I.
Introduction
In my teaching
on Romans over the years, the interpretation of Romans that I have offered is
not entirely in agreement with the so-called Old Perspective on Paul (OPP) or
the New Perspective on Paul (NPP). My
understanding of Paul’s theology and of his letter to the Romans might be
expressed as a Missional Interpretation of Paul (MIP). A missional interpretation is a narrative
reading of the Old Testament that relates God’s salvation history in the OT to
the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As such, it
is not only Paul’s theology but also Paul’s interpretation
of the OT or, better put, for Paul theology
is Old Testament theology. To state
that again, Paul was an Old Testament theologian.
As a side note,
anyone reading this who has not taken my course on Romans might wish to look at
several of my lectures on YouTube:
Paul,
the Law, and the Gift of Grace:
Parts I and II: https://youtu.be/42KsNoBz8X8
Part III: https://youtu.be/S1z_DzKgc84
Parts IV, V, and VI: https://youtu.be/ruk26EgXkc8
New
Perspective on Paul: https://youtu.be/eWssFrXqFVc
In my teaching
of Romans in general, I often engage more with some of the old perspectives
from Augustine and the Reformation than with the NPP. This is partly because I believe that New
Testament theology is not only a theological synthesis of exegetical
material. It is also an academic study
in the mode of tradition interpretation. Too much of New Testament studies in general
is a conversation of the past few years of scholarship with the text of the
Bible rather than being a study of the text in light of two thousand years of
Christian interpretation. Moreover, the
NT itself is an interpretation of the OT.
I find both the OPP and the NPP lacking in failing to understand Paul
and theology in general as a study of the interpretation of Scripture (rather
than doctrines) in light of this long tradition of enquiry. The NPP has rightly criticised the OPP for
reading Paul in light of the issues of the 16th century. Yet its own sociological approach to Paul
(i.e., Paul addressing Jewish and Gentile fellowship) has reduced Paul too much
to a missional pastor responding to his own social context rather than seen him
as a missional theologian explaining the Scriptures to his churches. There can be overlapping agreement with both
the OPP and the NPP in this focus, but it is ultimately a different approach to
Paul and to interpreting Romans.
The primary
purpose of this essay is to explain more about the NPP for those who have sat
through my course on Romans, though others might find it helpful as a simple introduction
to some of the NPP notions. The NPP is
really a grouping of various views since E. P. Sanders wrote in 1977 (see
below); it is more about new perspectives than a single, new perspective. The over forty years of scholarship on the
NPP has produced a variety of views and exegetical interpretations that one
could follow in much greater depth.
Thus, this essay is a very basic introduction, and it is mainly meant to
highlight where my interpretation of Romans have taken different paths from the
NPP (and also sometimes from the OPP).
In essence, the NPP on Paul entails
redefining Paul’s understanding of the human plight and God’s solution in more
group and social categories rather than individual categories:
•
The human plight is not about the individual’s or the Jews’ failure to obtain
righteousness through works of the Law but about believing community’s
relationship to God and one another as Jews and Gentiles.
•
The solution is not God’s declaring us just because of Christ’s imputed
righteousness but is about our participation in Christ.
Looking back over the past forty years of the
NPP, what stands out to me is how much this perspective actually fits into
shifts in intellectual thinking in the West.
The West has increasingly shifted the emphasis in intellectual enquiry
from the Modernist dominance of science to the Postmodernist dominance of the
social sciences in the university. The
NPP has proved to be a good example of this in Pauline studies. Paul is read in terms of the social concern
of the relationship of Jews and Gentiles in the Church. (And I have also appreciated this point, but
it must not dominate.) The issue of the
Law is understood as a social issue (Jewish identity). The new approach to Paul was presented by E.
P. Sanders in terms of his own social concern to affirm Jews and Judaism. The OPP’s view of justification is replaced
with a social interpretation of participation in Christ, of God’s faithfulness
to His covenant relationship with His people, and of Christ’s faithfulness. All such points come to be dealt with through
exegesis, but one should not let the Western intellectual context escape one’s
awareness of these social emphases. I do
believe that the context has been ripe for receiving the NPP, and this has explains
why people have often been so receptive to the interpretations of the NPP
interpreters. If so, we will eventually
see some of the NPP interpretations fade, as the dominance of Rudolf Bultmann
has faded—even disappeared altogether—since the 1980s in Pauline scholarship.
