Now available at Mohr Siebeck: Moral Transformation in Greco-Roman Philosophy of Mind

I have to say that I'm super excited to see that my book Moral Transformation in Greco-Roman Philosophy of Mind was just made available for purchase on the Mohr Siebeck website (here). Now I'll just have to wait until the author copies arrive on my doorstep through international mail. Looking forward to hold a print copy in person! PTL! 

A Taxonomy of 6 Interactions Types as a Means of Detecting Greco-Roman Allusions in the New Testament (Part 2)

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Screen capture of p. 494 which summarizes the
6 types of interactions between rival sects in
Greco-Roman antiquity as a template for how
Paul might interact with the moral traditions of his day

This is blog post #2 following up on the first one which announced the forthcoming publication of Moral Transformation of Greco-Roman Philosophy of Mind: Mapping the Moral Milieu of Apostle Paul and His Diasporal Jewish Contemporaries (some time this month of April 2020). 
     I'm tackling the contributions in reverse order, from its secondary purpose to its main ones, because it is probably the 2ndary purpose of mapping the types of interactions between rival philosophical and religious sects in Greco-Roman antiquity which has the most direct relevance to New Testament interpretation. The encyclopedic knowledge of Roman Stoicism and Middle Platonism and their respective developments from the old Stoa and Plato stand alone as a valuable contribution to classical and NT studies, but their relevance is not as overt. I'll expand on this for another post.
    Here I want to focus on what Troel Engberg-Pedersen has called the "Transitional Period" of the 1st century B.C. to 2nd century A.D. as a time when there is shift of intellectual and cultural influence from Stoicism to Platonism. During this period, there was considerable interaction between the two philosophical schools where the adherents of each school engaged, rejected, redefined, and appropriated select concepts from their rivals without necessarily compromising their own sectarian identity or school allegiance. 
    In the last chapter of my book (see the screen capture above), I do something different than simply summarize the findings of my study. I re-examine select philosophical texts as examples of certain interaction types between Stoicism, Platonism, and sometimes Epicureanism. My goal is to map out a taxonomy of interaction types between rival sects/schools, and I posit that these six basic types of interactions can provide the basis for detecting Paul's own interactions with concepts and tenets of "rival" philosophical and religious traditions. While Paul (or more literate, more educated New Testament authors as the author of Hebrews or Acts) may not have employed all six types, the taxonomy provides a checklist of possibilities for how Paul or another New Testament author may have interacted with moral discourse of a specific sect/group, or more widely with a common ancient ethical tradition shared between several groups.
      Rather than rehearse the definitions of the six interactions types listed in the screen capture above (i.e., eclecticism, refutation, competitive appropriation, irenic appropriation, concession, and common ethical usage; click on the pic above for a basic definition of each), I am going to propose quickly possible places in the Pauline letter corpus where I believe some of the above interactions occurs: 

1. Refutation - Where there are indications of diatribe being used by Paul (e.g., Romans 3:1-9), Paul takes the proposition/argument of his interlocutor and point-by-point presents a counter-argument to the position which the interlocutor represents.
2. Competitive appropriation - Though this is still a controversial topic of debate in New Testament scholarship where some have strongly resisted reading Paul's gospel as a critique against empire (e.g., Seyoon Kim, John Barclay; cf. my review article ), nevertheless it remains an argued thesis by many (e.g., N.T. Wright, Richard Horsley, Warren Carter, John Dominic Crossan, Richard Cassidy, Scot McKnight, and others; here is a nice article summarizing the issues) that Paul's anti-imperial gospel appropriates key terms of the Empire - such as κύριος or εὐαγγέλιον -- and redefines them in distinctly Christian terms. 
3. Irenic appropriation - Though this is a thesis to be argued in a journal article that I would like to write up in the near future, and is partially discussed in my dissertation, one example of irenic appropriation I suggest in Paul's letters is his use of Stoic arguments in 1 Cor 6:12b ("But I will not be overpowered by anything") to counter an Epicurean ethic of pleasure ("Food for the belly, and the belly for food"). Paul is not a Stoic but he nevertheless agrees with Stoicism that what we eat and don't eat is not adiaphora but can become erroneous behavior if the activity is enslaving or addictive. It is a Stoic (counter-)argument that the elitist Corinthian wisdom group would have understood even if they themselves favored Epicurean practices.
4. Common ethical usage - I discuss this category more thoroughly in my monograph (ch. 12) and in a separate essay "Ancient Mentors and Moral Progress in Galen and Paul" for FS Klyne Snodgrass, but to summarize quickly here, Paul's imitation language is part of a more broadly shared tradition which Abraham Malherbe calls psychagogy and cuts across the sectarian divide. Paul, as I argue in my essay, offers his distinctly Christian understanding of spiritual mentorship and exemplum but nevertheless his language of imitation is part of a set of practices and traditions in moral instruction characteristic of his Greco-Roman cultural environment. 

