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Biblical Hermeneutics

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  • What do you understand "fulfillment" to mean? Obviation? Commented Nov 24, 2017 at 19:12
  • What's important exegetically is what both Matthew in quoting Jesus in Matthew 5:17, and Paul in Romans 13:8 meant by the Greek word translated "fulfill" (πληρῶσαι and πληρόω). The word is numbered 4137 in Strong's Concordance. Commented Nov 24, 2017 at 22:52
  • The thing is that both the Greek word (biblehub.com/greek/4137.htm) and the English word (merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fulfill) have many usages! So just using the word without saying in what sense you intend it doesn't really communicate much. It is like saying "Joe drew" with no context. Did he draw a picture? A card? A gun? A crowd? 1 John 1:4 uses the same word: "We write this to make our joy complete (full)." So it is necessary to specify in what sense you take the word. Commented Nov 24, 2017 at 23:21
  • CORRECTED TEXT Yes, that's why it's important to look at the context of the passages. Certainly Jesus and Paul were trying to communicate an important concept. We can get additional clues from the antonyms that they chose: Matthew chose Καταλύω (Strong's 2647) to represent the suggestion that Jesus rejected, and Paul chose πίπτει (Strong's 4098) and καταργηθήσεται (Strong's 2673) in I Corinthians 13:8 as the opposite of fulfill. Commented Nov 25, 2017 at 0:25