Today

Today

Today a brief note from The Big Death flew in through the window
Today my blood boiled

You killed a part of me

Today

Today I went and sat outside
Today I stared into emptiness

You had more strength, less heart

Today

Today I lamented and wept
Today I ached for depth and authenticity

You didn't know

Today

Today I fell into the arms of community that loves and carries me
Today they kicked me in the behind and said, you're letting THIS get you down?

You can't stop me

Today

Today I put my bare hands to the shattered pieces from The Big Death and slowly sweep them up
Today I allow myself to feel that pain all over again as they pierce my fingers

You can't stop me

Today I'll write stories again
Today I'll feel again

You can't stop me

Today I'll be vulnerable again
Today I'll trust wholeheartedly again

You can't stop me

Today I'll learn to love you again.

Not because I want to. Not at this moment, I really don't
But because you're family, I'll learn to love you until it comes naturally again.

And no, this time, you can't stop me.
Because the tsunami of Agape has more weight than human boundaries and social structures.

Today I'll choose to love you.
And no, you can't stop me.

Today.
And everyday.

Celebrating Across the Seas

Well, it's officially "Black Friday" on this side of the world.

In all my years of celebrating Thanksgiving, I've only done the Black Friday madness once--only because Jenny and Becca convinced me that since it was my last Thanksgiving in the US, I had to at least get out there in the wee hours of the morning once, even if just for the cultural experience. I can't say I enjoyed the experience much; but maybe it's because I was more used to parking down in the Rhynard house for the Thanksgiving weekend 007 marathon with my homework or crochet, and trying to keep warm in the Michigan winter.

I remember my first snow. Danielle and I were going to pick Cody up from high-school (yes, Cody, I know you're grown-up now because you're in seminary, but I'll always remember you as that dorky high-schooler who wouldn't stop giving your sister crap, as all good brothers should) the day before Thanksgiving. We were walking in to the school when Danielle stopped me and said, "Look! It's snowing!"

Folks always talk about being excited about snow. But that first snow, I thought I was going to slip on the snow, hit my head on the side-walk and die. It didn't help that I crash-landed in a pile of snow when out on my first snow-mobile ride with Danielle and Cody. "Death by snow on her first Thanksgiving." Great headline, eh?

The years passed quicker than I was ready for them. My last two American Thanksgivings have been characteristically un-snowy--rainy at best, but snow would have been a major fluke in the weather system.

So we learn to adapt. We don't do snow or snow-mobiles, but we do stories. Turkeys cost four times as much here as they would in Michigan or Indiana, so we do chicken. Pumpkins only happen as a whole fruit and not in cans, so we puree our own for pies and coffee creamers. And we include friends for whom Thanksgivings may have never been, or will ever be, traditions, but whose stories we get to write together at least for this season.

It wasn't that many years ago that traditional celebration story-sharing started. Those first awkward Chinese New Year celebrations in the dorm rooms without a real kitchen to work with, or easy access to an Asian grocer. And we learnt to adapt anyway.

That's the life of living all around the world. We carry our stories, our food, our traditions and celebrations with us. We adapt where necessary, and we start new traditions and carry those with us to new corners of the world and fill even more pages of our stories with new friends, laughter, and always, always food.

And after the dishes have all been cleared away, we pause to sit down with a cuppa joe. And we give thanks for the stories we get to be a part of, the table of food and laughter shared, and for a rich and abundant life.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours. May it be filled with love and laughter.

On Merton

I haven't written in a while. Not because I haven't had anything to write about. But because everything's been such a whirlwind that nothing has really had time to stew. And writing... At least, my writing, needs stewing.

So in the midst of the hustle and bustle, I'm stopping for what Anne Lamott calls "radical self-care".

Earlier this year, Emily sent me a copy of devotional meditations from Thomas Merton's journals. I read it consistently for a couple weeks, then as usual, chucked it aside. Maybe it's because the busier I get, the more I crave putting in disciplines (I am a J according to Myers-Briggs after all), so I recently picked it up again. And the more I read it, the more I crave simplicity.

I had the idea a couple weeks ago of checking out the monastic life, then realised I would probably miss my people too much to live in a monastery full time. The concern I have with monastic life is that in taking folks in to the inner spiritual life, there is the risk of forgetting there's still an outside world that exists. The greatest commandments are to love God AND our neighbour, and I fear that I'd forget the neighbour outside of the monastic walls.

Anyhow, that is a whole separate discussion that I need to do more research about. But I came to realised today it's time to start thinking about resolutions for 2013. And since I have a record of not being great at keeping resolutions, I had almost decided to stay away from those this year since I didn't need another thing to potentially fail at. But the more I thought about it, the more these two things stuck out as must-dos for 2013.

1) Intentionality
2) Simplify

In this crazy season leading up to Advent, I haven't really had time to think about what it really means to wait for the Christ-child and the anticipation and expectancy involved. But stripping everything else away, the two still remain. I want to be intentional. And I want to keep things simple.

