Remain in Your Calling is Available

Remain in Your Calling is now available. It can be purchased through Wipf and Stock's website initially and then it will appear on amazon.com and all the other usual book selling outlets. Here is a description of the book. Remain in Your Calling explores the way the Apostle Paul negotiates and transforms existing social identities of the Corinthian Christ-followers in order to extend his gentile mission. Building on the findings of Tucker's first monograph, You Belong to Christ: Paul and the Formation of Social Identity in 1 Corinthians 1-4, this work expands the focus to the rest of 1 Corinthians. The study addresses the way Paul forms Christ-movement identity and the kind of identity that emerges from his kinship formation. It examines the way previous Jewish and gentile social identities continue but are also transformed "in Christ." It then provides case studies from 1 Corinthians that show the way social-scientific criticism and ancient source material provide insights concerning Paul's formational goals. The first looks at the way Roman water practices and patronage influence baptismal practices in Corinth. The next uncovers the challenges associated with the transformation of the Roman household when it functions as sacred space within the ekklesia. The final study investigates the way Paul uses apocalyptic discourse to recontextualize the Corinthians' identity in order to remind them that God, rather than the Roman Empire, is in control of history.

Anthony Thiselton on Identity and Behavior

The connection between identity and behavior is central to the work of Anthony Thiselton who argues for the ‘inseparability of Christian identity and Christian lifestyle, or of theology and ethics’ (2000: 458). He understands Paul’s rhetorical strategy to be ‘stabilizing the corporate identity and structure of a community’ with the cross as the foundation for Christian identity (94, 147-48). Unlike Richard Hays, Thiselton specifically addresses social identity (cf. 1 Cor 1:27-29) and incorporates discussions of honor/shame and that ‘which deprives the self of its social identity’ into his interpretation (187). The experience of being in Christ is central to the life of the community, however, for Thiselton the presence of God and the work of the Spirit are also that which ‘constitutes the identity of the people of God’ (cf. 1 Cor 3:16; 310, 317; cf. Volf 1996: 176-78).

For Thiselton, communal identity is Paul’s primary focus, who ‘does indeed want “to hold together” a corporate Christian identity founded on the death and resurrection of Christ, which applies Christ and the cross as a criterion and critique of freelance claims to be “spiritual persons,” or “people of the Spirit”’ (372 emphasis original). Though not intentionally excluding individual concerns, Thiselton understands Paul to be preoccupied with forming the communal identity of the Corinthians. There may be room for a slight corrective here, for example, when dealing with the moral issue in 1 Cor 5:1-13, which appears to be quite focused on the individual. Thiselton concludes that Paul does not want ‘persistent immorality of a notorious kind to compromise the corporate identity of the community (5:5, 7, 13)’ (381).

Thiselton also interacts with current approaches to power in that discussion of identity formation leads to questions concerning authority, power, and the potential for domination (372-76). His work also all too briefly discusses how texts, such as 1 Corinthians form identity, especially in relation to how their response to the text unmasks their identity (296). Thiselton also understands Paul’s ethical exhortations to be sourced in the Hebrew Scriptures, quoting Rosner, Paul ‘showed himself to have Scriptural structures of thought, such as the notion that identity must inform behavior’ (446; Rosner 1994: 121; emphasis original). Paul was forming an alternative community with a distinct ethos in comparison with the broader culture, so one would expect analogs for Paul’s guidance to emerge from the Hebrew Scriptures rather than for example, the moral philosophers. Thiselton concludes ‘that Christian corporate identity has a distinctive foundation and a distinctive lifestyle as against Graeco-Roman social, political, and religious traditions’ (446-47; 450-51). This coheres well with the presupposition that Paul was thoroughly embedded in Judaism and argued as such. Thiselton’s work shows a high degree of complexity in relation to identity studies and his influence on my work is quite obvious.

References:
Rosner, Brian S. Paul, Scripture and Ethics: A Study of 1 Corinthians 5-7. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994.
Thiselton, Anthony C. The First Epistle to the Corinthians: A Commentary on the Greek Text. Grand Rapids, Mich: W.B. Eerdmans, 2000.
Volf, Miroslav. Exclusion and Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996.

