Q. Let’s talk about pistis, a word which certainly can be translated ‘trust’ but it can also be translated faith and even faithfulness, for instance in the phrase in Romans which refers to the pistis Theou, the faithfulness of God. Why do you not recognize the spectrum of possible ways Paul could have used this important word, and simply render it trust throughout the commentary? A. First of all it is better to keep to the one meaning consistently throughout... Read more
Q. I was a bit surprised by your take on Rom. 7.7-25. Speech in character, from a rhetorical point of view or prosopoeia requires that one be speaking as a well-known historical person recently mentioned, as Quintilian stresses. In this case the person in question is Adam, mentioned less than 5 minutes before Rom. 7 in the continuous reading of the text of Romans likely by Phoebe. Notice the change in verb tenses from 7.7-13 to 7.14-25. Also, only Adam... Read more
Q. I really find the argument of Neil Elliott as not compelling, trying to find anti-imperial rhetoric in Romans here there and everywhere. I think Rom. 13 cannot be explained that way at all. Rather I think Paul is sharing a rather typical Jewish reaction to paganism from Rom. 1 on. It requires a lot of assumptions to find Elliott’s argument compelling. For one thing, we do not know that the Christians in Rome are Romans or Roman citizens who... Read more
Q. In your exposition about Rom. 1.18-32 I was surprised that while you rightly emphasized the critique of pagan idolatry, you said nothing about pagan sexual immorality in the form of same sex sexual activity which it seems is clearly referred to in that context. It seems clear to me that Paul sees that as the fallenness pagans were given up to because of their idolatry. Yes? I realize his critique of homosexuality is perhaps less strident than say Philo’s... Read more
Q. You are right that not infrequently Paul uses the rhetorical device of diatribe and also the device of rhetorical questions to further his arguments. This however does not amount to alternating between diatribal sections and epistolary sections of the document. The non-diatribal material does not reflect epistolary anything, other than at the outset and conclusion of the document. Rather, we have a progressive series of arguments and they follow rhetorical not epistolary rules and categories. The need ito see... Read more
Not infrequently I’ve been asked, how (and why) I have written so many books. I wish I had known the warning of Edna St. Vincent Millay earlier in my publishing career. “A person who publishes a book willfully appears before the populace with his pants down…If it is a good book nothing can hurt him. If it is a bad book nothing can help him.” (cited in Cliff Black’s new volume on the Gospel of Mark, p. 76— to be... Read more
There are many problems that ultimately can be traced back to the human heart and its desires, its needs, its wants. Food related obesity is one such problem, and 42% of this state is considered obese or morbidly obese. But that’s a post for another day. During primary season I got sick and tired of seeing campaign ads claiming— ‘we stopped drugs at the borders of Kentucky’ or we will do so if you elect us. What absolute rubbish. Really? ... Read more
O.K., I admit it, I love sports. Not surprisingly, having been raised on Carolina basketball, college basketball is decidedly my favorite sport, and fortunately, I’ve seen my alma mater win 6 national championships (the first being in 1957 where we went undefeated and beat Wilt Chamberlain in 3 overtimes in Kansas in the most improbable championship ever). I don’t much care for the NBA, unless we are talking the Celtics in the playoffs. In fact of the professional sports, I... Read more
There have always been problems with word dictionaries. Why? Because words don’t have meanings in isolation from their contexts. It is not true that ‘in the beginning was the Dictionary, and the Dictionary was good’. Every existing dictionary of whatever sort involves persons having done detailed study of the use of words in numerous contexts, to establish the semantic range of the word. And often enough, that range is broad, though not quite free range like the chickens. And the... Read more
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