II. Three Ways for Reading Romans
A. The Old
Perspective is not only more individualistic, answering the question, ‘How
might I, a sinner, be saved?’ It is also
a ‘transactional’ interpretation of salvation.
So, for Martin Luther (Old Perspective), the question of how I get right with God is answered with
the following emphases:
•
Focus: individual.
•
‘All have sinned’ (Rom. 3.23): Every individual has sinned (Rom. 1.18-3.26)
•
Problem with the Law: Pride in my works of righteousness. Thus, all works are a problem: for the Jew
living by works of the Law and for the Catholic Pelagian of the 16th
c. doing works to earn salvation. (Jews
= Catholics on Luther’s view.)
•
Solution: God’s justification of the sinner through Christ’s righteousness imputed to us and our faith in Him (esp. seen in Rom.
3.21-5.21). Righteousness is alien, not ours: it is Christ’s righteousness.
•
Reason for Romans: Paul writes out his theology.
•
Election in Rom. 9-11 is about God’s electing individuals to salvation and
about God’s predestination of the elect for salvation. (For Calvin, it is also about predestination
of the rest to condemnation.)
•
Justification by faith is soteriological and forensic (God the judge saying that the sinner
is justified through God’s grace in Jesus Christ paying the debt for sin and
our believing in His salvation).
•
‘Faith of Jesus’ = belief in Jesus, not Jesus’ faithfulness.
•
Ethics: Justification is different from sanctification, otherwise
‘works’ remains a part of salvation.
Luther’s emphasis was so strongly on an ‘alien righteousness’ of Christ
and on God’s grace that he could say that a Christian is simul iustus et peccator (at the same time just and a sinner). Calvin understood justification as part of
Christian regeneration, and so there
was a closer link between justification and sanctification. Anabaptists thought both Luther and Calvin
were too weak on the transformation in God’s salvation work: ‘justification’
was God’s work (contra Catholics),
but it was a making the sinner righteous
(an even closer link between justification and sanctification). The OPP is a Lutheran and Calvinist
perspective, not Anabaptist (or Catholic) perspective.
•
Hermeneutics: The OPP interprets Romans and Paul through Protestant, systematic
theological lenses (‘election,’ ‘justification,’ ‘predestination,’ etc.).
B. The NPP shifts interpretation of Paul to a more social reading. The ‘righteousness of God’ is about
God’s covenantal faithfulness. The
thrust of Romans is about the two groups and their relationship to one another,
Jews and Gentiles. ‘Works of law’ are
better understood as Jewish works/laws that
separate Jews from Gentiles (circumcision, food laws, special Jewish holy
days).
Since the Jews did not believe that they were saved by
works but were God’s elect people, Paul could not have been writing about the Pelagian problem in 16th
c. Catholicism, i.e., that I can earn my salvation through works.
While ‘justification’
is still read forensically, as in the OPP, according to N. T. Wright (NPP), it ‘denotes
a status, not a moral quality. It
means “membership in God’s true family’ (Justification,
p. 121).
‘Faith of Jesus’
is Jesus’ own faithfulness (not my belief in Jesus). Emphasis is not so much or only on Jesus’
being a sinless sacrifice as his being a faithful Israelite. ‘It was not so much that “God needed a
sinless victim,” though in sacrificial terms that is no doubt true as well, as
that “God needed a faithful Israelite,” to take upon himself the burden of
rescuing the world from its sin and death (Wright, Justification, p.
204).
Thus, the key
question for Paul (and in Romans) is, ‘How do Jews and Gentiles integrate in
the church?’ The NPP thereby offers a
different perspective from the OPP on a number of fronts, with some variation
in how scholars have pursued these:
•
Focus: social.
•
‘All have sinned’ (Rom. 3.23; Rom. 1.18-3.26): both groups, the Jews and the Gentiles
•
Problem with the Law: divides Jewish and Gentile believers (only Jewish ‘covenant badge’
laws are the problem: food, special days, circumcision).
