A few theses on Paul and mortality. (a thread)

1) Paul locates the ultimate problem of the human condition not in Genesis 3 ("the fall") but in Genesis 2.7: "the Lord God took some dirt from the ground & formed a man out of it". In 1 Cor 15, the problem with Adam is that he is

made from dirt. Because he is made from dirt, he is corruptible and subject to death, both physically and morally. Sin is only a problem insofar as it has the ability to utilise this corruptible physical human body as its base of operations.

2) Thus “the flesh”—literally the physical, human body—is the origin of moral corruption because it is the source of desire (1 Cor 7). The moral problem with humanity—what they do—is essentially an ontological one—what they are made of.

3) For Paul, circumcision does nothing to solve the problem of sin because it is an attempt to deal with the flesh by altering the flesh. But it is the entirety of the dirt-made human ontology that is the problem, so altering it in this way will do nothing.

4) Paul is so pessimistic about the human condition that nothing short of full ontological transformation will keep people from sin. In order to solve the problem of death and sin, humans need to exchange their corruptible dirt-bodies for pneumatic bodies.

I'm eagerly waiting for the moment when someone says that I'm wrong about point (4) because it's "gnostic".