Review Article: "Galatians", By Philip F. Esler -- By: Mark Bonnington

Journal: Tyndale Bulletin
Volume: TYNBUL 50:1 (NA 1999)
Article: Review Article: "Galatians", By Philip F. Esler
Author: Mark Bonnington


Review Article:
Galatians, By Philip F. Esler

Mark Bonnington

I. Introduction

Philip Esler’s new contribution to the Routledge NT Readings series1 is one of the boldest and most comprehensive attempts to use social scientific methods to shed new light on a NT text. In his study of Galatians, Esler examines a letter that has been subject not only to much renewed theological analysis in the light of the ‘new perspective on Paul’ but has also be a central locus of rhetorical criticism.

Professor Esler’s Galatians is a guide to the main interpretative problems of the letter. The plan of the book is to deal with questions of ‘introduction’ and then with the main issues in the order that they arise within Paul’s letter itself. Bracketing this detailed engagement with the text are introductory and concluding chapters that elucidate Esler’s interpretative assumptions and his suggested hermeneutical model. Esler takes the opportunity to make a new hermeneutical proposal for a Christian reading of the text, a hermeneutic that he calls ‘interculturalism’.

In the introduction (chapter 1), Esler clarifies his interpretative method: he is against historicist and theological readings of the letter and wishes to stress the culturally embedded nature of the letter. He prefers a historical approach supplemented with new insights from anthropological and sociological studies. It is this agenda that shapes the method of the whole book—the combination of traditional exegetical method with recent social anthropological theory. Although he introduces bits of social scientific theory throughout the book, the main presentation is in chapter 2 where he outlines social identity theory and group conflict theory. These have obvious relevance to the rhetoric and context of the Galatian controversy. In describing the crisis in Galatia Esler is less interested in tracing its roots in the

development of Paul’s relationship with Peter than in stressing the need for Paul to develop the group identity of the Galatian believers over against both Jewish and gentile out-groups (chapter 3).

Esler then revisits the discussion of Jew-gentile commensality, concluding that table fellowship between them was forbidden to first-century Jews (chapter 4). This leads Esler to a reconstruction of the events of Galatians 2 in Jerusalem and Antioch (chapter 5) which stresses the differences of view between Paul and the Jerusalem authorities, a conclusion justified by reference to the honour codes of Mediterranean culture.

In dealing with the the...

You must have a subscription and be logged in to read the entire article.
Click here to subscribe
visitor : : uid: ()