Will the Real Paul Please Stand Up?

Paul — the chief of sinners, yet teacher of the Christian Church!

The apostle Paul stands near the top of any list of “the most important people in Christian history.” Yet he wouldn’t necessarily see himself that way.

He saw himself as the chief of sinners and one abnormally born. “I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom,” he writes, “I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling” (1 Cor. 2:1, 3), a man accused of being “timid” when face to face with congregations (2 Cor. 10:1), only bold when he writes letters. Ah, humble Paul, just a scribbler.

That brings us to his letters: thirteen of them, from Romans to Philemon and everything in between, almost half the books of the New Testament (more if you tilt towards assigning Hebrews to Paul as some do). Those churches that read three lessons in worship hear Paul almost every week because that middle lesson (the second, or epistle, lesson) almost always comes from Paul’s letters, letters written mostly to the churches he founded or was about to visit.

That brings us to Paul’s travels. Paul also happens to be one of the great missionaries of all time. He went from town to town and continent to continent preaching Jesus and establishing churches. Most of the major Christian churches in Turkey, Greece, and Rome claim Pauline connections.

Between his writing and mission work, some label Paul the founder of Christianity (N.T. Wright wrote What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of Christianity?) In baseball terms, with Paul, we’ve got a five-tool player: he can hit for power and average, run well, field, and throw.

While we give the honor and title of founding Christianity to Christ (we are, after all, Christians, not Paulinians), you can’t debate how big a shadow Paul casts in Christian theology.

Take the Lutheran church as an example. Luther wrestled with Paul. The phrase “the righteousness of God” in Romans 1 killed Luther, because he heard in it God damning us even when we do our best. And this is the gospel, the good news? Bad enough that God punishes sin, but it gets worse. Even God’s “good news” drives us further down into the grave.

But when Luther read Romans 3 and the Spirit showed him a righteousness from God, God’s gift to us: that we are, through faith in Christ, declared righteous in God’s sight, then, as Luther said, it was as if God opened paradise. Even though Luther primarily lectured in the Old Testament, it is his commentary on Galatians that many people spend their time reading: Luther’s thoughts on Paul.

 But what did Paul really say and mean?

But Luther’s Spirit-wrought conclusion has come under fire in the last generation. For centuries, really since before Luther, back to St. Augustine in the 400s, the common view of Paul has been a man who contrasts faith with works, law versus gospel. Most people for many centuries have read Paul as standing in direct contrast to the Jewish faith from which he came, a faith that relied on works to get into heaven. Paul preaches that we are justified (declared righteous) by God through faith in Christ, not by works of the law – any works whatsoever – “If it is by works, then it is no longer grace” (Romans 11:6). Hence the ubiquitous confirmation verse, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).  And if Christianity is by grace and Judaism is by works, then it’s Christianity versus Judaism.

But in the 1970s a “new perspective” on Paul emerged. Scholars like E.P Sanders, N.T. Wright, and James D.G. Dunn questioned thousand-year old assumptions. Were Jews and Christians really all that different? Did Jews rely on works for salvation, to earn their way into heaven? Is that what Paul was arguing against when he said “not by works”?  Others before them had tried to find the “real” or “historical” Jesus; these men sought (and seek) “the real Paul.”

They did (and still do) this for three reasons. The first is the most noble: they care about what the Bible says. I applaud that. I have been reading a lot of Wright, Sanders, and Dunn, and find respect for Scripture among them. Compared to the theology of the so-called “higher critics,” the guys who say that the Bible wasn’t written by any of the guys who claimed to have written it (Moses, Isaiah, Matthew, Peter, Paul, the Holy Spirit) and almost nothing the Bible says happened the way the Bible says it did, these guys are, in many ways a breath of fresh air (though they have weaknesses too).

I mentioned three reasons. Here’s number two. Much of this debate began in the years shortly after World War II. That means people discussed Paul and his view of Jews and Gentiles, faith and works, just after the Nazis murdered millions of Jews in the Holocaust. Many Christians felt some guilt about that, because, and this can’t be denied, a strain of anti-Semitism has run through Christianity. Remember all the controversy about Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ and his portrayal of the Jewish leaders, and that line, “Let his blood be on us and on our children!”? Even Martin Luther in his later years says things about the Jews that Lutherans disavow.