•
Solution: participation in Christ (Rom. 5.12-8.39)
•
Reason for Romans: Paul addresses the Jew-Gentile situation in the Roman church
(e.g., in God’s plan of salvation, Rom. 9-11; regarding Jewish food or special
days, Rom. 14-15)
•
Election (Rom. 9-11) is not about personal salvation but Jews and Gentiles
in God’s plan
•
‘Righteousness of God’
is about God’s covenantal faithfulness.
Justification is about status; it is forensic, not moral.
•
‘Faith of Jesus’ is
Jesus’ faithfulness. Emphasis is not so
much or only on Jesus’ being a sinless sacrifice as his being a faithful
Israelite.
•
Ethics: life in Christ entails a new way of life.
•
Hermeneutics: introduction of a narrative reading of Scripture and of Paul’s
theology in particular.
C. The approach that
I have taken in my teaching of Paul and of Romans is that both the OPP and the
NPP have some good points and bad points and, ultimately, a different
perspective is needed. I suggest calling
this a Missional Interpretation of Paul (MIP).
Over against a primarily systematic
theological reading (OPP) or a more social
reading (NPP) of Paul, I find a missional
(Paul the apostle/missionary; the Old Testament as God’s salvation history)
and interpretation of the Old Testament
reading of Paul (especially in Galatians and Romans) more helpful and
accurate. Of course, there are ways in
which all three readings of Paul can overlap.
However, here are some contrasts:
Paul’s main
question in Romans is ‘How are Jewish and Gentile sinners, despite God’s
revelation of righteousness to both, made righteous in Christ and by the Holy
Spirit?’ This leads to the following
interpretational issues:
•
Focus: the missional Gospel works obedience of faith for both the
individual and the two groups in God’s plan: Jews and Gentiles.
•
‘All have sinned’ (Rom. 3.23; Rom. 1.18-3.26): both groups, the Jews and the
Gentiles, and therefore all individuals in Adam (Rom. 5.12-21)
•
Problem with the Law: as a revelation of sin
and righteousness, the Law no more solves the problem of sin than natural
revelation does (Rom. 1.18-3.20); it succumbs to the power of sin (Rom. 7.7-25). Rom. 7.7-25 has to do with life outside of
Christ and under the Law, without the Spirit.
The Christian life is contrasted to this in Rom. 8.1-39.
•
Solution: God’s mission is to reveal His glory, in which His people will
share. Sinners fall short of the glory
of God (Rom. 3.23). God reveals His
justice through the atoning sacrifice of Christ (Rom. 3.21-26) and the
transformation of life in Christ and the Spirit (5.12-8.39).
•
Reason for Romans: Paul addresses the situation in the Roman church, which mirrors
his own missional challenge of Jews and Gentiles becoming the people of God,
which is a result of God’s mission to reveal His glory in His mercy on both
Jews and Gentiles (Rom. 11.32-36).
•
Election and Predestination (Rom. 9-11) are discussed in terms of God’s plan for
salvation. These are corporate and
‘plan’ categories, despite examples of some individuals to make the points—and
these examples are about God’s plan of salvation and not their individual
salvation. This whole discussion is
about Jews and Gentiles in God’s plan.
•
‘Righteousness of God’ is about God’s being and working His righteousness for sinful
people—Jews and Gentiles--that brings forgiveness and moral
transformation. ‘Justification’ (a forensic notion) is only half of Paul’s point;
the other half is about how, by God’s righteousness, He makes us ‘Righteous.’
•
‘Faith of Jesus’ is our faith in Jesus. It
contrasts with ‘works of Law’ and has to do with what is required of people to
reach the goal of righteousness (Rom. 10.4).
•
Ethics: God’s glory is revealed in His people’s faith in His work
and their obedience that results from life in Christ and the Spirit.
•
Hermeneutics: We should appreciate a narrative reading of Scripture and Paul’s
theology, especially through a missional lens—God’s mission and our inclusion
in it.
III. The New Perspective on Justification
and the Center of Paul’s Theology
The Lutheran
version of the OPP placed justification by faith at the centre of a systematic
theology. The Calvinist version placed
God’s sovereignty at the centre, but it, too, read Romans with the main topic
being justification by faith. The
traditions interpreted justification by faith similarly: individualistic,
forensic, alien righteousness of Christ.
