| Throughout Paul's epistle to the Galatians, there are certain references to the death of Jesus Christ as an act beneficial to those who are "of faith" or "in Christ" (2:19-21; 3:1, 13-14; 5:11-12, 24-26; 6:12, 14, 17); however, the scholarly community has debated over the extent to which Paul's theology connects the benefit of Christ's death to the sacrificial cult of the Old Testament Law. While Paul does not explicitly make this connection in his letter to the Galatians, the absence of explicit reference to Christ's death as an atoning sacrifice need not be taken as evidence of Paul's disinterest in the subject matter or his rejection of the same. Rather, one may account for the silence by recognizing his perception of the common ground shared with his audience, regarding some aspects of the death of Christ. Because of the rhetorical nature of the letter to the Galatians, it is expected that Paul's argumentation will be explicit where he perceives a disagreement over the significance of Christ's death and less explicit where he believes there is agreement. Through literary critical methods, one may construct a profile of the "implied reader's" understanding of the death of Christ which identifies Paul's assumption that Christ's death was an atoning sacrifice, bringing an end to the sacrificial cult of the Law, and the expectation that the reader accepts the same assumption. This is a view that is consistent with what Paul says elsewhere in his writings about the death of Christ, and it is also consistent with the tradition of the death of Jesus in the rest of the New Testament writings. |
