Because some of my Romans students are taking the class as part of a new residential MA program, I've been feeding them some articles and sources. Here are a few:
The Context of Romans
Krister Stendahl, "Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West"
Peter Lampe, "The Roman Christians of Romans 16," although I still find Kasemann very tempting.
I also sent them a copy of Dunn's, "The Incident at Antioch"
Righteousness of God
Chapter 6 of What Saint Paul Really Said
Ernst Kasemann's "The Righteousness of God in Paul"
Another important article is Wright's, "On Becoming the Righteousness of God"
Dunn's Romans 1-8 is helpful for 1:16-18 as well, I think
Homosexual Acts in Romans 1
I gave a couple books to a presenter, including Gagnon
Richard Hays has a chapter in Moral Vision
Justification by Works in Romans 2
Wright's out of print commentary is good here, I think.
Faith of/in Jesus
The famous sparring of James Dunn with Richard Hays
Works of Law
I didn't actually send but here are some excerpts I might have:
Dunn mentions both in his preface and in many articles in here
N. T. Wright has one on 4QMMT in here
Justification
Chapter 7 of What Saint Paul Really Said (although I think Wright over-does it)
"Lacking the glory"
I didn't but might have copied from Dunn's Romans 1-8 here.
Hilasterion in Romans 3:25
Here's one I could have given them, even if I'm not necessarily convinced
Showing posts with label Richard Hays. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Richard Hays. Show all posts
Saturday, October 24, 2015
Tuesday, December 09, 2014
Faith versus works in Paul
Continuing some of my writing from Sunday...
__________________
... If Dunn is correct that Paul primarily has works of the Jewish Law in view, particularly those actions that distinguished Jew from Gentile, then the issue is alleviated somewhat. Then Paul was never thinking about works of love or a life free of murder or sexual immorality when he declared that Jews and Gentiles are not justified by works of Law. Rather, he was primarily thinking about works like circumcision, food laws, Sabbath observance, and so forth. [1] This ambiguity in Paul’s language of Law goes a long way toward explaining what might otherwise seem like inconsistencies. How could a Gentile possibly demonstrate the Law written on their hearts (Rom. 2:15) unless some of Paul's uses of the word law referred to a core of the Jewish Law that did not include those boundary markers than distinguished Jew from Gentile? Other instances then had these boundary markers as their primary referent.
A second ameliorating factor in explaining Paul's rhetoric of faith versus works against a revised sense of his Jewish background is the strong possibility that at least some of his references to the "faith of Jesus Christ" refer not to human faith directed toward Christ but to the faithfulness of Jesus Christ himself. The name of Richard Hays is not usually invoked when presenting the new perspective on Paul. He is rather associated most strongly with the resurgence of a particular interpretation of the phrase, pistis Iēsou Christou, in passages like Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16. [2] Reviving and re-presenting an older suggestion, Hays argued that this phrase should be understood as a reference to the "faith of Jesus Christ," his faithfulness to the point of death, rather than to faith in Jesus Christ, as the phrase had traditionally been understood. It is a question of whether Jesus in this phrase is an objective genitive—trust of Christ—or a subjective genitive—faith of Christ, understood as Christ's faith. Hays' revival of this interpretation was not a direct result of Sanders’ work on Judaism nor of Dunn and Wright’s versions, so it is understandable that it is often not included in discussions of the new perspective.
Another reason why the pistis Christou debate is often not connected to the new perspective is the fact that James Dunn, one of the key players in the new perspective, is Hays' most notorious sparring partner on the issue. Neither Sanders nor Dunn agree with Hays' reading of the key passages. On the one hand, Hays does not deny that faith in Jesus was part of Paul's theology. Indeed, part of his argument in relation to the interpretation of Galatians 2:16 is that Dunn’s interpretation implies an extensive redundancy in this verse. Paul's statement amounts to three consecutive mentions of faith in Christ: "knowing… through faith in Jesus Christ, even we have put faith in Christ Jesus in order to be justified through faith in Christ." By contrast, in Hays’ interpretation, only the second instance, the expression εἰς Χριστὸν Ἰησοῦν ἐπιστεύσαμεν (“on Christ Jesus we have believed”), refers to faith directed toward Christ Jesus.
If Hays' interpretation is at least in part correct, our picture of earliest Christianity does seem even more integrated with its Jewish precedents than even in Dunn's reconstruction. Paul’s theology, for example, turns out to be theocentric more than Christocentric. God rather than Christ becomes the primary object of faith (cf. 1 Thess. 1:8). I have argued elsewhere that Paul may, in effect, argue "from Hays to Dunn." In this reconstruction, the initial sense of διὰ πίστεως Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ in both Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16 would be "the faithfulness of Jesus Christ," perhaps a shorthand for a common Christian belief that the faithful death of Jesus was an atonement for the sins of Israel. Paul may then have used the ambiguity of the genitive phrase in order to suggest that the fundamental principle of justification was faith, now contrasted with works of Law in a more ethnocentric sense. [3] This reading combines the strengths of both Hays and Dunn's arguments.
In this revised perspective on Paul, Paul conflicts with other Jews primarily on the significance of what we might call the ethnic particulars of the Jewish Law, those boundary aspects of the Law that most differentiated Jew from Gentile. This is an argument generated from practice, namely, whether Gentiles must be circumcised and whether Jewish believers can have table fellowship with Gentile believers. These arguments are simply ideological proxies for real people that Paul believed must be fully included within the people of God.
Paul argues that faith is the more basic principle than these boundary practices. He uses the example of Abraham, who was justified before he engaged in the Jewish boundary marker of circumcision (e.g., Rom. 4:9-10). While Paul's Jerusalem brothers and sisters agree that the faithful death of Christ as essential to justification, in Paul's view they overrate the significance of Jewish particulars in the Law in the equation of righteousness. Paul radicalizes the principle--even Jews are not established as right before God by their keeping of boundary markers. The essence of rightness before God is faith, and there is a core to the Law that even Gentiles can keep, a circumcision of the heart...
[1] As Dunn and Wright have both demonstrated, 4QMMT among the Dead Sea Scrolls suggests that the phrase "works of Law" especially referred to inter-Jewish debates over how to keep the Jewish Law. See Dunn, "4QMMT and Galatians" in New Perspective, 339-345 and Wright, "4QMMT and Paul: Justification, 'Works' and Eschatology," in Pauline Perspectives, 332-355.
[2] πίστις Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. His primary work in this regard is, The Faith of Jesus Christ: The Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1-4:11, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002).
[3] "2 Corinthians 4:13 and the πίστις Χριστοῦ Debate," CBQ (2008): 524-37.
__________________
... If Dunn is correct that Paul primarily has works of the Jewish Law in view, particularly those actions that distinguished Jew from Gentile, then the issue is alleviated somewhat. Then Paul was never thinking about works of love or a life free of murder or sexual immorality when he declared that Jews and Gentiles are not justified by works of Law. Rather, he was primarily thinking about works like circumcision, food laws, Sabbath observance, and so forth. [1] This ambiguity in Paul’s language of Law goes a long way toward explaining what might otherwise seem like inconsistencies. How could a Gentile possibly demonstrate the Law written on their hearts (Rom. 2:15) unless some of Paul's uses of the word law referred to a core of the Jewish Law that did not include those boundary markers than distinguished Jew from Gentile? Other instances then had these boundary markers as their primary referent.
A second ameliorating factor in explaining Paul's rhetoric of faith versus works against a revised sense of his Jewish background is the strong possibility that at least some of his references to the "faith of Jesus Christ" refer not to human faith directed toward Christ but to the faithfulness of Jesus Christ himself. The name of Richard Hays is not usually invoked when presenting the new perspective on Paul. He is rather associated most strongly with the resurgence of a particular interpretation of the phrase, pistis Iēsou Christou, in passages like Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16. [2] Reviving and re-presenting an older suggestion, Hays argued that this phrase should be understood as a reference to the "faith of Jesus Christ," his faithfulness to the point of death, rather than to faith in Jesus Christ, as the phrase had traditionally been understood. It is a question of whether Jesus in this phrase is an objective genitive—trust of Christ—or a subjective genitive—faith of Christ, understood as Christ's faith. Hays' revival of this interpretation was not a direct result of Sanders’ work on Judaism nor of Dunn and Wright’s versions, so it is understandable that it is often not included in discussions of the new perspective.
Another reason why the pistis Christou debate is often not connected to the new perspective is the fact that James Dunn, one of the key players in the new perspective, is Hays' most notorious sparring partner on the issue. Neither Sanders nor Dunn agree with Hays' reading of the key passages. On the one hand, Hays does not deny that faith in Jesus was part of Paul's theology. Indeed, part of his argument in relation to the interpretation of Galatians 2:16 is that Dunn’s interpretation implies an extensive redundancy in this verse. Paul's statement amounts to three consecutive mentions of faith in Christ: "knowing… through faith in Jesus Christ, even we have put faith in Christ Jesus in order to be justified through faith in Christ." By contrast, in Hays’ interpretation, only the second instance, the expression εἰς Χριστὸν Ἰησοῦν ἐπιστεύσαμεν (“on Christ Jesus we have believed”), refers to faith directed toward Christ Jesus.
If Hays' interpretation is at least in part correct, our picture of earliest Christianity does seem even more integrated with its Jewish precedents than even in Dunn's reconstruction. Paul’s theology, for example, turns out to be theocentric more than Christocentric. God rather than Christ becomes the primary object of faith (cf. 1 Thess. 1:8). I have argued elsewhere that Paul may, in effect, argue "from Hays to Dunn." In this reconstruction, the initial sense of διὰ πίστεως Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ in both Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16 would be "the faithfulness of Jesus Christ," perhaps a shorthand for a common Christian belief that the faithful death of Jesus was an atonement for the sins of Israel. Paul may then have used the ambiguity of the genitive phrase in order to suggest that the fundamental principle of justification was faith, now contrasted with works of Law in a more ethnocentric sense. [3] This reading combines the strengths of both Hays and Dunn's arguments.
In this revised perspective on Paul, Paul conflicts with other Jews primarily on the significance of what we might call the ethnic particulars of the Jewish Law, those boundary aspects of the Law that most differentiated Jew from Gentile. This is an argument generated from practice, namely, whether Gentiles must be circumcised and whether Jewish believers can have table fellowship with Gentile believers. These arguments are simply ideological proxies for real people that Paul believed must be fully included within the people of God.