An alternative interpretation arose early in the 20th century
with Albert Schweitzer—from within the Lutheran, German world of Pauline
interpretation. Schweitzer claimed that, while Paul’s
theology of justification was one way of understanding Romans, it was not the
only way and was, in fact a minor ‘crator’ into which his theological teachings
fell. The larger crater was what he
called Paul’s ‘mysticism’ and which other subsequently have better termed
‘participation in Christ’. For
Schweitzer, Paul argued justification by faith in Romans 3.21-5.21. As this theology could not answer Paul’s
question in Romans 6.1, ‘Shall we sin so that grace may abound?’, he turned to
his mysticism. Thus, ‘justification’ (in
the Lutheran and Calvinist sense) did not produce a reason for Christian
ethics, but ‘being in Christ’ did.
Romans 6 speaks of dying and rising with Christ and being baptised into
Christ such that the sinner is transformed and able not to sin.
Somehow,
Schweitzer failed to see how Paul connected ‘justification/righteousness’ in
Romans 4-5 with chapter 6. (English
readers of these chapters must remember that the same Greek word stands behind
these two translations of dikaiosunē). The New Perspective on Paul built on this
distinction, arguing that Paul’s theology was not about justification as God
imputing (reckoning) the alien righteousness of Christ to us (OPP) but was
about our participating in the righteousness of Christ.
Krister Stendahl
advanced this challenge to reading Romans in terms of justification. He claimed that: Paul did not, like Martin
Luther, wrestle with the question,
‘Am I righteous?’ Paul was not an angst-ridden personality. This wrong understanding
was due to the West’s mindset of an ‘introspective consciousness,’ and it
resulted in a misreading of Rom. 7.7-25 as to do with Paul’s internal fight. Stendahl says of himself, ‘as to zeal, a persecutor
of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless’ (Phl. 3.6). Thus,
•
‘Justification by faith’ was
polemical and not central for Paul.
•
It was developed in regard to
the rights of Gentile believers in the Christian community. Jews and Gentiles alike are justified by
faith.
•
In the West, it came to be interpreted
as an abstract doctrinal response to either human despair (failing to fulfil
the Law’s demands, cf. Luther) or human pride (living up to the Law’s demands):
‘the introspective conscience of the West.’
IV. The New
Perspective on Paul and Judaism
While E. P.
Sanders’ arguments in Paul and Palestinian Judaism (1977) were not new,
his considerably in-depth study of second temple Jewish literature and his
bringing several ideas together led to what later would be called the New
Perspective on Paul. George Foot Moore
had already argued in 1927 that Judaism did not believe in works righteousness. This was the central thesis of Sanders, who
framed his argument in terms of Judaism’s ‘pattern of religion’. By this, Sanders meant how Judaism answered
two questions, and the answers he found lined up rather well with a good
Presbyterian reading of Paul!
•
How Do You Get In?: You get in by grace (God’s election of His covenant people)
•
How Do You Stay In?: You stay in by grace and living by the Law (obedience to the Law was
not how you get in; God graciously provides
covenantal means for dealing with sin, such as sacrifices and forgiveness)
These two questions and answers Sanders called ‘covenantal nomism’.
Significantly, Sanders did not include in his examination of Jewish
literature a study of the 1st c. AD work, IV Ezra, which does offer a strong emphasis on works. Even so, Sanders
showed the vein of grace running deep in the Jewish bedrock of religion. After all, we might add, Paul argued that
this was the right reading of the Old Testament, so why should this not show up
as an emphasis in Judaism? If so,
though, we need to point out that the Pelagian theology of 16th
century Catholicism could not be identified with Judaism: the latter was not a
‘works righteousness religion.’
What, then, does this mean for our reading of Paul—and of Romans in
particular? Two things. First, Paul’s problem with the Law and his
problem with Judaism was not that they had to do with a righteousness of works. This point led James D. G. Dunn and some
other NPP interpreters to claim that ‘works of Law’ were not any laws but
Jewish ‘covenant badges’—identity marker laws (circumcision, food laws, Jewish
holy days). (This made sense logically on this line of reasoning, but I have
argued it is not exegetically sound at all.)
Not only Paul (Stendahl) but also Judaism was not exercised by a problem
of sin that the Law could not solve. The
Jews were happy in their covenantal nomism.
