Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:10:13.390Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

‘Under a Curse’: a Fresh Reading of Galatians 3.10–14

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Christopher D. Stanley
Christopher D. Stanley
Affiliation:
Greensboro, North Carolina, USA
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Though Martin Luther was doubtless not the first student of the NT to notice the apparent discrepancy between Paul's general affirmation in Galatians 3. 10a and the citation he introduces to support it in 3.10b, his statement of the problem has scarcely been improved upon in the centuries that have followed. As it stands, the Pauline text does present something of a conundrum. Whereas Paul's own statement appears to pronounce a ‘curse’ upon anyone who would attempt to live by the Jewish Torah, the biblical text to which he appeals clearly affirms the opposite: its ‘curse’ falls not on those who do the Law, but on those who fail to do it. What is Paul trying to say? Does he simply misunderstand his citation at this point? Or is there an underlying link between text and ‘interpretation’ that is not evident at first sight?

Type
Articles
Information
New Testament Studies , Volume 36 , Issue 4 , October 1990 , pp. 481 - 511
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 A Commentary on St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians, ed. Watson, Philip S (London: Clarke, 1953) 244.Google Scholar

2 Saint Paul Épître Aux Galates (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1950) 69.Google Scholar

3 Supporters of this view in one or another of its forms include Luther, Calvin, Lightfoot, Eichholz, Burton, Schoeps, Guthrie, Hill, Bligh, Hübner, Mussner, Wilckens, Räisänen, Ebeling, and Bring.Google Scholar

4 E.g., Burton, Schoeps, Hübner, Räisänen.Google Scholar

5 E.g., Luther, Calvin, Ebeling, Bring.Google Scholar

6 ‘The Apostle Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West’, in Paul Among Jews and Gentiles (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976) 78–96.Google Scholar

7 The Faith of Jesus Christ: An Investigation of the Narrative Substructure of Paul's Theology in Gal 3. 1–4. 11 (Chico: Scholars, 1983) 207.Google Scholar

8 Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983) 23–4Google Scholar. Günter Klein points further to Gal 3. 21, where Paul in no way limits the law's inability to ‘make alive (ζωοποισαι)’ to ‘sinners’, but rather ties it to the law's very existence as a divinely ordained institution. See ‘Sündenverständnis und theologia crucis bei Paulus’, in Theologia Crucis-Signum Crucis. Festschrift für Erich Dinkler zum 70. Geburtstag, , ed. Carl, Andresen and Günter, Klein (Tübingen: Mohr, 1979) 273.Google Scholar

9 The Epistle of Paul to the Galatians (Moffatt; London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1934) 93.Google Scholar

10 Der Brief an die Galater (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1949).Google Scholar Compare Rudolf Bultmann's section on ‘The Law’ in vol. 1 of his Theology of the NT (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1951,1955) 259–69.Google Scholar

11 The explanation offered by Hans Dieter Betz in his Galatians (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979), to the effect that the problem with ‘doing’ the law is that it cuts the ‘doer’ out of the blessing promised to men of ‘faith’ in the prior verse (not being under ‘blessing’ = being under ‘curse’) is similar enough to that of Schlier that no separate critique will be offered here.Google Scholar

12 Commentary on Galatians (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983) 160.Google Scholar

13 Paul and the Law (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1983) 95.Google Scholar

14 ibid.

15 The Truth of the Gospel (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985) 174.Google Scholar

16 ‘For All Who Rely On Works of the Law Are Under A Curse’, in The Laws in the Pentateuch and Other Studies (Edinburgh/London: Oliver & Boyd, 1966).Google Scholar