Paul argues that faith is the more basic principle than these boundary practices. He uses the example of Abraham, who was justified before he engaged in the Jewish boundary marker of circumcision (e.g., Rom. 4:9-10). While Paul's Jerusalem brothers and sisters agree that the faithful death of Christ as essential to justification, in Paul's view they overrate the significance of Jewish particulars in the Law in the equation of righteousness. Paul radicalizes the principle--even Jews are not established as right before God by their keeping of boundary markers. The essence of rightness before God is faith, and there is a core to the Law that even Gentiles can keep, a circumcision of the heart...
[1] As Dunn and Wright have both demonstrated, 4QMMT among the Dead Sea Scrolls suggests that the phrase "works of Law" especially referred to inter-Jewish debates over how to keep the Jewish Law. See Dunn, "4QMMT and Galatians" in New Perspective, 339-345 and Wright, "4QMMT and Paul: Justification, 'Works' and Eschatology," in Pauline Perspectives, 332-355.
[2] πίστις Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. His primary work in this regard is, The Faith of Jesus Christ: The Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1-4:11, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002).
[3] "2 Corinthians 4:13 and the πίστις Χριστοῦ Debate," CBQ (2008): 524-37.
Monday, December 08, 2014
Hays' Reading Backwards
1. If you were to ask me the top influences on me as a New Testament scholar, James Dunn probably comes first. For all my griping Tom Wright is probably second. Then I think the tie goes next to Richard Hays and Krister Stendahl.
[I am of course sui generis as a Hebrews person--the interpretation I preach came neither from a mortal nor through a mortal, but... just kidding]
I'm sure Hays doesn't know it but I actually co-dedicated one of my church-directed Paul books to him, N. T. Wright, and of course my Doctor father, Dunn. I'm rather bad about telling people that I have dedicated books to them. My old professor David Thompson just happened to wander through the Seminary building last month and, as he was leaving, it suddenly occurred to me that I had co-dedicated a book to him as well. ;-) Dr. Bauer, yours is signed and also sitting on my desk.
If by chance Richard Hays or Tom Wright stumble on this post, I'd be glad to send you a copy if you need something to balance out your bed. :-)
2. But I'm on a tangent again...
Hays' new book, Reading Backwards, promises to be very memorable indeed. His books are all quite significant. Practically every one is a benchmark of some sort: The Faith of Jesus Christ, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul, The Moral Vision of the New Testament...
This is a book about the way in which the Gospel authors breathed the Old Testament as an intertext. Hays of course is known for leaning more toward the side that sees the NT authors as presupposing more rather than less of the literary contexts they quote and to which they allude. "Metalepsis" is his middle name, meaning that he thinks allusions pull in significant meaning from the texts with which they interact.
For today I just read his Preface. [I particularly resonated with the part about it being hard to get much scholarly writing done as an academic Dean] He puts some stakes down. He is including John. He will be looking at the Greek OT rather than the Hebrew, since the Gospel authors were drawing on the Greek, not the Hebrew. He is not particularly friendly to Q but is good friends with Mark Goodacre (just kidding). He is in the "Early High Christology Club" (as opposed to Dunn, who is in the High Christology club and the late Maurice Casey, who was in the Christology Club--in joke).
He mentions the scholars who have most influenced him in this area (not that he always has agreed with them): C. H. Dodd, Barnabas Lindars, Nils Dahl, Donald Juel (who is closer to my thinking), Hans Frei, Joel Marcus, N. T. Wright, Larry Hurtado, Richard Bauckham, Daniel Boyarin, and Kavin Rowe. David Moffitt gets the nod for being the real author of the book (again, just kidding).
Well, that's just the Preface. But it promises to be a most excellent read, first delivered as lectures at Cambridge and, eventually, to be a full scholarly treatment (probably after he steps down from being Dean ;-)
[I am of course sui generis as a Hebrews person--the interpretation I preach came neither from a mortal nor through a mortal, but... just kidding]
I'm sure Hays doesn't know it but I actually co-dedicated one of my church-directed Paul books to him, N. T. Wright, and of course my Doctor father, Dunn. I'm rather bad about telling people that I have dedicated books to them. My old professor David Thompson just happened to wander through the Seminary building last month and, as he was leaving, it suddenly occurred to me that I had co-dedicated a book to him as well. ;-) Dr. Bauer, yours is signed and also sitting on my desk.
If by chance Richard Hays or Tom Wright stumble on this post, I'd be glad to send you a copy if you need something to balance out your bed. :-)
2. But I'm on a tangent again...
Hays' new book, Reading Backwards, promises to be very memorable indeed. His books are all quite significant. Practically every one is a benchmark of some sort: The Faith of Jesus Christ, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul, The Moral Vision of the New Testament...
This is a book about the way in which the Gospel authors breathed the Old Testament as an intertext. Hays of course is known for leaning more toward the side that sees the NT authors as presupposing more rather than less of the literary contexts they quote and to which they allude. "Metalepsis" is his middle name, meaning that he thinks allusions pull in significant meaning from the texts with which they interact.
For today I just read his Preface. [I particularly resonated with the part about it being hard to get much scholarly writing done as an academic Dean] He puts some stakes down. He is including John. He will be looking at the Greek OT rather than the Hebrew, since the Gospel authors were drawing on the Greek, not the Hebrew. He is not particularly friendly to Q but is good friends with Mark Goodacre (just kidding). He is in the "Early High Christology Club" (as opposed to Dunn, who is in the High Christology club and the late Maurice Casey, who was in the Christology Club--in joke).
He mentions the scholars who have most influenced him in this area (not that he always has agreed with them): C. H. Dodd, Barnabas Lindars, Nils Dahl, Donald Juel (who is closer to my thinking), Hans Frei, Joel Marcus, N. T. Wright, Larry Hurtado, Richard Bauckham, Daniel Boyarin, and Kavin Rowe. David Moffitt gets the nod for being the real author of the book (again, just kidding).
Well, that's just the Preface. But it promises to be a most excellent read, first delivered as lectures at Cambridge and, eventually, to be a full scholarly treatment (probably after he steps down from being Dean ;-)
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Wright versus Campbell at Duke
Finally made it through the hour and a half panel discussion from last Monday that took place at Duke Divinity School. N. T. Wright was the reason, who spoke last Tuesday there. Richard Hays moderated. Douglas Campbell was the main debate partner, with Susan Eastman and Ross Wagner occasionally weighing in.
If I am allowed an opinion, I have similar questions about the extent to which Wright sees the exodus/return from exile motif in Paul, as well as his identification of Christ with Israel. Campbell's opening question seemed quite apropos.
Still, I didn't enjoy what soon felt like Campbell badgering him. Wright fittingly asks him if he is a lawyer at one point. I'm currently trying to wade through Campbell's own tome. Frankly, I don't think Barth is particularly helpful for understanding Paul, for whom I believe theology is ultimately more central than Christology.
For those not acquainted with Richard Hays, he is the elder statesman of Duke Divinity School, currently Dean. He made his entry into the scholarly world by championing that the expression, "the faith of Jesus Christ," referred to Jesus' faithfulness (to death) rather than to faith in Christ. Most reading this post would benefit most by reading his book called, The Moral Vision of the New Testament.
The table seemed arranged from least sympathetic at least to most congenial. Ross Wagner is a class act, and a steal for Duke. Beyond that, I'll let the video speak for itself.
If I am allowed an opinion, I have similar questions about the extent to which Wright sees the exodus/return from exile motif in Paul, as well as his identification of Christ with Israel. Campbell's opening question seemed quite apropos.
Still, I didn't enjoy what soon felt like Campbell badgering him. Wright fittingly asks him if he is a lawyer at one point. I'm currently trying to wade through Campbell's own tome. Frankly, I don't think Barth is particularly helpful for understanding Paul, for whom I believe theology is ultimately more central than Christology.
For those not acquainted with Richard Hays, he is the elder statesman of Duke Divinity School, currently Dean. He made his entry into the scholarly world by championing that the expression, "the faith of Jesus Christ," referred to Jesus' faithfulness (to death) rather than to faith in Christ. Most reading this post would benefit most by reading his book called, The Moral Vision of the New Testament.
The table seemed arranged from least sympathetic at least to most congenial. Ross Wagner is a class act, and a steal for Duke. Beyond that, I'll let the video speak for itself.
Sunday, November 16, 2014
Best New Perspective Insights
Here is my attempt to capture the best insights of the last sixty years or so since the first rumblings of a revised perspective of Paul in relation to Judaism:
- Paul did not see himself as a miserable failure at keeping the Law before he believed on Christ. If anything, his attitude was more like the Pharisee in the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector in Luke 18. As far as the righteousness in the Law, he was blameless (Phil. 3:6). Stendahl
- Paul's "conversion" certainly was not a change of religions but a partial modification of his beliefs within Judaism, most significantly the fact that he came to believe that Jesus was the Messiah. (Stendahl would say a call, but that is probably too weak.) Paul is not his Christian name (Acts continues to call him Saul for over a decade after he believes Jesus is the Messiah) but relates to his Roman name. It would be easy to argue that Paul had long suppressed his Diaspora identity--a more generative psychological explanation for his conversion than introspective guilt in the modern sense.
- Paul's turning point centered on a religious experience he had of the risen Christ. (Segal)
- The earliest Christians were thus a messianic sect. They in no way saw themselves as departing from Judaism but saw themselves representing what all of Israel should believe and do, true Israel, as it were.
- Those elements of Paul's theology that the "new perspective" has most impacted largely grew out of the Gentile mission. In these areas, Paul's theology largely developed "from solution to plight." (Sanders) Paul knew that the Gentiles were in through Christ (solution); therefore, he presented arguments for why keeping "works of Law" was not effective for "justification" before God (problem).
- "Works of Law" for Paul referred especially to those aspects of the Jewish Law that were "boundary markers" that separated Jew from Gentile. (Dunn) These stood at the heart of the earliest Christian debate over the inclusion of the Gentiles into the community of faith. Judaizers argued that Gentiles had to be circumcised to be included, and James/Peter argued that they had to observe certain purity rules to have table fellowship. Paul's teaching on justification by faith (solution) grew out of these problems.
- Later interpreters of Paul have understandably misread Judaism in the light of Paul's arguments. For example, Jews did not see themselves as keeping the Law to get right with God. Keeping the Law was not about "getting in" but about "staying in" (Sanders). Indeed, it wasn't even as much about staying in as about responding appropriately to God's covenant expectations (covenantal nomism--Sanders).
