The Problem of Paul S Social Class: Further Reflections

The Problem of Paul’s Social Class: Further Reflections

Ronald F. Hock

University of Southern California

Introduction

My renewed interest in the problem of Paul’s social class arose as a sort of parergon to my recent labor on the parables.[1] While collecting evidence on the various conventions of thought and behavior that governed the lives of people in the parables I also came across evidence that had a bearing on Paul’s tentmaking and in fact suggested a solution to tensions that I have sensed in my previous argument for Paul’s original aristocratic status.[2] I presented that solution very briefly in a note to another article,[3] but now that Todd D. Still has brought renewed attention to my work on Paul’s tentmaking in a detailed and incisive way,[4] it seems a good time to elaborate on my current views regarding Paul’s social class.

Although it has been thirty years since I first addressed the problem of Paul’s social class, the problem remains the same. Simply put, it is this: how do we explain Paul’s trade as a tentmaker to support himself while an apostle (Acts 18:3; 1 Thess 2:9; 1 Cor 4:12), a trade which would have put him in a social role usually associated with urban marginals like Lucian’s finely characterized shoemaker Micyllus,[5] when other indices of Paul’s life—for example, his dual citizenships,[6] his educational attainments,[7] and his use of athletic imagery[8]—point instead to the status and opportunities afforded an aristocrat?

This question still has no satisfactory answer. That this is the case is due in part to my own partial and even confused attempt at answering it, as two recent biographers of Paul, citing my work, have come to opposite conclusions. Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, for example, accepts my argument that Paul’s attitudes regarding his trade were those of aristocrats,[9] whereas Calvin Roetzel accepts my argument that Paul had learned his trade from his tentmaker father and concludes that Paul was not “from the socially élite.”[10]

These opposing views of Paul’s social origins highlight the tensions in my own work.[11] My aim here is to try to resolve the tension and still favor Paul’s having had an aristocratic origin and upbringing. This task will involve two steps: first, I will maintain my earlier view that Paul’s attitudes toward his own work at a trade were those of aristocrats, a position that Still challenges;[12] and, second, I will correct my earlier view that Paul had learned his trade from his father by arguing instead that he more likely learned it after his conversion, a line of argument Still considers impossible.[13] The latter, as we will see, will resolve the tension inherent in my earlier position. But first some preliminary remarks on the nature of Paul’s trade so that we will know what we are talking about.

Paul’s Trade as a Tentmaker

That the apostle Paul practiced a trade as his principal means of support as an apostle is clear from scattered statements in his letters, in particular 1 Corinthians 4:12—“We toil by working with our hands (kopiw~men e)rgazo/menoi tai=j i)di/aij xersi/n)”—and 1 Thessalonians 2:9—“You remember our toilsome labor; night and day we worked so as not to be a burden on any of you” (mnhmoneu/ete … to\n ko/pon h9mw~n kai\ to\n mo/xqon: nukto_j kai\ h9me/raj e)rgazo/menoi pro\j to\ mh\ e)pibarh=sai tina u(mw~n)” (cf. also 1 Cor 9.19; 2 Cor 6:5; 11:7, 23, 27; 2 Thess 3:7-9).[14] What is less clear, however, is the precise trade that Paul practiced. For that our only evidence comes from Acts where Paul is said to have had the same trade (to\ o9mo/texnon) as Aquila and Priscilla who are identified as skhnopoioi/, or tentmakers (18:3).

Scholars have usually accepted the evidence of Acts that Paul’s trade was tentmaking[15] but have gone on to debate whether Paul’s trade involved making tents from goats’ hair, linen, or leather. The first two options are more likely if, as is usually assumed, Paul learned his trade at home while a boy, as I argued previously,[16] for goats’ hair, that is, cilicium, would connect his trade to his province of Cilicia, whereas linen would, too, since it was a principal commodity of his hometown of Tarsus.[17] But this connection with Tarsus does not work for Aquila and Priscilla, Paul’s fellow tentmakers, since Aquila at least was from Pontus (Acts 18:2), and it would not work for Paul either, if he learned his trade after leaving Tarsus, as I will argue below. There are still advocates of Paul’s trade as involving weaving,[18] but the view that Paul made tents from leather, not to mention other leather products, remains—correctly, in my view—the dominant one.[19]

