Re: Galatians 3:13

Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Mon, 11 May 1998 13:37:08 -0400

At 12:10 PM -0400 5/11/98, Edgar Foster wrote:
>---"Carl W. Conrad" <cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu> wrote:
>
>> At 2:51 PM -0400 5/09/98, Edgar Foster wrote:
>> >To whom does hHMAS and hHMWN refer to in Gal. 3:13?
>
>> You've probably had an answer to this one by the time I can get this
>> posted, but nevertheless:
>
>> At the very least this first plural pronoun must refer to the Galatian
>> congregation and the author, Paul himself. It is surely not a
>rhetorical 1
>> plural = "me." I think the reasonable surmise here is that it refers
>to
>> believers, specifically to the "faith-justified" in the sense
>clarified by
>> Paul in this letter (and also, of course,in Romans).
>
>Let me ask you one more question, Carl. Do you think that Paul is
>strictly speaking of Jewish believers, or gentiles as well?

I think he is UNDOUBTEDLY speaking of gentiles as well: the congregations
he has founded are predominantly gentile congregations, even if there may
be some Jews among them. The usual view of the context of Galatians is that
"Judaizer" missionaries have come to this community and upset it by telling
the members that they must be circumcised and obey the Mosaic Law; some
interpret the context a bit differently, but in any case, it is hardly a
community of Jewish Christians, much less of unconverted Jews, of which he
is speaking.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University
Summer: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/