Love God. Love people.
Be intentional.
And keep it simple.

Culture Shock: Paradigm Shift

I've now spent nearly a third of my life away from my country of birth, and every day I'm even more aware of the things I have yet to learn or re-learn.

Like most days, I fumble over grammar. Is this the right English word to use in this English-speaking country?
Or the cucumber story. I still don't know where to find them in the grocery store in Singapore. Every time I'm back, I have a mild panic attack before I head downstairs to the shops because I wouldn't know where to find the cucumbers.
Or the realisation that I've lived in Western countries for the past 8 years but I still don't know how to make a white sauce.

Today it was the realisation that my cultural biases toward racism surprised even myself. While I was at the store earlier, these two men were yelling rather loudly at each other. It took me a while to realise the store manager, a White man (using "White" here because I couldn't figure out if he had non-European blood as well), had been accused by an Indian man of being racist. These were the bits I caught:

"I'm a customer here. Don't think that just because you're the manager here, you can tell me to come back later."
"I was saying that to the other man."
"Don't think that you're the manager here so you can be racist."
"I don't think you understand what that word means."

It went on for quite a while, but out of fear that someone would end up getting hurt, I quickly got my yoghurt and walked down the next aisle.

That was when I realised that I was feeling sorry for the White man even though I hadn't had the full story. The bits I gathered seem to suggest that he wasn't the one at fault, but again I didn't have the full story.

But it made me realise too, in similar situations of ambiguity, I always end up feeling bad for the White folks. Then I had another mild panic attack. Have I become that kid that thinks of her roots as inferior to the Great White that I should always assume they're right? Or was it something else?

I had a moment of flashback to Freshman year. It was a very vivid scene where I was sitting up in the balcony with the other international kids (cos we're badass like that). Bear in mind these were in my good-girl days where I decided I was going to hang out with the "bad" kids so that I could influence them to be like me and Jesus AKA before the realisation we were all equally bad, just at different things. It was the usual chaos that I tried to tune out, but the Gospel Choir leading the Black History Month celebration was the bigger distraction this time.

Why in the world is it necessary to celebrate Black History Month, asked the kid that grew up in multi-culti Singapore where the worse of racial riots happened in the 1960s, prior to our independence. Why can't everybody just decide they want to get along and do it? I mean, I acknowledge Singapore is small and the history of racial tensions is short compared to the rest of world history. Still, it's been so many years since Dr King's assassination. Aren't people tired of that tension?

It wasn't until much later when someone pointed out the far-reaching effects of slavery that I understood why it was difficult. Reconciliation IS hard work. But reconciliation can't happen while one side hangs their head in shame while the other continues wagging a finger at them. They'll always hear the, "Bad dog. Bad, bad, bad." We know it's not good for kids' self-esteem so we avoid it, but why do we do it elsewhere?

I remembered having the same struggle in Germany. How long are we going to wag fingers at them for the 2 World Wars? Or the Pakeha for not holding up their end of the Treaty of Waitangi?

Maybe it's easy for me to speak since I come from the part of the world that history books would paint as victims of violence rather than perpetrators. Maybe it's because neither of my grandmothers have any stories (or at least, not ones they've told) of being raped by the Japanese soldiers. Maybe it's because I live in such a safe bubble that I don't have any reason to hate the perpetrators of violence. Maybe it's because as I loaded groceries in the van, I caught a reflection of myself--that Asian-looking girl that sounds American but is dressed like a hippie (I know, I know, I'm far from looking anything like a real hippie since I'm still refusing the dreads. But try convincing my ANTM-watching sister of that...) and drives a family van that's only loaded with kids on the rare occasion--and realised anyone meeting me for the first time would have no idea what box to put me in so I feel less judged by either side. Or maybe it's just very simply because I haven't gotten the whole story, or the historical accuracy of the stories.

But really, how long?

And what are WE, as Christians, supposed to do about reconciliation?

I don't know how I would respond if the day should come where I, too, become a victim of violence. I hope someone would look and say, "She responded with the love of Christ," but I also know I'm human.

Kyrie eleison. Christe eleison.
Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy.

Dinner With A Politician

The year is 2004. George W Bush is running against John Kerry in the US presidential elections where Bush is hoping to be re-elected for a second term. The war in Afghanistan has been raging for about three years now.

I was talking to the boy halfway across the world whom I was dating, and he wanted my perspective on the political climate in Anderson Indiana since I had recently moved there. All I said was, "What's wrong with Bush? I don't like change, so he can remain in office for all I care."

The response I got was one of gentle mockery. "You can't make decisions based on whether or not you like change. That's not very rational."

Fast forward a couple years. I'm sitting in Convocation, listening to student candidates running for Student Government elections. They're making promises about stuff that I wasn't even sure were within their control. My inner child is rolling his eyes and has already made the decision not to vote that year.