- Judaism thus thoroughly presupposed that God was a God of grace, meaning that his favor was not earned by Israel's faithfulness. (Sanders) Once we understand grace against the backdrop of patron-client relationships, we see that there were informal expectations that came with grace, even if grace could not be earned. (Malina)
- It is thus incorrect to accuse either Judaism or interpretations of Paul as "justification by works" if we conclude that there were definite ethical expectations of both Jews and believers. Paul teaches that our deeds are an element of our final justification before God. (Wright) This neither contradicts a proper understanding of grace nor Paul's arguments that keeping the ethnic particulars of the Jewish Law cannot demonstrate one's right standing before God.
- Justification language did not stand at the heart of Paul's theology but was rather a set of lenses Paul used in response to opposition to the Gentile mission from conservative elements within the earliest church. (Sanders, Dunn)
- Paul's arguments about "faith in Christ" begin with statements about how he and the Jerusalem church agree on the necessity of the "faithfulness of Jesus" for a right standing before God. (Schenck, synthesizing both Hays and Dunn)
- Paul's arguments with his opponents are thus arguments over a story (Hays), namely, the story of Christ's death and resurrection. Paul shares with earliest Christianity the belief that the resurrection has enthroned Jesus as Messiah. He shares with earliest Christianity the belief that the cross has functioned as a sacrifice of atonement, that the "faithfulness of Jesus" has made justification possible before God. He agrees that baptism in the name of Jesus is a mystical participation in the death of Jesus (Sanders, Schweitzer). He disagrees on the implications of these affirmations.
- Wright is probably correct on a background narrative at least in this respect. The cross was seen by the earliest Christians as the solution to the problem of Israel's "captivity." Israel should not be under the power of the Romans. God would send a Messiah to deliver it. Jesus' death was likely initially seen as a Maccabean type sacrifice to atone for the sins of Israel.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Faith in Jesus/Faith of Jesus
Dave Larsen asked me on Twitter where I stood on the "faith in Jesus"/"faith of Jesus" debate but realized 140 characters might not do it. Frankly, there's no silver bullet so several books wouldn't do it. Here's the skinny on my thoughts.
1. First, most probably don't even know what we're talking about. In a number of key places in Paul, the literal expression Paul uses is "faith of Jesus Christ," even though most translations thus far have translated it "faith in Jesus Christ." Rom. 3:22; Gal. 2:16, 20 are a couple for starters.
2. I believe that in most of Paul's discussion in Rom. 4 and Gal. 3, as well as verses like Rom. 3:28, Paul has human faith in view. These are not places where he uses the expression "faith of Jesus" but speaks of faith in general as the mechanism of justification. However, such faith is primarily directed toward God, not Jesus (e.g., Rom. 4:17).
I disagree with Wright that faith is a "badge" of membership in God's people for Paul. I wrestled with this for a good long while. What is Wright saying? He's so smart and deep. As has happened with many such things I have struggled with, I finally decided the problem was not that I was stupid but that Wright (in this case) is just wrong. He's a Reformed Anglican and Paul isn't. Faith is a mechanism of justification for Paul, despite later debates about monergism, synergism, etc.
I might add, however, that I agree with Wright on many other things.
3. Romans 5:19 and Luke Timothy Johnson gnawed at me for a good long while. The language is almost exactly parallel to Romans 3:22. Obedience of one man is similar to what the faith of Jesus would mean. Many will be made righteous is pretty much the same as to be justified (same exact word). Strangely, 2 Corinthians 4:13 pushed me over the edge and I have an article in CBQ about it. The train of thought makes most sense if Paul there speaks of our faith imitating the faith of Jesus.
4. So my hunch is that the "faithfulness of Jesus" was a tradition of the earliest church coming out of Jerusalem. Paul seems to use the phrase, "through the faith of Jesus Christ" in a formulaic way, as if he is presenting tradition. And my sense of the development of early Christian soteriology, the topic I started writing on during my sabbatical, sees this phrase as corresponding directly to the earliest understandings of Jesus' death--the death of a righteous person that satisfies God's wrath toward Israel and thus catalyzes Israel's redemption from enslavement. As Philippians 2 puts it, "obedience to the death," the "faithfulness of Jesus Christ" that is an atoning sacrifice. On that half I agree with Hays.
5. But I agree with Dunn that Paul quickly moves to our faith... in God though more than in Christ. Paul does have a place for faith in Christ in his theology (e.g., Rom. 9:33) but it is subsidiary to faith in God. I've argued that he may exploit the ambiguity of the phrase "faith of Christ" to move from what traditionally referred to Jesus' faithfulness to his emphasis on the necessity of our faith.
As I put it in the article, Paul moves "from Hays to Dunn," "from faith to faith." This is a very complex argument and unprovable, but it makes sense of all the data in an elegant way, in my opinion.
1. First, most probably don't even know what we're talking about. In a number of key places in Paul, the literal expression Paul uses is "faith of Jesus Christ," even though most translations thus far have translated it "faith in Jesus Christ." Rom. 3:22; Gal. 2:16, 20 are a couple for starters.
2. I believe that in most of Paul's discussion in Rom. 4 and Gal. 3, as well as verses like Rom. 3:28, Paul has human faith in view. These are not places where he uses the expression "faith of Jesus" but speaks of faith in general as the mechanism of justification. However, such faith is primarily directed toward God, not Jesus (e.g., Rom. 4:17).
I disagree with Wright that faith is a "badge" of membership in God's people for Paul. I wrestled with this for a good long while. What is Wright saying? He's so smart and deep. As has happened with many such things I have struggled with, I finally decided the problem was not that I was stupid but that Wright (in this case) is just wrong. He's a Reformed Anglican and Paul isn't. Faith is a mechanism of justification for Paul, despite later debates about monergism, synergism, etc.
I might add, however, that I agree with Wright on many other things.
3. Romans 5:19 and Luke Timothy Johnson gnawed at me for a good long while. The language is almost exactly parallel to Romans 3:22. Obedience of one man is similar to what the faith of Jesus would mean. Many will be made righteous is pretty much the same as to be justified (same exact word). Strangely, 2 Corinthians 4:13 pushed me over the edge and I have an article in CBQ about it. The train of thought makes most sense if Paul there speaks of our faith imitating the faith of Jesus.
4. So my hunch is that the "faithfulness of Jesus" was a tradition of the earliest church coming out of Jerusalem. Paul seems to use the phrase, "through the faith of Jesus Christ" in a formulaic way, as if he is presenting tradition. And my sense of the development of early Christian soteriology, the topic I started writing on during my sabbatical, sees this phrase as corresponding directly to the earliest understandings of Jesus' death--the death of a righteous person that satisfies God's wrath toward Israel and thus catalyzes Israel's redemption from enslavement. As Philippians 2 puts it, "obedience to the death," the "faithfulness of Jesus Christ" that is an atoning sacrifice. On that half I agree with Hays.
5. But I agree with Dunn that Paul quickly moves to our faith... in God though more than in Christ. Paul does have a place for faith in Christ in his theology (e.g., Rom. 9:33) but it is subsidiary to faith in God. I've argued that he may exploit the ambiguity of the phrase "faith of Christ" to move from what traditionally referred to Jesus' faithfulness to his emphasis on the necessity of our faith.
As I put it in the article, Paul moves "from Hays to Dunn," "from faith to faith." This is a very complex argument and unprovable, but it makes sense of all the data in an elegant way, in my opinion.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Hays and Wright
Unfortunately I missed the Wheaton conference on N. T. Wright last week. There are some good reviews out there, particularly by Nijay Gupta and Michael Gorman. The key exchange was between Richard Hays and Tom Wright. Wright considers Hays too Barthian. Hays considers Wright too oriented around the historical.
Here is Gorman's summary.
Here is Gupta's summary.
Here is Gorman's summary.
Here is Gupta's summary.
Friday, February 06, 2009
Galatians 2:16 Mini-Bibliography
We spent nearly all of Greek Galatians class today translating Galatians 2:16. Surely it is the most debated verse in the New Testament. Am I wrong?
It occurred to me that I always throw out a core bibliography when I go through Galatians 2:16 for whatever reason. I thought I would post it. Certainly, the key articles reflects my interpretive leanings. Obviously, James D. G. Dunn features high on my list of resources. Since most of the relevant essays now appear in one volume, The New Perspective on Paul, I list the older articles as they are situated in this volume.
"We who are Jews by nature and not sinners from the Gentiles..."
James D. G. Dunn, "The Incident at Antioch (Gal. 2:11-18)," in Jesus, Paul and the Law: Studies in Mark and Galatians, 129-82 remains, in my opinion, an excellent introduction to the basic context of Galatians 2:15-21, which I agree is indeed the proposition of the letter.
Since we know that a person is not justified...
What does it mean to be justified? In general, John Piper is too thoroughly ensconched in the Calvinist tradition to be a reliable original meaning interpreter of Paul in general, although as we might expect, he is a good scholar when the right conclusion fits within Calvinist parameters.
N. T. Wright is good on justification two-thirds of the time--on the law court and eschatological parts of it. His covenantal spin, however, continues to be the best illustration of the fact that we often formulate our key ideas when we are young in a PhD program, then become associated with those immature ideas, then spend the rest of our career defending them. A must read is his forthcoming response to John Piper on the topic.
Basically, you can trust a Bible scholar when they are critiquing another Bible scholar. You just can't trust us when we are selling material from our dissertations :-)
by works of law...
Here Dunn's mature statement in the long introduction to The New Perspective, "The New Perspective--Whence, What and Wither" (1-97), is in my opinion the best understanding of this phrase.
Also significant is his earlier piece, "Works of the Law and the Curse of the Law (Gal. 3:10-14)" from 1985 (New Perspective, 121-40), not to mention the article that put the name "new perspective" on the new perspective, namely, "The New Perspective on Paul" (1983--in New Perspective, 99-120).
except...
Should we translate the two words here in their normal sense or as "but." Dunn's "Incident at Antioch" above argues for "except."
through faith of Jesus Christ...
The two key articles here are reprinted in Richard Hays' signature volume, The Faith of Jesus Christ: The Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1-4:11. The two articles were originally presented in Kansas City at the 1991 SBL: Hays: "Pistis and Pauline Theology: What's at Stake" and Dunn: "Once More, Pistis Christou."
even we have placed our faith in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by Christ faith and not works of law...
All the key issues above are repeated here. Consult especially Dunn on works of law and Hays/Dunn on redundancy if one goes with an objective genitive throughout.
