Alec J. Lucas on Romans 1:23

The following comes from:

 

Alec J. Lucas, Evocations of the Calf? Romans 1:18-2:11 and the Substructure of Psalm 106 (105) (Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 201; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2015), 126, 127-30

 

Table 36. Jer 2:11; Ps 106(105):20; and Rom 1:23

 

Jer 2:11	Ps 106(105):20	Rom 1:23
11 εἰ ἀλλάξονται ἔθνη θεοὺς αὐτῶν; αὶ οὗτοι οὔκ εἰσιν θεοί. ὁ δὲ λαός μου ἠλλάξατο τὴν δόξαν αὐτοῦ ἐξ ἧς οὐκ ὠφεληθήσονται	20 καὶ ἠλλάξαντο τὴν δόξαν αὐτῶν ἐν ὁμοιώματι μόσχου ἔσθοντος χόρτον	23 καὶ ἤλλαξαν τὴν δόξαν τοῦ ἀφθάρτου θεοῦ ἐν ὁμοιώματι εἰκόνος φθαρτοῦ ἀνθρώπου καὶ πετεινῶν καὶ τετραπόδων καὶ ἑρπετῶν
11 If nations will change their gods? But these are not gods. Yet my people changed their glory, from which they will not profit.	20 And they changed their glory for the likeness of a calf which eats grass.	23 And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of a corruptible human being and of birds and of four-footed animals and of serpents.

 

As the table above shows, the verbal parallels with Ps 106(105):20 are more extensive than those with Jer 2:11, a fact that has led scholars to stress the influence of the former than the latter in Rom 1:23, . . .

 

What is significant, however, is that the words in Ps 106(105):20 referring to the golden calf (μοσχου εσθοντος χορτον) are omitted from Rom 1:23 and replaced by human and animal imagery connected to idolatry. This brings us to the second set of texts: Gen 1:20-27 and Deut 4:15-18.

 

Table 37. Gen 1:20-27 and Deut 4:15-18

 

Gen 1:20-27	Deut 4:15-18
20 καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεός ἐξαγαγέτω τὰ ὕδατα ἑρπετὰ ψυχῶν ζωσῶν καὶ πετεινὰ πετόμενα ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς κατὰ τὸ στερέωμα τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καὶ ἐγένετο οὕτως 21 καὶ ἐποίησεν ὁ θεὸς τὰ κήτη τὰ μεγάλα καὶ πᾶσαν ψυχὴν ζῴων ἑρπετῶν ἃ ἐξήγαγεν τὰ ὕδατα κατὰ γένη αὐτῶν καὶ πᾶν πετεινὸν πτερωτὸν κατὰ γένος καὶ εἶδεν ὁ θεὸς ὅτι καλά 22 καὶ ηὐλόγησεν αὐτὰ ὁ θεὸς λέγων αὐξάνεσθε καὶ πληθύνεσθε καὶ πληρώσατε τὰ ὕδατα ἐν ταῖς θαλάσσαις καὶ τὰ πετεινὰ πληθυνέσθωσαν ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς 23 καὶ ἐγένετο ἑσπέρα καὶ ἐγένετο πρωί ἡμέρα πέμπτη 24 καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεός ἐξαγαγέτω ἡ γῆ ψυχὴν ζῶσαν κατὰ γένος τετράποδα καὶ ἑρπετὰ καὶ θηρία τῆς γῆς κατὰ γένος καὶ ἐγένετο οὕτως 25 καὶ ἐποίησεν ὁ θεὸς τὰ θηρία τῆς γῆς κατὰ γένος καὶ τὰ κτήνη κατὰ γένος καὶ πάντα τὰ ἑρπετὰ τῆς γῆς κατὰ γένος αὐτῶν καὶ εἶδεν ὁ θεὸς ὅτι καλά 26 καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεός ποιήσωμεν ἄνθρωπον κατ᾽ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν καὶ καθ᾽ ὁμοίωσιν καὶ ἀρχέτωσαν τῶν ἰχθύων τῆς θαλάσσης καὶ τῶν πετεινῶν τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καὶ τῶν κτηνῶν καὶ πάσης τῆς γῆς καὶ πάντων τῶν ἑρπετῶν τῶν ἑρπόντων ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς 27 καὶ ἐποίησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν ἄνθρωπον κατ᾽ εἰκόνα θεοῦ ἐποίησεν αὐτόν ἄρσεν καὶ θῆλυ ἐποίησεν αὐτούς	15 καὶ φυλάξεσθε σφόδρα τὰς ψυχὰς ὑμῶν ὅτι οὐκ εἴδετε ὁμοίωμα ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ᾗ ἐλάλησεν κύριος πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἐν Χωρηβ ἐν τῷ ὄρει ἐκ μέσου τοῦ πυρός 16 μὴ ἀνομήσητε καὶ ποιήσητε ὑμῖν ἑαυτοῖς γλυπτὸν ὁμοίωμα πᾶσαν εἰκόνα ὁμοίωμα ἀρσενικοῦ ἢ θηλυκοῦ 17 ὁμοίωμα παντὸς κτήνους τῶν ὄντων ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ὁμοίωμα παντὸς ὀρνέου πτερωτοῦ ὃ πέταται ὑπὸ τὸν οὐρανόν 18 ὁμοίωμα παντὸς ἑρπετοῦ ὃ ἕρπει ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ὁμοίωμα παντὸς ἰχθύος ὅσα ἐστὶν ἐν τοῖς ὕδασιν ὑποκάτω τῆς γῆς
20 And God said, “Let the waters bring forth serpents among the living creatures and winged birds upon the land against the firmament of the sky.” And it became so. 21 And God made the great sea monsters and every living creature of the serpents, which the waters brought forth according to kind, and every winged bird according to kind. And God saw that they were good. 22 And God blessed them, saying “Increase and be multiplied and fill the waters in the seas, let the birds be multiplied upon the land. 23 And evening came and morning came, the fifth day. 24 And God said, “Let the land bring forth the living creature according to kind, four-footed animals and serpents and beasts of the land according to kind.” And it became so. 25 And God made the beasts of the land according to kind and the cattle according to kind and all the serpents of the land according to their kind. And God saw that they were good. 26 And God said, “Let us make humankind in our image and according to likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle over all the land and over all the serpents slithering upon the land. 27 And God made humankind according to God’s image he made it, male and female he made them.	15 And guard your souls greatly, because you did not see a likeness on the day in which the LORD spoke to you at Horeb on the mountain from the midst of the fire. 16 Do not act lawlessly and make for yourselves an engraved likeness, any image—a likeness of male or female, 17 a likeness of any animal among those upon the land, a likeness of any winged bird, which flies under the sky, 18 a likeness of any serpent which slithers upon the land, a likeness of any fish, as much as are in the waters under the land.

