Chapter 11 closes Paul's long discussion of the roles of Jewish and Gentile Christians, comparing Gentile Christians with a new olive branch grafted onto the old tree of Judaism. All Israel would eventually be saved.

We looked at some translation issues in Romans 11 -- the good News Bible appeared to add extra explanation by appending the words "the false god" to the word "Baal", though the original Greek does not support this. The imagery of the "table" that as a "snare" and a "trap" was lost in this translation, though it was the only translation to hand that noted that Paul's concept of "hospitality" may well have been wider than the idea of entertaining fellow-Christians.

It has been suggested that the New Testament is good theology but poor farming -- the parable of the Sower -- in which the sower recklessly misuses priceless see corn -- has been thought of as a parable that would amuse an agricultural audience, whicle explaining the complex theology that the response to the Word depends on the listener. Paul appears to have the theory of grafting backwards; usually one grafts a new branch onto an less advanced tree, whereas Paul's image does the opposite when explaining how Christianity will be a "wild branch" grafted onto the rich tree of Judaism.

Is any of the Bible written by women?

No book of the bible cites a woman as its author.  However, there are books without any ascription – a notable example being the Epistle to the Hebrews in the New Testament.  Various attempts have been made to guess at the author of Hebrews, and one of the candidates is a woman – Prisca.  She was a Christian who left Rome in 49 CE when Claudius expelled all the Jews from the capital.  She worked  with Paul in Ephesus, and was sufficiently intellectual and eloquent to take on the Alexandrian missionary, Apollos, in debate, and convert him to Pauline Christianity. [1]

Another possibility for feminine authorship is the Book J.  If the first five books of the Bible, the Pentateuch, are dissected according to the name they give to God, one of the “books” that emerges is “J”.  Some have posited that the author was a woman[2].

 When Paul was traveling to Jerusalem for the last time, he stayed for some time (according to some translators – “an unexpectedly long time”) with the deacon Philip and his daughters, who were prophetesses (preachers).[3]   It has been suggested that these daughters provided source material for Luke, who may have been gathering material for a defense document for Paul.  The Gospel of Luke is one of the two gospels that contain a nativity story, and this is full of feminine touches, such as Mary’s visit to her cousin Elizabeth, unmentioned by the other gospels.[4]

The Song of Miriam[5] is sometimes quoted as the oldest material in the Old Testament, and the Magnificat[6] as the oldest Christian document.  Both are attributed to  women.

Romans 7-8  January 4, 2009

Paul continued his line of complex reasoning, developing the thought that he might be controlled by sin, so that he did not do what he wanted, but what sin wanted.  Some of the class compared this to the role of the Devil in some of Luther’s writings, others to Flip Wilson’s famous line “The Devil made me do it”.

We looked briefly at how Paul describes the Devil as “Lord of this World”, and discussed how this might answer the question “Why does God let bad things happen to good people”.  Paul, indeed, does not expect Christians to have a comfortable life, but warns them to expect suffering.

Paul describes how the Law could suggest sinful actions, and thus be counter-productive.  Paul suggests that Jesus can be the solution to these dilemmas, and concludes chapter 8 with the famous statement “I am persuaded that neither death not life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, no any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Jesus Christ our Lord."

A discussion we had on whether any scripture was written by women is posted separately.