Why, then, did Paul set up the problem in Romans as the plight of sin
for Jews (Romans 2.17-29)? Surely, Jews did not reason from a plight of sin to a solution of justification but
of covenantal inclusion by God, who elected them to be His people. For Sanders, this was Paul’s was of constructing a plight to come before the solution of
God that he presents in Romans.
Second, Paul’s problem with the Law was simply that it was not
Christ. Since Jews did not reason from a
plight to a solution, Paul had to invent the plight and therefore had to begin
with a solution. (This argument was
soundly defeated by Frank Thielman, From
Plight to Solution. Jews did
wrestle with the plight of sin in the Old Testament and in second temple
literature.) So, for Sanders, Paul reinterprets the Jewish plight in light of Christ. He reasons backwards from Christ’s
solution to the Jewish plight. An
especially important verse for Sanders was Galatians 2.21: if justification
comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing. Therefore, if Christ died for our sins, we
must have had a plight of sin after all.
For Sanders, then, Paul reasoned from the cross of Christ backwards to
the plight of sin—even for Jews.
VII. The New
Perspective on Justification
Another prolific
NPP author has been N. T. Wright. One of
his contributions to the NPP has been his attempt to understand justification
in a new light.
Amazingly, he has attempted to argue that justification is not soteriological but only covenantal and juridical in Paul:
Justification’ is thus the declaration of God, the
just judge, that someone is (a) in the right, that their sins are forgiven, and
(b) a true member of the covenant family, the people belonging to Abraham….
It doesn’t describe how people get in to
God’s forgiven family; it declares that they are in.
(Note how
Wright’s interpretation picks up on Sanders’ covenantal nomism language.) One should always be very wary of earth
shattering interpretations that have not been entertained through the centuries. Stephen Westerholm has provided a solid
response to Wright in various books.
Justification in
Paul is now supposed to be seen as Jewish covenantal nomism. What, then, is Paul’s difference from
Judaism? Essentially—as with Sanders—the
difference is that Paul adds ‘Jesus Christ’.
Jesus was the one true and righteous Israelite on whom the promises of
God’s covenant fell, and Christians are participants in this covenant because
they are ‘in Christ’. This fancifully
skirts around the cross as an atoning
sacrifice and simply puts the emphasis on our participation in Christ and God’s
declaration that we are in.
Wright argues that the
order of salvation does not understand ‘justification’ as the salvation
event. Note the order Paul gives in two
passages:
2 Thes.
2.13-14: God loved, chose, called, glorified
Rom. 8.29-30: God foreknew, foreordained, called, justified, glorified
For Wright,
since justification is the declaration by God that those with faith
belong to Christ, the ‘call’ is the salvation event in the order of salvation
in 2 Th. 2.13-14 and Rom. 8.29-30. Thus,
‘justified’ in Rom. 8.29 is not a salvation term. It is
something that follows on from the ‘call’ through which a
sinner is summoned to turn from idols and serve the living God, to turn from
sin and follow Christ, to turn from death and believe in the God who raised
Jesus from the dead…. Justification’ is the declaration which God at once
makes, that all who share this faith belong to Christ, to his sin-forgiven
family, the one family of believing Jews and believing Gentiles together, and
are assured of final glorification.
Wright’s view is
not wholly opposed to the OPP. For example, he emphasises the forensic understanding of
‘justification’—it is not about our being
made righteous but about our being declared righteous because of God’s righteousness (though for Wright this simply means
His fidelity to the covenant relationship).
Wright helpfully draws attention to two
Qumranic texts for a discussion of God’s justification.
1QS 11.2–3; 12; 13–15
As
for me,
my justification is with
God.
In
His hand are the perfection of my way
and the uprightness of my heart.
He will wipe out my transgression
through his righteousness. . .
As
for me,
if I stumble, the mercies of God
shall be my eternal salvation.
If
I stagger because of the sin of flesh,
my justification shall be
by the righteousness of God which endures for ever. . .
He
will draw me near by His grace,
and by His mercy will He bring my justification.
He
will judge me in the righteousness of His truth
and in the greatness of His goodness
He will pardon all my sins.
Through
His righteousness He will cleanse me
of the uncleanness of man
and of the sins of the children of men,
that
I may confess to God His righteousness,
and His majesty to the
Most High.
