In the process of considering
whether or not this concern about the imposition of the cultural honor and
shame system is a legitimate approach to take in an attempt to understand
Paul’s concerns, the larger movement of the letter to the Corinthians, and the
singular importance of the meal to the early Christian communities, it is
appropriate to here revert to the fifth chapter of the letter, to continue to
build an awareness of the structure of the mounting argument about the body of
believers that comprise the church community that takes place within the letter,
and perhaps culminates in Paul’s communion dissertation of the eleventh
chapter.
Bearing in mind the short discussion of
the historical facts of the symposium that has been previously presented, while
also keeping in mind that Paul’s letter will be read to the gathered church
(not in silent isolation and contemplation), and perhaps strategically read in
the midst of the meal that will eventually devolve into the symposium (which
some in the church were probably imagining to be an example of the messianic
banquet), is necessary to the effort to attempt to hear the Apostle in the same
circumstances in which his initial hearers found themselves.
As was seen through the reading of much
of the sixth chapter, when it is read in the light of a meal and the symposium,
a great deal of illumination is on offer when coming across words such as “Your
boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast affects the
whole batch of dough?” (5:6) The very mention of bread could function as
an indicator that Paul wanted (and expected) this letter to be read in
conjunction with the church’s meal, while the mention of boasting calls
attention to the boasting that was a regular and accepted component of the
symposium.
Going on, Paul
writes, “Clean out the old yeast so that you may be a new batch of dough---you
are, in fact, without yeast. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been
sacrificed” (5:7). This use of Passover terminology presumes that this
church, located in a Gentile city and presumably populated by Gentiles, has
been well-instructed in the history of Israel, so as to properly see themselves
as a part of that continuing narrative of the covenant people, as apart from an
understanding of the exodus the talk of Christ as Passover lamb would fall on
ignorant ears.
At a meal, with the
messianic feast of the Lord’s Supper and what it communicates about the church
and its role as emissaries of the kingdom of God in view, the recipients of the
letter go on to hear “So then, let us celebrate the festival (whether the actual
Passover or simply the Lord’s Supper in recognition of the messianic feast in
which the Passover is consistently called to mind to provide the
messianic-banquet-informed communion with its depth of meaning) not with the
old yeast, the yeast of vice and evil, but with the bread without yeast, the
bread of sincerity and truth” (5:8).
Not only does the
talk of yeast and bread strongly indicate that a meal is taking place and is
the setting of the gathering of the church and the reading of the letter, and
not only do the mention of yeast and bread serve as additional references to
the Passover in particular, but it is also the case that such talk calls to
mind that which would have been part of the oral traditions concerning Jesus
that were then in circulation. Specifically,
those traditions are likely to have included Jesus’ reported reference to the
yeast of the Pharisees and Herod, which could certainly produce thoughts of the
two great feasts over which Jesus presided (found in the Gospel of Mark, which
may have been the earliest and most widely know thread of Jesus traditions
within the orally oriented church community).
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