spin

Paul chooses to narrate an event in a cagey way, more for his audience's benefit than for information.

This doesn't represent the text to me. They didn't "compel" Titus to be circumcised. The rest is not there.

He claims to have met two of them, one only briefly. And the result of his official meeting with the pillars is his rejection of them -- "what they were makes no difference to me".

Who are the false believers secretly brought in?


spin

Ben C Smith

If this helps explain why Paul would, in the face of a circumcision controversy in Galatia, choose to narrate only a food controversy and not a circumcision controversy, I do not see how.

Not compelling a gentile convert to be circumcised is agreeing with Paul. The only way to disagree with Paul on circumcision is to compel a gentile convert to be circumcised.

Exactly how many pillars are you counting in 2.9?

You have heard me on this before (the verb tenses, remember?). To pretend that this is new is disingenuous, and I do not plan on rehashing it all again.

Paul does not say who they were. What Paul does say is that they either did or would have compelled Titus to be circumcised, given half a chance.

Ben.

Amaleq13

No, that seems rather forced to me. Specifically intended to reach a particular conclusion, in fact.

Paul is consistently talking about what his Galatians believed about the necessity of following the law. He convinced them of his position by his portrayal of Christ crucified and is expressing his dismay that they have somehow lost their conviction despite that previously persuasive portrayal. Please note that he never makes any effort to defend the reality of what was portrayed and consistently defends his interpretation of its import.

As Ben points out in The crucifixion in the epistle to the Galatians., Paul's opponents in Galatia clearly believed in "the cross of Christ".

JoeWallack

JW:
Here's what I said (in reference to your assertion that there is nothing in Paul indicating that Paul's opponents doubted the crucifixion):

JW:
I'm taking you out of the game Doug for not playing defense. You can watch on the sidelines.



Joseph

Amaleq13

You asked my opinion and I gave it. I do not think it is a "reasonable understanding" given that, elsewhere, Paul refers explicitly to his opponents belief in "the cross of Christ".

It is, as I said, a forced reading intended to obtain a specific conclusion rather than understanding what Paul actually meant. I'll stay on the sidelines while you keep playing with yourself. :wave:

Ben C Smith

spamandham

I guess I can't see any agreement here. To me, it's patently obvious that Rom 10:15 is not referring to Paul's gospel either directly or indirectly.

Here is the implication of your argument. According to your argument, the gospel Paul refers to in Gal. 1 is not his complete gospel, but just the portion about gentile salvation, correct? Repeatedly, you've affirmed that Galatians is all about circumcision.

So in Gal. 1:23, we have people formerly persecuted by Paul rejoicing that he has joined them and is now preaching as gospel their faith ...of gentile salvation without circumcision?

It's absurd to interpret it that way. Obviously, the faith they referred to is their faith, which Paul now preaches. We do not know a priori the degree to which that overlaps Paul's gospel. All we know, is that they were in some way devoted to Jesus Christ, and now so is Paul.

It tells us what we already know; that the Jerusalem sect was devoted to Jesus Christ, and now so is Paul. But it does not tell us what they believed specifically.

I'm not ignoring the rest of your post, I just feel like we've beaten those points to death, so I'm not going to respond to them again.

Ben C Smith

I still do not know what you are doing with Romans 10.8-9, smack dab in the middle of a chapter that both you and Paul (in rare agreement ) say is about Jewish conversion.

No, that is not my position. My position is that the gospel referred to in Galatians is the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ plus what for Paul is the natural implication of that event, namely the nonrequirement of circumcision for gentile converts. The only point in that gospel that is in dispute happens to be that last bit, and Paul asserts that to modify that one part is to spoil the whole gospel. This explains his seeming equivocation in chapter 1: The Galatians are getting another gospel which is really not another, but rather a distorted gospel.

Yes, Galatians is mainly about circumcision.

No, he is preaching as gospel their faith in Christ as raised from the dead plus what he regards as the natural consequence of that faith, and he is calling it all one gospel.

IOW, when he first converted, as it were, to this faith in Christ, he immediately realized (to his own satisfaction, at any rate) that a crucified and resurrected messiah held out certain implications, chief of which for our purposes was the suspension of the Mosaic law for gentiles — so he says that he was specifically called to be an apostle to the gentiles with this knowledge. He was greatly encouraged, when he showed this gospel of his to the Jerusalem crowd, that they acknowledged his point.

From his point of view, surely, the pillars were simply acknowledging the natural implications of their own teaching; he was not adding to their doctrine (and he explicitly says they did not add to his), but rather giving it its full divinely intended meaning.

I agree with this.

Correct; we do not know this a priori; we know it after a careful examination of a host of relevant texts.

Ben.

spin

You are not representing what happened in the official meeting accurately. Paul marvels at the pillars not insisting on Titus being circumcised. That doesn't resolve the circumcision issue. Paul doesn't get bent out of shape over any looking after the poor. What happened at the meeting isn't clear. Paul isn't being direct about it.

That is your interpretation based on not knowing anything about the pillars or the situation that Paul isn't unveiling.

This meeting seems to be the pillars giving Paul the kiss off. You go do whatever you like in the diaspora, but if you're going to pretend Jewishness in any way, remember the poor.

The comment deals with prior to the meeting with the pillars. He'd met Peter and, briefly, James.

Well, you'd better point me back to it. I thought I'd dealt with that quibble.

They had nothing to do with Titus.


spin

Ben C Smith

(A) It was not a quibble; it was the exposure of an assumption in your argument, namely that Paul was disappointed at the time of the meeting. (B) You did not deal with it; you asserted, you did not argue, that the present tense reflected a truism.

Here is the link.

I have no idea how to fit most of this into the debate. Every single sentence above can be construed in several different ways. For example, the third sentence could mean that Titus not being circumcised did not resolve the circumcision issue in the long run, or it could mean that Titus not being circumcised did not resolve the circumcision issue even at the time. I would agree with one of those, but not with the other, and it would take at least two more posts to straighten it all out. I ask myself: Why bother?

Here is an example of running around in circles already fulfilled:

Look very carefully at the references I gave you. Galatians 2.3 and 2.14. Now examine your direct response to my point:

Do you see the slippage? I was claiming that Paul asserted agreement with the pillars in chapter 2. Your very first response was to say that Paul claimed to have met only two pillars, obviously referring to the meeting in chapter 1. Why? What is your point? How does Paul meeting only two pillars in chapter 1 in any way argue against my point about chapter 2? Suppose for a moment that I am dead wrong about there being any agreement in chapter 2; if I am wrong about that, it is most assuredly not because Paul met only two pillars in chapter 1. He could have met no pillars at all in chapter 1, or he could have met an entire colonnade of pillars in chapter 1, and it would not make my point on chapter 2 either more or less correct than it is on its own merits.

So we get into the following meaningless exchange:

Excellent. I suppose we had to settle our mathematical prowess at counting to 2 (in chapter 1) and counting to 3 (in chapter 2) once and for all before moving on to other items of no importance.

And for what? To establish that you and I disagree on the significance of the right hand of fellowship, the importance of the present tense, the meaning of Titus not being compelled to be circumcised, and the likelihood of 1 Corinthians 15.3-11 being an interpolation?

We disagree. Simple as that. No hard feelings. Just a disagreement on a text.

Ben.