Since this is my blog, you'll forgive me if I sneak in my article here, "2 Corinthians and the Pistis Christou Debate, CBQ 70 (2008): 524-37," which suggests Paul may have a double entendre in mind in the final pistis Christou. Since that claim was not a part of my dissertation, you can trust it. :-)
for by works of law no flesh will be justified.
This quotation of Psalm 143 and Paul's modifications to it are well treated by Richard Hays in his book, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul.
You could do a whole course on this verse, reading through this literature. It would actually be quite a good introduction to Paul's theology in the specific area of his interaction with the Jerusalem church. If twenty of you wanted to do an online graduate course on Acrobat in the Fall... :-)
Dunn's Historical Jesus summary of the day is a comin'.
It occurred to me that I always throw out a core bibliography when I go through Galatians 2:16 for whatever reason. I thought I would post it. Certainly, the key articles reflects my interpretive leanings. Obviously, James D. G. Dunn features high on my list of resources. Since most of the relevant essays now appear in one volume, The New Perspective on Paul, I list the older articles as they are situated in this volume.
"We who are Jews by nature and not sinners from the Gentiles..."
James D. G. Dunn, "The Incident at Antioch (Gal. 2:11-18)," in Jesus, Paul and the Law: Studies in Mark and Galatians, 129-82 remains, in my opinion, an excellent introduction to the basic context of Galatians 2:15-21, which I agree is indeed the proposition of the letter.
Since we know that a person is not justified...
What does it mean to be justified? In general, John Piper is too thoroughly ensconched in the Calvinist tradition to be a reliable original meaning interpreter of Paul in general, although as we might expect, he is a good scholar when the right conclusion fits within Calvinist parameters.
N. T. Wright is good on justification two-thirds of the time--on the law court and eschatological parts of it. His covenantal spin, however, continues to be the best illustration of the fact that we often formulate our key ideas when we are young in a PhD program, then become associated with those immature ideas, then spend the rest of our career defending them. A must read is his forthcoming response to John Piper on the topic.
Basically, you can trust a Bible scholar when they are critiquing another Bible scholar. You just can't trust us when we are selling material from our dissertations :-)
by works of law...
Here Dunn's mature statement in the long introduction to The New Perspective, "The New Perspective--Whence, What and Wither" (1-97), is in my opinion the best understanding of this phrase.
Also significant is his earlier piece, "Works of the Law and the Curse of the Law (Gal. 3:10-14)" from 1985 (New Perspective, 121-40), not to mention the article that put the name "new perspective" on the new perspective, namely, "The New Perspective on Paul" (1983--in New Perspective, 99-120).
except...
Should we translate the two words here in their normal sense or as "but." Dunn's "Incident at Antioch" above argues for "except."
through faith of Jesus Christ...
The two key articles here are reprinted in Richard Hays' signature volume, The Faith of Jesus Christ: The Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1-4:11. The two articles were originally presented in Kansas City at the 1991 SBL: Hays: "Pistis and Pauline Theology: What's at Stake" and Dunn: "Once More, Pistis Christou."
even we have placed our faith in Jesus Christ that we might be justified by Christ faith and not works of law...
All the key issues above are repeated here. Consult especially Dunn on works of law and Hays/Dunn on redundancy if one goes with an objective genitive throughout.
Since this is my blog, you'll forgive me if I sneak in my article here, "2 Corinthians and the Pistis Christou Debate, CBQ 70 (2008): 524-37," which suggests Paul may have a double entendre in mind in the final pistis Christou. Since that claim was not a part of my dissertation, you can trust it. :-)
for by works of law no flesh will be justified.
This quotation of Psalm 143 and Paul's modifications to it are well treated by Richard Hays in his book, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul.
You could do a whole course on this verse, reading through this literature. It would actually be quite a good introduction to Paul's theology in the specific area of his interaction with the Jerusalem church. If twenty of you wanted to do an online graduate course on Acrobat in the Fall... :-)
Dunn's Historical Jesus summary of the day is a comin'.
Friday, December 19, 2008
Friday Review HF: Dunn on pistis Christou
And now the promised review of Dunn's chapter in Richard Hays' Festscrift, The Word Leaps the Gap: Essays on Scripture and Theology in Honor of Richard B. Hays. Dunn's chapter is titled, "ἐκ πίστεως: A Key to the Meaning of πίστεως Χριστοῦ."
This might be my last post on the Festscrift for a while, because I want to wander through John Meier's A Marginal Jew for the twelve days of Christmas. It's 17 years old, but I've only dipped into it here and there, not plowed from cover to cover, and the fourth volume is coming out next year. Then from Epiphany to Easter I thought I might work through Dunn's Jesus Remembered in time to work through his second volume, Beginning from Jerusalem during Eastertide and into Pentecost. So many things to read, review, and write, especially when your main job is to teach.
Dunn begins this relatively short piece with a Dear Richard letter, celebrating their infamous debate in Kansas City in 1991 (when apparently, Dunn had to pay $75 dollars to reschedule his plane flight--I had to leave the unfortunately scheduled Tuesday morning meeting to catch my plane too). Hays' watershed The Faith of Jesus Christ has been republished with the two papers from that meeting (originally published in Pauline Theology 4) and Hays added a new preface to the second edition. So Dunn considered this a good time for response himself.
First, Dunn reviews some key points Hays considers established in his preface. One is that narrative elements undergird Paul's thought. Dunn agrees. He just doesn't find an emphasis of Jesus' faithfulness in Paul's engagement with that story.
Another is that "participation in Christ" pervades Paul's theology far more completely than the imagery of justification. Dunn notes, however, that only one "faith of Christ" expression is connected to such participation (Gal. 2:20). Finally, he agrees with Hays' observation of the poetic character of Paul's language.
Now Dunn launches this rejoinder to Hays' "faithfulness of Jesus" interpretation based on "out of faith" expression.
For the record, I have argued that Paul's thought moves "out of Hays into Dunn" in a recent CBQ article, "2 Corinthians 4:13 and the πιστις Χριστου Debate," CBQ 70 (2008): 524-37. I agree with Hays that Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16 refer to Jesus' faithfulness but with Dunn that the bulk of Paul's references in Galatians 3 and Romans 4 are oriented around human faith that leads to justification.
So, on the one hand, I agree with much of Dunn's critique in this section: "the problem I have always had with your πιστις Χριστου interpretation is that it has to draw in so many of the other πιστις references in the contexts of Galatians and Romans in order to maintain its credibility" (357). If we outline Dunn's essay as an argument, his first claim is that it is impossible to distinguish between the early "faith of Jesus" parts of these arguments and the later "out of faith" parts. They either all must fall Hays' way or they must all fall Dunn's way. I disagree with Dunn here for reasons I'll mention below.
This piece works backward. With his usual exegetical cunning, Dunn shows what I agree is the "inescapable conclusion" that Paul primarily uses the ἐκ πίστεως expression in reference to human faith. If the first part of his argument is that the train of thought is consistent. The second is that the latter part of Paul's argument falls his way, "faith in."
So now he reaches his conclusion, therefore the earlier "faith of Jesus" expressions must refer to faith in Jesus too, since it is hard to point to a place where Paul switches what he's talking about. Here is where I disagree with Dunn and agree with Hays' rendering of this expression in Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16. My article argues from what I believe to be the most obvious train of thought in 2 Corinthians 4:16, movement from Jesus' faith to Paul's faith. Given evidence that Paul can think this way, it became justifiable to see him thinking in this way in these passages.
I might add my strong suspicion that this is our problem because of an unspoken assumption that we need to be able to see the transition without considering the fact that we are likely missing important context for Paul's argument here. If the Jerusalem church used something like the expression "the faithfulness of Jesus" as a shorthand reference to his atoning death, then the audience of Galatians and Romans would immediately know to take the expression Hays' way because of tradition. Paul would then build on the potential double entendre to take the expression in the way that Dunn has correctly argued he does, namely, in reference to human faith.
Dunn ends the piece confident of his conclusion. "Sorry Richard," he writes before wishing him many years and signing it "Jimmy."
This might be my last post on the Festscrift for a while, because I want to wander through John Meier's A Marginal Jew for the twelve days of Christmas. It's 17 years old, but I've only dipped into it here and there, not plowed from cover to cover, and the fourth volume is coming out next year. Then from Epiphany to Easter I thought I might work through Dunn's Jesus Remembered in time to work through his second volume, Beginning from Jerusalem during Eastertide and into Pentecost. So many things to read, review, and write, especially when your main job is to teach.
Dunn begins this relatively short piece with a Dear Richard letter, celebrating their infamous debate in Kansas City in 1991 (when apparently, Dunn had to pay $75 dollars to reschedule his plane flight--I had to leave the unfortunately scheduled Tuesday morning meeting to catch my plane too). Hays' watershed The Faith of Jesus Christ has been republished with the two papers from that meeting (originally published in Pauline Theology 4) and Hays added a new preface to the second edition. So Dunn considered this a good time for response himself.
First, Dunn reviews some key points Hays considers established in his preface. One is that narrative elements undergird Paul's thought. Dunn agrees. He just doesn't find an emphasis of Jesus' faithfulness in Paul's engagement with that story.
Another is that "participation in Christ" pervades Paul's theology far more completely than the imagery of justification. Dunn notes, however, that only one "faith of Christ" expression is connected to such participation (Gal. 2:20). Finally, he agrees with Hays' observation of the poetic character of Paul's language.
Now Dunn launches this rejoinder to Hays' "faithfulness of Jesus" interpretation based on "out of faith" expression.
For the record, I have argued that Paul's thought moves "out of Hays into Dunn" in a recent CBQ article, "2 Corinthians 4:13 and the πιστις Χριστου Debate," CBQ 70 (2008): 524-37. I agree with Hays that Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16 refer to Jesus' faithfulness but with Dunn that the bulk of Paul's references in Galatians 3 and Romans 4 are oriented around human faith that leads to justification.
So, on the one hand, I agree with much of Dunn's critique in this section: "the problem I have always had with your πιστις Χριστου interpretation is that it has to draw in so many of the other πιστις references in the contexts of Galatians and Romans in order to maintain its credibility" (357). If we outline Dunn's essay as an argument, his first claim is that it is impossible to distinguish between the early "faith of Jesus" parts of these arguments and the later "out of faith" parts. They either all must fall Hays' way or they must all fall Dunn's way. I disagree with Dunn here for reasons I'll mention below.
This piece works backward. With his usual exegetical cunning, Dunn shows what I agree is the "inescapable conclusion" that Paul primarily uses the ἐκ πίστεως expression in reference to human faith. If the first part of his argument is that the train of thought is consistent. The second is that the latter part of Paul's argument falls his way, "faith in."
