> You also said,
> <<Ben Crick commented on the meaning of PEIRASMOS in context in
> Luke. I am much in favour of this kind of exegesis - I think that
> it is always advisable first to look for the meaning of the word
> elsewhere in the book(s) in which the passage occurs.>>
>
> That technique, sound as it is, would reflect the Lukan redaction in
> the Lord's Prayer more than the original referent in Jesus'
> teaching.
>
Exactly. This is what my next paragraph (which you did not
quote) went on to say - i.e. while in general I am in favour of this
kind of exegesis, it is difficult here because of the presence of the
word PEIRASMOS in Matt. It is one of the hazards of the Email
conference forum that sometimes the views that one is (gently)
criticising inadvertently become associated with one's own views!
The only thing I would want to add to the sentence above is that I
would be less happy about talking about 'the original referent in
Jesus' teaching' - but that is not a b-greek topic.
Like everyone else, I have found the current string on PEIRASMOS
enormously interesting and rewarding - and I am most grateful to
Jeffrey Gibson for the time he has taken to post his views and
interact with others. The only difficulty for me was that the recent
message came twice and used up virtually all the remaining space in
my mail-box. But it was worth it - it is far better to clog up the
system with valuable material than with general rubbish!
Perhaps I could put a little more flesh on my own earlier slight
contribution that there is a clear link between the Lord's Prayer and
the Gethsemane stories. Those familiar with my contributions to this
and other lists will know that my doctoral research was on the work
of Michael Goulder. One of Goulder's many radical claims is that the
Lord's Prayer was 'a prayer composed by the evangelist
[Matthew] from the traditions of the prayers of Jesus in Mark
and the teaching on prayer by Jesus in Mark, amplified from
the Exodus context of the Sermon, and couched in Matthean
language.' (*Midrash and Lection in Matthew* (London: SPCK,
1974), p. 298, cf. 'The Composition of the Lord's Prayer', *JTS* 14
(1964), pp. 32-45.
The relevance of this to our current discussion is that Goulder
claims that Matthew takes the Gethsemane charge to pray hINA MH
EISELQHTE EIS PEIRASMON and converts it to MH EISENEGKHiS EIS
PEIRASMON in the Lord's Prayer.
But Goulder's claim that the Lord's Prayer is 'couched in Matthean
language' is compromised by my test in *Goulder and the Gospels: An
Examination of a New Paradigm* (JSNTSup, 133; Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 1996), pp. 53-55 which analyses the words in common
to Matthew and Luke in the Lord's Prayer, two of which, EISFERW and
PEIRASMOS, are more characteristic of Luke than they are of Matthew
(EISFERW 1 Mt / 0 Mk / 4 Lk + 1Acts, introduced redactionally in
Luke 5.18 and 5.19; PEIRASMOS 2 Mt / 1 Mk / 6 Lk + 1 Acts,
introduced redactionally Luke 4.13 & 8.13). Furthermore, these are
the only two words common to the two evangelists in the Lord's Prayer
that are strongly characteristic of either evangelist. All the
really characteristic Matthean expressions in the Lord's Prayer are
unique to his version of it (our father in heaven etc.).
But whatever one thinks of Goulder's view, what does help us is the
attention it draws to the sheer similarity between the Lord's Prayer
and the Gethsemane prayer material. I would have thought that the
near identity of the clause under discussion concerning PEIRASMOS
would lend support to (what I perceive as) Jeffrey Gibson's view,
viz. that PEIRASMOS is not a matter of enticement to evil etc.
Good wishes to all
Mark
------------------------
Dr Mark Goodacre
Department of Theology
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham B15 2TT
Tel.: 0121 414 7512 Email: M.S.Goodacre@Bham.ac.uk
Fax.: 0121 414 6866