17 Ibid., 128.

18 Law in Paul's Thought (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1984) 43 (note 14).Google Scholar

19 Law, 125–7.Google Scholar

20 A somewhat similar argument from contemporary realities lies behind James Dunn's recent attempts (‘The New Perspective on Paul’, BJRL 65 [1983] 95–122,Google Scholar and ‘Works of the Law and Curse of the Law (Gal 3.10–14)’, NTS 31 [1985] 523–42)CrossRefGoogle Scholar to trace Paul's negative attitude toward ‘works of the law’ to his antipathy toward contemporary Jewish preoccupation with circumcision, food laws, and Sabbath observance as ‘badges of identity’ and ‘boundary markers’ intended to set them apart from their non-Jewish neighbours. Though his emphasis on the inherent contradiction between this ‘social function of the law’ and Paul's own mission to the Gentiles is laudable, Dunn's explanation of how Paul came to associate such an ‘improper’ use of the law with the ‘curse’ promised by Deut 27. 26 upon all who fail to ‘do’ the whole law (Gal 3. 10) remains unclear. Jan Lambrecht, in accepting Dunn's explanation, makes the connection more explicit: ‘durch diese Art von “Werken” wird niemand gerechtfertigt, denn – das impliziert das Zitat – durch die Übertretung anderer Vorschriften bleiben alle Sünder und werden daher durch das Gesetz verflucht’ (‘Gesetzverständnis bei Paulus’, in Das Gesetz im Neuen Testament, ed. Kertelge, Karl, Quaestiones disputatae 108 [Freiburg, Basel, Vienna: Herder, 1986] 115). Understood in this way, Dunn's view is open to the same criticisms brought forward earlier against the traditional ‘quantitative’ approach.Google Scholar

21 Paul, the Law, 21–7.Google Scholar

22 The same objections can be levelled against Ernest deWitt Burton's position (A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians [ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1921]) that the ‘curse’ here spoken of is not really God's curse, an expression of how he actually judges men, but rather the false curse pronounced by the law on those who attempt to fulfil it in a legalistic manner.Google Scholar

23 Cf. Victor Paul Furnish's attempt (Theology and Ethics in Paul [Nashville: Abingdon, 1968]) to show that even the most ‘theological’ of Paul's discussions have the ultimate aim of calling forth specific ethical responses from his readers.Google Scholar

24 The best overview of the application of the former to the biblical text is undoubtedly George Kennedy's, A.NT Interpretation Through Rhetorical Criticism (London/Chapel Hill: U. of North Carolina Press, 1984).Google Scholar For a valuable survey of the latter, see the collection of essays edited by Tompkins, Jane, Reader Response Criticism (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins U. Press, 1980).Google Scholar

25 Some illuminating examples of how this can work are presented by Stanley Fish in his article ‘Interpreting the Variorum’ in Tompkins, Reader, 164–83.Google Scholar

26 For example, it seems clear that Paul included biblical citations and allusions in his letters in an attempt to heighten the persuasive effect of certain affirmations upon his intended audience. In the case of those many Gentiles who lacked the necessary background to fully comprehend his references, however, the effectiveness of such argumentation would have been quite limited, if not lost altogether.Google Scholar

27 Interpretation, 34–6.Google Scholar

28 ‘The Rhetorical Situation’, Philosophy and Rhetoric 1 (1968) 1–14.Google Scholar

29 Ibid., 4.

30 For a survey of some of the more recent literature, see Sanders, , Paul, the Law, 48–9Google Scholar (note 6), who supports the ‘Jewish-Christian’ view. The classic exposition of the ‘Gentile-Christian’ view is Johannes, Munck, Paul and the Salvation of Mankind (Richmond: John Knox, 1959). The view that the ‘Judaizers’ were in fact Jewish agitators finds little support today in light of Gal 1. 6 and 6. 12.Google Scholar

31 As argued by Munck, , Salvation.Google Scholar

32 Note how the ‘Judaizers’ and their ‘converts’ are always referred to in the third person whenever they come up for mention, whereas the recipients of the letter are always addressed in second person. Gaston, Lloyd (Paul and the Torah [Vancouver: IT. of British Columbia Press, 1987[ 209, note 8) makes the same point quite clearly: ‘Paul does not argue with his opponents, even at second hand, but only calls them names (Gal 5. 10–12; 1. 6–9) and urges that they be cast out (1. 6–9; 4. 30). All of Paul's arguments in Galatians must be understood as being directed to the Galatian Judaizers and not to those who “court zealously” (4.17) or “trouble” (1. 7; 5.10, 12) or “compel” (6. 12–13) them.’Google Scholar

33 The arguments in 3. 6–14 and 4. 21–31 seem designed to counter arguments based on Gen 17. 1–14, where circumcision is clearly required for every male among God's covenant people, including even their foreign-born household slaves (v. 12).Google Scholar

34 The lack of any direct mention of Jewish food laws in the Galatian controversy (cf. Col 2. 20–22) raises problems for the attempts of James Dunn (see note 20) to discern behind Paul's concerns here a rejection of Jewish reliance on the common triad of circumcision, food laws, and Sabbath as ‘badges of identity’ and ‘boundary markers’ that hindered the Gentile mission.Google Scholar

