Paul rarely uses the terms µετάνοια / µετανοεῖν (“repentance” / “repent”), but word statistics should not be accorded too much weight. Besides using these terms to describe the process of returning to God by regretting one’s transgressions, Paul uses other terms and phrases in order to express the need to, and the reality of, changing mind and heart, outlook and behavior. It can be demonstrated that Paul knows the Jewish doctrine of repentance, that his missionary preaching calls for repentance, that his theological discourse presupposes repentance, that his rhetorical discourse in his letters includes the discourse of repentance, and that his ethical discourse entails exhortations to repentance.
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Cf. Helmut Merklein, “µετάνοια, µετανοέω,” in Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament (ed. H. Balz and G. Schneider; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990-93) 2:415-419, here 416.
A. Boyd Luter, “Repentance B. New Testament,” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary (ed. D.N. Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992) 5:672-674, 673, with reference to tdnt 4:629.
Warren A. Quanbeck, “Repentance,” in Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible (ed. G.A. Battrick et al.; Nashville: Abingdon, 1962) 4:33-34.
Jürgen Goetzmann, “µετάνοια,” in New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (ed. C. Brown; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1986) 1:357-359, 359.
Cf. Ceslas Spicq, “µετανοέω, µετάνοια,” in Theological Lexicon of the New Testament (3 vols.; Peabody: Hendrickson, 1996) 2:471-477, 471.
Georg Fohrer, “Umkehr und Erlösung beim Propheten Hosea [1955],” in Studien zur alttestamentlichen Prophetie (bzaw 99; Berlin: De Gruyter, 1967) 222-241, 225 n. 7. Cf. Merklein, “µετάνοια, µετανοέω,” 416, who cites both Wolff and Fohrer.
Fabry, in Graupner and Fabry, “שׁוּב,” 514; for the following comment see ibid.
Cf. Peter Stuhlmacher, Biblische Theologie des Neuen Testaments, Band 1: Grundlegung. Von Jesus zu Paulus (3., neubearbeitete und ergänzte Auflage; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2005) 258.
Cf. Klaus Haacker, Der Brief des Paulus an die Römer (4., erneut verbesserte und erweiterte Auflage; ThHKNT 6; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2012) 69, who emphasizes repentance as “Geschenk Gottes . . . das seine Zeit hat, die erkannt und ergriffen werden will, bevor sie unwiederbringlich vorbei ist” (with reference to Heb 12:17).
Simon J. Gathercole, Where is Boasting? Early Jewish Soteriology and Paul’s Response in Romans 1-5 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) 206, who goes on to argue that “thus, Paul would assume that the sacrificial system was not effective for him, and the interlocutor himself would have a wrong attitude toward it.”
Cf. Stuhlmacher, Römer, 100-101; cf. 1QS XI; 4 Ezra 3:18-22; 9:36-37.
Cf. Georg Bertram, “στρέφω κτλ,” in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (ed. G. Kittel and G. Friedrich; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964-76) 7:714-729, 728; Goetzmann, “µετάνοια,” 359; Simon Légasse, “ἐπιστρέφω, ἐπιστροφή,” in Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament (ed. H. Balz and G. Schneider; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990-93) 2:40; Traugott Holtz, Der erste Brief an die Thessalonicher (ekk 13; Neukirchen-Vluyn/Zürich: Neukirchener/Benziger, 1986) 59-61; Abraham J. Malherbe, The Letters to the Thessalonians (ab 32B; New York: Doubleday, 2000) 118-119, 132. See Eckhard J. Schnabel, Early Christian Mission(2 vols.; Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2004) 1365.
Roy E. Ciampa and Brian S. Rosner, The First Letter to the Corinthians (Pillar New Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010) 708, with reference to Don A. Carson, Showing the Spirit: A Theological Exposition of 1 Corinthians 12-14 (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1987) 116.
Richard B. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989) 132.