Another Qumran text, 4QMMT, has the phrases
‘works of the Law’ and ‘reckoned to you as righteousness’. This is the language of Galatians and
Romans.
4QMMT, lines 26-32
26
Now, we have written to you 27 some of the works of the Law, those which
we determined would be beneficial for you and your people, because we have seen
that 28 you possess insight and knowledge of the Law. Understand all these
things and beseech Him to set 29 your counsel straight and so keep you away
from evil thoughts and the counsel of Belial. 30 Then you shall rejoice at the
end time when you find the essence of our words to be true. 31 And it will
be reckoned to you as righteousness, in that you have done what is right
and good before Him, to your own benefit 32 and to that of Israel.
Wright says that 4QMMT offers parallels to
Paul. In both, justification is understood
as covenantal and eschatological. Paul
sees the eschatological event as having arrived in the cross and resurrection
of the Messiah and with the gift of the eschatological Spirit. This event has established the new covenant
community, now open to all.
This is true.
However, I would further point out that this Qumran text does not limit
‘works of the Law’ to Jewish identity markers.
Also, it suggests that doing works of the Law will lead to being
reckoned as righteous by God for both the individual and for Israel. Note, therefore, that here we also find the
idea of the extension of a righteous person’s merit to others. The teaching
about works of the Law here is directly contrary to what Paul says in Galatians
and Romans.
Of course, the OPP rightly holds that justification is the salvation
event. It also rightly understands
justification as God’s reckoning sinners to be righteous apart from any works. Further, it rightly understand that this is
because Jesus’ righteousness has been imputed to them just as Adam’s
unrighteousness had been imputed to them.
Where the OPP wobbles, however, is in not drawing this point further
into ethics. Being in Adam did not just
make us guilty, it also made us sinners (Romans 5.12). In the same way, Jesus’ righteousness did not
just bring us justification, it also made us righteous (which was the goal of
the New Covenant all along). In this
way, the argument of Romans 3.21-5.21 flows logically and consistently into
Romans 6 (contra Albert Schweitzer, e.g.).
One of the greatest blunders of the OPP, then, is to read Romans 7.7-25
as descriptive of Christians. In
opposing this, I have found no benefit from the NPP. One will find greater help from a pre-NPP
scholar like Morna Hooker.
VII. The New
Perspective on Narrative and Theology
One development in Pauline studies that began
to emerge after E. P. Sanders’ Paul and Palestinian Judaism was a
narrative reading of Paul’s theology, as well as of other New Testament
authors’ theology. Narrative theology
was introduced to theological studies earlier, but it did not take root in
Biblical studies until the 1990s. The
first such work already appeared in 1981, with the dissertation of Richard Hays, The Faith of Jesus Christ. Hays argued that Paul’s theological argument
in his letter to the Galatians worked from an underlying narrative
perspective. N. T. Wright made major
contributions to a narrative reading of the Bible and of Biblical theology from
the 1990s. He writes,
What I miss entirely in the Old Perspective, but find so powerfully
in some modern Pauline scholarship, is Paul’s sense of an underlying narrative,
the story of God and Israel, God and Abraham, God and the covenant people, and
the way in which that story came to its climax, as he says, ‘when the time had
fully come’ with the coming of Jesus the Messiah.
The narrative
theological reading of Paul can be related to Biblical metanarratives like Adam
(creation and the fall), Israel (from the patriarchs to the return from exile),
and the Gospel of Jesus Christ (from incarnation to His second coming). Hays, and some other NPP scholars, have seen
the ‘faith of Jesus’ as Jesus’ faithfulness to be a link with Israel’s story of
unfaithfulness. My own, unpublished
dissertation, completed in 1989, argued that the Gospel as a theological
narrative of Jesus was a major basis for Paul’s mission and ethics. Paul directly linked the plot of Jesus’ story
(incarnation, life, death, resurrection, ascension, and future Parousia) with his
missional and ethical understanding.
