Paul’s Sexual Rhetoric

Yesterday in an ecclessiology class discussion got to talking about the Evangelical aversion to symbolism and it’s causes. Very interesting stuff, especially in it’s implications for how the Zwinglian tradition sees the Lord’s Supper as not just symbolic (as versus real presence), but another step removed – that symbol is not a direct medium for the senses of sight, touch, and taste to connect us with the divine mysteries, but is another step removed, becoming just an aid to cognition.

An interesting comment was made to the effect of this aversion to symbolism being a prime reason for why Evangelicals love Paul so much, and end preaching like functional Marcionites. I think this might be the case, but Dr. Metzger was certainly right in responding that this is based on a misreading of Paul, since it is clear enough that he is drenched in symbolism, allegory, and rhetorical flights.

An example of this can be found in Romans 7. Evangelicals are plenty comfortable talking about law/gospel in Paul’s terms of slave/freedman or child under a pedagogue/mature adult, but I would venture that I have never heard the freedom of a Christian preached in terms of Romans 7.1-4. There Paul employs a clearly sexual metaphor for what happened in Christ.

The believer’s participation in Christ’s death and resurrection is here depicted in terms of a marriage. The law was our old husband, but that husband has died in the death of Christ, so that we aren’t committing adultery in being joined to another husband. All of the major translations offer “marry” as a translation of “γένηται” and “γενομένην” in verse three, and that works in a sense, but it’s problematic because the word doesn’t mean marry. The word literally means “to come/become,” and in male/female contexts it means “to have sex with” (think Jenny asking Forrest Gump if he’s ever “been with” a girl). So, what Paul is saying is that “if the old man is still living, she commits adultery if she comes to (has sex with) another man; but if the man dies, she is a free woman with regards to the law, so that she would not be an adultress in coming to (having sex with) another man.” Of course this is taking place in the context of marriage, but Paul derives that meaning through a sexual term. But here’s the real kicker: Paul tells us that the ultimate goal of our marriage with Christ is that “καρποφορήσωμεν τῷ Θεῷ,” which literally means that “we would bear fruit for God,” and nearly all the respectable translations leave it at that. But what that means in English (especially a baptized English) is something akin to the NLT’s “produce a harvest of good deeds.” This cowardly way of translating abandons the force and continuity of Paul’s rhetoric. The meaning of “bearing fruit” in Greek in the context of male/female relations is “getting pregnant and having kids.” So like it or not, I have only one translation to commend to English readers for this verse: The Message! Props to Eugene for translating it clearly as “bear offspring.”

Here is my translation of 7.1-4 (with all the proper blanks filled in):

Don’t you know, brothers and sisters (here I’m speaking to those who know the law), that the Law is the master of a person for the duration of of his life? A married woman is bound by law to her husband as long as he is living, but if the husband dies, she is released from the law of the man. And accordingly, as long as the husband is living, she would be committing adultery if she were to marry and have sex with another man. But if the husband dies, she is a free woman with regards to the law, so that she would not be an adulteress if she were to marry and have sex with another man. So then, brothers and sisters, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, in order that you might marry and have sex with another, namely the one who was raised from the dead, for the purpose of your getting pregnant and having children for God.

I’m left frustrated by the English language with the translation of  καρποφορήσωμεν.  Can anyone think of an equivalent in English that would connote both being pregnant and being fruitful?