.2). However, for most bilinguals/biculturals different languages or cultures, even when they have been embedded in these from a very early age, do not all have the same primacy in terms of their emotional and identity-forming aspect. Although research in this area of bilingualism/biculturalism is in its infancy, studies show that most bilingual/bicultural people have a sense of primary affiliation to one of the different languages, cultures and ethnic affiliations with which they are in contact (3.2.5). The arguments for such a primary sense of belonging or identification are supported by Bourdieu’s theory of ‘habitus’ and social and cultural ‘fields’, which in their interaction leave a primary imprint of dispositions in people. In its durability the ‘habitus’ is not static, but it is the aspect from, and in relation to which, subsequent experiences and interactions are shaped and integrated by us as agents of our lives in social and cultural contexts. Research into bilingualism/biculturalism demonstrates that a ‘habitus’ may have imprints from more than one ‘field’ not only socially, but also linguistically and culturally. Nevertheless, if we take into account the primacy of roots, there seems to be the primacy of a specific imprint, with others closely complementing it. The primacy of particular roots and bilingualism/biculturalism are thus not seen as being in opposition to one another but as complementary. Significantly for this study, it has been demonstrated that people who are bilingual/bicultural neither have a confused self-perception nor a diminished sense of belonging. The suspicion that translators and cultural negotiators are traitors1 or have a split personality (3.2.5) was perpetuated well into the twentieth century and led to terrible cultural and, at times political, impositions of linguistic and cultural assimilation. What recent research does demonstrate is that bilingual and bicultural people do have an enhanced sense of differences, sensitivity for small and seemingly negligent peculiarities of cultures, and a clear awareness that cultural codes and encyclopedias differ even where identical terminology is used. The diverse cultural associations of identical words in British, American and Australian English are only one example of this. This has led us to consider the peculiarity of the use of one particular language as a ‘lingua franca’. Contemporary research focuses mainly on the use of English here, and conclusively demonstrates that in this use, in distinction from what has been assumed about the use of Greek in the first century ce, the language adapts to the culture and identity of the people who use it, and not the other way round. It is not the language which imposes its meaning system, cultural codes and encyclopedias on the users, but the language is adjusted by its users to their social and symbolic universe (3.3). What emerged from the discussion of these aspects of culture, language and identity is the insight that the sense of belonging or ethnic identity are not identical with language or culture, but rather that cultural and linguistic features 1 As is indicated by the linguistic link between traduttore (translator) and traditore (traitor) in Italian – in English ‘translator’ and ‘traitor’ are also linked terms.

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are used by groups to delineate their sense of belonging, that is, their collective identity. Ethnic identity, culture and language are interwoven in a complex interplay, but no cultural or linguistic feature in and of itself is the decisive aspect of a group’s sense of belonging. I consider Floya Anthias’ emphasis on the decisive significance of a shared narrative of belonging to be crucial to the study of intercultural interaction and collective identity formation for the period in question, combined with the commonly named aspects of what constitutes ethnic identity (3.1.3), but most crucially with a focus on the role of shared practice as embedded in the shared narrative. Thus three aspects from contemporary studies into bilingualism/biculturalism have emerged as of particular significance for the study of cultural, ethnic and linguistic diversity in the Roman Empire of the first century ce: (1) the enhanced awareness of, and sense for, difference of bilinguals/biculturals; (2) the primacy of roots in combination with the embodiment of more than one language and culture; (3) the adaptation of a lingua franca to the social and symbolic universe of the language users. These three aspects, in conjunction with the centrality of a shared narrative and shared practice as focal dimensions of collective identity or a sense of belonging, informed our reading of Paul and his activity among people from the nations.

8.2 The Narrative and Practice of Belonging Although Paul is the focus of this study, he is not seen as an individual in the first instance but as part of groups of various kinds.2 His primary ‘habitus’ has been identified as having been formed, and continued to be embedded, in the Jewish social and symbolic universe of pre-70 ce Judaism. Writing in Greek, Paul explicitly identifies himself with another linguistic tradition, Hebrew, and with one of the tribes within the people Israel, Benjamin. This in and of itself is evidence that he is bilingual/bicultural, and his references indicate his awareness of respective differences. As a Greek-speaking Jew, Paul was part of a tradition of Greek Judaism, which had developed over two to three centuries in the aftermath of the Greek conquest. Similar to the modern context, this tradition is an excellent example of the use of a lingua franca by a group of people in accordance with their own tradition of belonging. It has been demonstrated that in this tradition, although the game of acculturation was played, it was played in a way which enabled its participants to maintain and express their particular collective identity in distinction from (not against) the identity-shaping traditions of other peoples. The Greek language was used according to the narrative of belonging of the Jewish people whether in a highly polished and proficient way, as by Philo, or not, as in the LXX. The cultural codes and encyclopedias expressed in Greek were those of the Jewish tradition. The traditions of this people evidently imprinted themselves on the language, and not the other way 2 See Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 35–62.

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round. Although it was not a different language that was used, and no specific Jewish-Greek sociolect was created, the language was used in a particular way that differed from other uses. Words acquired particular meanings, were used with particular emphases, or were used in a way, which may have seemed strange when compared with their general use (6.6).3 The peculiarities of this language use, the cultural codes and encyclopedias it transmitted could only be understood in the context of the entire narrative and practice of this tradition. Detached from this symbolic and social universe of meaning the language itself could not generate the meaning it had in the context of the Jewish narrative of belonging and its interpretive traditions. The context and the narrative in its Greek translation were inherently intertwined and although they could be separated linguistically, they could not be separated in terms of the web of Jewish tradition of which it was part. This was the narrative of belonging of a people who could accommodate to the cultural contexts in which they lived, but their collective identity was not accommodated to the collective identity of their neighbours and ‘hosts’. Cultural features of Greece and Rome or other peoples may or may not have been integrated into the traditions of belonging by the Jews, but they were integrated into and imprinted by the Jewish collective identity. Thus the identity-shaping issue is not whether or not Jews used the Greek language, knew Plato, used Greek or Egyptian pottery, or built their synagogues in the style of the respective region or period; the decisive factor is that they did all of these things as Jews, integrating them into their way of life, and their understanding of the ‘world’. In this vein the Greek language was used to express the Jewish identityshaping narrative of belonging as an alternative discourse, which enabled those who belonged to this people and its narrative tradition and respective practices to accommodate to, but more importantly to distance themselves from, the totalitarian impacts of the dominating social, political and ideological discourses of their rulers (6.2 and 6.3). The Jewish Greek discourse was a prime example of the power of a subjugated people to accommodate to and distance themselves from dominating power claims, if not in the political realm then in the realm of their own communities and in their alternative narratives of belonging which rendered meaning to their lives. The significance of the latter should not be underestimated, particularly in contexts where open resistance against domination is not possible. It empowers people to remain active agents of at least parts of their lives.4 To be able to see and understand the ‘world’ differently from the perception of a subjugating power is a powerful survival strategy as, for example, trauma therapy demonstrates (6.3). 3 See also Joosten’s analysis of eu)loge/w (2011b), and Rajak’s reference to the use a3giov (2009: 166–67) The project of the translation and creating a dictionary of the LXX is of great significance for further research into the Pauline letters informed by the paradigm proposed here. 4 This was the significance of the garden for Nelson Mandela during the twenty-seven years of his imprisonment and also explains the importance of the poem ‘I am the Captain of my Soul’ for him during these years.