So now he reaches his conclusion, therefore the earlier "faith of Jesus" expressions must refer to faith in Jesus too, since it is hard to point to a place where Paul switches what he's talking about. Here is where I disagree with Dunn and agree with Hays' rendering of this expression in Romans 3:22 and Galatians 2:16. My article argues from what I believe to be the most obvious train of thought in 2 Corinthians 4:16, movement from Jesus' faith to Paul's faith. Given evidence that Paul can think this way, it became justifiable to see him thinking in this way in these passages.
I might add my strong suspicion that this is our problem because of an unspoken assumption that we need to be able to see the transition without considering the fact that we are likely missing important context for Paul's argument here. If the Jerusalem church used something like the expression "the faithfulness of Jesus" as a shorthand reference to his atoning death, then the audience of Galatians and Romans would immediately know to take the expression Hays' way because of tradition. Paul would then build on the potential double entendre to take the expression in the way that Dunn has correctly argued he does, namely, in reference to human faith.
Dunn ends the piece confident of his conclusion. "Sorry Richard," he writes before wishing him many years and signing it "Jimmy."
Friday, December 05, 2008
Friday Review: Hauerwas--"The Way the Words Run"
Chapter 1 of the Richard Hays Festschrift: The Word Leaps the Gap. This chapter is by Stanley Hauerwas, "Why 'The Way the Words Run' Matters: Reflections on Becoming a 'Major Biblical Scholar.'" The "major biblical scholar" of the title is none other than Hauerwas himself, who has just published a theological commentary on Matthew in the Baker series.
I've never read Stanley Hauerwas' Unleashing the Scriptures, but I've read enough references to it to know I am at least half sympathetic to Hauerwas' hermeneutic--that is, except that Hauerwas is a far truer postmodern than I am. And as such, he strongly resists laying out any "superdescription" of how his readings work. As a true postmodern, he would like you catch the way he reads Scripture, to apprentice with him and be trained.
Of course he is not really interested in you watching him per se. He wants you to follow Jesus with the biblical text as you read it situated in the church. I offer not a summary, but a response to some interesting quotes from this piece, at least half of which is long footnotes. The essence of the piece is a response to critique Richard Hays offered in his Moral Vision of the New Testament. Hauerwas recognizes that Hays' thought has evolved somewhat in the more recent compilation he coedited with Ellen Davis, namely, The Art of Reading Scripture.
1. "Hays was kind enough to attend to my account of the role of the Bible in theological and ethical reflection" (2). "I use the word 'role' to avoid the word 'use'" (2 n.2).
It is going to hurt for me to suggest that use is way more accurate to what actually takes place in the relationship between Christians and the biblical text. This is way more true of theological hermeneutics than even original meaning interpretation, in my opinion.
2. "fundamentalism and historical criticism are but two sides of the same coin: they are both developments of the Protestant stress on sola scriptura, transformed by the printing press into "sola text." These developments were given ideological formation by democratic social orders that created something called the individual citizen, which presumed the ability to read the Bible without spiritual formation and moral guidance. As a result, the Bible was separated from the community necessary for it to be read as the word of God, that is, the church" (3).
This is Hauerwas' own summary of his earlier book, Unleashing the Scripture. I would agree with the bulk of this statement.
3. In Moral Vision, Hays suggests that Hauerwas' argument should lead him to become a Roman Catholic (4), a question Wieland Willker raised of a post of mine this week.
Hauerwas is not concerned to work out a finely tuned method, of course. He is truly postmodern. This comment is reflective: "Attempts to develop a hermeneutical theory that can resolve such differences in advance are doomed to failure. The church did not develop a theory to resolve conflicting readings; rather, the church was given an office to ensure that one church's readings would be tested by other churches. The name of that office is 'bishop'" (7 n.15).
In my own hermeneutic, it is neither Scripture nor the Church that are the final answer but the Spirit. The consensus of the Church reading Scripture is as sure as any indication of the Spirit's direction we might have. In that sense I reflect the emphasis of my revivalist roots, now balanced with the emphasis of the evangelical (Scripture) and catholic (Church).
I've written it up in popular form in my self-published, Who Decides What the Bible Means?
4. "contemporary preaching too often takes as its task to find 'applications' for the text, when its task should be to lead a congregation away from one narrative world and into another" (6 n.12).
"I avoid using the language of 'interpretation,' because I think such language suggests that the text has a 'meaning,' which must then be interpreted" (7 n.14).
"There is, moreover, no 'original historical sense,' and it is not at all clear why the 'literal sense' should be identified as that which the 'original' authors and readers understood. The very presumption of 'original' needs to be left behind" (6 n.13)
"I remain unconvinced that the so-called historical knowledge is a trump or even is necessary for how the Scripture is to be read by the church" (9).
While I agree with the legitimacy and primacy of Hauerwas' theological reading of Scripture, my main disagreement is his apparent denial of an original meaning for the biblical text. A theological reading without any reference to the original meanings of the Bible will be prone to run away into the celibacy of the clergy and purgatory. In this respect I remain a pietist Protestant--the consensus of the church at any point in time is not definitive or preclusive of reformation. I believe in meta-language, even if it is ultimately itself metaphorical or expressive.
5. "That historical critics will not let the church avoid the bits of Scripture that do not confirm our contemporary sensibilities is also a contribution we dare not ignore. Of course, I do not believe that historical criticism was necessary for the recovery of the significance of Jesus' life or for forcing us to attend to the unpleasant parts of Scripture. It just worked out that way" (12).
:-)
All true truth is God's truth, so our faith is always potentially enriched by any true pursuit of truth for its own sake.
6. Hauerwas refers to several co-conspirators in this movement that is significantly in play in Christian biblical studies. They should be mentioned.
a. Hays himself in the Art of Reading Scripture.
Hauerwas mentions some of the nine key theses of this book: "Scripture has multiple complex senses given by God," "Scripture is rightly understood in light of the church's rule of faith as a coherent dramatic narrative," and "Though the Bible contains the voices of many different witnesses, the canon of Scripture finds its unity in the overarching story of the work of the triune God," seem particularly relevant.
b. The Baker theological commentary series:
"this commentary series is based on the assumption that the Nicene tradition, in all its diversity and controversy, provides the proper basis for the interpretation of the Bible as Christian Scripture" (13).
Again, I affirm the legitimacy and primacy of this way of reading Scripture. I also affirm without reservation that hermeneutically this is a reader-response approach to the text of Scripture in which the words are not read in context and that the contextual, "original" meaning of Scripture will regularly diverge with this manner of reading, often simply being something almost completely different and, indeed, at times directly conflicting with the meaning thus found.
7. "the way the words run" names the way a community has learned to read texts through training..." (15).
"Christians so naturally read scriptural texts as shaping a form of life... moral readings" (15 n.36).
Reminds me of a comment by Keith Drury, something like "the only real function of the Bible in the life of the church is to create a holy people."
I've never read Stanley Hauerwas' Unleashing the Scriptures, but I've read enough references to it to know I am at least half sympathetic to Hauerwas' hermeneutic--that is, except that Hauerwas is a far truer postmodern than I am. And as such, he strongly resists laying out any "superdescription" of how his readings work. As a true postmodern, he would like you catch the way he reads Scripture, to apprentice with him and be trained.
Of course he is not really interested in you watching him per se. He wants you to follow Jesus with the biblical text as you read it situated in the church. I offer not a summary, but a response to some interesting quotes from this piece, at least half of which is long footnotes. The essence of the piece is a response to critique Richard Hays offered in his Moral Vision of the New Testament. Hauerwas recognizes that Hays' thought has evolved somewhat in the more recent compilation he coedited with Ellen Davis, namely, The Art of Reading Scripture.
1. "Hays was kind enough to attend to my account of the role of the Bible in theological and ethical reflection" (2). "I use the word 'role' to avoid the word 'use'" (2 n.2).
It is going to hurt for me to suggest that use is way more accurate to what actually takes place in the relationship between Christians and the biblical text. This is way more true of theological hermeneutics than even original meaning interpretation, in my opinion.
2. "fundamentalism and historical criticism are but two sides of the same coin: they are both developments of the Protestant stress on sola scriptura, transformed by the printing press into "sola text." These developments were given ideological formation by democratic social orders that created something called the individual citizen, which presumed the ability to read the Bible without spiritual formation and moral guidance. As a result, the Bible was separated from the community necessary for it to be read as the word of God, that is, the church" (3).
This is Hauerwas' own summary of his earlier book, Unleashing the Scripture. I would agree with the bulk of this statement.
3. In Moral Vision, Hays suggests that Hauerwas' argument should lead him to become a Roman Catholic (4), a question Wieland Willker raised of a post of mine this week.
Hauerwas is not concerned to work out a finely tuned method, of course. He is truly postmodern. This comment is reflective: "Attempts to develop a hermeneutical theory that can resolve such differences in advance are doomed to failure. The church did not develop a theory to resolve conflicting readings; rather, the church was given an office to ensure that one church's readings would be tested by other churches. The name of that office is 'bishop'" (7 n.15).
In my own hermeneutic, it is neither Scripture nor the Church that are the final answer but the Spirit. The consensus of the Church reading Scripture is as sure as any indication of the Spirit's direction we might have. In that sense I reflect the emphasis of my revivalist roots, now balanced with the emphasis of the evangelical (Scripture) and catholic (Church).
I've written it up in popular form in my self-published, Who Decides What the Bible Means?
4. "contemporary preaching too often takes as its task to find 'applications' for the text, when its task should be to lead a congregation away from one narrative world and into another" (6 n.12).
"I avoid using the language of 'interpretation,' because I think such language suggests that the text has a 'meaning,' which must then be interpreted" (7 n.14).
"There is, moreover, no 'original historical sense,' and it is not at all clear why the 'literal sense' should be identified as that which the 'original' authors and readers understood. The very presumption of 'original' needs to be left behind" (6 n.13)
"I remain unconvinced that the so-called historical knowledge is a trump or even is necessary for how the Scripture is to be read by the church" (9).
While I agree with the legitimacy and primacy of Hauerwas' theological reading of Scripture, my main disagreement is his apparent denial of an original meaning for the biblical text. A theological reading without any reference to the original meanings of the Bible will be prone to run away into the celibacy of the clergy and purgatory. In this respect I remain a pietist Protestant--the consensus of the church at any point in time is not definitive or preclusive of reformation. I believe in meta-language, even if it is ultimately itself metaphorical or expressive.