These are just four of the six basic interactions which I believe Paul employs in his letters. There are likely more examples of the four, and there may be more types than the six, and Paul may not utilize all the types which I catalogue in my monograph (e.g., I doubt that Paul exercises any form of concession to Greco-Roman moral traditions). But having a basic taxonomy gives the biblical interpreter a starting point for critically identifying Greco-Roman allusions in the New Testament. These are meant to be descriptive, not prescriptive, and foundational but not exhaustive. MJL

It is finished! Moral Transformation in Greco-Roman Philosophy of Mind (Part 1)

Pre-Print Graphic. The WUNT2 monograph

is forthcoming in June 2020

After 15+ years of off-and-on research time, trying to find gaps in a hectic teaching schedule, two sabbaticals, and every summer and winter break spent writing, and many nights of solitude typing away and increasing my caffeine tolerance, finally I can announce: "It is finished!" (John 19:30). By God's grace, I submitted the manuscript Moral Transformation in Greco-Roman Philosophy of Mind to Mohr Siebeck back in September 2019. With some back and forth with an excellent editorial and production team (thanks Tobias Stäbler and Jana Trispel!), my work with the corrections/editions plus indices is done. The book is in production and will likely be in print this coming April 2020. Many thanks to Megan Herrold, my research assistant, who help me edit the entire manuscript + indices. Words cannot express how much I owe to my doctoral supervisor Dr. Judy Gundry and second Doktorvater Dr. Seyoon Kim for their support and encouragement in seeing this book through to the end.
     The book's primary audience is for other scholars and doctoral students doing research on the moral traditions of early Christianity's Greco-Roman environment. It attempts to map the moral universe of the ancient Mediterranean world during the late Republic to early imperial period of Rome from which both Diaspora Judaism and early Christianity emerge. Troels Engberg-Pedersen (2017) calls this era "the Transitional Period" during which Stoicism and Platonism dominated the moral and intellectual environment of the Roman Empire. The intellectual culture during this era shifted from the traceable influence of Stoicism (i.e., the Middle Stoa and Neostoicism) in the 1st century B.C.E. towards the documented dominance of Middle or Imperial Platonism by the end of the 2nd century C.E. 
      This monograph contributes to the synoptic picture of Greco-Roman antiquity by defining the moral transformation systems of the Platonists and Stoics so that the historian can have a starting point for what constitutes Platonist doctrines and what constitutes Stoic ones, including the latter’s Neostoic innovations. In my study of Middle Platonism, I analyzed mainly the works of Plato, Plutarch, Alcinous, and Galen and for Stoicism, Zeno, Chrysippus, Musonius Rufus, Seneca, and Epictetus.
     Here I develop systemic models for a given philosophical school's teaching on emotional control, ethical action and habit, character formation, and the role of communities and the divine. These models demonstrate that the internal logic and interconnectedness between seemingly disparate moral topoi (or topics of ethical concern) which were shared between the major philosophical schools of this era find their coherence as distinct systems of moral transformation. This is the primary thesis that the monograph defends.
    Secondly, the book also functions as a type of handbook which gives a "big picture" of Platonism and Stoicism as systems of philosophy. The teachings of every philosopher are read in their contingent, historical particularity and for how they cohere with the overall tenets of a given philosophical school. This project thus develops independent models of contingency and coherence for each Greco-Roman philosophy of mind. The method has been applied by J. Christiaan Becker to Pauline theology (1980), and I have modified it for ancient philosophy of mind. Though, as Abraham Malherbe has argued, every philosopher should be examined independently in their own right (i.e., lex Maherbe), because every philosopher of a particular school (i.e., Stoicism and Platonism) is united in one's fidelity to the teachings of the founder (i.e., Zeno/Cleanthes/Chrysippus and Plato, respectively), we can also talk about 'systems' of a school based on the interpretation of the founder's texts and a coherence between different members of a given sect based on their fidelity to the founder.
    The relevance of the book for New Testament studies lies in its foundational role for a further research on how the Apostle Paul engaged, appropriated, and modified the moral traditions of his day to explain the gospel of Jesus Christ to Gentile audiences in terms which the latter could understand. If the moral traditions of the Greco-Roman world were dominated by Stoicism and Platonism, or rather, by the interactions between these two intellectual movements (i.e., the thesis of Troels Engberg-Pedersen and other contributors to From Stoicism to Platonism), then a systemic study of Stoicism and Platonism is needed in order to situate the moral exhortations of Paul to his Gentile churches within their Greco-Roman cultural environment. At heart, Paul was a missionary. He would know how to engage and modify the moral traditions of his day to explain better to his Gentile recipients the major tenets and distinctions of the gospel he preached. 
    In sum, a short epitome of the book's major contributions to both classical studies and New Testament research are listed as follows: 

