thief of fire

You don't know what paul normally means by the word. How could you possibly know? All you have is a letters written to "brothers" and "sisters". You cannot establish Paul's normal usage from this.
Just because Paul uses brother or sister to address or greet fellow believers doesn't allow us to conclude that is his normal usage. We would need to see what he uses when he talks about a real brother not a metaphorical one. So while you are lecturing others you should note your own argument is a non sequitur. It does not follow that if Paul uses "brother" to address fellow believers that this must be his normal usage.

And so, you are trying to call these letters pauls works, as if they were trhe works of Shakespeare.

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Your problem in this instance is not the christian hegemony, its a lot simpler. Its not the conspiritorial christian hegemony that stops you.

spin

As we only have his letters, they are the only evidence we have of his language usage, including you. As he uses the word αδελφος/οι over 80 times to refer to members of the religious community, we seem to have a good indication of his usage of the term. There is no evidence to the contrary. Hence my statement above regarding onus.

If you want to deny the only evidence we have, that is up to you. We judge significance by usage. It is not prescriptive. In his only surviving writings he uses the term as I have stated. The frequent usage allows us to make tentative conclusions. If you don't like them, muster some substantive evidence to the contrary.

spin

Don't be silly.

Grog

spin cited 1 Cor 9:5. Could you cite the passages you reference above? I only read brothers in that passage.

Diogenes the Cynic

The funny thing about 1 Cor. 5:9 is that, as with 1:19 it excludes the apostles and refers to them as a separate group.

I remembered this verse right after I posted above, and knew I would get called on it, but I still maintain that even this verse makes little sense except as a reference to literal siblings. It's just not credible that we should prefer an assumption that it alluded to some super elite group within the Church that Paul explains nowhere, which lacks any documentary evidence anywhere and which excludes the apostles themselves, and explicitly excludes Cephas.

The assertion that Paul's congregational use of the word adelphos is his "normal" use is specious at best and the assertion that this should be some kind of controlling assumption in 1:19 tips over into sheer sophistry.

I ask again, what was Paul's "normal" way to say somebody had a male sibling? If he wanted to say the Lord had a literal brother, how should we expect that he would word it?

TedM

I know.

Yes, I'm dealing with what Paul means when he refers to the brothers in the faith: He uses metaphorical biology. I gave you the verse and you didn't address it.

If you can provide us another term he uses to mean biological brother then the above would be a good argument. But you can't. All you can do is say he tends to use a qualifier such as 'according to the flesh'. I already explained the problem with that but you didn't seem to understand, so I'll try again: He qualifies when the same word or phrase could mean something else. If there were not two uses of 'brother of the Lord' -- (ie 1. biological brother of Jesus and 2. special believer) Paul would have no need to qualify his use of the term, when he uses it. Therefore the linguistic arguments you are giving here are weak.

aa5874

When will this absurdity end???

1. Galatians 1.19 cannot be used as its OWN corroborative source.

2. There is NO DATED Epistle to Galatians in the 1st century.

3. No Apologetic source named an Apostle called James as the Lord's brother.

4. The Galatians writer is NOT historically reliable.

5. The Gospels are NOT historically reliable.

Why are you using ADMITTED unreliable and uncorroborared sources as history??? Why, Why, Why????

jdboy

Jesus considers that anyone doing the will of God is his biological brother.


Mark 3:31-35
King James Version (KJV)
31 There came then his brethren and his mother, and, standing without, sent unto him, calling him.

32 And the multitude sat about him, and they said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren without seek for thee.

33 And he answered them, saying, Who is my mother, or my brethren?

34 And he looked round about on them which sat about him, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren!

35 For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother.

Diogenes the Cynic

None of this has any relevance to Galatians or Paul, but I'll point out that it still says Jesus has biological brothers.

jdboy

And none of these sibling claims make jesus a historical human being.
Biology is not being used to establish you as a brother a sister or a mother of jesus.
Was it Peter that denied jesus? Is Paul saying something about Peter and John's behavior?