St Paul and the Mystery Religions

It is scarcely

necessary to apologise for a discussion of St. Paul’s relation to the

Mystery-Religions of his Hellenistic environment. One of the most noteworthy

features in the trend of contemporary scholarship is the interest manifested by

philological experts in the phenomena of that extraordinary religious

syncretism which prevailed in the Græco-Roman world between 300 b.c. and 300 a.d. Their learned and instructive investigations touch nascent

Christianity at numerous points, and raise many fascinating questions. Obscure

places in early Christian literature are being illuminated, and the New

Testament itself has much to gain from the historical reconstruction of the

habits of thought and beliefs in the midst of which it came into being. The

natural tendency, however, of explorers in remote fields is to over-estimate

the significance of their discoveries. This temptation, I believe, has not been

escaped by the pioneer workers in the province of Hellenistic religion. And

their readiness to look in that direction for the source of various important

Christian conceptions has been encouraged by the ardour of those theologians

who find in the comparison of religions the main clue to the interpretation of

Christianity.

As a matter of

fact, the chief defect in the process is the failure to be sufficiently

rigorous in the application of the historical method. The more immediate

background of the Christian faith is apt to be strangely neglected. It will

appear again and again in the course of the present investigation that the Old

Testament supplies a perfectly adequate explanation of ideas and usages in the

Epistles of Paul which it is the fashion to associate with Hellenistic

influence. Perhaps Deissmann may be charged with over-statement when he

declares that “if we are to understand the complete Paul from the view-point of

the history of religion, we must grasp the spirit of the Septuagint” (Paulus, p. 70). But one has no doubt

whatever that this assertion sets in bold relief an aspect of the situation

which is too frequently ignored.

To dismiss the

view that the Christianity of Paul is a syncretistic religion is not, however,

to close one’s eyes to the light which may be shed from many quarters on the

conditions in which he accomplished his work as a missionary. And if we are to

do full justice to his own famous statement, “I have become all things to all

men that at all events I might save some,” we must recognise his willingness to

put himself en rapport with the

men and women whom he sought to win for Christ. Hence it is of real value to

understand something of the religious atmosphere in which his converts had

lived as Pagans, if we are to grasp the more delicate implications both of his

thought and language in those Letters which answered their questions and dealt

with their spiritual dangers.

H. A. A. Kennedy.

New College, Edinburgh,

July 5th, 1913.

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