1. The book argues and defends the thesis that moral transformation is one important and effective way to find internal coherence and interconnectedness between disparate moral topoi, a project that Johan Thom (2003) has called "mapping the moral universe" of Greco-Roman antiquity. 
2. It constructs models for the moral transformation systems of Stoicism and Platonism and therefore enables scholars to contextualize any study of specific moral topos from the broader perspective of an entire school of thought
3. The models differentiate for the reader areas of continuity and innovation between orthodox or early Stoicism and their latter Greco-Roman Neostoic heirs; the same has been done for distinguishing Plato's teachings and Middle Platonism
4. The types of interactions between Stoicism and Platonism have been mapped and organized in a way to help the interpreter detect Greco-Roman allusions in the New Testament and sets up possibilities for how the NT author engages, appropriates, and modifies the moral traditions of the ancient Mediterranean world. The concluding chapters argue for 6 interaction types between rival sects: eclecticism, refutation, competitive appropriation, irenic appropriation, concession, and common ethical usage. Paul and his Diaspora Jewish contemporaries may not have employed all of these interactions types in their engagement with Greco-Roman moral traditions but this taxonomy of interactions lays out the possible ways they have may have engaged and modified a common encyclopedia of knowledge intrinsic to their cultural environment. 

Below are screen shots of the Table of Contents. I plan on giving separate expanded blog posts for each of the major contributions described above. Stay tuned for further posts. MJL

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      ** Postscript: Originally I had hoped to publish the book way back in 2015/16. In fact, some book sellers like Amazon or Book Depository surprisingly list the monograph as having been published already. This is incorrect. The book's publication date is officially 2020. Nothing was released in 2015/16.

AAR-SBL 2018 in Denver: A Last Minute Invitation

As I do some last minute packing for the annual Society of Biblical Literature meeting in Denver this year (November 16-20, 2018), I wanted to give a final shout out to the plenary session of the Intertextuality in the New Testament Section which I co-chair with Alice Yafeh-Deigh at Pacific Azusa University.
    If you're like me, when I plan for SBL, I first get all my requisite business meetings, lunches/dinners with colleagues, and publisher's appointments all in my calendar first. Then on the plane, I thumb through the annual program and plan out what sessions I attend. If so, I hope you'll consider as you travel to Denver attending and participating in the session on Greco-Roman allusions in the New Testament. We have a stellar roster of leading New Testament scholars who work with the Greco-Roman material and texts which illuminate the interpretation of the New Testament. Their papers titles and abstracts are listed below. 
    Much ink has been spilt on the Old Testament echoes and the intertextuality between ancient Jewish discourse and the New Testament. Little has been done in analyzing systematically how the New Testament authors allude to Greco-Roman texts and artefacts and what exegetical methods they use to deploy such material. This session is an attempt to offer some initial explorations. Hope to see you there! MJL


S17-131

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Intertextuality in the New Testament
9:00 AM to 11:30 AM
11/17/2018
Agate (Third Level) - Hyatt Regency
Ancient Exegetical Methods in Greco-Roman Discourse and the New Testament
Each paper will be 25-30 min long. Peter Oakes will be responding after each paper for 10 min. There is a general discussion at the end of the session

