| Popis: |
This dissertation aims (a) to explore the shape and nature of Paul's conception of mission explaining his understanding of the church's mission in relation to his understanding of his own mission as an apostle, and (b) to show the influence of the Jesus-tradition on the apostle's conception. The thrust of the thesis is encapsulated in the title - Heralds and Community: An Enquiry into Paul's Conception of Mission and Its Indebtedness to the Jesus-Tradition. This reflects a conviction that constructing a plausible conceptuality of mission as understood by Paul and considering influential factors, particularly the Jesus-tradition, are essential for understanding Paul's ecclesial understanding and its relationship to his self-conception. The findings and positions taken in this study are as follows: I) Scholars have exaggerated the functional continuity between the apostle and the church in terms of evangelistic mission by using exegetically unsustainable arguments; in fact, Paul's letters are silent about proactive verbal evangelism by the church qua the church. 2) Paul's silence about congregational evangelism is due to his particular two-pronged (bifurcating) conception of mission, one prong being the event of eschatological heralds, the other prong being that of eschatological community. 3) In this conception of mission Paul maintains that God's inaugurated and ongoing salvation is to be implemented by proactive proclamation of the gospel by the heralds on the one hand, and by ontological/ethical actualization of the gospel by the community of the people of God on the other hand. 4) Jewish scriptures and traditions are formative for Paul's conception of mission, but Paul shows at various points his deep indebtedness to the Jesus-tradition, particularly to the context and contents of the synoptic mission discourse (for his concept of the heralds) and the sermon on the mount (for his concept of the community). |
