PAUL AND THE RHETORIC OF REVERSAL: KERYGMATIC ...

Boring, Berger and Colpe note that similar vices are still grouped together in Greco-Roman
ethics by the time of Plutarch, who often combines “getting sexually involved with one’s
mother, eating forbidden foods, restraining oneself from no vice”. They postulate:
The repeated naming of this series by Plutarch (in the second passage with an allusion
to Plato) shows that the series of topics treated by Paul [beginning in 1 Corinthians 5]
may possibly have a pagan tradition as its model. In each author the leading theme is
“complete lack of restraint and thoroughgoing lawlessness”. 85
This may be the case, although it is by no means certain that Paul is drawing directly on
“pagan” models. Jewish encapsulations of the Torah in the Hellenistic period often appear to
exhibit a similar conception of the fundamentality of the bodily passions of sexual desire and
greed.
A comparison of the Decalogue in Exodus 20 of the Hebrew and Greek texts reveals that the
ordering of the second table has been rearranged in the Greek translation of the Hebrew
Scriptures, moving the prohibition of adultery to a place of priority:
Masoretic Text Septuagint
1. No other gods No other gods
2. No idols No idols
3. Using the name of the LORD Using the name of the LORD
4. Keeping Sabbath Keeping Sabbath
5. Honouring father & mother Honouring father & mother
6. No murder No adultery
7. No adultery No stealing
8. No stealing No murder
85 M. Eugene Boring, et al., eds., Hellenistic Commentary to the New Testament (Nashville,
Tenn.: Abingdon, 1995), 397.
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