Paul’s Aristocratic Attitudes toward his Tentmaking

That Paul worked as a tentmaker is not sufficient to indicate his social class. More important are his attitudes toward his practicing this trade, for those attitudes, as we shall see, were not those of fellow craftsmen but rather those of aristocrats. And how did those two groups think of working with one’s hands? Not surprisingly, craftsmen’s attitudes toward their own trades were quite positive, as seen, for example, in the remarks Lucian’s Crobyle makes regarding her husband Philinus, whose craft as a smith provided enough of everything for his family (pa/nta h}n h(mi~n i9kana/) and provided him with a great name (me/ga o1noma) in the Piraeus,[20] or in the opening remarks of Lucian’s quasi-autobiographical Somnium in which his father and friends discussed Lucian’s future; it did not include further education which involved too much time and expense. Rather, they favored one of the acceptable trades which would immediately allow him to contribute to the family finances. Accordingly, Lucian is handed over to his maternal uncle, reputed to be the best sculptor (a1ristoj e9rmoflu/oj ei]nai dokw~n), to learn stone cutting, masonry, and sculpting—a trade that would provide a sufficient income and strong shoulders, as well as praise from everybody (qre/yh| gennikw~j kai\ w!mouj e#ceij karterou/j … e)paine/sontai/ se pa/ntej).[21] Finally, dedicatory inscriptions of weavers at the time of their retirement express pride in the virtue of their work. For example, Demo, Arsinoe, and Bacchyllis exult that they had lived without reproach by having gained their livelihood by means of their hands (to\n e0k xeirw~n a0rnume/na bi/oton).[22]

While those who practiced trades had positive attitudes about their prospects and reputations, aristocrats, in contrast, had attitudes toward such those workers that were universally negative, as Murphy-O’Connor has pointed out.[23] He merely cites Cicero’s famous comments in which trades were regarded as slavish and humiliating,[24] but many other passages repeat their substance and hence underscore their typicality.[25] For example, in the Somnium Lucian relates a dream he had in which two women appeared, one personifying the trade of sculpture and the other the path of education, with each attempting to persuade him to her side.[26] Paideia, besides emphasizing the benefits of a rhetorical education, puts down sculpture with aristocratic disdain, saying that choosing this trade involves toiling (ponw~n) with the body, wearing grimy workclothes (xitw/nio/n ti pinaro/n), being bent down over one’s work (ka/tw neneukw\j ei0j to\ e1rgon), having one’s hands full of tools—in a word, assuming a posture befitting a slave (sxh~ma douloprepe/j) which makes its practitioner in every way humiliated (pa/nta tro/pon tapeino/j).[27]

Equally negative are the attitudes of aristocrats who actually found themselves having to do some kind of work, as shown, for example, in the Greek novels. In Chariton’s Callirhoe the aristocratic Chaereas, after capture and enslavement, worked at digging (ska/ptwn) on his master’s farm. Because of the toil (ko/poj), neglect, and chains that this work involved,[28] he later included his digging in a peristasis-catalogue along with other hardships that he had endured while attempting to recover his wife Callirhoe.[29] Similarly, in Xenophon’s Ephesian Tale the aristocratic Habrocomes searches for his wife across the Mediterranean; when he is out of funds that he had received from the prefect of Egypt[30]—Habrocomes

got himself a job (a)pemi/sqwse) with a group of stonecutters (toi=j tou\j li/qouj e)rgazome/noij). As far as he was concerned, the work (to\ e1rgon) was toilsome (e0pi/ponon), for he was not at all accustomed to subjecting his body to toilsome (e0pipo/noij) and strenuous tasks (e1rgoij).[31] He was in a grievous situation and often lamented his fate. “Look, Anthia,” he said, “Your Habrocomes is now a worker (e0rga/thj) at a grievous trade (te/xnhj) and so I have given my body over to slavery (doulei/a|)….”[32]

Given these very different attitudes toward working at a trade—to the working classes as sources of sufficient income and pride but to aristocrats as toilsome, slavish, and humiliating activities—we can now read Paul’s statements to see on what side his attitudes fall regarding his work as a tentmaker. And those statements clearly put Paul on the aristocratic side, as he, too, calls his work “toilsome labor” (ko/poj kai\ mo/xqoj) (1 Thess 2:9; cf. 1 Cor 4:12; 2 Cor 6:5; 2 Thess 3:8). In fact, he describes his work as being “slavish” and “humiliating.” That Paul saw his trade as slavish is, to be sure, only implicit, at least as virtually all commentators understand 1 Corinthians 9:19, who see this verse in terms of the following ones, Paul’s missionary strategy (vv 20-23).[33] But, as I have argued earlier,[34] this verse—“Although I am independent of all people, I have enslaved myself (e0mauto\n e0dou/lwsa) to all, in order that I might gain more (converts)”—should also be seen in the context of the preceding argument (vv 3-18), in which Paul defends his refusal to accept financial support from the Corinthians despite his right to that support—a right based on experience (v 7), on Scripture (vv 8-10), on religious practice (v 13), and even on a teaching of Jesus (v 14). Thus his refusal to accept support made him independent, but the price of that independence was involved in part his having to take on a slavish trade (v 19).

