maagden & knapen & dope & hope: social mydichanges

1 Corinthians 11:
11 ~
'aval ein ha'ish blo ishah ve'ein ha'ishah blo ish ba'adon' ~
12 ~
'kie ka'asher ha'ishah min-ha'ish ken gam-ha'ish al-yedei ha'ishah vechal-zot me'elohim' ~

"Echter,
in hun verbondenheid met de Heer
is de vrouw niets zonder de man, en ook de man niets zonder de vrouw. Want zoals de vrouw uit de man is voortgekomen, zo bestaat de man door de vrouw ~ en alles is ontstaan
uit G D!" ~

~*~
~*~

THESE
VERSES
demonstrate
that PAUL had not changed his mind or backslid from Galatians;
they also explain, given the context of the Corinthian correspondence,
why he chose to omit
"There is no male & female"
in the Corinthian version
of the baptism.


I
SUGGEST,
therefore, that for Paul just as for the Corinthians,
a state of androgyny,
a cancellation of gender and sexuality,
would have been
the ideal!


The
difference between them
lies in the application
of the priciple?


The Corinthians
believe that they already achieved a state of perfection
that permits the acting out of the cancellation of gender difference,
whereas Paul is skeptical
of their achievements:
[cf. 4:8 ~
"Maar natuurlijk - u bent al helemaal verzadigd, u bent al rijk,
u bent al koningen geworden zonder ons.
WAS u maar koningen geworden, DAN zouden wij
het OOK zijn!" ~] ...


THIS
does not,
however, imply that for PAUL
the ideal of androgyny has no
social consequences?


~*~


THERE ARE
in fact three [not mutually exclusive] options
for a social enactment of the myth
of the primal
androgyne.


SOME
gnostics
[and perhaps the Corinthians]
seem to have held that once having attained the spirit,
humans transcended gender entirely and forever whether in celibacy
or libertinage.


PHILO,
on the other hand,
restricts such transcending redemption from gender to celibates,
and then only to special ritualized
moments of
ecstacy.


PAUL's
strictures
against women with short hair
and the speaking out of women prophets [14:37-38] -
IF the latter is genuinely Pauline - seem to suggest a third option:
For all [not only celibates] there is no male and female,
but only momentarily in the ritualized ecstacy
of baptism.


It is
ONLY THEN,
IN THIS LIFE, that people attain the status of life in the spirit,
in Christ or in the Lord, in which there is
no male and
female.


Another way
of saying this
is that Paul holds
that ontologically -
according to the spirit -
there is a permanent change
in the status of gender
at baptism,
but insofar as people are still living
in their unredeemed bodies,
gender transcendence is not yet
fully realized on the social level -
according to the flesh.


Perhaps,
we might say,
that final realization
awaits the
Parousia?


I
am
inclined
to agree with Tertullian's view
that the notion of Paul
giving celibate women the power to teach,
preach, and baptize
that is functional, social equivalence to men
seems hard to credit.


On
the other hand,
it may not be gainsaid that he had women associates in his ministry,
NOR that he implied that virgins could achieve spiritual states
unavailable to the married
[7:32-35]?!


ALL THREE
of these possibilities are equally dependent, however,
on a notion that gender difference exists only at one ontological level,
the outer or physical, the corporeal,
but that at the level of TRUE existence, the spiritual, there is no gender,
that is, they depend
on dualism.


Much
of the immediate
post-Pauline tradition
seems to have adopted a version
of the first option -
namely,
that celibate women
could attain
a permanent state
of the erasure
of gender,
a development
that has had
profound effects
on the later discourse
of gender
in European
culture.

knipoog
engel

14 aug 2005 - bewerkt op 19 mrt 2008 - meld ongepast verhaal
Weet je zeker dat je dit verhaal wilt rapporteren? Ja | Nee
Profielfoto van Asih
Asih, man, 81 jaar
   
Log in om een reactie te plaatsen.   vorige volgende