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Paul’s embeddedness in the tradition of Greek Diaspora Judaism is recognized widely. The significance of this is mainly seen as enabling Paul to relate meaningfully to the cultural context of the Christ-followers from the nations – since it is presumed that the shared language inherently implies shared cultural features – and thus to facilitate unproblematic understanding between conversation partners. In the light of the paradigm proposed here, Paul was embedded in Western Diaspora Judaism. But, as demonstrated above (6.2 and 6.3), this is a specifically Jewish Greek tradition, a tradition of resistance to the dominating imperial discourse rather than mere accommodation to it. Paul’s primary rootedness in this tradition means that he communicated the message of the gospel infused with the meaning of the Greek Jewish discourse from which this gospel emerged. The framework of meaning and understanding for Paul is the Greek Jewish social and symbolic universe. This is the context of his life and activities, this is the context of his letters written in Greek. As long as Paul communicates within the Jewish Greek world of the Diaspora, he can presuppose familiarity with this world on the part of his conversation partners. But as soon as the communication moves beyond the Jewish social and symbolic universe, the Greek language may be as problematic as it might have been helpful in the process of ‘translating’ the message of the gospel into the world of the nations. Similar to cult practice, where shared features certainly resonate with the examples to which Paul referred (7.3), the ‘cultural’ translation of the gospel into the world of people from the nations, despite using a shared lingua franca, did not necessarily lead to direct or easy understanding. ‘Loss’ and ‘gain’ were most likely part of this process, as they are in any linguistic or cultural translation process. The use of the Greek language opened the message of the gospel to cultural codes and encyclopedias which differed from those of the ‘world’ within which it was rooted. Aspects of this mainly Greek and Roman, possibly also Galatian, world must have been taken seriously by Paul if he was serious in his argument that people from the nations must ‘remain as they are when called’ (1 Cor. 7.20).5 There must have been room to integrate aspects of their social and symbolic world, aspects of their identity, into the realm of Christ. I think Paul encouraged such integration, as is evident in Phil. 4.8-10 and 1 Thess. 5.21. Which aspects of Paul’s letters and Greek terminology might have resonated precisely with which aspects of the world of the Christ-followers from the nations has been researched widely with regard to the world of thought, complemented more recently with studies which focus on the resonance of Paul’s language with imperial ideology. This is certainly valuable and I do not doubt that for some of Paul’s audience, and certainly for later generations of Christ-followers from the nations, the philosophical dimension became important. I doubt, however, that Paul thought primarily in philosophical terms. For members of the elite, aspects of Greek paidei/a and Roman humanitas certainly resonated with Pauline terminology and ways of arguing. But such elitist discussions only seem to be emerging in the second 5

Campbell 2011.

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century, with apologetic literature directing attention to links between aspects of the gospel and philosophical debates. This particular conversation of the Church Fathers and Greek and Roman philosophers thus emerged from a specific need in a particular context. It is a specific translation process rather than the only possible, or inherently necessary, translation of the gospel into the world of the nations. It is certainly a legitimate dimension of this process whether Paul would have envisaged it or not, and as such it can be considered a ‘gain’ in the translation of the gospel into the world of Greek paidei/a and Roman humanitas. Problems arise only when this particular translation is claimed to be the only and universally applicable way of relating the gospel to the world of the nations.6 The criterion for what aspects could and could not be integrated into the realm of Christ, for Paul, was Christ himself, rather than any other parameter. The element of subversion in Paul’s language and discourse, to which scholars like Georgi, Horsley and Elliott have drawn attention, is decisively indebted to the Jewish Greek resistance discourse. This narrative tradition of belonging is what frames and shapes all aspects of Paul’s understanding of the Christevent. Rather than only emerging with the Christ-event, it has been argued that the understanding of the Christ-event actually emerges from this alternative tradition. This narrative dimension is intertwined with, and complemented by the aspect I consider shaped most decisively the everyday life and identity of peoples in the empire, namely cult and ritual practice. The two aspects, the Jewish narrative world and the world of cult and practice cannot be separated and are considered to be the decisive aspects of Paul’s activities of translating the gospel into the world of the nations. In light of the paradigm for reading Paul proposed here, any attempt to emphasize one dimension involved in this translation process, Jewish, ‘Greek or barbarian’, at the expense of the other, is inadequate. All of these dimensions are interlinked in clear recognition of the differences of the respective collective identities. Through these differences the expression and reception of the gospel was shaped – in and with the respective particular cultural codes and encyclopedias of Israel and the diverse nations. Careful and detailed attention to these diverse narratives, codes and encyclopedias is required in any analysis of Paul’s theologizing. But rather than paying attention to these particularities in isolation we need to listen to the interplay between them in order to discern ‘loss and gain’ in the translation process in which Paul the go-between was involved.

8.3 ‘To the Jew first and also to the Greek’ Paul’s focus on Christ as the parameter of life for the e)kklhsi/a has led some scholars to the conclusion that this is what actually separates ‘in Christ’ identity from Judaism, rendering it a ‘third race’7 that is ‘neither Jew nor Greek’. What 6 Diversity in perspectives has been emphasized in particular in feminist theories; see Ehrensperger 2004: 92–120. 7 Ehrensperger 2012: 124–25.