Max Lee, North Park Theological Seminary, Presiding

	Bruce Longenecker, Baylor University Intertextuality in Pompeian Plaster: Can Vesuvian Artifacts Inform Our Expectations about Intertextual Expertise among Sub-elite Jesus-Followers? (30 min) Abstract: Audiences of New Testament texts are often enticed into intertextual tropes embedded within those texts. One of the difficulties regarding the effectiveness of intertextual tropes pertains to the expertise required by the audience in order to recognize and appreciate them. Was expertise of that kind restricted to the educated elite (as evidenced, for instance, by Seneca), or were intertextual tropes appreciated by a broader segment of Greco-Roman society? This paper (1) addresses that issue by canvassing a selection of the archaeological data from the first-century town of Pompeii and (2) suggests the relevance of that data for the study of New Testament texts.
	Judith M. Gundry, Yale Divinity School Roman Household Religion and the Interpretation of 1 Corinthians 7:14 (30 min) Paul’s discussion in 1 Corinthians 7 is widely assumed to address a Roman concern with mastery over the passions, or a Stoic ideal of freedom from distraction through celibacy. It is thus curious that virtually all scholars suppose that in 1 Cor. 7:14 Paul is addressing a “Jewish concern” with purity: “For the unbelieving husband ἡγίασται by his wife and the unbelieving wife ἡγίασται by her husband. For otherwise your children are ἀκάθαρτα, but as it is, they are ἅγια”... A more plausible reconstruction, as this paper will argue, is that Paul is addressing a Roman expectation of religious uniformity in the household, where religion played an important role (e.g., Plutarch, Tibullus, Hierocles). Apart from such unity, divorce may have seemed inevitable to the former Gentiles in Corinth. But, according to Paul, the unbelieving spouse who is willing to “live together” “is consecrated” to God – for the (also unbelieving) children are “consecrated” to God – similarly to the Christ-believer, who is a “consecrated one” (ἅγιος). Hence, Paul forbids divorcing the unbeliever.
	Paul Trebilco, University of Otago Echoes in Ephesus: "From the beginning" in the Johannine Letters and in Ephesian Foundation Myths (30 min) In 1 and 2 John, the phrase ‘from the beginning’ is used a total of ten times – a surprising number, given their short length. In each case, the stress is on ‘antiquity’ or on ‘foundations’. This emphasis resonates with the foundation stories of the cult of Artemis and other stories in the city of Ephesus; the sense of ‘looking back’ to antiquity was a vital part of what it was to be an Ephesian. In this context, it was entirely understandable for John as an author to speak of ‘what was from the beginning’, which for him referred to the one true ‘foundation story’, the one they had heard ‘from the beginning’, concerning the person, life, death and resurrection of Jesus.
	Peter Oakes, University of Manchester, Respondent

Intertextuality in the New Testament Section SBL Denver 2018

Invited Plenary Speakers for the Intertextuality in the New Testament Section
Theme: Ancient Exegetical Methods in
Greco-Roman Discourse and the New Testament
SBL Denver 2018

It's been quite some time since I revisited my blog but I have not forgotten about it. But I did need the timely break to get a sense on how to manage my time as the chair of the biblical field at North Park Theological Seminary.
    In this post, I'm excited to announce the opening plenary session of the Intertextuality in the New Testament Section at the Society of Biblical Literature Annual Meeting in Denver this November 2018. The theme of the session is Ancient Exegetical Methods in Greco-Roman Discourse and the New Testament. Much ink has been spilt on how the New Testament authors quote, cite, echo, and allude to Old Testament and Jewish texts in their writings, but little has been done on the way they quote, echo, allude or recontextualize Greco-Roman sources. The three main presenters who are giving papers on various intertexts between Greco-Roman discourse and the New Testament are all experts in their respective fields and have masterfully engaged with a wide range of rhetorical, religious, political and philosophical material by Greek and Roman authors. The speakers and their papers titles are listed below. 
     I especially want to highlight that the respondent to each of the papers is Peter Oakes. Anyone having read his 2005 journal article in JSNT entitled "Remapping the Universe," where he outlined four possible ways the New Testament texts allude, echo, appropriate or compete with Roman imperial texts/theology would know that there are few who could comment on not only the specific content of the papers but on the broader issue of how to map out a method for detecting Greco-Roman textual and conceptual allusions in the New Testament. It's sure to be a fantastic session. I hope all attending SBL and reading this post will come to the session on Saturday morning Nov 17, 2018. Best! MJL



Intertextuality in the New Testament
11/17/2018
9:00 AM to 11:30 AM
Room: Room TBD - Hotel TBD

Theme: Ancient Exegetical Methods in Greco-Roman Discourse and the New Testament
Each paper will be 25-30min long. Peter Oakes will be responding after each paper for 10min. There is a general discussion at the end of the session

Max Lee, North Park Theological Seminary, Presiding

Bruce Longenecker, Baylor University
Intertextuality in Pompeian Plaster: Can Vesuvian Artifacts Inform Our Expectations about Intertextual Expertise among Sub-Elite Jesus-Followers? (30 min)

Peter Oakes, University of Manchester, Respondent (10 min)

