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{"id":16840,"date":"2014-11-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-11-21T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leithart.level2d.com\/?p=1665"},"modified":"2014-11-21T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2014-11-21T00:00:00","slug":"no-more-jew-or-greek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/leithart\/2014\/11\/no-more-jew-or-greek\/","title":{"rendered":"No More Jew or Greek"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n<\/head>

\u201cWe have here a simple typology, limited to an essential factor that seems to anticipate history itself by specifying less what is than what \u2018had to be.\u2019 The two Greek words (aitein <\/em>and zetein<\/em>) have, in the apostle\u2019s intention, the value and force of a definition. The Greek is the man of inquiry; the Jew is the man of the question or of prayer. . . . They incarnate two ideas of man, or more precisely to ways of being that will sometimes be cited as fundamentals in the historical determination of the \u2018human essence.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Specifically, \u201cthe Greeks seeks causes or reasons. He takes care to give an account of and to give reasons for that which is.\u201d Jews on the other hand are \u201ca people of prophets who are less interested in the order of nature than in the vicissitudes of a tormented history and in the advent of a justice whose future is not assured. Therefore their \u2018demand\u2019 has nothing to do with that of the \u2018sage.\u2019 It takes the form of a prayer that cannot be reduced to the request for material goods.\u201d<\/p>\n

On this account, Christianity is neither Jew nor Greek in a pure form. Christians are people of prayer; we ask for signs. But it\u2019s hard to imagine a church without a \u201cGreek\u201d impulse, without the search for causes and reasons, without faith seeking understanding and using various modes of reasoning in the process. We both demand and seek. Jesus broke down the dividing wall, not only socially but mentally, forming a whole mind from the half-minds of ancient humanity.<\/p>\n

That, it seems, is precisely what Paul is on about in 1 Corinthians where he contrasts Jews and Greeks in this way. To be sure, the cross is a scandal for Jews and madness to Greeks. (Breton [146] suggests this splendid translation: \u201cUnderneath the Apollonian face we give God, there is a nocturnal passion putting him \u2018outside of himself\u2019 in madness [to moron tou Theou<\/em>] and impelling him toward the \u2018infirmity\u2019 of an abasement [to asthenes tou Theou<\/em>].\u201d) Yet in the folly and weakness of the cross, God displays a wisdom that answers the Greek search and a power that responds to the Jewish prayer. In the cross, inquiry and demand are united, wisdom and signs kiss each other.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"