Abstract:
First Peter addresses the Christians in the five Roman provinces in Asia Minor, and can in general terms be described as a letter of consolation and encouragement. Although they are suffering discrimination and injustice as a consequence of their faith in Christ, they should remember that they are in this world, but not from this world; that God has given them a new life through the resurrection of Christ; that they were born into a living hope of an inheritance that nothing can destroy or spoil. Within this broader picture of First Peter, the hymn in 2.21b-25 functions on two levels: firstly it exhorts the Christian house servants to obey their owners, although they are suffering without cause; as motivation the hymnal fragment deals with the suffering of Christ. He was without sin, yet He took their sins upon Him when He died at the cross, without retribution, thus leaving them an example to follow; secondly, it is pointed out that the author had with this hymn also the broader Christian community in mind (= servant paradigm), since they are all 'servants and slaves of God'. Apart from its function within First Peter as a whole, the paper also deals with the possible origin, demarcation, strophic structure and contents of the hymn.