Judith M. Gundry, Yale Divinity School
Roman Household Religion and the Interpretation of 1 Corinthians 7:14 (30 min)

Peter Oakes, University of Manchester, Respondent (10 min)

Paul Trebilco, University of Otago
Echoes in Ephesus: ‘From the beginning’ in the Johannine Letters and in Ephesian Foundation Myths (30 min)

Peter Oakes, University of Manchester, Respondent (10 min)

Discussion (30 min)

Business Meeting (0 min)

Highlights from Intertextuality, Rhetoric, and the Pauline Letters (Nov 23)

I got sidetracked during the Christmas holiday, but finally I found the time to give my final post on SBL-AAR 2015. 
    The session I presided over for the Intertextuality and New Testament Intepretation Section (S23-124: Intertextuality, Rhetorical Criticism, and the Pauline Letters) had five fantastic paper presentations, and I enjoyed them so much that I forgot to take a quick photo of our session. So here is a random book cover photo of a classic example of intertexuality: Ulysseys, James Joyce's modern retelling of Homer's Odyssey but set in modern 1904 Dublin. 

a 

James Joyce's Ulysses is a classic example of intertextuality,
which structures its poetry after Homer's Odyssey

As with the other session summaries, I won't comment on every paper but just share a few highlights. 
   First up was A. Andrew Das of Elmhurst College, with his paper entitled "An Audience-Oriented Approach to Paul's Use of Scripture in Galatians: Reader Competence and Differing Target Audiences." Das' paper did not really introduce any new theoretical framework on intertextuality but applied existing models in an innovative way. In my previous post, I gave a concise description of the rhetorical vs. narrative approaches to intertextuality (here). Usually, these approaches are seen as competing. But Das, in his reading of Galatians, applied both models in corresponding and consistent ways. From the perspective of reader competence, Das doubts that the Galatian Gentile converts had much knowledge of Scripture (key word here is "Gentile"). He argues that when Paul addresses the church at Galatia, for the most part, Paul's use of Scripture is rhetorical without reference to the wider co(n)text. 
    However, when Paul addresses the agitators (or Judaizers), Paul's approach is narrative and provides a much more sophisticated exegetical argument against a collective reading of the Genesis texts (i.e., the Judaizer position) which would posit the descendants of Abraham as the inheritors of God's promises. Nor does Paul identify the seed of Abraham as Isaac even though some contemporary Jews of his day did. Instead, Paul understands the seed of Abraham to be Christ and controversially the Judaizers as apostates to the gospel. 
    Probably the most provocative paper was by G. Brooke Lester of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, entitled "No, Seriously: A Unifying Theory of Allusion." Lester primarily is a Hebrew Bible scholar, and the Old Testament has its own theoretical models of intertextuality with ancient near eastern traditions or approaches to inner-biblical interpretation. Sometimes the models used do overlap with those employed by New Testament scholars, and in this case, Lester draws on the work of literary theorists Ziva Ben-Porat and Carmella Perri who are familiar to recent NT scholars on intertextuality (e.g., see the work of Christopher Beetham, David McAuley, and Leroy Huizenga; cf. Lester's own book on Daniel). Forgive the pun, but the theories of Ben-Porat and Perri on allusion had eluded me, and so I found Lester's paper on tacitness of reference very helpful.
   In the past, scholars have understood allusions to Scripture or other ancient texts in the New Testament to be defined by how tacit is an author's identification of a Scriptural reference. If, for example, Paul identifies an OT quotation with the typical formula "As it is written," then the OT text is not an allusion because it is overtly recognized by the reader with the author's help. 
    However, Lester points to the work of Ben-Porat and Perri to redefine allusion as a production of the author and reader. An allusion can be overtly identified, but it remains an allusion if the meaning of the NT text is still unclear even when the reader is aware of the alluded-to text. If the connection between texts creates a riddle, that is, it is unclear how the allude-to text is supposed to illuminate the meaning of the read text, then we have an allusion. An allusion creates an imaginative space that needs to be filled in by the reader who interprets the evoked text to make sense of what he or she has read.
    So a good signal that we may have a Pauline allusion to another text is when a surface or literal reading makes no sense. [Try reading Romans 9-11 without reference to the OT and you get the point]. Without the alluded-to text activating the meaning of the read text, the read text's interpretation remains undecipherable. 
    Let me give an example that I immediately thought about, but was not used by Lester: 1 Cor 6:13a: τὰ βρώματα τῇ κοιλίᾳ καὶ ἡ κοιλία τοῖς βρώμασιν.
   What does "food for the stomach, and the stomach for food" mean? Commentators have been trying to decipher this text for a while, and the myriads of possible interpretations keep building. To me, this is a signal that an allusion might be embedded, and without identifying the allusion, the 1 Cor 6:13a text will remain undecipherable. I suspect that the allusion is not, however, to Scripture but to Greco-Roman discourse which a wisdom group at the church in Corinth is using to justify a slogan and position on the ethics of pleasure which Paul finds objectionable.
   In any case, I have some reading to do with Ben-Porat and Perri, and I appreciate the theoretical framework provided by Lester's fine paper. 