35 Gal 5.3 and 6.13 might be seen as pointing toward the latter view.Google Scholar

36 In the highly influential view of Aristotle (Rhetoric 1.3.21–25), ‘expediency’ (i.e., what is in the best interest of the people concerned) is the primary basis for appeals in deliberative rhetoric: ‘The political [= deliberative] orator aims at establishing the expediency or the harmfulness of a proposed course of action; if he urges its acceptance, he does so on the ground that it will do good; if he urges its rejection, he does so on the ground that it will do harm; and all other points, such as whether the proposal is just or unjust, honorable or dishonorable, he brings in as subsidiary and relative to this main consideration.’Google Scholar From Solmsen, Friedrich, ed., The Rhetoric and the Poetics of Aristotle (Modern Library; New York: Random House, 1954) 32–3.Google Scholar

37 Agreeing with George Kennedy, Interpretation, 44–7, over against Hans Dieter Betz' (Galatians) categorization of the letter as ‘forensic’ in character.Google Scholar

38 Cf. Beker's, J. C.emphasis on the ‘contingent’ nature of much of Paul's theological argumentation in his Paul the Apostle (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980),Google Scholar as well as Hans Dieter Betz' warnings throughout his commentary against attempts to piece together the position of Paul's ‘opponents’ from the various polemical statements that recur throughout the present letter. Even those who recognize the necessity of moving beyond abstract theological interpretations often end up substituting theological constructions of a different sort, as in Donaldson, T. L., ‘The “Curse of the Law” and the Inclusion of the Gentiles: Galatians 3. 13–14’, NTS 32 (1986) 94: ‘What is not kept sufficiently in view in discussions of the passage is that Paul's treatment of these topics [faith, justification, law, works, etc.] is in the service of a more fundamental concern, viz. the inclusion of the Gentiles. Gal 3. 1–4. 7 is not an abstract discussion of the relative merits of “faith”and “works” or of the nature of Judaism per se, but rather an argument that uncircumcised Gentiles are to be included within the sphere of salvation accomplished by Christ crucified.’ Despite its situational orientation, Donaldson's approach is still concerned with the theological understanding that lay behind the text and not with the persuasive potential of the text itself.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

39 For a typical recent statement of the case, see Hübner, , Thought, 15–16.Google Scholar

40 Aristotle's two basic categories of refutation: see Rhetoric 2. 25.Google Scholar

41 καθώς standing alone is to my knowledge completely unattested as an introductory formula for a biblical citation, either in Paul or elsewhere.Google Scholar

42 Of course, once he has made his point, Paul feels free to return in vv. 28–29 to his common characterization of all believers as Abraham's children ‘in Christ’ (cf. Rom 4). Paul's foreshortening of the ‘sons of Abraham’ argument in the present context was probably not without cause: one can assume that he was by no means ignorant of the express stipulation of Gen 17. 14 (quite congenial to his ‘opponents’) that all of Abraham's ‘sons’ were to undergo circumcision or else suffer exclusion from the people of God. J. C. Beker notes the same discontinuity in Paul's treatment of Abraham here (Apostle, 47–52), though he understands the passage as a whole in somewhat different terms.Google Scholar

43 The introduction of the words πάντα τα ἔθνη from Gen 18. 18 into the citation of Gen 12. 3 in v. 8 highlights Paul's concern to make such an association, though it is of course unlikely that many of his Gentile readers would have recognized it as a modified text.Google Scholar

44 Note how Paul simply assumes that his Galatian readers will recognize and understand the reference in v. 6, a clear indication that the citation is meant to recall earlier teaching and not to introduce a new theme. Verse 7 then summarizes the content of that teaching, as the lack of further explanation again demonstrates. The γινώσκετε that introduces v. 7 should therefore be read as an Indicative (with Lightfoot) and not an Imperative (contra Burton, Bruce, Betz, et al.). On the whole subject, compare Howard, George, Paul: Crisis in Galatia. A Study in Early Christian Theology, SNTSMS 35 (Cambridge: University Press, 1979) 55: ‘The quotation of Gal. 3:6 is never mentioned again and offers nothing further beyond its immediate purpose [to answer the question in v. 5].’Google Scholar