That Paul also saw his work as humiliating, however, is explicitly stated, and specifically in 2 Corinthians 11:7—“Did I commit a sin by humiliating myself (e0mauto\n tapeinw~n), in order that you might be exalted, because I preached God’s gospel to you free of charge (dwrea/n).”[35] And not only does Paul use the same language as Lucian’s Paideia, Chariton’s Chaereas, and Xenophon’s Habrocomes did regarding their work—its being toilsome, slavish, and humiliating[36]—but he also, like Chaereas, lists his work in peristasis-catalogues (2 Cor 6:5; 11:23, 27; cf. 1 Cor 4:12)—making it one more of the many hardships that he had endured as an apostle. Indeed, like Chaereas, who contrasted his work at digging with the assumed luxury of his wife in Dionysius’ household,[37] Paul also contrasted his work with those Corinthians who were wise, powerful, and honored (1 Cor 4:10) or later with the rival super-apostles at Corinth (2 Cor 11:22-23). Accordingly, Paul’s attitudes toward his practicing a trade coincide very closely with those of aristocrats and hence provide valuable evidence for placing him among the provincial aristocrats of the Greek East of his day.

On Paul’s Taking Up a Trade after his Conversion

Given Paul’s aristocratic attitudes toward his work as a tentmaker, the question arises: Is it likely that Paul would have learned his trade as an aristocrat growing up, whether from his father as a boy or while studying with Gamaliel as a young man? The answer is no, as Murphy-O’Connor has finally recognized.[38] But for a long time the question was never even asked because Paul’s learning a trade was separated from questions of social class by assuming that Paul, whatever his social background, had learned his trade in accordance with an alleged practice among rabbis of his day who combined study of Torah with learning a trade.[39] I have argued against this assumption, largely on the grounds that this practice is difficult to establish before the mid-second century when poverty and need were the portion of Jewish rabbis and hence only then required them to combine study and work.[40]

But then I also went on to argue that, if Paul had not learned his trade during his student days, he must have done so earlier, that is, while growing up in Tarsus under his tentmaker father.[41] The inconsistency of asserting this context for Paul’s having learned a trade and his aristocratic attitudes about his trade escaped me at the time, but two seemingly unrelated kinds of evidence—a comment about the distribution of wax tablets in the educational curricular sequence and a story about an old fisherman—have led me at last to recognize the inconsistency[42] and to propose now an alternative scenario for Paul’s having taken up the trade of tentmaking. Specifically, if Paul learned a trade neither as a boy in Tarsus nor in Jerusalem under Gamaliel, then he learned it later, that is, after his conversion. Murphy-O’Connor has already proposed this option, but with only “intrinsic plausibility” to back it up.[43]

The two kinds of evidence mentioned above, however, should raise Murphy-O’Connor’s and my proposal from mere plausibility to probability. One piece of this evidence comes from a historian of ancient education, Raffaella Cribiore, who, when discussing the distribution of papyri, ostraca, and tablets through the curricular sequence, says that waxed tablets were used largely at the primary stage of education.[44] That statement reminded me of Herodas’ primary student, Kottalos, whose truancy from school leaves his wax tablets collecting dust at home[45] and of Lucian’s comment in his Somnium that he had been playing with the wax from his school tablets when his father handed him over to his uncle to learn a trade.[46] Kottalos’ mother regrets that she had not had her boy taught to feed asses instead of sending him to school,[47] and Lucian’s brief stint in his uncle’s workshop would have been, at the latest, when he had just finished his primary education, or at about eleven years of age. In other words, whether instead of primary school or just after it, people like Kottalos and Lucian would have taken up a trade as a boy. This situation, if applied to Paul, would argue against his having learned a trade at home since his education extended well beyond the primary stage to include the secondary and tertiary ones as well.[48] And given the demanding schedule of secondary students, as summarized in pseudo-Lucian’s Amores, there would have been no time for Paul to have learned the trade of tentmaker as well.[49]