Re: ARCWN THS EXOUSIAS TOU AEROS

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Sat Jan 03 1998 - 08:32:37 EST


At 10:41 PM -0600 1/2/98, Steven Cox wrote:
> ...an afterthought to that mail on DIKH...
>
> is hO ARCWN THS EXOUSIAS TOU AEROS (Eph2:2)
> pagan or Jewish? ARCWN suggests Jewish but
> TOU AEROS??? Is it something related to the
> local worship of Artemis?
>
> Sorry if this off the wall.
> Steven

I think it's pagan: the notion that the planets and the four STOICEIA each
had their own ARCONTES belongs to a number of systems of Hellenistic
thought, including some forms of astrology and some emerging forms of
Gnosticism, perhaps also in Mithraism. Paul's assertion at the end of Rom 8
that "nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ" includes a
number of hypothetical intervening factors to which his assertion denies
any efficacy: among these are ARCAI and DUNAMEIS; although EXOUSIAI aren't
in this list, that term also is used to designate subordinate astral
influences in cosmic hierarchies in these widely-variant late Hellenistic
systems of astrological and kindred religious cosmology.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cconrad@yancey.main.nc.us
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/



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