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Paul 4Ep.Pdf Use University of Cbieago 21 i bra vies A OF THE FOUR CHIEF PAULINE EPISTLES ROMANS, FIRST AND SECOND CORINTHIANS, AND GALATIANS BY L. GORDON RYLANDS,\\ * B.A., B.SC., AUTHOR OF "THE EVOLUTION OF CHRISTIANITY" LONDON : WATTS & CO., 5 & 6 JOHNSON'S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.4 "* '-.. -. I , . v * * ' >* . , > t *: < ** ^ First published June, 1929 Printed in Great Britain by Watts & Co., Nos. 5 and Johnson's Court Fleet Street, London, E.C.4 PREFACE THE progress of the development of any movement must necessarily be reflected in the literature produced by it. It follows that, until the literature thrown up by primitive Christianity has been correctly classified and dated, serious errors with regard to the course of the movement may be incurred. A preliminary study of the Pauline literature, undertaken in the course of an investigation into the origins of Christianity, convinced me that theologians had so little appreciated the true character of that literature as not to be in a position to perceive clearly the nature of the development which was going on from the middle to the end of the first century. The work of van Manen first gave me the clue to the labyrinth. That clue I have followed up in the present no doubt there are errors in detail book ; and, although which further investigation will rectify, the light that has been thrown upon a number of obscure and long-debated questions gives some assurance that in the main the results reached are correct. Incidentally and as a by-product, so to speak, a result achieved has been to do justice to the memory of a great man who has been misrepresented for eighteen hundred years. As many people are blind to the faults of those they love, so have very many, apparently without question or misgiving, accepted from the Epistles a portrait of Paul which is very far indeed from being that of an amiable character. The stripping off of fictitious charac- teristics and legendary accretions leaves us, it is true, with little of Paul as an historical but very knowledge personage ; his greatness can be inferred from the impression he made upon his contemporaries and followers, and from the nature of the religious system which he probably taught. It has been said that Paul was the real founder of Christianity. iv PREFACE Without serious qualification, the statement cannot be true. doctrine he is far from but to The propagated primitive ; what extent its elaboration was the work of Paul himself cannot now be determined. Moreover, it was not the Pauline Christology which became the predominant Catholic doctrine in the second century. Somewhere outside the Pauline com- munities there existed very different ideas with regard to the nature of Jesus and the conditions of salvation. When the Pauline Epistles are analysed into their constituent strata and the strata classified approximately in chronological order we find that not until the second century does the dogma which is the foundation-stone of Catholic Christianity make its appearance. The doctrine of Paul was too abstract and too highly spiritualized to become the religion of a multitude of uncultured people. But Catholic Christianity absorbed from it certain elements which were necessary for its own success. Paul was certainly not the founder of Catholic Christianity, but it was his work and the work of his coadjutors in cutting Christian doctrine free from the Mosaic law and the Judaic tradition which promoted Christianity from an obscure Jewish sect with no future to a system which was able to assert its claim to be accepted as a world-religion. Probably the immediate aim of Paul himself was to spiritualize Judaism. Like many other Jewish thinkers of the first rank, he con- templated a future in which a reformed and spiritualized Judaism would become the religion of the world, a light to the Gentiles the doctrine therefore to be lighten ; new had of a character which Gentiles could readily accept. But while the doctrine he offered might appeal to men imbued with a certain amount of culture, who desired for their guidance and consolation a religion rather than a philosophy, it could not spread widely among the multitude until it had been down to a lower in other brought somewhat plane ; words, until it had been catholicized a process which consisted to a considerable extent in the infusion into it of religious elements, chiefly Jewish, of much greater antiquity than itself. To avoid the risk of misapprehension, I had better explain PREFACE v " " that I have used the term Gnostic where perhaps other writers would have employed the term "Hellenistic." The latter term is somewhat ambiguous. New Testament scholars " " are not agreed as to whether Paul had come directly under the influence of Greek thought proceeding from Plato and from the Stoic philosophers, or whether the "Hellenism" in the Epistles is derived from a Hellenistic Judaism akin to the of Philo whether there have been system ; or, again, may both direct and indirect influence. In the