DeConick A.D

121
PAUL AND GNOSTIC DOGMA
through the ages. It resulted in human bondage to the forces of wickedness,
forces that are fueled and empowered by human disobedience in the
first place. These elemental powers thrive on human ignorance and disobedience,
and they have gained control of the universe because of this.
Creation itself has been subjected to their will and their futility. Humans
are bound into their world of decay and death (8:20–22).
The Universal One God
Paul does not consider the Father of Jesus to be the tribal God YHWH
but the One God YHWH who transcends the tribe (Romans 15:7–13). He
is the universal Creator God who has been misunderstood by his fellow
Jews in tribal and covenantal terms.
Paul uses the story of YHWH’s interaction with Abraham, the celebrated
patriarch of the Jews, to make the transgressive argument that,
all along, God had in mind the non-Jews as recipients of his grace. Paul
points out that God gave his promise of righteousness to Abraham and
his descendants long before Moses and the covenant of the Jewish law
came on the scene. God’s promise of blessing was to all those who would
be faithful to him. It was not limited to those who observed the Mosaic
law and belonged to this covenant (4:2–16). Everyone who belongs
to Christ is a descendant of Abraham—rightful heirs to God’s promise,
predestined children of glory, chosen by grace (Galatians 3:29; Ephesians
1:3–6, 3:6; Romans 8:28–30, 33, 11:5–6; compare with 2 Corinthians
1:12; Colossians 3:12).
Although the One God is righteous, according to Paul, his main characteristics
are love and grace (Romans 4:16; 2 Corinthians 13:11; Ephesians
3:4; Colossians 1:6). His love comes to live in humans when the
Holy Spirit is received at baptism (Romans 5:5). Baptism is the initiatory
mechanism that unites the human spirit with the Christ Spirit so that a
person may be transfigured and walk in the newness of life (Romans 6:1–5,
8:9–11). This is the moment when the initiate’s status changes, when he or
she becomes a legal child of God with all the rights of inheritance, instead
of a slave to the elemental powers of the universe and the Jewish law. Intimately
the initiate can call upon God as Abba (Daddy) (Romans 8:14–17;
Galatians 4:6–7). This new intimate, loving relationship with the One
God convinces Paul that none of the elemental forces ruling the universe