Highlights from the Pauline Epistles Session (Nov 21)

My flight back home is delayed, so while I'm waiting at the airport, I'm thinking the best use of my time is to do a quick post on SBL-AAR 2015. I won't be posting on every session and every paper that I attended but I will highlight what I feel were presentations either of particular interest to me personally, or I think would be of wider interest to those who, as Kevin Vanhoozer puts it, appreciate that one aspect of pastoral ministry is being a public theologian and therefore do not shy away from the insights born from engagement with academic study.

Pauline Epistles Session at SBL-AAR Atlanta on Sat morning (11/21/15)

   The Saturday morning Pauline Epistles session (Nov 21) had some great papers. I'm grateful that David Wheeler-Reed mined Galen's recently discovered treatise De Indolentia (now published in a critical edition) for how its exposition on λυπή (often translated as "grief") might illuminate Paul's discourse (paper title: "Paging Dr. Paul: Reading Paul's Use of Grief with Galen"). Long story short, after a great summary of the treatise, Wheeler-Reed argued that the injunction μὴ λυπῆσθε in 1 Thessalonias 4:13 should be translated not as "Do not grieve" but "Do not distress over." Galen, of course, was writing much later than Paul, but the former's discourse on λυπή, so argued by Wheeler-Reed, was part of the wider linguistic currency of the Greco-Roman world that ran through the 1st century up until Galen's time. 
   Theologically, the implications of the translation means that Paul was not against emotional grief per say (by all means, the loss of someone in this earthly life is an occasion to grieve, weep, and remorse). Rather "distress" relates to a mental state on how to deal with the tragedies and external circumstances surrounding an individual. Rather than reacting with visible demonstrations of panic, Paul's antidote to distress is faith, especially a faith which confesses that those who have died in the Lord will not be excluded from the benefits and promises of salvation. 
   I'm not completely convinced that Paul would limit the definition of λυπή to exclude the emotional component of distress. Paul does say: Don't grieve as those who have no hope, not: dont' grieve at all [period!]. And since Galen was not a Stoic but accounted for emotional experience in moderated measure (see my essay in Klyne Snodgrass' Festschrift), I'm inclined to think that Paul's use of the term did include some emotional component. However, the paper was a helpful reminder that λυπή focuses not on an internal condition of the soul but one's deliberate (not knee-jerk) response to present external circumstances. 
    I must mention also that my dean, colleague, and friend Stephen Chester gave a fantastic paper on "Conflicting or Mutually Dependent Perspectives?: Interpreting the Flesh, Sin, and the Human Plight in Paul." I don't think he meant to be humorous, but the points he made in his presentation were so clear, I could not help but laugh a few times throughout his presentation for the sheer irony that he was so ably cataloguing in his history of interpretation on Paul's justification language. His central thesis was that the New Perspective has made the mistake of lumping together the views of Augustine and Martin Luther so that in their re-reading of Paul, the NPP (= New Perspective on Paul) ends up faulting Luther for concepts that Luther himself does not support. In fact, if one examines Luther's interpretation of Galatians more closely, many of Luther's exegetical conclusions anticipate the criticisms of the NPP against Augustine. 
   In regards to Luther's understanding of the flesh vs. the Spirit, for example, the NPP has accused Luther of being dualistic in his views of human anthropology. However, Luther, in a text quoted by Chester, actually says: 

• The apostle [Paul] does not wish to be understood as saying that the flesh and the spirit are two separate entities, as it were, but whole... [LW 25:339-41 = WA 56:350, 22 - 352, 9]. Note that one and the same man at the same time serves the law of God and the law of sin, at the same time is righteous and sins! For he does not say: "My mind serves the law of God," nor does he say: "My flesh serves the law of sin," but "I, the whole man," the same person, I serve a two-fold servitude." [LW 25:336 = WF 56:347, 2-6; excerpt from a handout given by Chester]

When Luther talks about the whole person, he is hardly being dualistic or positing an anthropological hierarchy (human spirit > flesh). So when N.T. Wright says: 

