EIDWLOQUTA

Randy Leedy (RLEEDY@bju.edu)
Sat, 29 Nov 1997 14:45:20 -0500

I'm doing an article on 1 Cor. 10, which, of course, cannot be
treated apart from some consideration of chs. 8-9. Gordon Fee's
treatment of the EIDWLOQUTA in this passage, maintaining that the
term here refers specifically to sacrificial meat consumed on the
premises of the idol temple as part of a pagan ceremony, left me
dissatisfied, and I was prepared to argue against him to some extent.
I agreed with him that it could not refer specifically to marketplace
meat butchered in connection with idol worship but sold in the market
and consumed at home, but I felt that he had not provided a firm
basis for not accepting the word as referring generally to all kinds
of sacrificial meats, regardless of where consumed. On this view, the
introductory phrase PERI DE EIDWLOQUTWN (8:1) opens up a discussion
of such meat consumed in a variety of places: in connection with
pagan ceremony and in private homes, both at a believer's home and at
the homes of unbelieving acquaintances.

Now I have come across Ben Witherington's work on the question, both
his commentary on the Corinthian correspondence, and more to the
point, his Tyndale Bulletin article on EIDWLOQUTON (vol 44, pp.
237ff). He has put forth what is to me a quite convincing case, based
on analysis of all known occurrences of the word in extant ancient
literature, that EIDWLOQUTON has ONLY the sense that Fee maintained
it must have in this passage, that it NEVER refers to temple meat
bought in the market and taken home.

That idea I can buy; it appears to be justified by the data, and it
provides for everything that is exegetically attractive about Fee's
position while avoiding what were, EMOI, significant weaknesses in
Fee's lexical semantics. The brief instructions at the end of the
passage, relating to meat consumed in private homes, on this view
become simply a related expansion on the original topic. This view
also removes the necessity for Fee to do what I think is a very weak
piece of exegesis, when he claims that the person in 10:28 who
whispers TOUTO hIEROQUTON ESTIN must be a pagan, on the assumption
that a Christian would have said EIDWLOQUTON. If EIDWLOQUTON has only
this one referent as Witherington claims, then it could not appear
even on a Christian's lips (the pagan would obviously never use it,
since EIDWLON reflects a uniquely Jewish/Christian perspective) at a
meal in a private home, and hIEROQUTON turns out to be perfectly
appropriate in Christian vocabulary. I'd be interested, on this
point, to see a similar study on hIEROQUTON, to see if it does in
fact appear in Christian writings with reference to temple meat
purchased in the market and consumed at home.

Anyway, the question at hand for me is this: can anyone adduce
reasons for my NOT accepting Witherington's view?

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In Love to God and Neighbor,
Randy Leedy
Bob Jones University
Greenville, SC
RLeedy@bju.edu
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