David E. Aune, Westminster Dictionary of New Testament and Early Christian Literature and Rhetoric (Philadelphia: Westminster Knox, 2003) s.v. “Rhetorical Questions,” 422; for the next point ibid. For rhetorical questions in the New Testament cf. Jaroslav Konopasek, “Les ‘questions rhetoriques’ dans le Nouveau Testament,” rhpr 12 (1932) 47-66, 141-61; Wilhelm Wuellner, “Paul as Pastor: The Function of Rhetorical Questions in First Corinthians,” in L’apôtre Paul: Personnalité, style et conception du ministère (ed. A.Vanhoye; betl 73; Leuven: University Press, 1986) 49-77; Duane F. Watson, “1 Corinthians 10:23-11:1 in the Light of Greco-Roman Rhetoric: The Role of Rhetorical Questions,” jbl 108 (1989) 301-318.
Kenneth J. Dover, The Evolution of Greek Prose Style (Oxford: Clarendon, 1997) 66-67.
Donald A. Russell, Criticism in Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981) 180, in a discussion of an anonymous late Neoplatonic text on the question, “Why did Plato compose dialogues?”
Aristotle, Topica 8.1.156a.3-6: “Induction should proceed from individual cases to the universal and from the known to the unknown” (trans. W.A. Pickard). Topica 8 discusses “the problems of arrangement and method in putting questions” (8.1.155b.1).
H. Richard Lemmer, “Mnemonic Reference to the Spirit as a Persuasive Tool (Galatians 3.1-6 within the Argument, 3.1-4.11),” Neot 26 (1992) 359-388, 374; cf. D. Francois Tolmie, Persuading the Galatians: A Text-Centred Rhetorical Analysis of a Pauline Letter (wunt 2/190; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005) 102.
Hans Dieter Betz, Galatians: A Commentary on Paul’s Letter to the Churches in Galatia (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979) 135, takes the last phrase in 3:4b as a “rhetorical exclamation,” providing the answer to the rhetorical question: “if so, it really was in vain!” It is more plausible to interpret the phase in terms of Paul expressing his hope that the catastrophe of apostasy can be prevented; cf. James D.G. Dunn, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (bntc; London: Black, 1993) 157; Jürgen Becker, Der Brief an die Galater (ntd 8.1; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998) 47 (“Man kann Gottes Geist nicht vergeblich erhalten”); Tolmie, Persuading the Galatians, 107-108.
Cf. Eckhard J. Schnabel, Der erste Brief des Paulus an die Korinther (2., berichtigte und ergänzte Auflage; Historisch-Theologische Auslegung; Wuppertal: R. Brockhaus, 2010) 96; Dieter Zeller, Der erste Brief an die Korinther (kek 5; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2010) 93. Wolfgang Schrage, Der erste Brief an die Korinther (4 vols.; ekk 7; Zürich/Neukirchen-Vluyn: Benziger/Neukirchener Verlag, 1991-2001) 1:152-153, sees a reference to the church as Christ’s body, and argues that if each of the groups in the Corinthian church claims a monopoly of “Christ,” the unity of the church is destroyed when “Christ” is destroyed.
Cf. Windisch, Der Zweite Korintherbrief, 234. There is no reason to call this the “weakened sense of repentance” of the term, as Merklein, “µετάνοια, µετανοέω,” 418, does.
Harris, Second Corinthians, 538; the following point, ibid., 539.
Harris, Second Corinthians, 539. But cf. Margaret E. Thrall, Second Corinthians, 1:492: “In view of the contrasting θάνατος in 10b, the word σωτηρία must carry the full weight of meaning that attaches to the idea in Paul’s letters, i.e. final deliverance from divine wrath and final restoration to divine glory.” See already Philipp Bachmann, Der zweite Brief des Paulus an die Korinther (4. Auflage; orig. 1909; repr., knt 8; Leipzig: Deichert, 1922) 302-303; also Barnett, Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 377.
Windisch, Der Zweite Korintherbrief, 234. He argues that Paul found the emphasis in µετάνοια on human reason disagreeable (“unsympathisch”), and he argues that Paul’s view of the process of salvation must be seen in terms of a contrast to the call to repentance of the prophets and of John and Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels as well as in contrast to the intellectualism of philosophy: conversion is tied to a sacramental renewal connected to faith and it is caused by caused by God, which means that the notion of a change of mind (“Sinnesänderung”) is marginalized (“eben nur mit einschließt”).