45 The second ϊνα-clause is seen as dependent on the first in this reconstruction, following Calvin, Lightfoot, Williams, Bligh, and Betz, over against Burton, Lagrange, Ridderbos, Guthrie, and Bruce. Further confirmation of this understanding might be found a similar flow of thought in 4. 6, where the first clause, probably referring to the Gentiles (‘you’), is made logically prior to a second, more general statement (‘us’) by a öτi.Google Scholar

46 Lloyd Gaston (Torah, 73) has a similar understanding of the unity of 3. 1–14: ‘Paul begins with an appeal to reality: the Galatians have received the Spirit (and that not ‘from works of law’ but ‘from preaching of faithfulness’); and then he raises the question of possibility: how can this be? what is the Scriptural justification for the gift of the Spirit to Gentiles?’ Cf. Betz, Galatians, 142: ‘Paul's question … goes beyond the Old Testament: how could God bless the Gentiles?’Google Scholar

47 Ebeling, too, recognizes these as three separate sections of Paul's argument, though he describes the progression of the argument somewhat differently due to his downplaying of the ‘salvation-history’ aspects of the last section.Google Scholar

48 The present passage thus lends support to Ed Sanders' thesis that Paul's rejection of the law was based in the final analysis on his dogmatic interpretation of the Christ-event and the exigencies of the Gentile mission (Paul, the Law, 47, 152–3). A similar explanation can be found in Heikki Räisänen, Law, 176–7, 257–62.Google Scholar

49 Fish, ‘Variorum’, 174. The label Fish actually uses here is ‘optimal reader’, but the intent is the same. For a helpful analysis of the various types of ‘readers’ and ‘authors’ encountered in the diverse literature of ‘reader response’ advocates, see Robert Fowler's article, ‘Who Is “the Reader” in Reader Response Criticism’, Semeia 31 (1985) 6–20.Google Scholar

50 The phrase οι έκ πίστεως is likewise introduced without explanation in its first occurrence in 3. 7 (echoed in 3. 9). Whether Paul had employed these phrases in his earlier instruction of the Galatians or simply assumed their meaning to be self-evident, he clearly expected his readers to supply a significant part of their ‘meaning’ in the present context. The unavoidable gap between original and modern readers at this point has opened the door to a variety of ingenious interpretations on the part of modern interpreters. Most commentators have shown a tendency to over-exegete the έκ of the formulaic expressions employed here, reading the phrase őσοι… έξ, ἔργων νóμου as referring to ‘those who seek to fulfil the law in a legalistic manner’ (Burton), ‘those who take the law as the ground of their existence’ (Ebeling), ‘those whose existence depends on individual deeds or achievements’ (Hübner), ‘those who use the outward signs of the covenant as badges of identity and boundary markers over against the Gentiles’ (Dunn), etc. The simple understanding of the phrase as a shorthand version of the formulation in 2. 16, meaning ‘those who pursue the way of Torah’ and referring primarily to Gentiles, is quite appropriate for Paul's argument in the present passage.Google Scholar

51 Edwards, E. G., in her 1972 Princeton dissertation, ‘Paul, a Curse, and the Cross’, 231–2, makes a similar point regarding Paul's frequent use of b'coi in a ‘conditional’ sense. Such instances (e.g., Rom 8. 14, Gal 6. 12, 16, Phil 3. 15) usually involve a general statement of principle whose applicability to any particular individual remains indeterminate.Google Scholar

52 One would hope that Sanders, E. P. (Paul and Palestinian Judaism [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977]) has made it sufficiently clear that Jewish ‘soteriology’ in Paul's day was grounded in the final analysis not on obedience to Torah, but on God's gracious election of Abraham and his descendants. The automatic inclusion of Jews in the expression őσοι… έξ ἔργων νομου especially in light of the ‘conditional’ sense of őσοι, must be viewed as a gratuitous addition by the reader. Cf. Lloyd Gaston (Torah, 75): ‘Paul says nothing whatsoever about the significance of nomos in this sense for Israel or for Jewish Christians; he speaks only of its irrelevance for the Gentile Christians.’Google Scholar

53 The verse fulfils exactly this function in its original context in Deuteronomy as well, though one cannot simply presume that Paul's Galatian readers would have known this original setting. Even less likely is the possibility that they would have been aware of the alterations in wording introduced into the citation by Paul to generalize its application from the specific commands uttered on Mt. Ebal to the written Torah as a whole.Google Scholar