5. "That historical critics will not let the church avoid the bits of Scripture that do not confirm our contemporary sensibilities is also a contribution we dare not ignore. Of course, I do not believe that historical criticism was necessary for the recovery of the significance of Jesus' life or for forcing us to attend to the unpleasant parts of Scripture. It just worked out that way" (12).
:-)
All true truth is God's truth, so our faith is always potentially enriched by any true pursuit of truth for its own sake.
6. Hauerwas refers to several co-conspirators in this movement that is significantly in play in Christian biblical studies. They should be mentioned.
a. Hays himself in the Art of Reading Scripture.
Hauerwas mentions some of the nine key theses of this book: "Scripture has multiple complex senses given by God," "Scripture is rightly understood in light of the church's rule of faith as a coherent dramatic narrative," and "Though the Bible contains the voices of many different witnesses, the canon of Scripture finds its unity in the overarching story of the work of the triune God," seem particularly relevant.
b. The Baker theological commentary series:
"this commentary series is based on the assumption that the Nicene tradition, in all its diversity and controversy, provides the proper basis for the interpretation of the Bible as Christian Scripture" (13).
Again, I affirm the legitimacy and primacy of this way of reading Scripture. I also affirm without reservation that hermeneutically this is a reader-response approach to the text of Scripture in which the words are not read in context and that the contextual, "original" meaning of Scripture will regularly diverge with this manner of reading, often simply being something almost completely different and, indeed, at times directly conflicting with the meaning thus found.
7. "the way the words run" names the way a community has learned to read texts through training..." (15).
"Christians so naturally read scriptural texts as shaping a form of life... moral readings" (15 n.36).
Reminds me of a comment by Keith Drury, something like "the only real function of the Bible in the life of the church is to create a holy people."
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
Hays Festschrift has Arrived!
After missing the book at SBL, my copy of the Festschrift for Richard Hays, The Word Leaps the Gap: Essays on Scripture and Theology in Honor of Richard B. Hays has arrived (Eerdmans). I hope to make my way through this thickie over the next few months on Fridays or Saturdays. John Drury already posted a salacious tidbit from Stanley Hauerwas' lead off article below.
Wonderful for an egghead like me!
Wonderful for an egghead like me!
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Romans 10
Same drill. At least 100 word response to something in the post, then 2 further comments in relation to something someone else has commented. Worth up to 10 points of a 30 point total.
__________
9:30-33 "What therefore will we say? [We say] 1) that Gentiles who were not pursuing righteousness took hold of righteousness, even a righteousness on the basis of faith (ἐκ πίστεως), and 2) Israel, who was pursuing a Law of righteousness did not attain to the Law?
Why? Because [they pursued it] not on the basis of faith but as on the basis of works. They stumbled on the stone of stumbling, as it has been written, "Behold, I am placing in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of tripping, and the one who has faith on him will not be ashamed.
In my opinion, this passage establishes that when Paul uses the phrase "on the basis of faith," he is thinking of human faith primarily (rather than Jesus' faith). Faith in the verses above even refers to faith on Christ, even though in chapter 4 faith is mostly directed toward the God who raises the dead (e.g., 4:17).
The faith that (most of) Israel has not had is thus faith oriented around Jesus. Dunn's hypothesis that "works" here primarily refers to works of Jewish Law that most distinguished Jew from Gentile could work, although Paul could also simply have works in the absence of Christ in view.
The mention of a "righteousness on the basis of faith" perhaps argues for a double entendre back in 3:21, where Paul speaks of a "righteousness of God apart from works of Law." In other words, this righteousness would refer both to God's saving righteousness and the righteousness accredited to a believer on the basis of faith.
10:2-3 For I witness to them that they have a zeal but not according to knowledge, for not knowing the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own [righteousness], they were not subjected to the righteousness of God.
These two verses seem proof positive (against N. T. Wright) that Paul can use the phrase "righteousness of God" in relation to human righteousness. These may very well be double entendres, also referring to God's saving righteousness, but a reference to the human righteousness accredited on the basis of faith seems necessary from the train of thought.
I wonder if Paul thought of himself in the past when he wrote 10:1. Certainly he had a zeal at that time (cf. Phil. 3:6). His zeal was not according to knowledge.
As a point of application, it seems all too easy to be zealous over the wrong causes or even to be too zealous for something that is not as important as we make it out to be. This has seemed especially true with regard to religion throughout history.
10:4 For Christ is the goal of the Law leading to righteousness to everyone who has faith.
This statement seems similar to Galatians 3:23-25: "For before faith came we were being gaurded under Law, being imprisoned for the faith about to be revealed, with the result that the Law has become our paedogogue unto Christ, in order that we might be justified on the basis of faith."
It is common among certain interpreters to read this verse to say that Christ fulfilled the Law for us, that Christ is the end of the Law. But this is not Paul's meaning. Paul is simply saying again what he has said before, that the Law was intended to point us toward Christ by showing us our inability to be righteous in our own power, by our own works.
10:9-11 ... if you confess with your mouth "Jesus is Lord" and have faith in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart it is faithed leading to righteousness and with the mouth it is confessed leading to salvation, for the Scripture says, Everyone "who has faith in him will not be ashamed."
Here Paul gives us the content of faith, what we believe. We believe that God raised Jesus from the dead, as in Romans 4:24. Sanders is wrong to think that this sort of content of faith is unusual for Paul. It is the default content of faith.
To confess Jesus as Lord is to recognize that God raised him from the dead and enthroned him at His right hand as cosmic king. To confess him as Lord is to confess our allegiance to him as Lord, not a mere confession of words.
Such faith in God's doings and in Christ as the one to whom God is doing it and through whom He is doing it, effects coming salvation, when believers will escape the wrath of God.
10:13 For "everyone whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved."
This quote is fascinating because the verse Paul is quoting, Joel 2:32, clearly refers to YHWH--whoever calls on the name of YHWH will be saved. Richard Bauckham and others have argued that it is very likely that Paul would have known that YHWH was the LORD that stood beyond this text. Is Paul therefore equating Jesus with YHWH? Bauckham would say so.
One more to come...
__________
9:30-33 "What therefore will we say? [We say] 1) that Gentiles who were not pursuing righteousness took hold of righteousness, even a righteousness on the basis of faith (ἐκ πίστεως), and 2) Israel, who was pursuing a Law of righteousness did not attain to the Law?
Why? Because [they pursued it] not on the basis of faith but as on the basis of works. They stumbled on the stone of stumbling, as it has been written, "Behold, I am placing in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of tripping, and the one who has faith on him will not be ashamed.
In my opinion, this passage establishes that when Paul uses the phrase "on the basis of faith," he is thinking of human faith primarily (rather than Jesus' faith). Faith in the verses above even refers to faith on Christ, even though in chapter 4 faith is mostly directed toward the God who raises the dead (e.g., 4:17).
The faith that (most of) Israel has not had is thus faith oriented around Jesus. Dunn's hypothesis that "works" here primarily refers to works of Jewish Law that most distinguished Jew from Gentile could work, although Paul could also simply have works in the absence of Christ in view.
The mention of a "righteousness on the basis of faith" perhaps argues for a double entendre back in 3:21, where Paul speaks of a "righteousness of God apart from works of Law." In other words, this righteousness would refer both to God's saving righteousness and the righteousness accredited to a believer on the basis of faith.
10:2-3 For I witness to them that they have a zeal but not according to knowledge, for not knowing the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own [righteousness], they were not subjected to the righteousness of God.
These two verses seem proof positive (against N. T. Wright) that Paul can use the phrase "righteousness of God" in relation to human righteousness. These may very well be double entendres, also referring to God's saving righteousness, but a reference to the human righteousness accredited on the basis of faith seems necessary from the train of thought.
I wonder if Paul thought of himself in the past when he wrote 10:1. Certainly he had a zeal at that time (cf. Phil. 3:6). His zeal was not according to knowledge.
As a point of application, it seems all too easy to be zealous over the wrong causes or even to be too zealous for something that is not as important as we make it out to be. This has seemed especially true with regard to religion throughout history.
10:4 For Christ is the goal of the Law leading to righteousness to everyone who has faith.
This statement seems similar to Galatians 3:23-25: "For before faith came we were being gaurded under Law, being imprisoned for the faith about to be revealed, with the result that the Law has become our paedogogue unto Christ, in order that we might be justified on the basis of faith."
It is common among certain interpreters to read this verse to say that Christ fulfilled the Law for us, that Christ is the end of the Law. But this is not Paul's meaning. Paul is simply saying again what he has said before, that the Law was intended to point us toward Christ by showing us our inability to be righteous in our own power, by our own works.
10:9-11 ... if you confess with your mouth "Jesus is Lord" and have faith in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart it is faithed leading to righteousness and with the mouth it is confessed leading to salvation, for the Scripture says, Everyone "who has faith in him will not be ashamed."
Here Paul gives us the content of faith, what we believe. We believe that God raised Jesus from the dead, as in Romans 4:24. Sanders is wrong to think that this sort of content of faith is unusual for Paul. It is the default content of faith.
To confess Jesus as Lord is to recognize that God raised him from the dead and enthroned him at His right hand as cosmic king. To confess him as Lord is to confess our allegiance to him as Lord, not a mere confession of words.
Such faith in God's doings and in Christ as the one to whom God is doing it and through whom He is doing it, effects coming salvation, when believers will escape the wrath of God.
10:13 For "everyone whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved."
This quote is fascinating because the verse Paul is quoting, Joel 2:32, clearly refers to YHWH--whoever calls on the name of YHWH will be saved. Richard Bauckham and others have argued that it is very likely that Paul would have known that YHWH was the LORD that stood beyond this text. Is Paul therefore equating Jesus with YHWH? Bauckham would say so.
One more to come...
Friday, March 02, 2007
Book Review: Moral Vision, Divorce and Remarriage
The chapter of Hays' Moral Vision I read this week was on divorce and remarriage (chap. 15). In keeping with his general method, he begins with the descriptive task:
1. Mark 10:2-12
In this text, Jesus prohibits a husband or wife from divorcing the other spouse, and remarriage in either case is said to be to commit adultery.
