How does Paul change his speeches according to his audience?

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James Sandberg        RE – GRP        01/05/2007

How does Paul change his speeches according to his audience?

“If the inclusion of speeches highlights important phases and aspects of Paul’s mission, then we should note how Luke focuses first on mission to the Jews and then mission to the Gentiles.” – James D. G. Dunn (The acts of the Apostles)

This quote suggests that Paul was in fact more concerned with the Jews than he was with the Gentiles. This is further shown by Paul’s speeches, he seems to spend far more time explaining about how Jesus was in fact the messiah, and how they should worship him. But with the Gentiles he seems to be more concerned with the fact that they should convert and become what is essentially Judaism.

Paul changes his speeches in the book of ‘Acts of the Apostles.’ In Acts 13 v. 16 (in Antioch Pisidia) Luke records what Paul says. Paul is speaking in a synagogue and so most of the people there will either be Jews or God-Fears, this means that they will know the Scriptures and they will know the prophecies. This means that when Paul stands up and summarises the Scriptures the people in the synagogue will understand what he is trying to say. He has three sections to his speeches. In section one, he makes a summary of the Old Testament. He lists the Patriarchs, the Prophets, the Judges and the Kings. He then goes on to section two of his speech. He summarises the New Testament. He says that the messiah will come of the line of David. He then goes on to tell about John the Baptist who says that he is not the messiah but there is one who is greater who will come. Paul talks about the rejection of Jesus and the role of Pilate who makes Jesus die on a tree! But Jesus rises and there are witnesses! That links up to section three of his speech, the proof: Psalm 2, Psalm 16 and Isaiah 55. These all basically say that David (who was thought by some people to have been the messiah) saw corruption. Meaning that David died and the worms and other such creatures corrupted his flesh. But Jesus did not see corruption. He rose from the dead, he fulfilled the prophecies, and therefore he must be the messiah. Paul’s speech takes the form of a historical retrospect, just as Stephen’s defence did in Acts 6 v. 2. Paul has taken into his speech what has been said a thousand times before, in the Old Testement Kerygma.

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“The events Proclaimed in Paul’s speech are shown to have taken place as the inevitable sequel to Gods dealings with people in ancient days.” - G. E Wright.

This all takes place in a synagogue where all the people there would understand what he was saying beacduse they would know the scriptures. They would understand that the first section of his speech was the Kerygma, and that he was using that as a base to say that he had God ion his side. This means that Paul will have to change his speech when he is preaching primarally to ...

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