54 I.e., the individual can always cut himself out of the sphere of national ‘blessing’ by certain types of violations of the covenant (e.g., those listed in Deut 27. 15–26). See Noth, ‘Curse’, 126–8.Google Scholar

55 Cf. Sanders' similar description of the function of Gal 5. 3 (Paul, the Law, 27), where he demonstrates clearly that the latter verse has nothing to say about the inherent unfulfilability of the Jewish law.Google Scholar

56 Note again Aristotle's emphasis on ‘expediency’ as the primary basis for appeals in deliberative oratory (see note 36). Negative appeals, as in the present context, are regarded by Aristotle as being just as valid in persuasion as the more positive sort. (See his section on appeals to ‘fear’ in Rhetoric 2.5.)Google ScholarA number of good examples of this type of appeal to the likelihood of negative consequences can be found in the political speeches of Demosthenes collected in Saunders, A. N. W., ed., Greek Political Oratory (Middlesex: Penguin, 1970) 169–263. The entire argument in this verse is an example of what Aristotle would call the common topic of ‘Possibility’: see Rhetoric 2.19.Google Scholar

57 Indeed, there are exceptions. The most notable (and persistent) is Ragnar Bring (Commentary on Galatians [Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1961]), who argues that v. 12 refers to Christians fulfilling the law ‘in Christ’, based on Christ himself having already fulfilled the law. The approaches of Schlier, Lagrange, and most recently Lloyd Gaston (see notes 2, 10, and 35) differ little from Bring at this point. According to Bruce, F. F. (Galatians, 163), both Karl Barth and C. E. B. Cranfield want to read ό δίκαιος here as referring to Christ, a position which Bruce rightly rejects as having no foundation in the text. The similar-sounding argument of Richard Hays (Faith, 150–7), who believes that Paul read Hab 2. 4 as a Messianic text which he applied first to Christ and then to Christians who share in the ‘faith of Christ’, arises out of Hays' broader understanding of the narrative substructure of Paul's theology and cannot be addressed here.Google Scholar

58 Major: The one who is righteous (= justified) by faith shall live (v. 11b). Minor: The law is not grounded on faith (v. 12a, reinforced by v. 12b). Conclusion: No one is justified (= receives life) by law (v. lla).Google Scholar

59 In Paul's own use of Scripture this represents an instance of gezera shawa, the common Jewish practice of bringing together two verses having a common element in such a way that they mutually interpret one another. Though the method itself may well have been unfamiliar to Paul's readers, the sheer proximity of the verses and the presence of a possible contradiction helps to produce the intended effect nonetheless.Google Scholar

60 That έκ πíστεως should be construed adjectivally with ό δíκαιος (and not adverbially with ζήσεται) is evident from the verbal parallels that occur between the two verses in their present Pauline form: ό δíκαιος έκ πíστεως ζήσεται [έν αύτ] ό ποιήσας αύτά [=ἔργα νóμου] ζήσεται έν αύτοîς As can be seen from the above construction, the parallel wording of the two quotations (a Pauline creation) logically implies a second ‘in/by it’ at the end of the Habakkuk citation, the absence of which may be the source of some of the scholarly confusion on this point. Most recent commentators seem to favour the position taken here (Williams, Lagrange, Bligh, Bring, Hübner), though not a few have come down on the side of the more traditional association with ζήσεται. (Michel, Ellis, Mussner, Betz, Borse).Google Scholar

61 As Nils, Dahl points out in his article Contradictions in Scripture’ (in Studies in Paul [Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1977] 159–77), the two verses would have posed no contradiction at all for Jews, who regarded keeping the commandments as a vital part of an ongoing life of ‘faith’. For Paul, however, ‘faith’ meant ‘faith in the crucified Messiah’. The real difference lies in the ‘object’ toward which this ‘faith’ is directed.Google Scholar

62 Ed Sanders would appear to be right in tracing this position to a dogmatic presupposition on Paul's part that ‘salvation’ comes only through Christ (in Paul, the Law, 26–7, and Judaism, 474–510). Günter Klein likewise grounds Paul's rejection of the law in Gal 3 in his conviction that ‘im Glauben erfahren wird, daß das Leben nur empfangen werden kann’, but reverts to a position similar to Bultmann's to explain that conviction: ‘[Das Gesetz] eine Existenzdimension einrichtet, in der das Leben das Produkt des Tun ist.’ From ‘Individualgeschichte und Weltgeschichte bei Paulus’, EvT 24 (1964) 151, reprinted in Rekonstruktion und Interpretation (Munich: Kaiser, 1969) 206.Google Scholar

