Friday, September 18, 2009

Thesis update: another narrowing

Well folks I began this thesis doing a study of Paul's use of the Body of Christ as a metaphor for the Chruch, then I narowed it to only its use in 1 Corinthians, but even that was too big, I got stuck on 1 Cor 6:12-20 and have just had approval to write my whole thesis just on these verses.... good in that it is a lot less ground to cover, but bad in that:

"1 Cor. 6:12-20 is widely acknowledged to be one of the most difficult passages in the Pauline corpus. Commentators have described the paragraph as "disjointed," "obscure," "unfinished," "imprecise," "extravagant," and even "incoherent." Gordon Fee notes with understatement: "the passage is full of unique, and in some cases difficult expressions, which in turn have given rise to equally unique interpretations." Bruce N. Fisk rightly states that "[s]cholars continue to puzzle over the meaning and rhetorical function of 1 Corinthians 6.12-20."" From Brain Rosner, "Temple Prostitution in 1 Cor 6:12-20," Novum Testamentum, 40:4, 1998, 336.

Anyway, I'm having fun with it, and who knows I may even be the one to finally crack the nut and bring consensus to the troubled world of 1 Corinthians scholarship! (But I'd settle just to get the thing written.)

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Jesus treats the Syrophoenecian Woman as a Disciple

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