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is ‘lost’ in this perception is what Paul emphasizes far more strongly than ‘there is neither Jew nor Greek’, that is, ‘to the Jew first and also to the Greek’. If the gospel is ‘to the Jew first’ then this must first mean something within the Jewish social and symbolic universe before it is supposed to mean anything for ‘Greeks’. I am here not focusing on the salvation historical aspect of this sentence, although this is of course of equal importance. My concern here is that the meaning of the Christ event first and foremost is a meaning from within and in relation to the Jewish social and symbolic universe. The message of the gospel, that is, the understanding of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah, is a Jewish message about a Jewish life, death and resurrection. In this event the first Christ-followers saw the promises of the God to Israel confirmed, with implications for Israel which extended to the nations. But this event and its understanding are primarily embedded in the Jewish world, that is, the Jewish tradition of an alternative discourse, a discourse which enabled Jews in the Diaspora and in the Land of Israel to see the world in a light which was different from the one presented by Rome in particular. The understanding of Jesus as the Christ could not but emerge from within this tradition, that is, according to the Scriptures. Christ could not be and was not understood according to imperial ideology (although Christian understanding resonated with imperial ideology and challenged it – and in later centuries was actually accommodated to imperial ideology) but, according to the tradition of a God who had redeemed his people from slavery, continued to stretch out his hands to them and remained faithful to his promises. Paul and his colleagues understood the blessing of the promises as confirmed in Christ and via this confirmation extended also to the nations. Nothing of this hope and trust of Israel or God’s guidance for them through the Torah was rendered indifferent for Jews.8 But through Christ people from the nations were now called into an association with Israel; together with them they were called to glorify the God of Israel. Through Christ they are integrated into this Jewish narrative of belonging but as those from the nations. The Jewish roots of understanding the Christ-event are not only primary in a temporary sense, as is the theological and salvation-historical aspect of ‘to the Jews first’, but significantly in the sense of the importance of embeddedness and belonging. This is the relevance of the frequent references to the Scriptures, which in Paul’s words ‘are written for our instruction’. Any subsequent and necessary translation of the Christevent into other ‘worlds’ has to take this ‘according to the Scriptures’ seriously into account. These Scriptures are the Jewish Scriptures concerning the God of Israel and the nations, which through Christ are now also entrusted to the nations. They are ‘to the Jew first and also to the Greek’. The Christ-event can only and primarily be understood in the light of these, not the other way round. Any translation into other social and symbolic universes has to be rooted in this particular social and symbolic world. A decisive and irredeemable ‘loss’ in translation occurs when the connection to these roots is allowed to be lost. 8

Campbell 2013: 106–26.

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The understanding of the Christ-event actually depends on this connection – also for those from the nations. This connection includes not only the Jewish narrative of belonging, but also the Jewish people. In his letter to the Romans Paul seems to be trying to address an early loosening from these roots, which includes not only Jewish tradition but also the Jewish people.9 His attempts to emphasize the importance of this connection, and to establish actual ways of maintaining and strengthening it, also include the collection and its rationale. In Rom. 15.27 he emphasizes how much those from the nations owe to those in Jerusalem in terms of pneutmatikoi/ (‘spiritual things’). As those who have been called through the Spirit, this amounts to little less than their existence. This is how important the ‘Jewish connection’ is considered by Paul, and no diminishing of this is conceivable in his view, despite his emphasis that aspects of the identity of Christ-followers from the nations must be integrated into the realm of Christ. There can hardly be any doubt that Jerusalem is at the centre of Paul’s perception of the world rather than Rome.10 Those who are called from the nations cannot bypass Israel; their call is inherently linked to Israel through Christ, the dia/konov peritomh=v (Rom. 15.8). Difficulties on a significant scale for the identity of, and theologizing in, the e)kklhsi/ai arise when this is not appropriately recognized. The task of translation set for Paul in his call to the nations does not consist in the translation of words and discourses in linguistic terms, but rather in the cultural translation of the codes and encyclopedias associated with these. Since the codes and encyclopedias are those of the Jewish social and symbolic universe, a continued and continuing link with this world and its people is required for this translation process to be adequate. Although this is a decisive point for Paul, his colleagues, and all subsequent go-betweens involved in the communication of the gospel, the world of the nations is not just at the receiving end. For the translation process to be successful, Paul must relate it to aspects of the world ‘Greeks and barbarians’ are familiar with. For the message to make sense to them it must involve aspects of life which were important to them prior to their joining the Christ-movement. We have seen that Paul shows some familiarity with the dimension of cult, and makes an attempt to translate the meaning of table-fellowship in Christ with tablefellowship at temple tables. But when it comes to the translation of the narrative framework, including the Christ-event from within it, there is little evidence of a conscious link made by Paul to integrate philosophical or mythological traditions into the understanding of the Christ-event. The narrative framework is entirely Jewish, and it is the decisive means of instruction for those Christfollowers from the nations.

9 For a detailed discussion of the context of the issues discussed in Romans see Campbell 2006/2008: 121–39; 2010; 2013: 146–68; also Nanos 2012. 10 And the announced journey to the centre of the empire only serves as a stopover en route to the real goal of the journey, Spain; cf. Jewett 2007: 912–14, 923–26.

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8.4 Paul’s Theologizing: Negotiating Meaning in the Space-Between The implications of this for the understanding of the Christ-event for people from the nations, who are the main concern for Paul, are not self-evident and Paul does not present a ‘finished’ product, doctrine or template. What he does provide is a template for the ways and means in which meaning can be negotiated in ongoing processes of translation between peoples, traditions and practices. Paul’s place is seen at the crossroads, at a point on the map of life where there is more than one feasible way to go, where there is not just one way to follow in the footsteps of Christ. In this study Paul is seen as embedded in his own tradition, but as a bilingual/bicultural person who has an enhanced awareness of differences and diversity, including an enhanced ability to relate to people who are different (1 Cor. 9.19-23). As we have argued, he is thus ideally equipped to serve as a ‘go-between’ between different nations, cultures and traditions. He can serve in this capacity not because he has detached himself from any stances but because he is clearly rooted in a sense of belonging that enables him to relate to those who are and remain different. When he says it is not I but ‘Christ who lives in me’, the whole of Christ, his life, death and resurrection within his own Jewish tradition, needs to resonate for the addressees for them to get a sense of understanding. It is this Christ Paul claims to embody, in his vulnerability and brokenness, not a triumphalist pantocrator in the vein of a victorious Roman caesar. The theological meaning of the Christ-event in its Jewish embeddedness is something which needs to be ‘translated’ afresh into the world of different peoples in different contexts and times. The place at the crossroads is not a place to stay; it only provides a space en route, between places – not replacing such places. It is thus not, as in Bhabha’s theory, a third space of hybrid identity. This ‘space-between’ is not an identity space, it is not a location of identity; it is a space at the crossroads where people from different nations, cultures, languages and traditions of belonging meet. In their encounter, in a process of ‘theologizing translation’, the meaning of Christ is being negotiated.11 Theologizing is seen as a form of translation at the crossroads of peoples, cultures and traditions between people who are and remain different. It is part of the identity-shaping process in Christ, but the place of belonging is not there, at the crossroads, nor in this space-between. Paul is involved in the theologizing in the space-between. There are people of diverse identities and traditions involved in this theologizing conversation in this open space. Not all of them are members of an e)kklhsi/a. For Paul this conversation involved Jews (whether Christ-followers or not), and ‘Greeks and barbarians’ (whether Christ-followers or not), as well as Christ-followers, Jews and (in his case predominantly) ‘Greeks and barbarians’, people from the nations. 11 Arendt circumscribes such an ‘inbetween’ as ‘not tangible, since there are no tangible objects into which it could solidify; the process of speaking and acting can leave behind bo such results and end products. But for all its intangibility, this inbetween is no less real than the world of things we visably have in common’ (1958: 182–83).