Most folks whom I've spoken candidly with about politics know I'm cynical. Sure, I may appreciate one side a little more than the other(s). But the way it's been presented to me, it always boils down to the same thing: everyone's talking and nobody can tell who's lying or about to lie until they've been elected. Then everybody has an opinion of whether the elected's policies are working as promised, and nobody really wins.

I'm not saying you shouldn't vote or pay attention to politics. You definitely should; it is your right and civil duty after all.

But in a lot of ways, I'm really glad that in my nearly 27 years of life, I've only been in the right place at the right time to vote once. The candidate I ended up voting for seemed almost to good to be true (as most of their party members do), but the others needed too much work with their talking to not sound like fools. Even though I no longer lived in Singapore, I wasn't ready for the country that owns my passport to be represented by a fool--even if they only sound like one but are actually highly intelligent.

Especially not after one of my favourite politicians had just been voted out that same year.

The 2011 General Elections in Singapore was something I watched more closely than ever thanks to social media. Of all the talking going on, there was one politician that emerged my favourite even though I tried really hard not to like him. His brother was a former colleague of my mother's so he really had to convince me to work through my emotional bias (I can't just like the guy because I kinda/sorta know someone who knows him).

George Yeo was foreign minister at the time of the 2011 elections. Part of my interest, admittedly, was caused by the fact that I was about to move halfway across the world again. It made me realise for the first time the importance of an effective foreign minister for a nomad like me whose passport will probably always belong to the Republic of Singapore.

But his effectiveness as foreign minister wasn't quite what impressed me. He struck me as really down-to-earth for a politican, humble and willing to admit the faults of the government, but also very much in touch with the grassroots. He's always had a keen interest in the youth of the nation, recognising "they have to rebuild a world that is corroding," and was the first Singaporean minister to engage in social media. That he was a good ol' Catholic boy didn't hurt as well (although faith backgrounds have MUCH less presence in the political scene in Singapore than in other parts of the world).

Yet what impressed me most was the way he conducted himself throughout the elections. He stuck with his party even though the closer they got to the elections, the more it became apparent they weren't going to win. Word on the street was that most folks would vote for him if the others weren't involved. When they eventually lost, his Facebook page was flooded with folks asking if he would run for the presidential elections.

2-cents worth says he probably would be president of the Republic now if he had decided to run. While it would be nice to have a president as connected to the grassroots as he is, I found myself empathising with his decision not to run for presidency. I don't know that this is his reasoning for not running, but I've found that grassroots people work better collecting information for someone else to pass policies and make other decisions to effect change.

So why the heck am I randomly writing about George Yeo, you ask?

Well, I came across this today and thought of the dream I had the other night where I had dinner with him. Grassroots people networking, doing what we do best. It made me realise there are so many things about how he functioned as a political minister that I want to emulate as a religious minister. But if I didn't also add that that was an intimidating dream, I wouldn't be telling the whole story. It was one of those that you wake up feeling like the dream was real and you can't shake off all the carry-over emotions.

At the same time, it was the nudge I needed to kick-start a new project that I'm calling "Operation Third Place." More to come on this at another time when it's not 12:47 am.

Hey, all you kids in the US of A, go vote on Tuesday. Ok? Ok.

The Call

It started out as a feeling
Which then grew into a hope
Which then turned into a quiet thought
Which then turned into a quiet word

There are a few things I remember very vividly about Old Testament classes with Dr Ross.

1) The maps. Oh, the maps. And the highlighters. And where to sit in the classroom so you don't get called upon to tell the class where things are on the maps.
2) The bee-box story. Yes. Anyone who has been in one of Dr Ross's classes would have heard this one.
3) The videos. And the ones he himself fell asleep watching.

And then there was that paper that he had us write at the end of our first year of seminary.

The Call Paper

Second semester of Old Testament was on the prophets. The final paper for that class was kind of a reflection based on the prophet Jeremiah's prophetic call. We were to read portions from the book of Jeremiah and then write about our own call to ministry.

That was a paper I would never forget writing. At the end of the term, we all had to do a very short presentation from our papers. And then he concluded the term saying, "Never forget this paper you've written. The ministry journey will be difficult. But never forget your call so that as things get more and more difficult, you will remember this call, and it will keep you going."

Recently, I've been prompted by a few different occasions to think about this call. MaryAnn had asked if I would do a piece about it. Since I will be writing a full-length piece that's going to print, this is more of a first draft/idea bank than anything else, but also a reflection of the week at camp.

Paul, who directed the camp, had asked us all to spend some time before the campers arrived to reflect on why we follow Jesus today. He made it clear we weren't supposed to be thinking about "when we first got saved" because kids would rather know how it's relevant today.

The theme for the camp was Xpedition Force, and as an introduction within each small group, kids were asked to share about the biggest adventure they had been on. Each night, one of the leaders would share the stories of why we follow Jesus, if they felt comfortable doing so. So really briefly, this was the kid-friendly story that I shared around the campfire one night.