63 ‘That no one is justified by faith is evident, because “The one who does these things will live by them.” But faith is not grounded in the law; rather (it says), “The one who is righteous by faith will live.”’Google Scholar

64 In this instance, the link noted by the reader (see note 59 on gezera shawa) has actually been created by Paul himself: the original text of Deut 21. 23 reads κεκατηραμένς as the initial word, with no textual variants, and also includes the words ύπò θεο which Paul omits. Plausible explanations have been posited for both changes: Paul's understanding of the significance of Christ's death would have required him to clarify that the ‘cursing’ referred to here took place (in the case of Christ) in the act of ‘hanging’ itself, and not before, as the Deuteronomy text suggests; moreover, his Christian sensibilities may well have revolted against the idea of speaking of Christ as ‘cursed by God’. Unless Paul's readers were already familiar with the Deuteronomy text, however, the hermeneutical significance of these changes would have been lost on them. For the present purpose, all that matters is the Pauline form in which the reader encounters the verse here.Google Scholar

65 Note again how Paul actually expects his readers to understand this highly condensed theological formulation without further explanation.Google Scholar

66 Räisänen, Law, 59.Google Scholar

67 A variety of Old Testament backgrounds have been posited as underlying Paul's thinking at this point, but none has gained widespread approval (see Burton, Bruce, and Ridderbos for examples). More recently, Heikki Räisänen has argued (Law, 59–60, 250–1) that behind Paul's statement here lies a concern to explain how the righteous Jesus Christ could possibly have come under the ‘curse’ rightly pronounced by the law on those who were ‘hanged’. The majority of commentators (e.g., Williams, Duncan, Lagrange, Guthrie, Ebeling, Betz) recognize Paul's dependence on prior teaching at this point, and thus prefer to avoid speculation.Google Scholar

68 Lightfoot, Duncan, Burton, Williams, Lagrange, and Betz represent those who see the verse as referring primarily to Jews; Guthrie, Ebeling, Bruce, and Räisänen are typical of those who understand Paul to be speaking of both Jews and Gentiles as standing under ‘the curse of the law’ and thus requiring redemption. Strong arguments for and against both interpretations can be found in Donaldson, ‘Curse’, and Lambrecht, ‘Gesetzverstandnis’. Though the present reading sees the redemption of the Gentiles as Paul's primary concern here, it is by no means unlikely that his use of the inclusive ‘us’ in v. 13 reflects his underlying belief that believing Jews, too, have been freed from the ‘negative potentiality’ of Torah-observance by their faith in Christ. Gaston's attempts to ascribe all of Paul's negative judgments concerning νóμος to Gentile Christian contexts cannot be deemed successful.Google Scholar

69 Commentaries on the Epistles of Paul to the Galatians and Ephesians (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1948) 89.Google Scholar

70 Ibid.

71 Law, 94 (note 3).Google Scholar

72 Truth, 199.Google Scholar

73 Galates, 69.Google Scholar

74 Ibid., 72.

75 Ibid., 71. In a similar manner, E. G. Edwards (‘Curse’, 241–3) strongly affirms the conditional nature of the ‘curse’ in v. 10, but links this with a Bultmannian ‘self-justification’ explanation of έξ ἔργων νóμου in v. 10 to conclude that all humans are viewed as standing under God's actualized ‘curse’ in the present passage.

76 Galates, 68–9.Google Scholar

77 ‘Sündenverständnis’, 271.Google Scholar

78 ‘Individualgeschichte’, 206.Google Scholar

79 ‘Sündenverständnis’, 271; ‘Individualgeschichte’, 206. Donaldson, T. L. (‘Curse’, 103) observes similarly that ‘the apparently divergent arguments in vv. 10–12 … may be no more than clever but transient debating points which have no real bearing on the place of the “curse of the law” in Paul's thought’. In his preoccupation with the theology behind vv. 13–14, however, Donaldson never finds occasion to ask what role these ‘clever but transient debating points’ might have been meant to play in Paul's ongoing address to his Galatian readers.Google Scholar

80 His only attempt at explanation is to observe that ‘[hier] er den Gegner bei seinen eigenen Voraussetzungen behaftet’. See ‘Sündenverständnis’, 271.Google Scholar