Richard Hays and Identity Formation in 1 Corinthians

This review only looks at Hays' work in his commentary. I will address Conversion of the Imagination in a later posting.


Richard Hays understands Paul’s letters to be forming identity within their recipients (1997: 17). He approaches Paul within the framework that emphasizes universal Christian identity (123-24, 133). Hays, however, sources Christian identity in the legacy of Israel, for example regarding 1 Cor 1:19 and 1:31, the Corinthians should ‘understand themselves within the larger story of God’s dealing with Israel’ (38-39). Thus Hays rightly affirms the preeminence afforded Israel while at the same time emphasizing ‘Paul’s break with his past understanding of Judaism’, especially in relation to ‘identity-marking features of the Law’ (176). Here he overstates the evidence of Paul’s break with his past understanding of Judaism and if Jewish identity is no longer relevant for Christian identity, then Christian identity is eviscerated of its core – Jewish identity expressed through the Jewish Scriptures.
The universalizing tendency of Hays work is evident in his emphasis on baptism and the transcendence of ethnic and gender distinctions (99-100, 123). He understands Paul to be envisioning ‘the church as a community that transcended ethnic boundaries in order to unite Jew and Gentile as one new people serving one God’ (124). He refers to these distinctions as ‘adiaphora: matters that fundamentally make no difference’; however, later he argues ‘our identity is bound up inextricably with our bodily existence’ (123, 133, 278). One is hard pressed to see how Hays can argue that this new identity is not interested in bodily categories such as ethnicity and gender and then later argue that identity is a bodily phenomenon. These critiques aside, Hays’ work provides a compelling argument for the usefulness of identity as an interpretive tool for understanding Paul. His emphasis on the communal aspects, while not downplaying the individual components of identity provides a needed balance within Pauline studies (20, 45, 91). Also, his insistence on hearing Paul’s argument within the story of Israel is central to my general approach to identity formation in Paul, though the application and inferences drawn from that story will differ in some cases. Finally, Hays has correctly discerned the function of 1 Cor 1-4 in relation to the identity formation that is to occur in the rest of the letter: ‘In the chapters that follow, he will seek to build on the foundation of these opening chapters in a way that will decisively reshape the community’s understanding of its identity in Christ – and, therefore, its behavior’ (76).

Reference:
Hays, Richard B. First Corinthians. Interpretation, a Bible commentary for teaching and preaching. Louisville, Ky: John Knox Press, 1997.

Paul and the mystery in 1 Corinthians

Benjamin L. Gladd is Adjunct Assistant Professor of New Testament at Wheaton College; Revealing the MYSTERION: The Use of Mystery in Daniel and Early Judaism with Its Bearing on First Corinthians, is a revision of his Ph.D. dissertation done under the supervision G.K. Beale at Wheaton Graduate School.

Here is a section from a book review I am writing for this work.

...Chapter 5 connects Paul’s use of mystērion in 1 Cor. 4:1 with Dan. 2:20-23. Gladd argues that Paul understands himself in ways consistent with Daniel, as did the Teacher of Righteousness and Josephus (181). Furthermore, he argues that ‘not beyond what is written’ in 1 Cor.4:6, refers to the various references from Israel’s scriptures 1 Cor. 1-4. Gladd contends that Paul’s desire in 1 Cor. 4:1-6 was to present himself as a faithful steward of the mysteries of God. Moreover, Paul’s argument is directed only to the leaders in Corinth and not the whole community.

Chapter 6 Gladd researches the use of mystērion in 1 Cor. 13:2 and 14:2. He rightly notes that the use of mystērion in these passages is not as fully developed as in other parts of 1 Corinthians. In 1 Cor. 13:2, the focus is still on revelation while it may plausibly be applied “to inspired exegesis or further insight into OT Scripture” (221-22). In 1 Cor. 14:2, Gladd argues that Paul draws on Dan. 2:46-47, combining both the personal and eschatological dimensions of mystērion that are also evident in Qumran and some forms of apocalyptic Judaism....

Gladd's done top drawer work and these monograph provides keen insight into Paul's use of mystery in 1 Corinthians.