Der Agon bei Paulus

Martin Brändl studies Pauline metaphors, allusions and specialist terms from the context of ancient athletics, gymnastics and agonistics and shows that Paul has a special position in the ancient agon tradition. His metaphors have their origins in the allusions to Old Testament and early Jewish traditions in which agonistic metaphors had already been firmly linked to the tradition of the suffering of the righteous before Paul's time. Paul also uses agonistic metaphors when alluding to local conditions. Using 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 as an example, the author shows that the Apostle creates metaphors by alluding to the local color of the Isthmian Games which took place every two years close to Corinth.