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Paul the Mythmaker

Description

Abstract:
This project argues that Paul adapted Greco-Roman mythic resources to promote his Judean Christ-cult among Gentiles. His letters articulate the cultic and moral-psychological corruption of Gentiles in terms of a prevalent mythic typology about the decline of civilization and its gendered consequences. He furthermore explains the spread of sin and death through reusing mythic materials about the beginnings of troubled mortality for humanity. And he portrays Christ’s significance for Gentiles with mythic resources about divine warriors whose victories over opponents result in benefits for their subordinates. Such reuse of myth not only renders Paul’s discourses about Gentiles and Christ intelligible to potential initiates, but also clarifies how he would have been recognizable. He was an independent religious expert among the many in their world who innovated with culturally available myths to articulate and authorize the divine benefits they offered. I use practice theory to explicate the concept of recognition. Focusing on recognition and intelligibility bypasses the conventional questions of influence or origins that often incline New Testament scholars to prefer either Judaism or Hellenism as the crucial matrix for Paul. Practice theory also provides resources for framing myth as a comparative and social category, and not as an epistemological or evaluative one as has been common throughout the history of New Testament studies. I accordingly employ the category of myth to bring concrete intersections between Paul and broader Greco-Roman religiosity into focus; in particular, intersections of social practices involving myth, sacred books, and cult. Overall this project repositions the investigation of Paul within the fields of religious studies, social theory, and their critical resources for studying myth. These resources reconfigure our gaze around questions that probe the practical, social, and ideological contours of Paul and myth.
Notes:
Thesis (Ph.D. -- Brown University (2016)

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In Copyright
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Collection is open for research.

Citation

Young, Stephen L., "Paul the Mythmaker" (2016). Religious Studies Theses and Dissertations. Brown Digital Repository. Brown University Library. https://doi.org/10.7301/Z0FX77V5

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