This guilt and fear led scholars to ask if the Church had been slandering or misrepresenting the Jewish faith for centuries. And wouldn’t you know it, they concluded that we had. E.P. Sanders kicked things off for this “new perspective” when he wrote Paul and Palestinian Judaism (1977). He concluded that the Jewish faith was not merely legalism that worked to earn the way to heaven, piling up works and a treasury of merits to be won by human effort. They knew about grace and understood that God chose them not because they were so good and righteous, but because God is.

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N.T. Wright and James Dunn pushed through Sanders’ open door. While scholars vary in the details, the “new perspective” boils down to saying that Paul’s chief concern was NOT how an individual person gets right with God, that is, how a man is saved and gets to heaven. Rather, Paul wants to let people know that God’s plan was not just for Jews; it was for Jews and Gentiles. The problem was not a works righteous attitude, it was too much Jewish ethnic pride, centering on circumcision, the observance of the Sabbath, and dietary regulations, what Wright and Dunn call the boundary markers and identity badges of the Jewish faith. In other words, when Paul rails against works of the law, he only means those things that distinguished Jews from Gentiles.

The positive of this “new perspective” is that it cautions us against overplaying the legalism hand. Perhaps we have been guilty of saying that Jesus’ opponents knew only works and no grace. Certainly some did, just as there are Christians today who focus only on good works without grace or Jesus. But Paul does say in Galatians 2, “We who are Jews by birth and not ‘Gentile sinners’ know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ” (vv15-16).

In other words, to be Jewish is to live by faith, as Habakkuk said (and Paul quoted repeatedly): “The righteous will live by his faith” (2:4). Properly read, the Old Testament doesn’t produce Judaism, it produces Christianity. Or, to put it another way Judaism should equal Christianity.

But it didn’t happen that way. This is where the “new perspective” misses the point. Sanders et al are right: the Jewish religion knows grace. Who can argue that Abraham, Anna, Simeon, Zachariah, Mary, and John the Baptist didn’t know grace? They looked for the consolation of Israel. They waited to see with their eyes (in Simeon’s case) God’s salvation for Jew and Gentile: all the world!

Yet that truth doesn’t absolve someone when they rely on works of any amount to give them confidence before God or maintain themselves in God’s favor, that is “staying in” the covenant, as many did in Judaism in the years before and after Christ. The testimony of Christ in the Gospels and Paul in his letters (not to mention extra-biblical writings from Jewish sources) proves this. That’s still trusting works and apart from faith, thus damned by Paul: “A man is justified by faith apart from works of the law” (Romans 3:28) and “If righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing” (Galatians 2:21). Some Jewish believers maintained that to be saved you must believe in Jesus AND get circumcised, eat kosher, etc. Paul says, “You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace” (Galatians 5:4).

In this way the Jewish faith fell into the same trap as Roman Catholicism. The Roman Church knows grace too. The Pope teaches that Jesus died for mankind’s sins, but he also teaches that you must believe in Jesus and do good works to merit eternal life, to finish the job God started. Grace AND works. Faith AND works.

Maybe I should get to that third reason for the rise of the “new perspective”. It’s called ecumenism. Since the early twentieth century many have desired to unite all churches into one church. For some this means returning to the Roman Catholic Church. This “new perspective” on Paul jumps with both feet into this movement when it debates the meaning of righteousness and justification.

For the “new perspective” justification, salvation, does not just happen now, in the present, it is something that will happen also at the end of time, called by some: “final justification.” Or, more interestingly, “justification by/according to works.” In addition, when they talk about righteousness, they often deny that it is Christ’s righteousness given to us, but make that righteousness transformative: something that happens to me, that makes me actually, personally, performatively righteous. This should scare you. Paul said “not by works” and now the “new perspective” reintroduces works.

Where does this “justification by works” talk come from? The “new perspective” interacts with places where Paul speaks positively about good works in the Christian life. Of course, Christian faith produces fruits. Christians do good works. Faith alone saves, but faith is never alone. “Produce fruits in keeping with repentance,” John the Baptist said.