Remember when we went around in our small groups on the first day of camp to share about the biggest adventure we've been on? Well, tonight I'm going to tell you a little bit about the biggest adventure I've been on. 

I was born in Singapore and when I was 18, I moved to the US for uni. I was nervous and afraid because I had no idea what to expect, and I was leaving my family and friends, and everything I knew behind.

The last Sunday I was in Singapore, my pastor got me up to the front of the church so that they could pray for me before I left. The last thing he said to me that day was to read the passage from Luke 5 about Jesus calling his disciples. The story went something like that: 

These two men had been fishing all night and caught no fish. Then along came this Jesus guy who told them, "Hey, take your boats out a little further and throw your nets a little deeper." Of course, they were thinking, "Well, we've done this all night and caught nothing. And we've done this for our whole lives, surely we know what we're supposed to do?" But they did it anyway, even though they still didn't really know who this Jesus was or what he was up to. And of course, what happens when they threw their nets out a little deeper? They caught a whole ton of fish! They were probably thinking, "Hmm, maybe this Jesus guy does know what he's talking about." 

And that was how my adventure began. In the same way that Jesus was with his disciples and looked out for them and their fish, every time I move somewhere around the world, whether it was to America, Germany, or now New Zealand, I remember that Jesus said to throw my nets out a little deeper because it's going to be the greatest adventure ever.

Of course, the Luke 5 story is also weaved into the very beginnings of the existence of this blog, which started as a place to chronicle the adventures in Germany. Little did I realise that the week at camp was about to be the roughest week I've experienced in my short career in children's ministry.

As we were leaving the campfire that night, I remembered thinking about how Kylee had once shared about how she usually feels really vulnerable after preaching because it was like she had just completely bared her soul. Any response to the sermon could be taken very personally because of that vulnerability.

That was how I felt that night.
"Was that story cool enough for the kids?"
"Do they now think I'm a complete nut-case?"
"Maybe moving around the world as an adventure isn't that interesting of a story for kids..."

The grass couldn't have been more fascinating that night even though it was pitch dark as I kept my head low to avoid anyone or anything that would make me feel less than human. Then along came this figure whom I recognised as one of the older boy campers who enjoyed appearing tough with the rest of his mates.

"That was a really cool story."
"Yeah? Which part?"
"The one about Jesus asking them to take the nets out further..."
(Awkward silence proceeds because Jael is shaken out of vulnerability bubble and gets flabbergasted really easily under normal circumstances anyway. And then panic ensues because Jael doesn't want to lose the interest of the young chap.)
"Yeah? Well, it is found in the Bible..."
(face-palm. What are you doing Jael? Get it together. You've gotta be cooler than that.")
"Really? Where?"
"It's in Luke 5. You can go read it if you have time."
"Oh cool! I'll do that."

It's never about me, is it?

That same night, I had my first homesick camper. I tried convincing her the story I had just told about moving away from home at 18 years old was the same thing as being away from home for the first time at camp.

Smooth. Real smooth.

The next day, the homesick camper would not stop bickering with the BFF who was in the same small group. Halfway through one of the craft activities, one of them left in tears because they had gotten into another fight.

"She said..."
"But she said..."
"No but..."
Sigh.

That night, as the campers filed out to their cabins after supper, Jacolize, the camp mum, found me. I had a minor breakdown as she prayed over the situation, wondering again why in the world I was working with kids when I had no experience and didn't even know what it's like to be or to feel as a kid would. My childhood was mechanical, and any emotion I have the ability to express today came from the intense hormonal re-structuring from the 4 years in an all-girls school in my teenage years. When I eventually returned to the cabin, Paul and Gwen had sat the girls down to talk to them about respect.

As if I didn't feel low enough, now all these other adults needed to come out to help me with my kids.

I don't know how or why, but I had packed my pink Kaleo shirt along to camp and as I put it on the next day, everything about Dr Ross and the bee-box and the Jeremiah paper came back.

Kaleo means "I call" in Greek.

I thought about my friend Emily, and how proud she would have been that I had brought that shirt to camp. It was the momentary high of the morning until the next bicker between the BFFs. It was a good thing the camp schedule was so full on that I didn't have time for an argument with God or the whole, "You know I didn't want to do the ministry thing, or the seminary thing, or the work in a church thing, or the children's ministry thing and yet I've submitted to it all so why the flip do you not make it any easier??" conversation would have made its pointless loop all over again.

I knew exactly why.


It started out as a feeling
Which then grew into a hope
Which then turned into a quiet thought
Which then turned into a quiet word

It was The Call.
I got curious, and so I answered.
And off we went.
I've always had the opportunity to stop any time I wanted.
But really, the highs are so much more fun that the lows can eventually become negligible.