Dieter Georgi, The Opponents of Paul in Second Corinthians (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986) 237. Cf. Windisch, Der Zweite Korintherbrief, 410-411, for the point that µετανοεῖν is a mission term. See Margaret E. Thrall, Second Corinthians, 2:868-869, who finds Georgi’s linguistic argument unconvincing; she suggests that the sexual sins mentioned in 12:21 were “a prominent characteristic of the pagan habits renounced at conversion (1 Cor 6.9-11),” and allows that Georgi may be correct. Paul’s argument in 1 Cor 6:12-20 clearly indicates that some Corinthian believers continued their sexually promiscuous behavior.
Harris, Second Corinthians, 902. Furnish, II Corinthians, 567, is less optimistic about the outcome: “their ruin is his defeat;” cf. Ralph P. Martin, 2 Corinthians (wbc 40; Waco: Word, 1986) 465: “Paul will be humiliated because he will feel that he failed in his mission.”
Barnett, Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 596-557; cf. Harris, Second Corinthians, 228; also Anthony C. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (nigtc; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000) 397 on 1 Cor 5:4-5: “in hope that the experience would cause him to repent and return to the fellowship of the church.”
Cf. Wuellner, “Rhetorical Questions in First Corinthians,” 67, 71.
Cf. Peter David Gooch, Dangerous Food: 1 Corinthians 8-10 in its Context (Studies in Christianity and Judaism; Waterloo, Ont.: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1993); Alex T.M. Cheung, Idol Food in Corinth: Jewish Background and Pauline Legacy (JSNTSup 176; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999); Bruce W. Winter, After Paul Left Corinth: The Influence of Secular Ethics and Social Change (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001) 269-301; John Fotopoulos, Food Offered to Idols in Roman Corinth: A Social-rhetorical Reconsideration of 1 Corinthians 8:1-11:1 (wunt 2.151; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003); David E. Garland, 1 Corinthians (becnt; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2003) 353-357; Schnabel, Erster Korinther, 428-432; Zeller, Korinther, 280-282, 336-342.
Cf. Franz Mußner, Der Galaterbrief (5. Auflage; orig. 1974; repr., HThK IX; Freiburg: Herder, 1988) 381.
Ceslas Spicq, “δοκιµάζω,” in Theological Lexicon of the New Testament (3 vols.; Peabody: Hendrickson, 1996) 1:353-361, 356.
Cf. Matthew A. Elliott, Faithful Feelings: Rethinking Emotion in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2006) 209.
Johannes Behm, “µετανοέω, µετάνοια,” in Theologische Wörterbuch zum Neuen Testament (ed. G. Kittel and G. Friedrich; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1933-79) 4:972-1004, 1000: “Antipathie gegen das durch die jüdische Bußpraxis entwertete Wort”; the English translation omits the reference to Judaism: Johannes Behm, “µετανοέω, µετάνοια,” in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (ed. G. Kittel and G. Friedrich; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964-76) 4:975-1008, 1005: “antipathy to a term devalued by penitential practices.” Behm’s view in twnt is taken up by Cranfield, Romans, 1:144-145 n. 2.
Francis T. Fallon, 2 Corinthians (New Testament Message 11; Wilmington: Glazier, 1980) 64, quoted approvingly by Martin, 2 Corinthians, 230.
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Paul rarely uses the terms µετάνοια / µετανοεῖν (“repentance” / “repent”), but word statistics should not be accorded too much weight. Besides using these terms to describe the process of returning to God by regretting one’s transgressions, Paul uses other terms and phrases in order to express the need to, and the reality of, changing mind and heart, outlook and behavior. It can be demonstrated that Paul knows the Jewish doctrine of repentance, that his missionary preaching calls for repentance, that his theological discourse presupposes repentance, that his rhetorical discourse in his letters includes the discourse of repentance, and that his ethical discourse entails exhortations to repentance.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 4455 | 576 | 38 |
Full Text Views | 262 | 2 | 0 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 143 | 13 | 2 |