something old, something borrowed, something ... new

In class yesterday our lecturer said that in the New Testament letters the writer will often repeat things and then build upon them. [I don't know about other writers, because he didn't mention it, and I didn't think to ask until now!]

 4 I always thank my God for you because of God’s grace given to you in Christ Jesus, 5 that by Him you were enriched in everything — in all speech and all knowledge.

Oddly enough, this was clearer in Greek because they used the same word.

But the same thing can happen with concepts too.

6 In this way, the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you, 7 so that you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ. 8 He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you will be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Authors can use this to reinforce their message and communicate clearly.

The repeated ideas come through really strongly, but it also helps you to follow their logic and to be on the lookout for what the 'new' element is.

Cool!

Does Paul have a "set play"?

Today in New Testament we went through an overview of the structure and themes of 1 Corinthians, which we will be studying this semester.  Some scholars say there's no structure at all, but our lecturer put forward the idea that the glory of God is the unifying theme of the book.

Furthermore, he said that wisdom, sexuality, worship and resurrection/consummation - the key issues in 1 Corinthians - are not just key for 1 Corinthians, but in other letters of his too.  This view is heavily drawing on the work of Rosner and Ciampa in their commentary on 1 Corinthians (I've appended an excerpt below).

I found it quite interesting to ponder - does Paul have a "set play" (to put it crudely).  Does he have a way he commonly argues?  If one did agree that there is a pattern, one could get frustrated at Paul saying the same thing over and over again.  However, I find this idea encouraging.  Rather than creating his own message, Paul is preaching the gospel.  Therefore, one would expect each message to be getting at the same idea.  Wonderfully, Paul addresses each different community with their different people and different struggles.  Yet - if these guys are right in their analysis - it all boils down to the same essence.  It is all about Christ, and all for the glory of God.

It will take a while to examine whether I think the Pauline letters fit this mold, but I like the idea of it :-)

What a marvel that God has spoken to us!  What a delight that He has given us such a clear revelation of Himself in His Son and His word!  And what a privilege that he has given us His Spirit, so that we might understand his word about his son and be drawn to Him and fashioned into His likeness.

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This “shape” to Paul’s teaching is evident across the breadth of his corpus. To put the pattern in point form, with the overall goal of the glory of God, we find:

    1.      The proclamation of the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ is a call to enter the new eschatological age established in and by him. It demands that all people submit in unity to Christ, living out the wisdom of the other-person-centered lifestyle of the cross.
    2.      They must abandon the Gentile vice of sexual immorality (to the glory of God).
    3.      They must abandon the Gentile vice of idolatry, and give proper worship to the one true God (to the glory of God).
    4.      The Gentiles’ lives will be characterized by expectant hope for the final consummation of God’s glory (and so their own glorification) in the future bodily resurrection.


Ciampa, R. E., & Rosner, B. S. 2010. The First Letter to the Corinthians. The Pillar New Testament Commentary (26). William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company: Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge, U.K.