Writing on the Edge: Paul's Use of Hyperbole in Galatians

In Pauls angry letter everything is magnified. His obstructers have insidious motives their Galatian victims are dense and on the brink of spiritual peril and the law itself is outmoded and a malevolent taskmaster. How do we read beneath the rhetoric? Writing on the Edge surveys ancient Greco-Roman and modern linguistic sources on hyperbole and demonstrates that it is possible to separate out the effect of Pauls edgy rhetoric on his ideas. Eleven criteria are applied to identify Pauls most hyperbolic passages in Galatians followed by a reinterpretation of those passages and the entire thrust of the letter. Pauls true attitudes emerge and a more consistent picture of the apostle materializes one in line with his Torah-observant behavior in Acts.