Week 12

As I began the second chapter of Paul it caught my interest. It gave us tools, in a way, which helps us to read a letter written in the first century. The interesting thing was that it wasn’t just any letter; specifically it is a Pauline letter. The main point that he tells us to remember is that many of our issues reading these letters did not exist back when they were written. I also find this very interesting because it shows how much our writing has changed and now we have problems reading the ancient writings.

Back when the letters were written those people did not view them as almost Shakespearean type writing, it was simple normal to them. Now we have to decipher it with the help of scholarly thinkers. I find this difference very interesting. Back when the letters were written even a common man could understand them. I find this almost funny how much things have changed and evolved so that we can’t even completely understand them.

Another interesting fact that he mentions is that we not only need to translate these letters in our minds, but also change them to stories. Each of these stories then has to have a message to us. The next main thing I think Borg focuses on is what the context of words mean in his letters. The biggest example that sticks out to me is his use of daughter. Back then a daughter was nothing to happy about; they needed to be cast out, or left. The next aspect I found interesting is the three different types of Paul; "radical" Paul is found in Philemon, the "conservative" Paul is founds in Colossians and the “reactionary". In this chapter Borg compares and contrasts the attitudes towards slavery. He also compares and contrasts the Radical, Conservative, and Reactionary texts. The Radical text, Philemon is read as a carefully structured rebuke to Philemon to free Onesimus voluntarily. In contrasts the Conservative text emphasize the duty of slaves to temper somewhat by pleas to the master to be nice. The reactionary text on the other hand concerns the duties of the slaves without many duties of them also without any attention to duties of the masters.

Overall I found this chapter very interesting. It was interesting to hear how we should read letters. However I really did enjoy the tools he gave us to interpret them. One of my favorite aspects of this chapter was the fact that we now have to learn how to read these letters. I find this somewhat entertaining because we have to get scholars to interpret what they are trying to say. Sometimes the norms of our generations completely evolve into something different. Like the way we write. At that time it was appropriate and understood, now the righting norm has changed. These chapters were very interesting and helpful.