num_pages: 391
description: A thick description of the Anatolian cultic context of the audience provides solutions to several persistent puzzles in Paul's letter to the Galatians. Starting with problems in the so-called "Hagar and Sarah" passage (4.21-5.1), this book argues that Paul attempts to dissuade his audience from being circumcised by identifying circumcision with the enslaving selfcastration of the galli of the Anatolian Mountain Mother of the Gods and by portraying the Law as a Mountain Mother. This background is also seen in the Flesh-Spirit dichotomy in Gal. 3.1-5 and in the two ways form in Galatians 5-6.Contents:Everyone but the audience --Part I. Galatian problems. --Law as a slave-concubine mountain --Law as an enslaving figure: Galatians 3.19-4.11 --Part II. Central Anatolian religious context. --Divine judicial system --Our mother, our place --Attis and the mother --Galli: the mother's slaves --Part III. Paul persuades his Anatolian audience to oppose circumcision. --Rhetorical situation revisted: circumcision and castration --Hagar, the meter sinaiene: Galatians 4.21-5.1 as a triple analogy --Two ways and the unity of Galatians --Flesh and spirit in Galatians 3.1-5.
language: English
title: Cutting Too Close for Comfort: Paul's Letter to the Galatians in Its Anatolian Cultic Context
titlecomplete: Cutting Too Close for Comfort: Paul's Letter to the Galatians in Its Anatolian Cultic Context
ratings_count: 3
publisher: T & T Clark International