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The space-between at the crossroads is the space where theologizing as translating/negotiating meaning can take place and can contribute to the identity formation of those involved – Israel and the nations, Christ-followers or not. But the place of belonging for those who join in this theologizing, translating conversation, is not there. Paul’s place of belonging is in and with his people Israel, the tribe of Benjamin, as a Hebrew of Hebrews, and as such he is participating in this theologizing at the crossroads. ‘Greeks and barbarians’ were not expected to give up being ‘Greeks and barbarians’. On the contrary, just as Jews were not expected or supposed to leave their place of belonging, neither were ‘Greeks and barbarians’. They were not expected to leave their places of belonging as ‘Greeks and barbarians’, husbands and wives, and – unacceptable from a contemporary perspective – slaves and free (1 Cor. 7.12-23). They were not expected to leave their domus or oi1kov, but as far as it depended on them, to maintain peace. In as much as the message of the gospel provides an alternative perception of the ‘world’, it is not counter-cultural wholesale, but only against dominating, subjugating and lifethreatening ideologies and practices. Christ-followers, whether from Israel or the nations, continued to live their lives in their places of belonging, except that those from the nations had to give up any relation to the deities with which they had previously been in association. They were expected to participate in the theologizing at the crossroads as ‘Greeks and barbarians’. As we have seen, Paul probably underestimated the social significance this had for Christfollowers from the nations, and how this affected their ties of belonging. Coming together as an e)kklhsi/a was expected to permeate all aspects of their lives, not to replace their previous lives entirely. There appear to be many implications of ‘belonging to Christ’ which Paul does not seem to have worked out. He only provided guidance in his letters about issues that emerged in the communities. They are fragments of theologizing at the crossroads. Paul did not set out a manual of potential implications of ‘being in Christ’, but rather expected the process of negotiating the meaning and implications of this to continue among those who are called, ‘from the Jews first and also from the Greeks’. He trusted that his role in this process would be rendered superfluous as others would mature and be able to take on leadership roles as go-betweens in the e)kklhsi/ai, that the communities would be empowered to theologize in the space-between and to translate the meaning of the Christ-event into their lives for themselves.12 Theologizing in the space-between at the crossroads does not mean copying Paul or merely repeating something he had said, but continuing the conversation of which he was part, and through his letters continues to be. His voice is certainly important in this ongoing negotiation of meaning. One emphasis of his contribution has been well received over the centuries: that is, the importance that ‘Greeks and barbarians’ be part of this conversation as Greeks and barbarians. But combined with the appreciation of this went the 12 Ehrensperger 2007/2009: 136, 189–90.

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silencing of the other voice which for Paul was of primary significance – the voice of his Jewish suggenei=v. The space-between at the crossroads became more and more a closed space, and negotiating the meaning of the Christevent became an exclusivist activity. In Paul’s time the e)kklhsi/ai were part of the Jewish symbolic universe, and perhaps also of their social universe. Paul, the bicultural go-between, probably did not see a problem with sanctified ‘Greeks and barbarians’ associating with God and his people Israel as ‘bicultural’ followers of Christ. He could not foresee that circumstances would move the e)kklhsi/ai away from this place, and that eventually the ties between Israel and the nations, church and synagogue would be severed completely. For Paul, the Christ-event did not lead to a separation. Quite the reverse: it established a firm tie between the e)kklhsi/ai tou= qeou= and his people, the Israh_l tou= qeou=, so that they would together glorify the God of Israel and the nations. This is the preamble of the theologizing conversation at the crossroads. Jews and their tradition cannot be excluded from this conversation for the translation of the gospel to be meaningful. The different contemporary identities of Jews and Christians, and their different but related narratives of belonging today, do not render obsolete theologizing at the crossroads in the space-between. This space continues to be a space of theologizing, where, in the footsteps of Paul, there should be space for all who are interested and who wish to participate in such a conversation – ‘for the Jew first and also for the Greek’.

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Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources Hebrew Scriptures/ Septuagint Genesis 141, 155 1–11 155 15.8 (LXX) 163 24.27 (LXX) 164 32.10 (LXX) 164 Exodus 141, 165 4.1 (LXX) 163 4.1-9 165 4.5 (LXX) 163 4.8 (LXX) 163 4.31 (LXX) 163, 165 18.11 127 22.21 162 34.6 (LXX) 164 36.10-13 166 Leviticus 8.16 (LXX) 202 24.22 156 Numbers 10.29 14.11 (LXX) 20.12 (LXX)

127 163 163

Deuteronomy 1.32 (LXX) 163 7.9 (LXX) 164 9.23 (LXX) 163 9.23 165 24.18 162 32.4 (LXX) 164 32.20 (LXX) 163 Joshua 24.14 (LXX)

164

1 Samuel 2.35 (LXX) 163 8 162 22.14 (LXX) 163 26.23 (LXX) 163

12.22 (LXX) 25.13 (LXX)

2 Samuel 2.6 (LXX) 15.20 (LXX)

Nehemiah 5.17 (LXX)

164 164

1 Kings 7.48 (LXX) 202 8. 23-53 155 17.1–2.13 162 2 Kings 2.13 162 8.15 155 Psalms 10.26 206 24.1 206 24.10 (LXX) 164 25.3 (LXX) 164 26.13 (LXX) 163 39.11 (LXX) 164 56.4 (LXX) 164 60.8 (LXX) 164 77.22 (LXX) 163 77.32 (LXX) 163 84.10 (LXX) 164 85.11-14 166 96 155 100.6 (LXX) 163 115.1 (LXX) 163 118.66 (LXX) 163 Proverbs 2.12 (LXX) 12.17 (LXX)

163 163

163 163

Ezra 6.21 155 202

Isaiah 1.21 (LXX) 163 1.26 (LXX) 163 2.2-4 165 2.3 155 7.9 (LXX) 163 8.2 (LXX) 163 14.1 165 14.2-9 156 17.10 (LXX) 163 25.3-10 165 28.16 (LXX) 163 29.5-8 156 34.1-4 156 38.19 (LXX) 164 43.10 (LXX) 163 49.7 (LXX) 164 53.1 165 54.10 166 56.6 155 56.7 156 58.6-10 163 60.11-16 156 65.11 (LXX) 202 Jeremiah 2.7 190 10.25 156 25.31-38 156 32.34 190 37.2 162

Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources

252

39.41 164 49.5 164 Ezekiel 20.7 190 20.30-31 190 23.38 190 34.1-10 162 41.22 202 44.16 202 47.22-23 155 Daniel 2.31-45 162 7.1-14 162 Hosea 2.22 (LXX) 163 5.1 162 Micah 4.2 155 Amos 6.1-7 162 Zechariah 2.11-12 155 Malachi 1.7 (LXX) 1.12 (LXX)

202 202

1 Maccabees 4.51 202 2 Maccabees 4.13 26 Tobit 14.6 156 14.6-7 155, 165 Wisdom 14.12 190 14.27 190

New Testament Luke 24 173 Acts 2 126 2.9-10 87 2.9-11 126 14.11 72 14.12 139 Romans 1.5 2, 165 1.6 166 1.7 123, 177 1.14 121 1.16 121 1.18–2.11 190 1.19-21 134 1.21-23 129 1.25 192 2.4 129 3.2 173 3.3 166 3.7 166 3.29 121 7.1 130, 195 9.3 117 9.24 121, 167 9.30 129 11.1 118 11.13 116 12.1 177 12.2b 167 12.11 137 12.13 167 12.20 167 14 199 14.1–15.14 158 14.13 159, 173 14.15 199 15.4 166 15.8 221 15.16 116, 211 15.19 211 15.23-26 2

15.27 221 15.31 211 16.4 16.20 120 16.26 165 1 Corinthians

13, 133, 142 1.2 123, 200 1.9 166 1.14 121 1.23 121 3.2-3 198 3.17 200 4.16 167 5.1 129 5.5 120 6.19 200 7 158 7.12-23 223 7.17-24 159 7.20 218 8 205, 208, 209 8–10 178 8.1 189 8.4 191 8.7 196 8.7-13 196 8.9 173 8.10 194, 198 8.17-22 197 9.19-23 118, 222 9.22b 154 9.24-27 200 10.11 195 10.11b 167 10.14-21 210 10.14-22 196, 200, 208, 209 10.23–11.1 205, 209, 10.26–11.1 197 10.29 208 10.31 208 10.32-33 208 11 185 11.1 167 11.2-16 193

Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources 11.27 204 12 200 12.2 190 12.31 137 14.11 121 14.12 137 14.39 137 16.19 123 2 Corinthians 1.18 166 1.20 166 6.3 139 6.16 177 7.7 137, 7.11 137 8.1 123 9.2 137, 122 9.4 122 11.2 137 11.22 118, 132 11.26 117, 134

3.5-6 120 3.7-8 120 3.17 167 4.8 138, 152, 154 1 Thessalonians 1.9 129, 131, 190 4.5 129 5.21 152, 154, 218 5.21-22 138 Pseudepigrapha Letter of Aristeas 16 190 Joseph and Aseneth 8.5 202 12.5 202

Galatians 1.2 123 1.9 2 1.10 211 1.13 119 1.13-14 119 1.13-17 119 1.14 133 1.16 112 2.3 121 2.15 120, 121, 129, 132 3.1 121 3.26-28 158 3.28 121 4.8-10 178 5.2 158 5.11 129 6.16 116

Jubilees 22.16 190

Philippians 2.1-11 159, 167 3.4-5 118 3.5 133, 134, 136

De confusion linguarum 6 123 190 123

Psalms of Solomon 17.34 123

­253

De decalogo 153 123 De ebrietate 33–40 127 193 178 In Flaccum 46 186 De Josepho 30 123 Legatio ad Gaium 8 123 83 123 145 123 162 123 De migration Abrahami 187 132 De mutatione nominum 35 123 De opificio mundi 128 123

Testament of Zebulon 9.8 123

Quod omnis probus liber sit 98 123

Ancient Jewish Literature

De plantatione 67 123 14 178

Philo De Abrahamo 136 123 De Cherubim 91 123

De providential 2.64 186 Quaestiones in Exodum 2.2 127 De specialibus legibus 1.195 186 1.211 123 2.148 176 2.165 123, 130, 190 4.120 123

254

Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources

De vita contemplativa 48 123 81 202 De vita Mosis 1.23

124, 126, 132 2.27 123 2.38 144 Josephus Antiquities 1.107 123 1.93–95 132 2.260 187 4.12 123 5.17 123 6.199 123 8.284 123 11.123 123 11.184 123 11.270 123 11.299 123 12.108–109 144 14.235 187 14.260–61 188 15.136 123 16.164 123 16.176 123 18.20 123 20.38–48 128 20.263–64 74 20.263–65 134 20.264 74 Apion 1.16 123 1.161 115 1.201 123 2.77 185 2.126 115 2.131 115 2.165 116 2.282 123, 127

Jewish War 1.3 108 1.5 107, 112 2.197 185 2.409 185 2.462–63 127 4.94–96 170 5.17 123 6.199 123 7.45 127 Ancient Christian Literature Augustine Epistulae 17.2 72 47.6 207 66.2 72 84.2 72 108.14 72 209.2 72 Epistula ad Romanos inchoate expositio 12 72 Enarrationes in Psalmos 11.32 72 Sermones 167.4 72 Johannes Chrysostomos Homilies on 1 Corinthians 25.2 205 Origenes Contra Celsum 8.21 205 Socrates Scholasticus Historia Ecclesiastica V.22 90 V.23 73

Classical Literature Aelius Aristides Panathenaic Orations 21 81 26.75 91 154 81 155 81 338 81 341 81 Augustus Res gestae 5.26 170 5.29 170 5.30 170 Aulus Gellius Noctes Atticae 17.17.1 93 20.1.39 169 Cicero De domo sua 56.143 81 109 182 In Catilinam 2.12.29 81 3.8.21 81 De Finibus 1.10 68 Pro Flacco 1–16 171 15 79 De Legibus 2.26 178 De natura deorum 1.83–84 179 1.115–16 183 3.5 181,183

Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources De re publica 3.35–37 171 Tusculanae disputations 1.1 78 1.1.2 78–79 In Verrem 4.147 67 Dio Cassius 50.24.6–25.3 98 50.27.1 98 56.34.3 112 Herodotus 2.154 74 Horatius Carmina 1.6 81 57–60 169 Livy Ab urbe condita 5.9–10 81 5.51.3–4 81 36.27.8 168 36.28.4 168 37.3.15–17 171 38.1–2 168 Lucan Pharsalia 7.270–72 80 Lucian Alexander 51 73 Ovid Fasti 3.101–104 78 Metamorphoses 185.826 98

Pausanias Periegesis Hellados 1.17.1 81 1.24.3 81 10.36.1 73 Pliny the Elder Naturalis Historia 15.5 80 28.10 183 29.26 80 35.48 80