 

The bold terms also occur in Rom 1:23 (cf. tale 36 on p. 126). As should be apparent, the parallels with Gen 1:20-27 are greater than those with Deut 4:15-18, especially since the one verbal parallel present in the latter but absent in the former, ομοιωμα (“likeness”), derives from Ps 106(105):20. Rhetorically, human and animal imagery drawn from Gen 1:20-27 serves, primarily, to depict the inversion of creation that occurs in idolatry, reinforcing what initially appears to be the application of Ps 106(105);20 only to Gentiles.

 

An issue that requires careful consideration is whether, secondarily, Paul’s biblical allusions in Rom 1:23 also participate in a retelling of the Adamic fall. This issue may be addressed by answering a question posed by A. J. M. Wedderburn, one that concerns the nature of the change to which Rom 1:23 refers: “[I]s Paul . . . talking about a change in the object of man’s worship or a change in man’s nature?” (Wedderburn, “Adam,” 417) The answer to this question depends on how one construes the term εικων (“image”), which, in turn, is a function of the background against which one reads εικων. There are two basic options. One is that εικων in Rom 1:23 refers to an “image” in the sense of what humanity bears, as in Gen 1;26-27 and the normal usage of this term in the Pauline corpus (Rom 8:29; 1 Cor 11:7; 15:49; 2 Cor 3:18; 4:4; Col 1:15; 3:10). If one adopts this understanding of εικων, then the change to which Rom 1:23 refers is in human nature.

 

The other option is that εικων in Rom 1:23 means an “image” in the sense of an idol, as in Deut 4:16 and many other biblical texts. There is thus a change in the objects of worship (the glory of the incorruptible God for human and animal idols) but not in human nature.

 

These two options, however, are not mutually exclusive if εικων is interpreted in context. In accordance with its source text, Gen 1:20-27, εικων in Rom 1:23 refers to an “image” in the sense of what humanity and animals bear. Yet, preposed to εικων is language drawn from Ps 106(105):20. Significantly, the conflated evocation that results does not say: καὶ ἤλλαξαν τὴν δόξαν τοῦ ἀφθάρτου θεοῦ ἐν εικονι φθαρτοῦ ἀνθρώπου καὶ πετεινῶν καὶ τετραπόδων καὶ ἑρπετῶν (“And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the image of a corruptible human being and of birds and of four-footed animals and of serpents”). If it did, one would argue that an actual human being as well as the animals listed replaced God in that each bears his/its own image. Instead, Rom 1:23 refers to changing the glory of the incorruptible God ἐν ὁμοιώματι εἰκόνος . . . (“for the likeness of an image . . .”). Thus, it is not human/animal image-bearers that have replaced God but rather the likeness of them, that is, idols made to resemble the image-bearers. There is, in other words, a play on the two meanings of εικων. Considered on its own εικων retrains its signification in Gen 1:26-27 as a borne-image; yet the broader prepositional phrase of which it is part refers to idols, cleverly depicted as the likeness of image-bearers, whether of a human or animal. Paul, then, in Rom 1:23 is talking about a change in the objects of worship, not in human nature.