Morality and Boundaries in Paul

In the Pauline communities, ethics, ethos and identity were closely intertwined. This essay analyses the way in which Paul emphasised the mental boundaries of the Christ communities to turn them into moral boundaries. In this process, the fencing off of these communities over against their past and their present was a fundamental feature of Paul’s reasoning. The communities thus became fenced off from their past, because the Christ event was seen as causing a major change in history. This change affected both Gentile and Jewish believers. At the same time, Paul stressed the boundaries with the outside world: he characterised the inside world as the loyal remnant of Israel, consisting of Jews and Gentiles alike, and pointed out that this group is the group of the elect ‘saints’. The perspective with which Paul looked at ethics and morality inside this group was strongly coloured by the assumed identity of this group as ‘Israel’. Even though the Mosaic Law was no longer the focal point for the identity of this eschatological Israel, the ethical demands Paul mentioned over against the members of this new Israel were highly influenced by the morality of the law. For Paul, sanctification was a fundamental ideal, and this ideal reflected the spirituality of the Holiness Code of Leviticus. This particular ethical model was framed by the awareness that Paul (and Christ before him) was ‘sent’ by God, much in the same way the prophets of Israel themselves had been sent

‘Do not quench the Spirit!’ The discourse of the Holy Spirit in earliest Christianity

The Trinitarian discourse of the 4th and 5th centuries grew out of earlier developments, whilst at the same time reflecting a renewal over against the language of the earliest Christian sources. This article reflects on the way in which early Christianity thought about the Holy Spirit and developed a new discourse on the basis of earlier, Jewish traditions. It situates the development of the idea of the Holy Spirit as God’s presence in past and present within the social history of the developing Christian movement, and shows how this idea was connected to the concept of apostolic succession. Thus, emerging Christianity legitimised itself and its social structures by the theology of the Holy Spirit. Its message was presented as old instead of new, as the Holy Spirit had foretold the Christ event. Its organisation was seen as divinely inspired, because its leaders were thought to be endowed with the Spirit. In this development, the narrative of Luke-Acts has thoroughly influenced the way in which Christianity developed a new discourse to present itself as old.http://www.hts.org.zaam201

Sleepy scribes and clever critics : a classification of conjectures on the text of the New Testament

This article presents a classification of conjectures on the text of the New Testament. It focusses on the types of arguments used by conjectural critics. The argumentation for a conjecture basically comprises (1) the perception of a problem (or problems) in the transmitted text and (2) the suggestion of a cause (or causes) for the supposed scribal change. Type (or types) of perceived problems and of supposed causes are classified, and illustrated with a range of important conjectures.http://booksandjournals.brillonline.com/content/journals/156853652017-01-31hb201