Canon II. If anyone shall condemn him who eats flesh
which is without blood and has not been offered to
idols nor strangled, and is faithful and devout, as
though the man were without hope of salvation because
of his eating, let him be anathema.
Quoted in The Evolution of the Late Antique World by Peter Garnsey and Caroline Humfress (page 193).
Best regards,
Edgar
Hi Edgar,
ReplyDeleteColossians 2:16-23 (TNIV) might state principles for an addition to your discussion:
"Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath Day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ. Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you ... ... Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!? These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence."
I take Paul's apostolic reinterpretation of Mosaic law (just like the Mishnah Oral law reinterprets the Toral Written law for Jewish minds today) to effectively downplay "forms" of ritualistic cleanliness that the Jewish mind took great delight in ... in adherence to Mosaic law requirements (which focused on the exterior but not interior heart condition?).
I would reference this paradigm shift with Peter's visions in Acts 10 & 11 about clean vs unclean foods, and Jesus' acerbic cleanliness comments reference straining out a gnat but swallowing a camel etc ... as well as Paul's Romans 14 & 15 weak vs strong comments ..
However, we agree Acts 15 bans eating overt idol foods; yet, Paul allows eating local markets' meat for the new believers in Corinth just as long as they don't find out it's dedicated to idols...
This is a pragmatic solution.
Why?
Corinth had many Greco-Roman shrines in Paul's day circa AD 50-52, most famously to Aphrodite on the AcroCorinth, Demeter and Kore, and the 7 remaining Doric columns of the "Archaic Temple" which Nancy Bookidis and Ronald Stroud, current supervisors of the dig there point speculatively to Apollo and linking with descriptions from Pausanias. The point is the close proximity of many shrines and food preparation and selling areas.
So if Paul downplays to the Asia Minor Colosse believers who live in a similar setting, and reiterates the same to the similar setting Romans, let alone the "it is for freedom Christ set you free" quite strong rhetorical arguments to the churches in Galatia -
Then it goes that ritual cleanliness (as distinct from moral cleanliness) was no longer essential to maintaining faith with the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob.
So in the words of one of my lecturers ... (who maybe controversially says):
"Why institute rules where a grace would do instead?"
Overdoing rules focuses us on the below, instead of the sovereign work of the above - which provided access to relationship with God through the Son's atoning death and resurrection...
Was this an ok reflection, in line with the intent of your original theme?
I think church tradition should continually realign to the NT interpretation of the Torah originally self-revealed by the Son of God, who perfectly reveals the Father's love and substance of all his policy positions revealed to all the OT prophets; and then expounded by Paul, Peter and the rest of the apostles and their posse - as Jesus never wrote the books although in his role as fully God (Colossians 2:9 states "For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form...") then Jesus Christ, the God-Man, superintended the writing of all Scripture (2 Timothy 3:16 "All Scripture is God breathed..." etc).
Ok - i'm done :)
Cheers
Hi Edgar,
ReplyDeleteColossians 2:16-23 (TNIV) might state principles for an addition to your discussion:
"Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath Day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ. Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you ... ... Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!? These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence."
I take Paul's apostolic reinterpretation of Mosaic law (just like the Mishnah Oral law reinterprets the Toral Written law for Jewish minds today) to effectively downplay "forms" of ritualistic cleanliness that the Jewish mind took great delight in ... in adherence to Mosaic law requirements (which focused on the exterior but not interior heart condition?).
I would reference this paradigm shift with Peter's visions in Acts 10 & 11 about clean vs unclean foods, and Jesus' acerbic cleanliness comments reference straining out a gnat but swallowing a camel etc ... as well as Paul's Romans 14 & 15 weak vs strong comments ..
However, we agree Acts 15 bans eating overt idol foods; yet, Paul allows eating local markets' meat for the new believers in Corinth just as long as they don't find out it's dedicated to idols...
This is a pragmatic solution.
Why?
Corinth had many Greco-Roman shrines in Paul's day circa AD 50-52, most famously to Aphrodite on the AcroCorinth, Demeter and Kore, and the 7 remaining Doric columns of the "Archaic Temple" which Nancy Bookidis and Ronald Stroud, current supervisors of the dig there point speculatively to Apollo and linking with descriptions from Pausanias. The point is the close proximity of many shrines and food preparation and selling areas.
So if Paul downplays to the Asia Minor Colosse believers who live in a similar setting, and reiterates the same to the similar setting Romans, let alone the "it is for freedom Christ set you free" quite strong rhetorical arguments to the churches in Galatia -
Then it goes that ritual cleanliness (as distinct from moral cleanliness) was no longer essential to maintaining faith with the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob.
So in the words of one of my lecturers ... (who maybe controversially says):
"Why institute rules where a grace would do instead?"
Overdoing rules focuses us on the below, instead of the sovereign work of the above - which provided access to relationship with God through the Son's atoning death and resurrection...
Was this an ok reflection, in line with the intent of your original theme?
I think church tradition should continually realign to the NT interpretation of the Torah originally self-revealed by the Son of God, who perfectly reveals the Father's love and substance of all his policy positions revealed to all the OT prophets; and then expounded by Paul, Peter and the rest of the apostles and their posse - as Jesus never wrote the books although in his role as fully God (Colossians 2:9 states "For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form...") then Jesus Christ, the God-Man, superintended the writing of all Scripture (2 Timothy 3:16 "All Scripture is God breathed..." etc).
Ok - i'm done :)
Cheers