• [Paul's anthropological terms] sometimes appear to designate different 'parts' of a human being, but, as many have pointed out, it is better to see as each encoding a particular way of looking at the human being as a whole but from one perticular angle (Paul and the Faithfulness of God, p. 491; excerpt from Chester's handout)

Luther would agree with Wright, and would add: And I said it first! Luther says the whole man serves God or sins. He does not think two different faculties in a person are at war with each other in some sort of (Neo)platonic dualism as Augustine does, but the NPP wrongly posits Luther's position as Augustinian. 
   So there is a delicious irony at work: the NPP has defined its movement vis-à-vis the Reformers but in fact many of its tenets (e.g., a holistic view of the flesh, or sin as an apocalyptic power) continue to depend on the exegetical work of the Reformers like Luther. 
    This paper, by the way, is part of a larger monograph that Stephen is almost finished with, and is tentatively entitled: Righteousness in Christ: Paul, the Reformers, and the New Perspective. He plans to submit a manuscript to Eerdmans and we will probably see it debut at the next SBL-AAR 2016 in San Antonio, Texas. Can't wait! 

Top Picks for SBL-AAR 2015 (Part 2)

Chris Spinks' suggested jogging route for SBL 2015

Continuing from the previous post, on Sunday Nov 22, I plan to attend the Worship Service of the Institute for Biblical Research at 7:30am. Then, for the morning sessions, I'm looking at: 

S22-140

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Pauline Epistles
11/22/2015
9:00 AM to 11:30 AM
Room: 209 (Level 2) - Hilton

Caroline Johnson Hodge, College of the Holy Cross, Presiding

Todd Berzon, Bowdoin College
Reading Galatians in Late Antiquity: An Ethno-History (25 min)

Sonja Anderson, Yale University
Are Idols Real? Demons, Christians, and Rabbis (25 min)

Mark A. Ellis, Faculdade Teológica Batista do Paraná, Brazil
The Augustinian Captivity of Rom 5:12 (25 min)

James Starr, Johannelund Theological Seminary
Second-Century Reception of Pauline Paraenesis (25 min)

Will Deming, University of Portland
Similarities between Paul and the Stoics on Ethics (25 min)

I'm particularly interested in Anderson's paper on idols and idol food in the Corinthian correspondence, and to hear what Deming thinks are shared categories in moral philosophy and ethics between Paul and the Stoics. I have my ideas on the subject but I would be curious to hear Deming's own independent evaluation on the matter, and catalogue his assertions/suspicions along side those of Troels Engberg-Pedersen and a growing number of Scandinavian scholars who have written on the topic in a jewel of an essay collection, sadly not getting quite enough press, entitled: Stoicism in Early Christianity (2010). 
    For the early afternoon session, I'm heading over to: 

S22-237

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Philo of Alexandria
11/22/2015
1:00 PM to 3:30 PM
Room: International 4 (International Level) - Marriott

Theme: Philo & the History of Interpretation
Seminar papers will be available on-line at http://torreys.org/philo_seminar_papers/.

Sarah Pearce, University of Southampton, Presiding

Nelida Naveros Cordova, Loyola University of Chicago
The Greek Philosophical Tradition in Philo's Ethical Teaching: Eusebeia for the Service of God and Human Beings (25 min)

Frank Shaw, Ashland University
An Onomastic History: What Can Philo Provide? (25 min)

Michael Francis, University of Notre Dame
Voluntary and Involuntary Sin and the Allegory of the Soul in Philo (25 min)
Break (10 min)

Ludovica De Luca, Università degli studi Roma Tre
The Bronze Snake according to Philo of Alexandria in Legum allegoriae II, 79–81 (25 min)

Justin M. Rogers, Freed-Hardeman University
The Reception of Philonic Arithmological Exegesis in Didymus the Blind's Commentary on Genesis (25 min)
Discussion (15 min)

An appealing feature of the above section is that the papers, for the most part, are already available to be read (here). The session is therefore dedicated to discussion of the papers, and over the years, there have been some very good ones. I'll have to make the most of my airplane flight and read especially Navaros Cordova's and Francis' papers so I can track whatever dialogue or debate ensues.
   For Sunday late afternoon/evening, I'm stuck again. I want to attend the Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics session but every year, I also attend the Korean Biblical Colloquium, especially to support rising scholars in biblical studies who read their papers for the first time at KBC. 

