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  • From: "Tim Gallant" <tim AT rabbisaul.com>
  • To: "Corpus-Paul" <corpus-paul AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Corpus-Paul] Who is addressed in Romans 2?
  • Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 10:52:40 -0700

This leads Esler to the conclusion that Paul's heart
is not in his indictment of all (Jew and Gentile,
Greek and Barbarian) in sin...the conclusion that
Paul's 'heart is not in the production of such a
list' for Judeans p 153, undermines the power of
the epistle to the point that one might wonder why
it had any effect in Rome, let alone in history.

Well Bob, we should certainly appreciate the "comic
nature" (as Esler puts it) of Paul's disparity. On the
one hand the Gentiles are idolatrous, God-hating,
lustful, greedy, wicked, envious, murderous,
malicious, treacherous, violent, merciless, and
senseless (1:19-2:6) while the Judeans commit
adultery, steal and rob temples (2:17-24)! "The signs
of Paul's straining to produce a Judean analogy to
non-Judean sinfulness for the purpose of his argument
is quite visible." (153) Stuff like this is amusing,
if you have a perverse sense of humor as I do. Whether
or not Paul's "heart was in the matter" is another
question. I tend to be of the mind, against Esler,
that Paul's heart was perhaps too much in these
matters.

Mind you, the above assumes that Paul's charge against his fellow Jews actually comes in 2.17-24. That's the more common reading, but I don't think that's the case. For one thing, he does not *say* that "the Judeans commit adultery, steal, and rob temples." He posits the rhetorical question, and we need to ask why. The truth is that nowhere in 2.17-24 does Paul attempt to make a charge against his fellow Jews.

My own position is that 3.1-8, which is usually treated as a strange digression, in fact contains Paul's charge. I cannot go into all the exegesis here. I have an article on the passage which I hope to get published soon. But essentially, I see Paul's charge having to do, not with generic law-breaking, but with rejecting the Messiah. This he calls being unfaithful (or unbelieving, depending how you take apistos) with the oracles (logia) of God (3.2). His previous mention of God's word goes back to 1.2, which refers to the prophecies concerning God's Son. There are a great many reasons why this makes sense of the rest of the passage, but I will simply note here that we are probably not going to "get it" unless we are willing to think in terms of intertextuality.

What then is going on in 2.17ff? I suggest that Paul is *setting up* for the charge by saying something that most Jews would in fact agree with: that radical sin could have the effect of genuine covenant-breaking. The specific radical sin that he is actually concerned with, however, is not adultery, theft, or temple-robbing/sacrilege (unless perhaps on some metaphorical leve), but failure to submit to the righteousness of God in Christ (as in 10.3).

When we recognize this, btw, I think 3.5 makes much more sense in the context: "if our unrighteousness demonstrates the righteousness of God" can now be linked to the same kind of language later in the chapter. It was precisely because Jesus was rejected and in fact handed over to death that He accomplished "the righteousness of God" (which I take to be rooted in the saving promises of Isaiah 40-55). He has become "propitiation" (3.25). So paradoxically, the sin has also been the occasion of the accomplishment of salvation.

tim

Tim Gallant
Pastor, Conrad Christian Reformed Church

http://www.timgallant.org
tim | gallant site group






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