Propertius Elegiae 3.11.33–42 98 3.21–22 81 Pseudo-Lucian De Dea Syria 31–32 84 33 84 Pseudo-Skymnos 756 26

Pliny the Younger Epistularum 4.3.5 67

Quintilian Institutiones 9.265–66 82

Plutarch Cato 12.4-5 67

Quintus Ennius Fragments 525 93

Moralia 5 80 813D–F 81

Sallustus Bellum Iugurthinum 14.19 81

Quaestiones Romanae 22 80

Servius Ad Aeneid 8.721 111

Petronius Satiricon 17.5 178 Polybius Historiography 2.7.5–6 99 2.19.3–4 99 2.32.7–8 99 3.78.2 99 3.79.4 99 6.56.13–15 169 20.9 168 20.9–10 109 20.9–12 172 20.11.20 168

Strabo 12.565 73 13.631 73 Suetonius Augustus 98 59 Claudius 42.1 68 Tacitus Agricola 4.21 66 Annales 4.74 95 14.20 80

­255

256

Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources

Germania 33.2 112,157 43.4 96 Historiae 4.84.5 180

Valerius Maximus 1.1a–b 181 2.2.2 68 6.6 170

Virgil Aeneid 1.291 169 8.688 98 8.696–700 98 12.820–40 69 12.837 69

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Index of Modern Authors Abulafia D. 20, 225, 243 Adams, J. N. 36, 63, 67, 68, 70, 71, 73, 74, 75, 225, 233 Alcoff Martin, L., 229, 241, 244 Alexander, P. 20, 225 Ameling, W. 86, 225 Anderson P. 134, 225 Ando, C. 4, 68, 91, 108, 109, 179, 225 Anthias, F. 31, 33, 34, 35, 47, 48, 49, 50, 216, 225 Antonaccio, C. M., 76, 77,225 Arendt, H. 222, 225 Ascough, R. S. 225 Assman, J. 20, 96, 225 Bachmann, M. 225, 246 Bahrani, Z. 226 Ball, W. 73, 75, 85, 95,226 Baltrusch, E. 109, 226 Barclay, J. M. G. 114, 116, 119, 134, 137, 140, 147, 146, 226 Barreto, E. D. 226 Barth, F. 49, 226 Barton, C. A. 157, 226 Barton, S. C. 226, 237 Baumgarten, A. I. 74, 144, 226 Baur, F. C. 17, 19, 23, 27, 226 Beard, M. 180, 181, 185, 226, 235 Becker, A. H. 226, 234 Becker, E. M. 6, 226 Belayche, N. 70, 179, 182, 227 Belezos, C. J. 227, 242 Bendlin, A. 177, 227 Benet-Martinez, V. 58, 227 Betts, R. F. 227 Bhabha, H. K. 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 222, 227, 236 Bichler, R. 18, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 227 Bieringer, R. 227, 228 Biernacki, R. 228

Birenboim, H. 227 Blackledge A. 54, 227 Bodel, J. P. 227 Bonnell, V. E. 228 Bons, E. 228, 238, 242, 247 Bookidis, N. 180, 181, 228 Bourdieu, P. xiv, 5, 6, 11,40,43,44,45,46,47, 48, 54, 55, 61, 66, 69, 120, 215, 228, 235, 236, 238, 239, 246, 247 Brah, A. 29, 230 Brawley, R. L. 159, 228 Brett, M. G. 226, 228 Breytenbach, C. 163, 228 Bruner, J. S. 41, 228 Buchholtz, M. 41, 228 Budick, S. 225, 228 Burke, P. 3, 8, 51, 96, 228 Burke, T. 228 Butcher, K. 228 Byrskog, S. 228, 249 Cameron, R. 228, 246 Campbell, W. S. xiii, 2, 105, 116, 118, 120, 138, 143, 158, 159, 161, 166, 172, 175, 218, 220, 221, 228, 229 Canagarajah, S. 60, 61, 229 Caputo, J. D. 229, 241, 244 Charles, R. 229 Chester, A. 127, 229 Cheung, A. T. 189, 229 Ciampa, R. E. 142, 189, 192, 193, 199, 201, 202, 205, 229 Clackson, J. 76, 229 Claussen, C. 187, 229 Cogo, A. 60, 229 Cohen, N. G. 147, 229 Cohen, S. D. 140, 177, 230 Coleman, J. E. 230

258

Index of Modern Authors

Collins, J. J. 19, 27, 28, 230, 236 Combes, A. E. 29, 230 Cotton, H. 225, 227, 230, 231, 237 Cowey, J. M. S. 230 Cronin, M. 139, 230 Crook, Z. A. 230 Crüsemann, F. 155, 230 Deines, R. 137, 229, 230, 236, 241 Dell’Acqua, A. P. 138, 144, 145, 148, 230 DeMaris, R. 176, 230 Dench, E. 66, 68, 70, 96, 99, 100, 101, 113, 115, 231 Derks, T. 77, 231, 246, 247, 249 Diaz-Andreu, G. 231 Dmitriev, S. 108, 168, 231 Dochhorn J. 135, 136, 231 Dodd, C. H. 119, 231 Donaldson T. L. 123, 124, 126, 127, 128, 143, 155, 231 Dowling F. G. 231 Droysen, G. 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 34, 36, 40, 227, 231, 241, 243, 249 Dunn, J. D. G.116, 119, 231 Eastman, S.116, 231 Eberhardt C. A. 176, 184, 201, 231, 239 Eck, W. 65, 231 Eckhard, B. 231, 234 Eco, U. 3, 232 Edrei, A. 18, 19, 113, 114, 126, 232 Edwards, J. 41, 42, 43, 50, 52, 53, 54, 55, 60, 61, 232 Ehrensperger, K. xiii, 2, 6, 8, 31, 43, 105, 106, 109, 114, 117, 118, 120, 124, 132, 133, 134, 136, 138, 139, 141, 142, 143, 144, 156, 158, 165, 166, 167, 173, 175, 177, 181, 199, 209, 216, 219, 223, 228, 232, 244, 246 Eisenbaum, P. 141, 166, 177, 232 Eliav, Y. Z. 242, 244 Elliott, N. 90, 107, 108, 125, 137, 152, 157, 161, 162, 165, 167, 168, 170, 171, 185, 219, 232 Elsner, J. 84, 85, 232

