Fri 1 Feb 2008
Podcast 1.11: Legacies of Paul – Women’s leadership, part 1
Posted by Phil Harland. Categories: Christian origins and literature , Paul of Tarsus , Podcast1 Comment
Here I look at legacies and interpretations of Paul after his death. In particular, I use several letters written in the name of Paul (the Pastoral epistles) and a novelistic story about Paul and a woman named Thecla (Acts of Paul and Thecla) as a window into debates about leadership of women in groups of Jesus-followers in the second century. This episode is part of series one (“Paul and his Communities”) of the Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean podcast.
Podcast 1.11: Legacies of Paul – Women and leadership, part 1 (mp3; archive.org page with various downloading options here).
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February 2nd, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Thanks once again, Phil. Some comments/questions:
1. You seem quite generous towards the P.E.. Would it not be better to call them forgeries?
2. You seem overly sceptical of Acts.
3. I see no real evidence that the P.E. were written in Asia minor. 1 Tim 1:3 has Paul leave Timothy in Ephesus, which never happened. This shows that the author of the P.E. was ignorant of this detail of Paul’s history in Asia, and this argues (weakly) against the P.E. being written in Asia minor. In any case the mention of Ephesus, Lystra, Iconium and Antioch do not demonstrate that the P.E. were written in Asia minor because there is also mention of Crete, for example. Have I missed something?
4. While some have questioned it, I think the majority view is that the Acts of Paul is dependent on the P.E.. This seems to be in tension with the fact that the P.E. and the Acts of Paul are in conflict, as you point out. How can this tension best be resolved?
Richard Fellows.