A Confused Soul

To the Jews I became as a Jew, so that I might win Jews; to those who are under the Law, as under the Law though not being myself under the Law, so that I might win those who are under the Law;  to those who are without law, as without law, though not being without the law of God but under the law of Christ, so that I might win those who are without law.  1 Corinthians 9:20-21 NASB

So that – Could Paul have been any more confusing than in this passage to his Corinthian assembly?  What does he mean when he says he “became as a Jew”?  He was a Jew!  He didn’t become one.  And what can he possibly mean when he claims he is not under the Law?  If he’s Jewish, then he’s Torah observant, and he claims such.  How can he say he isn’t under the Law?  And, finally, how can this same person go on to say that in his mission to the Gentiles, he was as one without the Law?  The man is schizophrenic!  Who could possibly understand him?

The Christian Church’s explanation is straightforward (and mistaken).  It simply claims that Paul “converted” to Christianity and that’s why he can pretend to be Jewish when he’s with Jews and, simultaneously, claim to be out from under the Law when he’s with Gentile Christians.  This standard explanation ignores that fact that Paul (and everyone else) never claims to be a “Christian,” that the term wasn’t invented yet, that “religion” itself wasn’t a word yet invented, that Paul specifically claims to be Torah observant in other passages, and that he accepted the ultimate test of Torah observance after the Acts 15 council meeting (the vow payment).  The standard Christian interpretation, separating Law and Grace—Jew and Christian, further ignores Paul’s endorsement of Jewish practices for Jewish believers and his insistence that Jews as Jews will be part of the eschatological Kingdom.  They will not somehow become “Christians.”  Contra Martin Luther, Jews are not “incomplete” until they become Christians.  So, the typical Christian answer fails.  Whatever Paul is doing here, it isn’t setting up a new religion.

Paul was an apocalyptic preacher.  His message to all, Jew and Gentile, is that the end of the age has arrived in the resurrection and that, soon, God’s kingdom will be established, a kingdom that includes Jews, as the original chosen people, and Gentiles, as representatives of the all the nations called into the kingdom.  When Paul was with Jews, this message meant he demonstrated his allegiance to his heritage, customs and ethnicity through Torah observance.  In other words, he did what he had always done.  He acted Jewishly.  The Greek verb is gínomai, used here in the aorist.  This is a verb about “birth’ (genesis).  What Paul is saying is more like this: “To the Jews I was (born) a Jew.”  In other words, Paul’s ethnic heritage was not in question among the Jews.  He was one of them.  But he was one of them as a Messianicapocalyptic believer and therefore,  from their perspective, he acted in such a way as to validate the Law under the Messiah.  To the Gentiles, however, for whom the Law had no special significance, Paul could take an approach quite different than other Jews.  In the first century, orthodox, Torah observant Jews would have avoided any contact with Gentiles, as we see Peter doing in Acts.  Paul’s view is just the opposite.  If the end of the age has come, the Gentiles are a necessary component of the Kingdom and must therefore be brought into the Kingdom through the Messiah.  So, Paul reaches out to them despite the cultural interpretation of strict Jewish thinking because the end of the age requires it.  To the Gentiles, he acts as if the law of exclusion does not apply precisely because it does not apply.  The circumstances (the end of the age) require radical reinterpretation.  Thus, from the perspective of the Gentiles, Paul acts as if the traditional exclusion does not matter.

Paula Fredriksen makes this point in several important statements:

“It is among gentiles that Paul most enacted his own charismatic authority; it was the gentiles who provided the strongest empirical evidence that the End-time had indeed dawned; and it was consequently on the gentile mission that Paul most focused his energies and efforts.”[1]

“The Law only revealed sin for gentiles.  The Law was a service of death for gentiles. But for Israel the Law, God-given, was a defining privilege.”[2]

“It was the ekklesia’s socially destabilizing practice of separating a city’s pagans from their gods, and not some imagined infraction of Jewish practice, that explains Paul’s both giving and, later, getting disciplinary flogging.”[3]

“But it was the subsequent turning of the gentiles—a biblically prophesied but socially unprecedented phenomenon—that proved so successful, so widespread, and so long-lived.  These ex-pagan pagans further and continuingly reinforced the apostles’ convictions, compelling some of them to press ahead with outreach to pagans, to make disciples of all nations.  It was over these nations that the triumphant returning of Christ would rule (Rom 15.10; Isa 11.10 LXX).  These ex-pagan pagans represented, indeed embodied, both the final Davidic messiah’s staged victory over foreign gods and the confirmation of God’s ancient promises to Israel.”[4]

Now we can see why Paul’s statement appears confusing but is, in fact, a description of his tactics.  He isn’t vacillating according to the audience in an effort to deceive them into believing.  He is just being the apocalyptic Messianic believer that he is—Jewish, orthodox, and eschatological.  It is the audience that perceives him in two different ways, both of which accomplish his goal—to bring in the Kingdom.

Topical Index: Paul, Gentile, Jew, Law, apocalyptic, 1 Corinthians 9:20-21

[1] Paula Fredriksen, Paul: The Pagans’ Apostle (Yale University Press, 2017), p. 165.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid., p. 168.

[4] Ibid.