Classic Books or Diverse Books?

St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians is among the earliest documents in the collection of texts that we call the New Testament. It’s an ill-tempered letter in which Paul rebukes a rival faction of early Christians who sought to keep the movement within Judaism by insisting that new converts be circumcised. Paul refers to his opponents simply as “the Jews.” In time, the vitriol of the letter fed the anti-Semitism that tainted Christianity for centuries, with gruesome consequences that include the genocide of European Jews. Some years ago, I heard a Lutheran minister and professor at a seminary tell undergraduates that Paul’s letter is a “contaminated text,” and that her work as a minister and scholar was, in part, an effort to decontaminate it.