As I began to put more of these thoughts together, the song that became the theme as I transitioned out of Anderson last year came back.

It started off as a feeling

It's the same song that has kept me through all the weaving in and out of stories in the past year. Stories that I've interacted with along the road, even the ones I've only spent a day or a week with.

The Call is what I make of it.

I'll come back when they call me,
No need to say goodbye

Exegesis of 1 Corinthians 7:25-35, Paul on Marriage

Now concerning virgins I have no command of the Lord, but I give an opinion as one who by the mercy of the Lord is trustworthy. I think then that this is good in view of the present distress, that it is good for a man to remain as he is. Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released. Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife. But if you marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned. Yet such will have trouble in this life, and I am trying to spare you. But this I say, brethren, the time has been shortened, so that from now on those who have wives should be as though they had none; and those who weep, as though they did not weep; and those who rejoice, as though they did not rejoice; and those who buy, as though they did not possess; and those who use the world, as though they did not make full use of it; for the form of this world is passing away. But I want you to be free from concern. One who is unmarried is concerned about the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord; but one who is married is concerned about the things of the world, how he may please his wife, and his interests are divided. The woman who is unmarried, and the virgin, is concerned about the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and spirit; but one who is married is concerned about the things of the world, how she may please her husband. This I say for your own benefit; not to put a restraint upon you, but to promote what is appropriate and to secure undistracted devotion to the Lord.

 - 1 Corinthians 7:25-35

Introduction

            In deciphering scripture, there are many issues that one needs to consider. The tendency in reading scripture is for one to read our own agenda into the text without letting it truly speak to us. Often when this happens, scripture becomes the cause for division and manipulation. In the case of this scripture from 1 Corinthians 7:25-35 that is under exegesis, much has been said about whether marriage should be a qualifier for one to be in ministry. Each difference in opinion has caused the division in the church to fracture a little bit more. If Paul were the author of this letter, and he preached so much about unity in the community, could it possibly have been his intent for his letter to cause division? Here we will examine this text more closely.

Literary Criticism

            With regards to authorship, scholars seem to come to a general agreement that this first letter to the Corinthians is Pauline. Both Jerome Murphy-O’Conner and Joseph Fitzmyer interprets the Lucan account to be the main source of credibility that Paul did actually travel to Corinth.[1] However, Murphy-O’Conner goes on to say that:

Luke gives the impression that he arrived more or less on the heels of Aquila and Prisclla, he arrived more or less on the heels of Aquila and Priscilla, who had ‘recently’ come from Italy as a result of the edict of Claudius (Acts 18:1-2). Thus, Paul would have arrived not long after A.D. 41. Unfortunately, things cannot be as simple as this.

He argues that it is on his second missionary journey that Paul arrived in Corinth. In holding the Lucan account and placing Paul’s other letters on a chronological timeline, we arrive at the conclusion that Paul probably left Corinth sometime in A.D. 51.[2]

Murphy-O’Conner writes that “Paul returned to Ephesus in mid to late summer AD 52. He stayed there for two years and three months (Acts 19:8-10), during which he probably wrote letters to Galatia, Philippi, Colossae, Philemon, and Corinth.”[3] Murphy-O’Conner, Bruce J. Malina and John J. Pilch all agree that 1 Corinthians is not actually the first letter that Paul wrote to the Corinths, as Paul does make a reference to a previous letter in 1 Corinthians 5:9.[4] Murphy-O’Conner writes that the first letter was actually lost. These three scholars maintain that because of the reference to a previous letter, it sets it up that Paul “was already situated in a well-set-up information exchange relation.”[5] Murphy-O’Conner writes that

The circumstances surrounding the writing of 1 Corinthians are much more complex, and go a long way to explaining the number of subjects dealt with in what is easily the most dialogical of all Paul’s letters . . . Paul had three sources of information regarding the situation at Corinth – Chloe’s people, the delegation, and the letter. Together these revealed two sets of problems, to which Paul responds in different ways.[6]

Form Criticism

            Malina and Pilch suggest that the book of 1 Corinthians can actually be divided into two sections. They write that

In the first part of the letter, Paul responds to the information brought by Chloe’s people . . . In the second part covering questions put in the letter sent by some Corinthians, Paul deals with their concerns about having children (7:1ff), arranging marriage (7:25ff), eating foods set before images (8:1ff), and gifts of the Spirit (12:1ff); about his own idea of a collection for Jerusalem (16:1ff); and about Apollos (16:12).[7]

Ben Witherington III seems to agree with this analysis of the text. He writes that “[Paul] is convinced that even social problems have theological roots and ethical implications . . . He must show the future good of allowing love to govern how, when, and whether one expresses one’s freedom, knowledge, and gifts . . . Paul structures his discourse to achieve these aims.”[8] He gives the suggestion that this chapter under exegesis falls under the section probatio, which includes arguments concerning marriage and singleness amongst other topics. He writes that “The probatio was the heart of a rhetorical speech or letter and included the principal arguments used to persuade the audience.”[9]

Textual Criticism

            To gain as close of an unbiased understanding of this text as we can, we need to examine the text more closely, especially with regards to the use of words such as “virgin” and “unmarried.”