Engberg-Pedersen, T. 19, 20, 119, 137, 152, 225, 232, 241 Esler, P. F. 8, 10, 43, 117, 233 Evans, T. 96, 233 Evans, T. V. 233 Faraone, C. A. 233, 244 Ferguson, R. J. 113, 233 Ferrary, J. 233 Fewster, P. 69, 75, 233 Fishbane, M. 142, 233 Fitzgerald, J. T. 233, 238, 240 Foss, P. 182, 233 Fotopoulos, J. 189, 233 Fowl, S. 175, 233 Fraade, S. D. 186, 233 Fredriksen, P. 141, 143, 166, 177, 192, 193, 202, 233 Frey, J. 120, 133, 135, 137, 139,147, 234 Friedman, J. 33, 34, 234 Friesen, S. J. 228, 234, 244, 248 Funck, B. 26, 234, 235, 248 Gane, R. E. 178, 234 Garnsey, P. 233, 234 Gaventa, B. R. 105, 119, 234 Given, M. 234, 242 Gleason, M. 80, 92, 93, 234 Goldhill, S. 232, 234, 243 Gooch, P. D. 189, 234 Goodblatt, D. 117, 118, 234 Gordon, R. 194, 235 Gracianskaya, L. I. 235 Gramsci, A. 150, 235 Grenfell, M. 235, 241 Grenholm, C. 8, 235 Grosjean, F. 58, 235 Gruen, E. S. 99, 100, 124, 168, 170, 234, 235, 246 Gruenwald, I. 235 Gupta, N. K. 235 Gutsfeld, A. 225, 235 Haas, O. 73, 235 Haber, S. 235 Hacham, N. 235 Hahn, F. H. 235 Hales, S. 64, 225, 235, 237, 241

Index of Modern Authors Hall, E. T. 235 Hall, J. M. 50, 77, 236 Hall, K. 41, 229 Han, J. H. 236 Hanks, W. F. 236 Hardwick, L. 236 Harland, P. A. 84, 236 Harlow, D. C. 236, 238 Harrington, H. R. 177, 236 Harris, W. V. 10, 20, 65, 70, 71, 72, 73, 75, 236 Harrison, J. 81, 83, 107, 110, 152, 156, 160, 236 Harrison S. J. 236 Hays, D. 236 Hekster, O. 231, 236 Hengel, M. 5, 18, 19, 27, 28, 69, 86, 137, 230, 231, 236 Herman, J. 151, 236 Herr, M. D. 186, 236 Herzfeld, M. 10, 20, 236 Herzer, J. 229, 230, 241 Heschel, S. 154, 230, 236, 247 Hill, D. 4, 237 Hingley, R. 10, 21, 22, 47, 65, 66, 69, 71, 98, 109, 180, 237 Hodos, T. 50, 64, 225, 235, 237, 240 Hogeterp, A. L. A. 136, 176, 237 Holmberg, B. 237, 244, 249 Horbury, W. 191, 237 Horrell, D. G. 190, 193, 199, 237 Horsely, R. A, 107, 108, 137, 152, 219, 237 Horst, P. W. V. D. 237 Hoyland, R. 75, 225, 230, 231, 237 Hsia, R. P. 228 Hunt, L. A. 228 Hurst, H. 237, 247 Hurtado, L. W. 133, 237 Hutchinson, J. 50, 237 Hutton, C. 41, 237 Isaac, B. 64, 76, 84, 237 James, P. 229, 233, 242, 245, 249 Janse, M. 73, 225 Jenkins, R. 49, 237 Jervis, L. A. 29, 237

­259

Jewett, R. 133, 221, 238 Joas, H. 238 Johnson-Debaufre, M. 30, 238 Jones, C. P. 77, 99, 117, 238 Joosten, J. 145, 146, 148, 163, 217, 228, 238, 242 Joseph, J. E. 41, 42, 43, 60, 238 Judge, E. 186, 188, 193, 210, 238 Kahl, B. 90, 98, 107, 111, 120, 150, 156, 160, 238 Kaizer, T. 179, 238 Kaminsky, J. 156, 236, 238 Karrer, M. 230, 238, 239, 247 Kelly, L. C. 81, 181, 188, 238 Kittredge, C. B. 59, 238 Klawans, J. 177, 199, 238 Klingbeil, G. A. 177, 238 Klinger, E. 229, 239 Knust, J. W. 184, 239, 246 Koch, D.-A. 127, 225, 235, 239 Kögler, H. 44, 239 Kok, M. 239 Konradt, M. 226, 239 Kraabel, A. T. 127, 239 Krauter, S. 211 Krauter, T. 247 Kraus, T. J. 228, 238 Kraus, W. 230, 238, 239, 247 Krüger, R. 151, 239 Kugel, J. L. 226, 229, 239, 241 Kugelmeier, C. 74, 239 Kuhrt, A. 21, 27, 36, 66, 86, 87, 245 Kurek-Chomicz, D. A. 176, 239 Labahn, M. 231, 239, 241 Laurence, R. 233, 239 Lee, J. 227 Lee, S. 239 Lévinas, E. 3, 156, 232, 239 Levine, A. J. 10, 239 Levine, L. I. 187, 188, 193, 213, 233, 234, 235, 236, 239, 240 Levinskaya, I. 127, 191, 240 Lévi-Strauss, C. 35, 240 Lidonnici, L. 240, 245 Lieber, A. 240, 245 Liebschütz, J. 168, 169, 240

260

Index of Modern Authors

Lightstone, J. 187, 240 Lim, K. Y. 89, 193, 240 Lim, T. 135, 240 Lindsay, D. R. 161, 240 Longenecker, B. W. 159, 211, 226, 240 Lopez, D. C. 30, 89, 90, 98, 107, 110, 111, 112, 120, 122, 125, 150, 151, 155, 157, 240 MacMullen, R. 171, 240 Malherbe, A. J. 233, 240 Marchal, J. A. 29, 30, 59, 69, 107, 240 Marshall, J. W. 29, 241 Martin, D. B. 5, 17, 19, 22, 28, 117, 241 Martin, T. 241 Maton, K. 44, 241 Mattingly, D. J. 10, 20, 21, 76, 109, 110, 241 Meeks, W. A. 154, 241, 248 Meiser, M. 241 Mendels, D. 18, 19, 113, 114, 126, 232 Meuser, M. 48, 241 Meyers, C. 86, 241 Meyers, E. M. 86,241 Middleton, P. 232, 241 Milikowsky, C. 69, 134, 147, 241 Millar, F. 75, 241 Miller, M. P. 228, 246 Mitchell, M. M. 133, 241 Modood, T. 234, 247, 248 Momigliano, A. 22, 24, 87, 241 Mor, M. 234, 242 Moyer, I. S. 87, 88, 241 Mullen, A. 229, 233, 242, 245 Mutschler, B. 161, 242 Naiden, F. S. 201, 233, 242, 244 Nanos, M. D. 118, 119, 120, 132, 141, 158, 159, 161, 166, 193, 199, 221, 242 Nasrallah, L. 30, 238 Nicklas, T. 143, 242 Niebuhr, K. W. 135, 229, 230, 241, 242 Norich, A. 242, 244 North, J. 226, 235 Noy, D. 135, 191, 237, 242 Oakes, P. 242