writings of Philo we have an example of the interaction of Jewish religion and Greek philosophy. There is sufficient evidence that in the first century B.C. the result of that interaction was a great variety of speculation of a kindred nature which gave birth to a number of sects differing in the details of their dogma, but deriving it in greater or less degree from the Wisdom literature and from certain Platonic and possibly Stoic ideas by which the groundwork of their Judaic theology was profoundly modified. The body of doctrine thus evolved, however differently it may have been worked out in detail, was distin- guished by certain conceptions and modes of thought which may be comprised under the general term "Gnosis," and is recognizable by the use of certain characteristic expressions and phrases. Those sections of the Epistles which betray the influence of such conceptions and modes of thought to a greater or less degree I have described as Gnostic. The question of the direct influence of Greek thought upon any of the writers of the Epistles is a difficult one, which it has not been necessary to take into consideration. In any case, such influence appears not to have been considerable. The fundamental distinction between Judaic and Catholic doctrine on the one hand and Gnostic on the other is that according to the former redemption is achieved by the expiatory sacrifice of the redeemer, while in the latter men are held to be redeemed through the knowledge of God and of his plan of salvation (gnosis) brought to them by a Christ who may or may not have been regarded as the Son of God, but whose principal features in any case were developed from the hypos- tatized Word of God (Logos) and Wisdom (Sophia) of the vi PREFACE Wisdom literature. This Christ was of course put to death, but not as an expiation or a sacrifice. He was killed by the supernatural powers opposed to God, who foresaw that their influence over mankind was about to be terminated. To " " restrict the term Gnostic to the elaborated Gnosticism of the second century is scientifically incorrect. That Gnos- ticism did not in full flower the had suddenly appear ; plant been growing for a considerable time. My very sincere thanks are due to Mr. Thomas Whittaker for his careful revision of the MS. and proofs, and for his assistance in clearing up some obscurities in the text of the Epistles. L. G. R. CONTENTS THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS PAGE 1. INTRODUCTORY 1 2. THE OPENING ADDRESS - - - - 13 3. THE Two WRITERS OF CHAPTERS I TO VIII - 27 - 4. THE GNOSTIC EPISTLE - - 35 . 5. THE GNOSTIC SECTIONS : THE EARLIER 52 6. THE THIRD WRITER .... - 69 7. THE HORTATORY SECTION .... 83 8. THE CONCLUDING CHAPTERS 90 9. INDICATIONS OF DATE - - - - 99 10. SUMMARY OF RESULTS .... 103 11. THE GNOSTIC EPISTLE REPRODUCED - - 104 12. THE EPISTLE OF R3 REPRODUCED ... 108 13. THE HORTATORY SECTION REPRODUCED - - 111 THE FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS 1. INTRODUCTORY - - - - -115 2. THE GNOSTIC EPISTLE TRACED - - - 119 3. THE GNOSTIC SECTION UPON THE RESURRECTION - 132 4. THE SECOND SECTION- - - - - 139 5. THE FIRST EDITOR - - - - -161 6. LATER EDITIONS OF THE EPISTLE - - 170 7. THE CONCLUDING CHAPTER - - - - 187 8. INDICATIONS OF DATE .... 190 9. SUMMARY OF RESULTS - - - - 199 10. THE GNOSTIC EPISTLE REPRODUCED - 200 11. THE SECTION UPON THE RESURRECTION - - 202 12. THE EPISTLE OF C (SOSTIIENES) - 203 vii viii CONTENTS THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS PAGE 1. INTRODUCTORY - 209 2. THE GNOSTIC EPISTLE TRACED - - - 211 3. THE EPISTLE OF C2 - - - - 229 4. CHAPTERS VIII AND IX - - - - 236 5. CHAPTERS X TO XIII - .... 243 6. INDICATIONS OF DATE - 261 7. SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS - 266 8. THE GNOSTIC EPISTLE - 269 THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS 1. INTRODUCTORY - 275 2. THE WRITERS OF THE EPISTLE- - 286 3. CHAPTERS V AND VI - - - - 296 4. THE ORIGINAL EPISTLE RECOVERED - - - 301 5. THE EPISTLE AS AN HISTORICAL DOCUMENT - - 316 6. THE EVIDENCE OF THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES - 331 7. THE VISION ON THE ROAD TO DAMASCUS - - 344 8. INDICATIONS OF DATE - 353 9. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS AND SUMMARY - - 356 10. THE POSSIBLE IDENTITY OF C4 AND G 363 11. THE ORIGINAL EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS - - 365 CONFIRMATIONS AND CONCLUSION 1. THE EVIDENCE OF TERTULLIAN - - 371 2. THE EVIDENCE OF IUEN^JUS AND IGNATIUS - - 388 3. THE EVIDENCE OF EPIPIIANIUS - 390 4. TEXTUAL ------ 401 5. CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS - 409 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE ----- 415 The Epistle to the Romans THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS 1 . INTRODUCTORY THE work of van Manen has of late years brought into prominence the view that some at least of the Pauline Epistles, especially those to the Romans and Corinthians, are of those of later date composite ; portions Epistles being than others.
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