            Fitzmyer offers that the noun parthenos could have been in reference to a girl without experience of a man, or who has not been given to a man. He writes that

Elsewhere in the NT it denotes (14 times) a chaste marriageable girl (except Rev 14:4, where it is figurative: parthenoi, those who have not defiled themselves with idolatory) . . . Here, however, parthenoi has to be understood as masc. as well as fem., because v. 26 extends its connotation to anthropos, “human being,” and v. 32 applies it to masc. ho agamos. For this reason, the RSV, REB render it “the unmarried.” The translation “betrothed” (ESV, Hurley, “To Marry,” 16; Elliot, “Paul’s Teaching”) is tendentious and wrong; and parthenoi, as “widow(er)s married only once” (Ford, “Levirte Marriage,” 362) is bizarre. The noun occurs elsewhere in the Pauline corpus only in 2 Cor 11:2.[10]

Richard Horsley however, offers that “Traditionally, because of the reference to “his virgin” (NRSV: fiancée) in verse 36 and the verb “cause to marry” in verse 38, the passage has been understood as addressed to fathers about their virgin daughters.”[11] Gordon Fee seems to agree with this translation. He writes that “Of the various options for the meaning of “virgins,” that seems most probable which sees Paul as speaking to some who are betrothed and are now questioning whether to go through with their marriages.”[12] If we hold that Paul was writing this letter to address the issues raised by the Corinthian church, then the argument presented by Horsley and Fee would probably hold more water.

Fee goes on to address the use of the word “being loosed” that presents some difficulty to work with. It is often assumed that in this case, Paul is referring to divorce. However, Fee raises the question that “If Paul had intended divorce, therefore, why did he use this strange noun?”[13] He writes that “The clue lies with the word “loosed,” which is found throughout the papyri as a technical term for discharging someone from the obligations of a contract . . . If the view is correct, then [the reference here would be] in particular to those who are already under obligation to one another.”[14] Fitzmyer agrees with this argument. He writes that “The perf. Lelysai might seem to mean, “have you been loosed from a wife,” i.e., by death or divorce. The NEB understands it of one whose marriage has “been dissolved.” In view of the preceding question, however, it must mean, “Have you been free of any bond to a wife?” . . . In saying this, Paul is not speaking against marriage as such.”[15]

Another part of this text that needs to be examined are the words “free of concern.” Fitzmyer writes that “Paul is expressing his pastoral care by providing guidance to the celibate male, and is undoubtedly using a notion often associated with marriage in Stoic writings . . . Paul makes this assertion about an unmarried man in the context of an exhortation in favor of virginity. What he thus asserts is intended as a recommendation to consider the appropriateness of “pleasing the Lord” in a celibate way of life.”[16] Fee offers here that

The words “to be free from concern” translate the infinitive “to be” and the adjective “without anxiety” (amerimnous). They have to do with a state of being, not with “cares” as such . . . Paul’s concern most likely still has to do with living in the present age as an eschatological person. That is, because life is determined by one’s new existence in Christ (already but not yet, with the “not yet” clearly in view), the believer should be free from the anxiety-ridden existence of those who are determined by the world in its present form . . . These things do not determine one’s existence; the clear vision of the future does.[17]

Redaction Criticism

            Because of the nature of this text being a specific letter addressing specific issues to the Corinthian church, there is little that can be said about the redaction of this text. However, we do find that this issue of the “present distress” that Paul talks about in verse 26 is also discussed in Luke 21:23.

The passage in Luke makes reference to a time of great distress in the land. However, the tone in this text seems to indicate more of an empathetic tone toward those who are suffering than one of reprimanding for the fate that they found themselves in. If anything, it seems to suggest that Paul might have suggested the Corinthian church remained as they were because in a time of great distress, a change from the status quo might bring trouble, similar to the reference made in the Lucan text.

Another portion of scripture that seems to reflect what Paul is saying in verse 26 about a man remaining as he is can be found in verse 8 where he encourages the unmarried and the widowed to remain as he was. However, it is difficult to interpret what he might have really meant in that text. Murphy-O’Conner suggests that, “When Paul wrote 1 Corinthians he was single. His formulation, however, draws attention to a latent ambiguity.”[18] He also raises the point that we cannot make the conclusion that Paul remained single his whole life based on one verse found in one of his letters.[19] This again points us back to the fact that Paul wrote this letter specifically to the Corinthians, addressing the specific issues that they had asked him.

