Subject: tc-list First church-

From: "David W. Odell-Scott" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 31 Mar 1998 17:17:34 -0500

First point. As to the status of 1 Cor 14:34-35.  Jack Kilmon wrote that "In
this respect, I think we can indeed look to Corinth and Paul's reminder for
the women to keep silent, hence I don't think that this is a later
interpolation."  I have argued that vv 34-35 were quotations from a letter
from Corinth to which Paul replied in v 36.  I contend that the reply at v
36 critiques the arrogance of those who assert their superiority over women,
and therefore rejects the silencing of women in worship.  In summary, the
quotation (vv 34-35) expresses the views of a faction in Corinth whose views
Paul quotes and critiques in his reply at v 36.  Therefore, on this reading,
I contend that I Tim 2:11-12 is not  an echo of Paul's position, but if it
is an echo of 1 Corinthians, it is an echo of Paul's opponents.  So, the
dating of Timothy does not aid the present discussion regarding the first
church with respect to Corinth.

Second point.  Jack's contention that EKKLHSIA is from EKKLEIW (meaning "to
shut out" or "to turn out of doors") of course plays upon the sense of
EKKLHSIA as an assembly of citizens in a city.  And our quick assumption
that Paul means by EKKLHSIA "a" or "the" "church" may be to confuse very
different conceptions of community.  The EKKLHSIA as understood by Paul may
not resemble the synagogue or the church, but may be expressive of an idea
of community which Paul hopes for.

Third point.  It might be the case that many of the peoples who became
christians in Corinth were not associated with a synagogue or made
identification with the Jewish religious and cultural traditions.  So, to
suggest that everyone in the Corinthian Christian community had to go
through some transformation in order to allow women into the gathering or
that women in the cult was a "novelty" for them is to make what I judge to
be questionable assumptions about the social, cultural and religious
backgrounds of the population who identified themselves to be Christians in
Corinth.  The city of Rome-Corinth was populated by diverse peoples drawn
from many different regions of the Roman empire.

David W. Odell-Scott

Associate Professor of Philosophy
Coordinator of Religious Studies

Philosophy Department
Kent State University
Kent, Ohio 44242-0001

Voice (330) 672-2315
FAX   (330) 672-4867