While a
narrative theological reading of Paul can
be linked to the NPP, there is no necessary link between the two approaches
to Paul. (I made no such link in my
dissertation, e.g.) For our purposes in
discussing Paul’s theology in Romans, we can say that a narrative reading has
been helpful apart from any NPP. We have rejected reading ‘faith of Jesus’ as
‘Jesus’ faithfulness.’ Yet Paul does work from narrative frameworks in
Romans: Adam (creation and the fall), Israel’s history of pursuing
righteousness (Law, failure), Israel’s predestination and election, God’s plan
of salvation that includes all humanity in terms of both the Jews and the
Gentiles, and the Gospel as the narrative of Jesus Christ. One significant point that I have pressed in
my reading of Romans is that Paul’s primary question in this letter is not ‘How
can I, a sinner, be justified before God?’ but is ‘How can both groups of
humanity, Jews and Gentiles, who are sinful despite God’s revelation of
righteousness, be made righteous in Christ and by the Holy Spirit?’ The first question is a more OPP, systematic
theology sort of question. The second
question is a more narrative, missional, and ethical question. It is, of course, thoroughly theological, but
it is theological in just these ways.
Thus, Romans 7.7-25 is not about
my struggle with sin even as a Christian; it is about how the Law fails to make
the sinner righteous. Romans 9-11 is not
an election or predestination theology for the individual Christian but about
God’s election plan regarding both groups, Jews and Gentiles. Ethics, moreover, is not related to theology
in a way often stated as gratitude for
grace. Christian ethics is grounded
more firmly in the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit. From a narrative perspective, the Old
Testament narrative of Israel’s exile and return is not only about God’s
gracious delivery of the sinful Jews from their punishment in exile. It is rather
about God’s ‘new covenant righteousness’ whereby He removed Israel’s sin and gives them His Spirit and
transformed hearts that they might now fulfill the righteous requirements of
the Law (cf. Isaiah 59.20-21; Jeremiah 31.31-34; Ezekiel 36.24-27). In these ways, I have presented an
interpretation of Romans that diverts a number of times from the OPP, but it is
not defined by a NPP either. Perhaps it
could be called a Missional Interpretation of Paul (MIP), since my argument has
been that Paul’s theological argument arises from his comprehension of God’s missional
purposes in the Old Testament in light of the story of Christ Jesus (the
Gospel).
Conclusion
The focus of
this essay has been on some aspects of the NPP.
In my teaching, I have engaged more with the OPP, and so this essay has
provided some more balance. I have also,
however, brought out some key ways in which my alternative (the MIP) to both
the OPP and the NPP differs. While this essay is long in one sense and yet far
too brief to cover so much material, it is an attempt to conclude my teaching
on Romans.
[5] Frank Thielman, From Plight to Solution: A Jewish Framework
for Understanding Paul's View of the Law in Galatians and Romans (Eugene,
OR: Wipf & Stock, 2008; orig. 1989).
Cf. N. T. Wright, ‘4QMMT and Paul: Justification,
‘Works,’ and Eschatology,’ accessible:
http://ntwrightpage.com/Wright_4QMMT_Paul.pdf; Originally published in History and
Exegesis: New Testament Essays in Honor of Dr E. Earle Ellis for His 80th
Birthday, ed. Aang-Won (Aaron) Son (New York and London: T & T Clark
2006), pp. 104-132.
Words in bold are
mine. Let us add several points
regarding this passage. Note the relationship between ‘justification’
and ‘righteousness.’ Note the language
of ‘sin of the flesh’ and God’s goal being both the pardon of sins and the work
of cleansing and making righteous. Note
that this is spoken by an individual about personal sin. And note that the focus of this missional
activity is, as the last two lines show, a confession of the righteousness of
God and the majesty (or glory) of God that He has revealed in what He has
accomplished.
Cf. ‘The work of the Law’: Rom. 2.15; ‘Works of Law’: Gal. 2.16 (3 times); 3.2
(vs. ‘hearing of faith’), 5 (vs. ‘hearing of faith’), 10; Rom. 3.20, 28 (vs.
justified by faith)’ ‘Law of Works’: Rom. 3.27.
Morna D. Hooker, ‘A Partner in the Gospel: Paul’s Understanding of
His Ministry,’ in Theology and Ethics in Paul and His Interpreters: Essays
in Honor of Victor Paul Furnish, eds. Eugene Lovering, Jr. and Jerry Sumney
(Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1996).
Also: Michael Gorman, Cruciformity: Paul’s Narrative
Spirituality of the Cross (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001).