There are two really intriguing aspects of this passage, both of which Hays mentions at least in passing.
a) The first is that Jesus tells the wife not to divorce her husband. This may not strike us as odd, but it is not at all clear that wives could legally divorce their husbands in Galilee at this time. For this reason, perhaps the majority of NT scholars do not believe that Jesus said it quite this way. Most think what Jesus said was that husbands should not divorce their wives. Then Mark and Paul, writing for a broader cultural context, expanded Jesus' prohibition to include wives divorcing their husbands, since this was possible in the Greco-Roman world. Christian tradition would thus have balanced out Jesus' historical teaching as the gospel expanded beyond the borders of Israel.
This will of course be a controversial claim, although I do not believe we can listen to the gospels and not conclude that the Spirit of Jesus has sometimes been conveyed in the gospels well beyond the things Jesus actually said while on earth. Nevertheless, the fact that Paul focuses first and I believe foremost on the wife divorcing the husband in his relating of what the Lord said (1 Cor. 7:10-16) must at least raise the question of whether scholars have correctly understood what was and wasn't possible at the time in Galilee.
b) The second striking thing about Jesus' words in Mark 10 is that he says that the husband who divorces and remarries commits adultery against his wife. This statement must have sounded very bizarre to Mark's and/or Jesus' audiences. I do not just mean that it was a really "liberal" "feminist" type statement that was revolutionary in the way it took the woman into account, although I imagine this is true as well. [I find it nearly impossible to read Jesus as a conservative in his world]
It is just that the word adultery at the time meant to shame a man by sleeping with his woman, with his "property," so to speak. One could not by definition commit adultery against a woman. I've tried to think of a way to convey the wierdness of the statement. Perhaps this starts us toward the connotations: "Anyone who trades in his dog for another steals himself away from the dog." So if the current understanding of ancient adultery is correct, this statement would be another example of Jesus' hyperbolic speech.
Hays' most important thought on Mark 10 is that Jesus places staying in marriage within the context of discipleship, following Jesus. This section of Mark is Jesus' trip to Jerusalem to die and Jesus is teaching his followers how to be true disciples in it. By implication, Hays thinks, staying within marriage comes to be part of following Jesus, even when it can involve suffering.
2. Matthew 19:3-12
Hays points out three ways in which Matthew's version of the Mark statement (assuming Markan priority) modifies Mark:
a. Matthew removes the "adultery against her" statement.
b. Matthew drops the prohibition of a woman divorcing her husband.
c. Matthew adds an exception clause: "except for porneia."
Overall, Hays believes that Matthew adapts Jesus' saying to make it more practiceable and brings it more closely into line with Jewish custom and the patriarchal assumptions of Jewish law. Thus no mention of a woman divorcing her husband is made and the kind of exception necessitated by purity rules in the Jewish law is made.
Hays also mentions that since Matthew deals with this issue twice, here and in Matthew 5:31-32, it may have been an issue of some concern in his community.
This section of Hays' chapter deals with two other matters of relevance: what porneia is and the two Pharisaic schools. Hays discusses the options that 1) porneia means adultery, 2) porneia means pre-marital unfaithfulness during the betrothal phase and 3) that it refers to incestuous relationships. I agree with him that we should probably 4) take it as a catch-all term that would include a large number of sexual sins, certainly including adultery and incest.
Hays rightly concludes that Matthew's Jesus lines up more closely with the School of Shammai than the School of Hillel. The School of Hillel allowed divorce for almost any reason. The School of Shammai only allowed it for porneia and thus for reasons of purity only. Hays, as most scholars, believes however that Jesus himself probably did not enumerate the exception clause and that it is a Matthean adaptation. [In this sense Jesus' words are more restrictive than either of these schools, yet more liberal in a way since he seems to disregard the concern for the purity of the man]
Hays on remarriage after divorce notes that Matthew does not explicitly prohibit a divorced man from remarrying a woman who has not previously been married (now looking at Matthew 5:31-32), while the divorced woman who remarries commits adultery. An interesting twist to note here, I think, is that Matthew's Jesus does not actually prohibit a woman from remarrying. Strikingly, he assumes a wife will remarry! Any man who divorces his wife forces her to commit adultery [against him]. In short, he is causing her to sin against himself by forcing her to marry another man!
This is again exactly the kind of hyperbolic speech we would expect of Jesus, even if we are less certain whether this is a historical statement or a distinctively Matthean adaptation.
An interesting part of Matthew 19 is the indication that staying in a marriage might involve some suffering of shame. Hays at least mentions the sometimes made suggestion (e.g., Malina) that to become a eunuch for the kingdom of God might refer to the figurative castration a husband can receive in terms of his honor by remaining in a marriage with a woman who disgraces him culturally.
3. Luke 16:18
I wonder if Luke gives Jesus' saying closest to its most original form? Anyone who divorces his wife commits adultery and whoever marries her commits adultery.
4. 1 Corinthians 7:10-16
Because Paul mentions the wife divorcing her husband, his version of the divorce logion is closest to Mark's. Of course Paul's statement is actually the closest to Jesus in time, since all the gospels were all written decades later than 1 Corinthians (I personally date the current form of Mark to the early 70's).
The main addition Paul makes is his allowance for an unbelieving spouse to depart--"if the unbelieving spouse departs, let her depart." This "pastoral improvisation," as Hays puts it, now comes into play as the gospel reaches a Gentile audience where we face the possibility that one spouse will become a believer and the other will not. It is surely noteworthy that Paul does not insist a Christian man force his wife to convert!
Also fascinating is Paul's statement that the unbelieving spouse and their children are sanctified and made holy by continguity with the believer. Hays reads this verse a little differently than I do. Hays thinks it is optimistic, "Who knows, maybe you will save them?" I read it more in the sense, "Let them depart, you ultimately can't save them for sure by staying with them..."
Hays' Synthesis
In Hays synthesis of these biblical data, he notes that despite some of the diversity, divorce is always seen as exceptional--"divorce is therefore flatly contrary to God's will" (372). He also notes, however, the principle of accommodation we see. Mark and Paul adjust Jesus' teaching to a Hellenistic context and Matthew brings it more into line with patriarchal Jewish customs.
Hays turns to Malachi where marriage is seen as a mirror of God's covenant with Israel. He turns to Ephesians where marriage is put in the context of the cross. The image of marriage is an image of redemption (e.g., Revelation) and of new creation. Divorce, by contrast, is an image moving in the wrong direction.
Because the church is a community, divorce can never be a private matter for a Christian. Paul's pastoral concerns in particular reflect the interests of the community of faith ("God has called us to peace").
Hermeneutics
Hays notes that love and justice are never brought into the equation of divorce in the NT. Christian tradition does not favor divorce, for it was hardly even possible until recent days (although the RC church used the idea of annullment to work with the exigencies of life). Hays suggests that experience currently is what has been used these days to trump all else (e.g., Spong), but without any basis in either Scripture or tradition.
He suggests six things about appropriating the biblical text on this issue:
1. Marriage is an aspect of discipleship, a reflection of God's faithfulness.
2. Divorce is contrary to God's will except in extraordinary circumstances. The NT mentions two: porneia and the will of an unbelieving spouse. But the NT itself models a process of reflection and adaptation with regard to what such exceptional circumstances might be. Hays suggests spousal abuse would likely be one obvious adaptation the church today might want to make.
3. Marriage is not grounded in feelings of love but in the practice of love. Lack of fulfillment is not a Christian basis for divorce.
4. Sometimes a spouse can deeply wrong the other, as Matthew implies, to the extent that the marriage cannot continue.
5. Remarriage cannot be excluded as a possibility not least because of the principle of redemption. He thinks the fact that it is better to marry than to burn with passion can apply here as well.
6. The community of the church must seek to find ways to provide koinonia for those divorced persons who choose not to remarry.
Once again, while we can always disagree on details, I find Hays once again a model of how to appropriate Scripture.
1. Mark 10:2-12
In this text, Jesus prohibits a husband or wife from divorcing the other spouse, and remarriage in either case is said to be to commit adultery.
There are two really intriguing aspects of this passage, both of which Hays mentions at least in passing.
a) The first is that Jesus tells the wife not to divorce her husband. This may not strike us as odd, but it is not at all clear that wives could legally divorce their husbands in Galilee at this time. For this reason, perhaps the majority of NT scholars do not believe that Jesus said it quite this way. Most think what Jesus said was that husbands should not divorce their wives. Then Mark and Paul, writing for a broader cultural context, expanded Jesus' prohibition to include wives divorcing their husbands, since this was possible in the Greco-Roman world. Christian tradition would thus have balanced out Jesus' historical teaching as the gospel expanded beyond the borders of Israel.
This will of course be a controversial claim, although I do not believe we can listen to the gospels and not conclude that the Spirit of Jesus has sometimes been conveyed in the gospels well beyond the things Jesus actually said while on earth. Nevertheless, the fact that Paul focuses first and I believe foremost on the wife divorcing the husband in his relating of what the Lord said (1 Cor. 7:10-16) must at least raise the question of whether scholars have correctly understood what was and wasn't possible at the time in Galilee.
b) The second striking thing about Jesus' words in Mark 10 is that he says that the husband who divorces and remarries commits adultery against his wife. This statement must have sounded very bizarre to Mark's and/or Jesus' audiences. I do not just mean that it was a really "liberal" "feminist" type statement that was revolutionary in the way it took the woman into account, although I imagine this is true as well. [I find it nearly impossible to read Jesus as a conservative in his world]
It is just that the word adultery at the time meant to shame a man by sleeping with his woman, with his "property," so to speak. One could not by definition commit adultery against a woman. I've tried to think of a way to convey the wierdness of the statement. Perhaps this starts us toward the connotations: "Anyone who trades in his dog for another steals himself away from the dog." So if the current understanding of ancient adultery is correct, this statement would be another example of Jesus' hyperbolic speech.
Hays' most important thought on Mark 10 is that Jesus places staying in marriage within the context of discipleship, following Jesus. This section of Mark is Jesus' trip to Jerusalem to die and Jesus is teaching his followers how to be true disciples in it. By implication, Hays thinks, staying within marriage comes to be part of following Jesus, even when it can involve suffering.
2. Matthew 19:3-12
Hays points out three ways in which Matthew's version of the Mark statement (assuming Markan priority) modifies Mark:
a. Matthew removes the "adultery against her" statement.
b. Matthew drops the prohibition of a woman divorcing her husband.
c. Matthew adds an exception clause: "except for porneia."
Overall, Hays believes that Matthew adapts Jesus' saying to make it more practiceable and brings it more closely into line with Jewish custom and the patriarchal assumptions of Jewish law. Thus no mention of a woman divorcing her husband is made and the kind of exception necessitated by purity rules in the Jewish law is made.