Source Criticism

That Paul begins this part of the letter with “Now concerning virgins I have no command of the Lord, but I give an opinion as one who by the mercy of the Lord is trustworthy,” seems to indicate that he could not address this issue directly based on his knowledge of the Law. Peter Tomson offers that when we approach this passage, we have to recognize Paul’s authority as a Jewish religious teacher in his “previous life.”[20]

Witherington makes the suggestion that “Throughout this letter Paul tries to inculcate in the Corinthians a sense of what it means to live in the eschatological age . . . For Paul, the one thing of eternal significance that humans can do in this world is serve the Lord, proclaiming the good news of eternal salvation available through the crucified Messiah Jesus.”[21] If we hold this argument to be true, then perhaps we can assume that Paul wrote this section of his letter based solely on his authority as an apostle of Christ, “one who by the mercy of the Lord is trustworthy.”

Socio-Historical Criticism

            Witherington writes that “Often the study of passages like 1 Corinthians 7 has been attempted without consideration of the character and conduct of Roman marriage and family life. Such background study might help to explain why the Corinthians were acting as they were and why they were making statements like “It is good for a man not to ‘touch’ a woman.””[22]

Malina and Pilch offer that “The principle behind [Paul’s answers] are consistently the same: our present living is hemmed in by coercive conditions . . . The theme here is anxieties that come from family life. Given the shortness of time before the Lord’s coming, it seemed better, in terms of orderly and devoted living, to bypass family problems.”[23]

In his book, “Paul on Marriage and Celibacy,” Will Deming offers that there may have been a reason for Paul’s approach to celibacy. He writes that “An option pursued by a number of other scholars posits an ascetic theology among the Christians that arose from their confusion over Paul’s teachings on holiness and eschatology. As Johannes Weiss explains, these “earnest, fearful, unfree souls” were frightened by the Apostle’s condemnation of sexual sins, such as one finds in 1 Corinthians 6, and by the nearness of the End.”[24]

However, we still need to understand what is going on in the Roman world during this time to truly understand what it is that Paul is speaking to in this passage. Witherington offers several ways in which we can look at this. He writes that

First, while moderns tend to view a home as a haven or refuge from public life, the demarcation between public and private life was by no means as strong in antiquity . . . Whether because of work or because of arranged marriages, Romans frequently looked outside the home for pleasure and for much else that we would associate with home and family . . . A good deal of this background information comes into play in 1 Corinthians 7 because of the household setting of the ekklesia, which meant that sexuality and sex roles . . . represented an area Christians themselves could influence and control, whereas the public world was outside their control.[25]

Also, advocating that singleness was better than marriage was a view that would probably have been frowned upon by the Roman Corinthains. Witherington writes that “Some emperors, especially Augustus, had done all they could to encourage Romans to marry and have many children. Augustus even put into law penalties on women who remained unmarried too long after being widowed.”[26]

            At the same time, there was also much debate between the Stoics and the Cynics about the issue of marriage. Deming writes that “The starting point for this “Stoic-Cynic marriage debate” . . . was the recognition of a basic datum of free Greek society: marriage involved a man in weighty responsibilities . . . The effect was cumulative: marriage was the equivalent of leaving the freedom of one’s bachelor days behind and beginning the settled life of a responsible citizen with all its cares and concerns.”[27] One of these concerns was the issue of having children, as this was synonymous to being married in the eyes of both Stoics and Cynics. Deming goes on to write that “The basic question they asked was: Should the intelligent, informed, morally upright person take on such responsibility?”[28]

            The Stoics did not evaluate marriage as an entity in itself, but “as an important component in a larger system of morality. The act of marrying was a sign of allegiance to a higher metaphysical order.”[29] The Cynics, on the other hand, saw freedom to be more important than anything else. Deming writes that “the Cynic idea of freedom necessarily also included freedom from the responsibilities of conventional existence: “from all care about food, clothing, house, home, marriage . . . For this reason they resolutely excluded marriage from their sphere of moral concern.”[30]

            These were the arguments both for and against marriage during the time that Paul wrote this letter to the Corinths. However, Deming also presents that “In 7.26 Paul speaks of what is “good for a man”, an expression he uses in 7.1, and for which we have analogies in Stoic authors. In contrast to 7.1, however, where Paul follows this phrase with a Cynic-like judgment on marriage, here he states explicitly that he is giving his own advice as one who has been shown mercy by the Lord.”[31]

Witherington seems to agree with this argument. He writes that “He urges the Corinthian Christians to do what is for their benefit (v. 35), that is, what allows couples to be united and individuals to be sure of what their marital status ought to be.”[32] He also says that Paul is not merely being socially conservative “in the interest of the ekklesia’s survival.”[33] Murphy-O’Conner makes the same argument in this. He writes that

Paul applies a very coherent set of principles to the solution of these problems. (1) God’s call comes to people in all walks of life. Hence one’s social status essentially irrelevant. In particular, celibacy is not intrinsically better than marriage (verse 7). Thus in itself no social change will raise one in God’s estimation. (2) A change of status may be initiated in order to compensate for human weakness . . . (3) A forced change of status should be accepted.[34]

Praxis

            In examining what Paul really thought about community and life in the church, it is hardly surprising that even in this text in 1 Corinthians, we come to the conclusion that essentially, whatever labels or structures that society may try to impose on us really does not matter. We may not always come to the same conclusion about everything concerning lifestyle habits, but we are essentially just “everyday people” trying to live “everyday lives.” As Paul himself concludes in this passage, “This I say for your own benefit; not to put a restraint upon you, but to promote what is appropriate and to secure undistracted devotion to the Lord.” (1 Cor. 7:35).

