Paul and Boasting

Ethnomedical Anthropology and Paul's “Thorn” (2 Corinthians 12:7)

“…This statement is climactic for the whole letter by effectively relativizing earthly evaluations of Paul, his ministry, and his weakness with a direct commendatory statement from the risen Christ. As a number of scholars have shown, the purport of Paul's self-commendation (culminating in our reference passage) met the requirements of ancient apology, but did so while it undermined conventional social values associated with it (Litfin 1994; Winter 1997; Peterson 1998; Fredrickson 2003; Watson 2003).…”

“…The same concern for balance may also be at the root of Paul's advice (in 1 Cor 7:9) concerning spouses coming back together after bouts of abstinence (for prayer) in order to control the “burning” ( pyrousthai ) of passion/desire (Parry 1992: 263; Martin 1995: 212–13; Alexander 1998: 254). In our reference passage (2 Cor 12:.7), too, Paul describes his illness as originating from an influence of excessive external forces (“revelations”) ( tē hyper bolē tωn apokalypseωn ) upon the composition of Paul's person, resulting (potentially) in an imbalance of internal elements, excessive self-exaltation ( hypera irωmai ) (Cairns 1996; Watson 2003: 89–95). Such concern for balance is connected to what is a key reference point in Paul's rhetoric not only here (2 Cor 12:7–10), but also in his overall moral discourse: the notion of self-mastery (or lack thereof) with all of its attendant, gendered implications.…”

“…As Plutarch advised (De laude 541A), Paul is mediating his boasting by referring to a personal, physical “weakness.” Yet, in this case the weakness is interpreted as “strength” ( dynamis). Thus, what typically would soften boasting in Greco-Roman society is used to strengthen it within Paul's wrangling with this early Christian community (Watson 2003: 89). Paul's choice of language (“weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities”; v 10) also puts him in dialogue with the philosophical and religious elites of the Empire, where notions of virtue and hardship are commonly and closely associated with one another.…”

Rethinking Paul’s Rhetorical Intentions: An Interaction with Ryan S. Schellenberg’s Abject Joy

“…16-50); those from a theological perspective see a paradoxical consistency (Bultmann 1964;Barrett 1986) 18 . The works of Judge (1968) and Betz (1972) ushered in the question of context-studies that located Paul's boasting in its social milieu, in relation to Greco-Roman rhetorical tropes and practices (Forbes 1986), the phenomenon of sophistry (Winter [1997] 2002), and the cultural values of honor and shame (DeSilva 2000;Watson 2002Watson , 2016. It is this last item that prevails in scholarly discussions of Paul's boasting, notwithstanding a recent emphasis on the question of corpus, which considers the discursive role of boasting language in individual letters (Davis 1999;Donahoe 2008;Harvey 2016;Blois 2020;Kasih 2023).…”