Hays also mentions that since Matthew deals with this issue twice, here and in Matthew 5:31-32, it may have been an issue of some concern in his community.
This section of Hays' chapter deals with two other matters of relevance: what porneia is and the two Pharisaic schools. Hays discusses the options that 1) porneia means adultery, 2) porneia means pre-marital unfaithfulness during the betrothal phase and 3) that it refers to incestuous relationships. I agree with him that we should probably 4) take it as a catch-all term that would include a large number of sexual sins, certainly including adultery and incest.
Hays rightly concludes that Matthew's Jesus lines up more closely with the School of Shammai than the School of Hillel. The School of Hillel allowed divorce for almost any reason. The School of Shammai only allowed it for porneia and thus for reasons of purity only. Hays, as most scholars, believes however that Jesus himself probably did not enumerate the exception clause and that it is a Matthean adaptation. [In this sense Jesus' words are more restrictive than either of these schools, yet more liberal in a way since he seems to disregard the concern for the purity of the man]
Hays on remarriage after divorce notes that Matthew does not explicitly prohibit a divorced man from remarrying a woman who has not previously been married (now looking at Matthew 5:31-32), while the divorced woman who remarries commits adultery. An interesting twist to note here, I think, is that Matthew's Jesus does not actually prohibit a woman from remarrying. Strikingly, he assumes a wife will remarry! Any man who divorces his wife forces her to commit adultery [against him]. In short, he is causing her to sin against himself by forcing her to marry another man!
This is again exactly the kind of hyperbolic speech we would expect of Jesus, even if we are less certain whether this is a historical statement or a distinctively Matthean adaptation.
An interesting part of Matthew 19 is the indication that staying in a marriage might involve some suffering of shame. Hays at least mentions the sometimes made suggestion (e.g., Malina) that to become a eunuch for the kingdom of God might refer to the figurative castration a husband can receive in terms of his honor by remaining in a marriage with a woman who disgraces him culturally.
3. Luke 16:18
I wonder if Luke gives Jesus' saying closest to its most original form? Anyone who divorces his wife commits adultery and whoever marries her commits adultery.
4. 1 Corinthians 7:10-16
Because Paul mentions the wife divorcing her husband, his version of the divorce logion is closest to Mark's. Of course Paul's statement is actually the closest to Jesus in time, since all the gospels were all written decades later than 1 Corinthians (I personally date the current form of Mark to the early 70's).
The main addition Paul makes is his allowance for an unbelieving spouse to depart--"if the unbelieving spouse departs, let her depart." This "pastoral improvisation," as Hays puts it, now comes into play as the gospel reaches a Gentile audience where we face the possibility that one spouse will become a believer and the other will not. It is surely noteworthy that Paul does not insist a Christian man force his wife to convert!
Also fascinating is Paul's statement that the unbelieving spouse and their children are sanctified and made holy by continguity with the believer. Hays reads this verse a little differently than I do. Hays thinks it is optimistic, "Who knows, maybe you will save them?" I read it more in the sense, "Let them depart, you ultimately can't save them for sure by staying with them..."
Hays' Synthesis
In Hays synthesis of these biblical data, he notes that despite some of the diversity, divorce is always seen as exceptional--"divorce is therefore flatly contrary to God's will" (372). He also notes, however, the principle of accommodation we see. Mark and Paul adjust Jesus' teaching to a Hellenistic context and Matthew brings it more into line with patriarchal Jewish customs.
Hays turns to Malachi where marriage is seen as a mirror of God's covenant with Israel. He turns to Ephesians where marriage is put in the context of the cross. The image of marriage is an image of redemption (e.g., Revelation) and of new creation. Divorce, by contrast, is an image moving in the wrong direction.
Because the church is a community, divorce can never be a private matter for a Christian. Paul's pastoral concerns in particular reflect the interests of the community of faith ("God has called us to peace").
Hermeneutics
Hays notes that love and justice are never brought into the equation of divorce in the NT. Christian tradition does not favor divorce, for it was hardly even possible until recent days (although the RC church used the idea of annullment to work with the exigencies of life). Hays suggests that experience currently is what has been used these days to trump all else (e.g., Spong), but without any basis in either Scripture or tradition.
He suggests six things about appropriating the biblical text on this issue:
1. Marriage is an aspect of discipleship, a reflection of God's faithfulness.
2. Divorce is contrary to God's will except in extraordinary circumstances. The NT mentions two: porneia and the will of an unbelieving spouse. But the NT itself models a process of reflection and adaptation with regard to what such exceptional circumstances might be. Hays suggests spousal abuse would likely be one obvious adaptation the church today might want to make.
3. Marriage is not grounded in feelings of love but in the practice of love. Lack of fulfillment is not a Christian basis for divorce.
4. Sometimes a spouse can deeply wrong the other, as Matthew implies, to the extent that the marriage cannot continue.
5. Remarriage cannot be excluded as a possibility not least because of the principle of redemption. He thinks the fact that it is better to marry than to burn with passion can apply here as well.
6. The community of the church must seek to find ways to provide koinonia for those divorced persons who choose not to remarry.
Once again, while we can always disagree on details, I find Hays once again a model of how to appropriate Scripture.
Saturday, January 27, 2007
"Violence in Defense of Justice"
I already mentioned that I'm reading through Richard Hays' Moral Vision of the New Testament this semester. This past week I read his chapter on whether Christians can engage in violence and war in the name of justice.
Following his overall method, Hays begins this chapter with what he calls the descriptive task. This is where he attempts to identify what particular passages of the New Testament had to say on the issue in question (original meaning). In this chapter he focuses in particular on Matthew 5:38-48, the love your enemy part of the Sermon on the Mount. He argues against several interpretations out there with regard to the original scope of these words. So...
Following his overall method, Hays begins this chapter with what he calls the descriptive task. This is where he attempts to identify what particular passages of the New Testament had to say on the issue in question (original meaning). In this chapter he focuses in particular on Matthew 5:38-48, the love your enemy part of the Sermon on the Mount. He argues against several interpretations out there with regard to the original scope of these words. So...
- Matthew does not treat this material as an impossible ideal. The wise man does these things (Matt. 7).
- This is not an interim ethic, since Matthew 28 anticipates that the end of the age may be some time off.
- The Gospel of Matthew never advocates violence in defense of a third party, such as one of those with Jesus tries to do in the garden.
- Matthew applies these words to the disciples (beginning framing) and the crowds (ending framing). They do not apply to just a special class of Christians like ministers.
- Matthew knows nothing of "our inevitable failure to be able to do these things simply is to show us our need for grace."
- And even if Horsley were right that Jesus were just speaking to peasants in Galilee about fighting with their neighboring villages, Matthew universalizes the teaching--and it is Matthew as Scripture that is normative for the church, not some hypothetical reconstruction of Jesus.
Next, Hays performs what he calls the synthetic task, which is something like what I call integration. He goes through various other biblical texts to see how unified it may be on the topic at hand.
Here he concludes, first, that the NT is uniform on this issue. Whether another gospel, Acts, Paul's writings, Hebrews, James, 1 Peter, even Revelation, Hays finds no justification for going to war, self-defence, or even acting with force for the sake of another. Rather he finds that Christians are to submit to persecution in hope of God's ultimate vindication.
First, I mostly agree with him on the OT. When the NT and OT are in conflict on an issue, the NT trumps. So to the extent that the Sermon on the Mount and Jesus' love ethic stand in conflict with OT warring, the NT wins.
I slightly disagree with him, however, in the sense that the OT addresses matters of governance, while Jesus and most NT texts deal with a position of disempowerment. I have not found any of Hays' arguments to alter my sense that this fundamental distinction must be factored into the discussion.
I personally suspect that he and others like him have also over-reached in their reading of the NT as well. For example, when Paul mentions that rulers are appointed to administer justice, Paul approves of this role (which would include a tacit support of capital punishment). I draw the implication that, although it would involve significant modifications, Paul the Christian would also administer forceful justice if he were in political power.
Hays also recognizes that the mention of Christian soldiers in the gospels and Acts is a potential weak point. He responds by lumping them in with tax collectors and prostitutes. But in their cases, the gospels indicate that they should stop the sinful aspects of their "jobs." When John the Baptist indicates what these might be for soldiers, he does not tell the soldiers to stop being soldiers. He tells them to be content with their wages and refrain from extortion. He gives no indication that soldiering is intrinsically unchristian, as Hays believes. This seems to me fatal to a thoroughgoing pacifist interpretation of the NT.
In my opinion, the obvious need for governments to enact justice--at times in a forceful way--was so obvious to most of the NT authors that it was an underlying assumption, revealed by these anomalies in Hays' position. The reason they do not come to the fore is precisely because the NT world was a thoroughly disempowered world.
By the way, Hays also integrates with three primary lenses: community, cross, and new creation (ecclesiology, soteriology, and eschatology). A nice touch, I think. He finds these to support a pacifist position as well.
Hays third phase includes more of what I would put in the category of integration and then a running of the issue through tradition, reason, and experience. He calls it the hermeneutical task.
First, he finds unanimity in all the biblical modes. Explicit rules prohibit violence. Biblical principles would preclude violence. Narrative paradigms do not model violence. And the symbolic world of the NT does not include struggle with flesh and blood.
It is, of course, in the category of tradition, reason, and experience that Hays finds the strongest arguments against his position. Since Augustine the consensus of Christendom has supported the appropriateness of war under certain circumstances (just war theory). Reason and experience of course strongly tell us that the person/nation that does not defend itself is a person/nation destined to be annihilated, barring some deus ex machina (which seldom arrives).
Common sense would also say that defending someone else fits well with love of one's neighbor, even if it involves forcibly stopping an agressor. To be sure, the unloving run miles with these "inches." But abuse is no excuse. It is a diversion of topic to try to undo a truth by what abuse someone else might do with that truth.
Hays cannot listen, for "extrabiblical sources stand in a hermeneutical relation to the New Testament; they are not independent, counterbalancing sources of authority" (341). So despite the fact that "this way is sheer folly" (343), we are called to have "simply obedience to the God who willed that his own Son should give himself up to death on a cross."
Certainly we must admire this level of obedience, and fundamentalists should recognize that he considers this element of NT teaching far clearer than its teaching on divorce and remarriage, homosexuality, or abortion. As I've said above, I don't think the NT integrates nearly so neatly as Hays suggests. But Hays is more right than wrong to be sure.
The final phase living the text is clear given what has preceded. Do not resort to violence for any reason, including self-defense of individual or nation or to protect others.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