Odgen, D. 227, 242 Olsson, B. 229, 240, 242 Osborn, E. 108, 242 Oppenheimer, A. 113, 126, 242 Owen, S. 237, 247 Papaconstantinou, A. 75, 242 Parker, R. 177, 184, 242 Pastor, R. 234, 242 Patte, D. 8, 232, 235 Pavlenko, A. 39, 40, 51, 52, 53, 54, 56, 57, 227, 242 Pernot, L. 82, 83, 243 Phua, L. R. 194, 243 Pillar, E. 137, 243 Pollefeyt, D. 227, 228 Poorthuis, J. H. M. 243, 244, 248 Porter, S. E. 142, 229, 232, 243 Portier-Young, A. E. 28, 66, 67, 90, 149, 150, 151, 162, 243 Pöschl, V. 168, 243 Prabhu, A. 30, 243 Préaux, C. 87, 243 Preston, R. 77, 78, 80, 81, 243 Price, J. J. 225, 230, 231, 237 Price, S. 226 Raaflaub, K. A. 226, 243 Räisänen, H. 205, 243 Rajak, T. 3, 114, 127, 146, 148, 154, 162, 177, 217, 243 Rebenich, S. 227, 243, 249 Reed Yoshiko, A. 226, 234 Reynolds, J. M. 127, 128, 243 Richter, D. S. 77, 243 Rickman, G. 243 Ritzer, I. 243 Rock, I. E. 68, 89, 107, 108, 137, 152, 243 Rosenberger, V. 243, 244 Rosman, M. 124, 154, 244 Rosner, B. 142, 189, 192, 193, 199, 201, 202, 205, 228, 229, 236 Roymans, N. 77, 231, 246, 247, 249 Runsesson, A. 10, 244 Rüpke, J. 183, 184, 185, 227, 235, 240, 244

Index of Modern Authors Sanders, E. P. 6, 7, 119, 133, 134, 135, 136, 244, 247 Sandnes, K. O. 139, 244 Satlow, M. 27, 28, 77, 101, 112, 244 Saurer, F. 244 Scheid, J. 183, 184, 185, 244 Schmidt-Hofner, S. 236 Schnelle, U. 228, 244 Schottroff, L. 106, 142, 158, 194, 197, 200, 201, 244 Schowalter, D. N. 228, 234, 244, 248 Schüssler Fiorenza, E. 34, 69, 244 Schwartz, B. J. 177, 200 Schwartz, D. R. 211, 213, 227, 233, 234, 235, 236, 240 Schwartz, J. 243, 244, 248 Schwartz, S. 95, 135 Scott, J. M. 123, 155, 244 Sechrest, L. L. 29,118, 245 Seesengood, R. P. 29, 30, 245 Segal, A. F. 119, 245 Seidman, N. 4, 245 Sen, A. 39, 245 Sharifian, F. 41, 42, 47, 48, 55, 60, 76, 245 Sherwin-White, S. M. 66, 86, 87, 245 Simkin, O. 94, 245 Smith A. D. 50, 237 Smith, M. 178, 245 Smith, R. R. R. 111, 245 Sommer, M. 85, 246 Sorek, S. 95, 246 Spitaler, P. 229, 242, 246 Stanley, C. D. 9, 29, 107, 122, 142, 229, 232, 238, 240, 243, 246 Stegemann, E. W. 141, 149, 246 Stegemann, W. 177, 246 Steinmetz, G. 46, 246 Stowers, S. K. 4, 161, 175, 182, 184, 246 Strecker, C. 108, 161, 168, 169, 170, 171, 246 Strobel, K. 49, 246 Stuckenbruck, L. 75, 142, 146, 149, 246 Sugirtharajah, R. S. 30, 246 Sumney, J. L. 159, 242, 246 Susen, S. 238, 239, 247 Swain, S. 36, 63, 73, 74, 225, 233, 247

­261

Tannenbaum, R. 127, 128, 243 Tcherikover, V. 86, 247 Terrenato, N. 86, 247 Thiselton, A. 199, 201, 205, 247 Thorsteinsson, R. M. 65, 112, 138, 152, 247 Tiwald, M. 136, 247 Tomson, P. 194, 206, 207, 247 Tov, E. 145, 154, 163, 164, 247 Trebilco, P. R. 127, 247 Tucker, J. B. xiii, 8, 43, 159, 193, 228, 244, 246, 247, 249 Turner, B. S. 238, 239, 247 Tuval, M. 247 Udoh, F. 230, 247 Usener, K. 145, 247 Vahrenhorst, M. 176, 177, 199, 200, 247 Van der Louw, T. A. W. 144, 247 Van der Spek, R. J. 87, 247 Van der Veer, P. 33, 247 Van Nijf, O. 94, 248 Vannini, P. 48, 248 Varhelyi, Z. 184, 239, 246 Vasunia, P. 248 Von Bredow, I. 26, 248 Von Ehrenkrook, J. 191, 248 Wagner, J. R. 142, 229, 231, 248, 249 Wallace-Hadrill, A. 10, 20, 21, 23, 25, 26, 35, 36, 39, 59, 66, 67, 68, 78, 79, 80, 92, 233, 239, 248 Walters, J. 248 Walters, J. C. 234, 248 Walz, C. A. 230 Wander, B. 248 Waskul, D. D. 48, 248 Wasserstein, D. J. 63, 64, 75, 148, 225, 230, 231, 237, 248 Weiss, Z. 227, 235, 245, 247 Weitzman, S. 248 Welborn, L. L. 137, 248 Werbner, P. 35, 234, 247, 248 Werman, C. 190, 248 White, L. M. 233, 238, 240, 246, 248 Whitmarsh, T. 83, 225, 234, 238, 248, 249

262

Index of Modern Authors

Whittacker, D. 93, 249 Wiemer, H. 21, 227, 243, 249 Wierzbicka, A. 41, 249 Wiesel, E. 151, 249 Wiesehöfer, J. 21, 22, 249 Wilk, F. 229, 231, 249 Wilson, A. 94, 249 Winter, B. W. 137, 152, 249 Wirz, U. 151, 249 Woolf, G. 9, 23, 63, 95, 96, 181, 249 Woyke, J. 126, 134, 188, 249

Yarborough, O. L. 246, 248 Yntema, D. G. 92, 93, 249 Young, R. J. C. 23, 29, 31, 33, 249

Zangenberg, J. 231, 239 Zetterholm, M. 130, 141, 166, 228, 229, 240, 242, 249