Everyday People

Sometimes I'm right, but I can be wrong

My own beliefs are in my song

The butcher, the baker, the drummer and then

Makes no difference what group I'm in

I am everyday people

Yeah, yeah

There is a blue one who can't accept the green one

For living with a fat one trying to be a skinny one

Different strokes for different folks

And so on, and so on and scooby-dooby-doo

Ooh, sha, sha

We got to live together

I am no better, and neither are you

We are the same, whatever we do

You love me, you hate me, you know me and then

You can't figure out the bag I'm in

I am everyday people

Yeah, yeah

There is a long hair that doesn't like the short hair

For being such a rich one that will not help the poor one

Different strokes for different folks

And so on and so on and scooby-dooby-doo

Ooh, sha, sha

We got to live together

There is a yellow one that won't accept the black one

That won't accept the red one that won't accept the white one

Different strokes for different folks

And so on, and so on and scooby-dooby-doo

Ooh, sha, sha

I am everyday people

           

Bibliography

Dunn, James D.G., Editor. Paul and the Mosaic Law. Grand Rapids, MI: William B Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1994.

Dunn, James D.G., Editor. The Cambridge Companion to St. Paul. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Fee, Gordon D. The First Epistle to the Corinthians. Grand Rapids, MI: William B Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1987.

Fitzmyer, Joseph. First Corinthians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, vol. 32 from the Anchor Yale Bible. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008.

Horsley, Richard A. 1 Corinthians from Abingdon New Testament Commentaries Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1998.

Murphy-O’Conner, Jerome. Paul: A Critical Life New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Murphy-O’Conner, Jerome. St Paul’s Corinth: Texts and Archaeology, vol. 6 from Good News Studies. Wilmington, DE: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1983.

Malina, Bruce J. and John J. Pilch. Social Science Commentary on the Letters of Paul. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2006.

Witherington III, Ben. Conflict & Community in Corinth: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary on 1 and 2 Corinthians. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995.

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[1] Joseph Fitzmyer, First Corinthians: a new translation with introduction and commentary, vol. 32 from the Anchor Yale Bible (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008), 37; Jerome Murphy-O’Conner, St Paul’s Corinth: Texts and Archaeology, vol. 6 from Good News Studies (Wilmington, DE: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1983), 130.

[2] Murphy-O’Conner, St Paul’s Corinth, 139-140.  For the purpose of this paper, we will not go into an extensive discussion of when the letter to the Corinthians might have been written. Various texts, including the Cambridge Companion to St. Paul and Social Science Commentary on the Letters of Paul  seem to either point to Murphy-O’Conner as the authority on Paul, or make the general assumption that Paul is indeed the author of the letters to the Corinthians. Murphy-O’Conner’s in-depth discussion of dating 1 Corinthians in this book.

[3] James D. G. Dunn, eds., The Cambridge Companion to St Paul (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 75.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Bruce J. Malina and John J. Pilch, Social-Science Commentary on the Letters of Paul (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2006), 59.

[6] Dunn, 75-76.

[7] Malina, 59.

[8] Ben Witherington III, Conflict & Community in Corinth: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary on 1 and 2 Corinthians (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995), 73.

[9] Ibid., 76.

[10] Fitzmyer, 314.

[11] Richard A. Horsley, 1 Corinthians from Abingdon New Testament Commentaries (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1998), 104.

[12] Gordon D Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (Grand Rapids, MI: William B Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1987), 323.

[13] Ibid., 331.

[14] Ibid., 332.

[15] Fitzmyer, 316.

[16] Ibid., 318-319.

[17] Fee, 342-343.

[18] Jerome Murphy-O’Conner, Paul: A Critical Life (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 62.

[19] Ibid., 62-63.

[20] James D. G. Dunn, eds., Paul and the Mosaic Law (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1994), 255.

[21] Witherington, 179.

[22] Witherington, 170.

[23] Malina, 90.

[24] Will Deming, Paul on Marriage and Celibacy: The Hellenistic Background of 1 Corinthians 7 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995) 16.

[25] Witherington, 172-173.

[26] Witherington, 174.

[27] Deming, 52.

[28] Ibid., 54.

[29] Ibid., 57.

[30] Ibid., 61.

[31] Ibid., 173.

[32] Witherington, 174.

[33] Ibid.

[34] Dunn, 78.