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Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics
11/22/2015
4:00 PM to 6:30 PM
Room: 202 (Level 2) - Hilton

Theme: A Preposition You Can't Refuse
This session is dedicated to Greek prepositions. The history of preposition scholarship, linguistic theories, and issues of exegesis will be addressed.

Jonathan M. Watt, Geneva College
From Adams (1885) to Zimmerman (2003): In, With, and Under the Elements of Prepositions (15 min)

Stanley E. Porter, McMaster Divinity College
Greek Prepositions, Processes, and Cases in an SFL Framework (30 min)

Steven E. Runge, Logos Bible Software
The Contribution of Prototype Theory and Diachrony to a Synchronic Understanding of Prepositions (30 min)

Constantine R. Campbell, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School
Greek Prepositions and New Testament Exegesis (30 min)
Discussion (45 min)

Dilemma! Dilemma! Dilemma! What I'm likely to do is attend the first half of the BGLL session and run over to KBC to catch the New Testament papers by Kim and Park.

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Korean Biblical Colloquium
11/22/2015
4:00 PM to 6:30 PM
Room: 210 (Level 2) - Hilton
Immediately following the papers, we will have a brief business meeting. Afterwards, we invite members (and guests) to dinner at a nearby restaurant (TBA).

John Ahn, Howard University, Presiding

Sok-Chung Chang, Catholic Kwandong University
The Korean Translation of "Two Stones" in Exod 1:16 (30 min)

Baek Hee Kim, Brite Divinity School (TCU)
Whose Offspring Are Worthy of Honor? Ben Sira's Honor and Shame Matrix as a Counter-Colonial Discourse (30 min)

Donald Kim, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary
Faith(fulness) of Christ within Paul’s Judaism (30 min)

Hyun Ho Park, Graduate Theological Union
Minjung in the Sinking of the Sewol Ferry: A Reading of Luke 10:25-42 from Minjung Theology’s Perspective (30 min)
Business Meeting (30 min)

After the day's sessions are over, I'm off to a dinner with Levant and the folks at Tuktu Tours to hear more about the possibility of a trip to Asia Minor to see the seven cities of Revelation. I'm hoping all the details can be worked out. I'm eager to go!

    On Monday Nov 23, after the Full Theological Seminary breakfast at 7:00am, I'm going to have to miss the morning session featuring a book review of John Barclay's Paul and the Gift (2015) because I'm chairing a session for the Intertextuality and New Testament Interpretation Section. The papers for the INTI session look fantastic. It's just a shame that our session has to compete with the review of Barclay's book. 
     After the morning session is over, I'm heading to the airport and back to Chicago. I'm cutting my trip a day short and returning on Monday instead of Tuesday like I normally do.

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Pauline Soteriology
11/23/2015
9:00 AM to 11:30 AM
Room: Marquis A-B (Marquis Level) - Marriott

Theme: Review of John Barclay, Paul and the Gift (Eerdmans 2015)

Alexandra Brown, Washington and Lee University, Presiding

Joel Marcus, Duke University, Panelist (20 min)

Margaret Mitchell, University of Chicago, Panelist (20 min)

Miroslav Volf, Yale University, Panelist (20 min)

Break (10 min)

John Barclay, University of Durham, Respondent (40 min)
Discussion (40 min)

     Hoping, nevertheless, to see many people for the INTI session on Paul and his rhetorical use of intertextual echoes. Safe travels to all who are going to Atlanta one week from tomorrow! MJL

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Intertextuality in the New Testament
11/23/2015
9:00 AM to 11:30 AM
Room: L404 (Lobby Level) - Marriott

Theme: Intertextuality, Rhetorical Criticism, and the Pauline Letters

Max Lee, North Park Theological Seminary, Presiding

A. Andrew Das, Elmhurst College
An Audience-Oriented Approach to Paul’s Use of Scripture in Galatians: Reader Competence and Differing Target Audiences (20 min)
Discussion (10 min)

Raymond Morehouse, University of St. Andrews
Diatribe and Deuteronomy: Romans 3:1-6 as Guided Reflection on Deut 32:4 (20 min)
Discussion (10 min)

Douglas C. Mohrmann, Cornerstone University
Paul’s Use of Scripture in Romans 9–11 as Palimpsest: Literature in the Second Degree (20 min)
Discussion (10 min)

Jason A. Myers, Asbury Theological Seminary
Paul and the Rhetoric of Obedience: A Rhetorical Reading of Obedience (20 min)
Discussion (10 min)

G. Brooke Lester, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary
No, Seriously: A Unifying Theory of Allusion (20 min)
Discussion (10 min)