The problem is the “new perspective” talks about something called “covenantal nomism.” Covenant refers to God’s initiative, His grace, bringing someone into his covenant. Nomism comes from the Greek word for “law”, nomos. E.P. Sanders asserted that grace “gets you in” and good works “keep you in” or help you “stay in.” Others have polished or revised his language, but many of the “new perspective” defenders end up saying one of two things: either we have to do some good works to finish the job of salvation, or justification isn’t just a declaration of righteousness, the giving of a status, it is making righteous, giving us some inherent holiness that allows us to perform and do; it’s a medicinal act, healing us. Thus we must produce good works to be saved. Our good works count in some way towards salvation. “New perspective” proponents hedge and hem and haw and say, “No, you aren’t earning salvation; you aren’t meriting anything,” but their language belies this.

The ecumenical benefit? That’s exactly what Rome teaches. The Roman Church teaches that we are not simply declared righteous, we become righteous, and so do good deeds, which now can earn and merit salvation. N.T. Wright says explicitly that this “new perspective” should help us come closer to Rome. James Dunn goes in another direction and says if Paul isn’t talking about all works, but only boundary markers, than anything that marks boundaries (like denominational badges, the doctrine of inerrancy, the inspiration of Scripture, close communion, the roles of men and women, etc.) can be ignored and we should all just get along and work together.

So what? Isn’t this just a bunch of scholarly debate?

This last gets us into the weaknesses I have so far observed in the new perspective. As I said above, in the authors I have read – Sanders, Wright, Dunn – I have sensed a respect for Scripture. However, their desire to absolve Judaism of all charges and to talk about community over the individual, about unity trumping all things, causes them to downplay sin and God’s undeserved love and overplay the hand of works. It also tends to ignore or dismiss the question: if all this is true about Judaism and the Jewish faith, if they knew grace and God’s covenant:  why did they reject Christ? Finally, with the “new perspective”, you now have to wonder if it’s not about how I’m saved and get to heaven, well, then, what is it about, and, by the way, how am I saved and get to heaven? And you have to worry: what do I have to do to stay in God’s covenant?

In other words, where can my conscience run when the devil assaults me with my sins? Even after my Baptism I still sin, don’t I? While I grant that God brings me into the covenant by grace, I see how poorly I maintain my status in that covenant. How can I possibly “stay in” when my righteous acts are filthy rags?

This isn’t just a “new perspective” problem. It’s an old Adam problem. Theologians have coined a term for this: they call it the opinio legis (some Latin to throw around at dinner parties this week), that is, “the opinion of the law.” We all have in our hearts this tendency and desire to want to get in and stay in based on our own efforts. The Jews did it. Roman Catholicism teaches it. Our sinful hearts do it. We talk big about grace, but then measure our salvation by our church attendance, contributions, and how we dress for church versus how that guy over there does it so poorly. We want credit for the “good works” we do, especially compared to that no-good do-badder over there. We must be the ones who aren’t just “in” but “staying in.” By works. Our works. And then it’s no longer grace.

I can stay in only when I see that this righteousness I need comes from God – beginning, middle, and end – through Christ. He began the good work in me; he completes it. He authors and perfects my faith. It is by faith from first to last, as Paul writes in Romans 1. And that faith is in Christ, as Paul so eloquently teaches in Ephesians 1. God blesses us…in Christ. God chose us…in Christ. God predestined us to be adopted…through Christ. We have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins…in Christ. God makes known to us his good and gracious will…in Christ. God chooses us…in Christ. God includes us…in Christ. God marks us with a seal, the Holy Spirit…in Christ. For all the talk about “justification by faith”, this good news is not always front and center in the “new perspective” on Paul.

I write this not to confuse you, but to make you aware. Many of the books being written about New Testament theology and Paul take these new ideas for granted. You need to be aware of these trends and currents because many people, on Facebook for example, when discussing Paul will come from this angle.

But it’s not new. Augustine talked about similar ideas in the 400s. Luther addressed them in the 1500s. We need to deal with them, because when we talk about Paul, despite his own protests to the contrary, we talk about one of the chief apostles, hand-picked by God to pass on to us the faith and the chief thing of the faith: “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3ff). That’s about being saved and getting to heaven. And it’s all God, all his grace. And that’s for you. In Christ.