Corpus-Paul

["moon-ryul jung" <moon AT saint.soongsil.ac.kr>]

Dear members, 
because there is some discussion going on about Gal 2:16, I would
like to take this opportunity to ask some questions about the
"center of Paul's thought" vs. "righteousness by faith".

Let me quote from PPJ by Sanders (p. 502-8, 507f):

"being justified by faith" and "being in Christ" point to the
same reality, while the "participatory" categories serve to 
DEFINE the "juristic ones". 

According to Sanders, both the juristic and participatory languages 
are means employed to express the salvation in Christ. But
as some member of the List once pointed out, it seems that
the language of "being righteoused by faith not by (works of) the
law" is used mainly in the context of dealing with the "Jews-Gentile
social relations" typified in Galatians. 

For example, in Rom 1:19, we have:
For it is God's power for salvation to ALL who believe, JEW first but also
GENTILE. For the RIGHTEOUSNESS of God is being revealed in it from faith
to faith. 

Simiarly both in Rom 3:21-23 and Rom 3:28-30, the language of "being
righteous by faith" is linked to the language of "no distinction
between Jew and Gentile". 

In Phil 3:9, we have "not having a righteousness of my own, based on law, 
but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that 
depends on faith".
Even here, the context which is set in Phil 3:2 is related to the 
Jew-Gentile relation.
3:2-3 "Look out for the dogs, look out for the evil-workers, look out for 
those who mutilate the flesh. For we are the true circumcision, who worship 
God in spirit, and glory in Christ Jesus, and put no confidence
in the flesh."

Based on this data, my WILD guess is that Paul was borrowing 
the language of "being righteoused" ,"righteous ones", and "righteous" from 
Judaism (I guess these issues were their central concern as members of the 
covenant with God). Suppose that they required that Christ-believing 
Gentiles perform the "works of the law" to be considered "righteous ones". 
Then it was natural for Paul to say that it was not
necessary to perform the works of the law to be "righteous ones", 
to use their own language. But it does not mean that Paul
considered the concept of "being righteoused" marginal. It means
that the language was familiar to those Jews and saying God 
righteouses both Jews and Gentiles based on faith in Christ is a most
forcefull way of saying  God saves both Jews and Gentiles based on faith
in Christ, without distinction.  Expressing Paul's convinction by means 
of this language might have been a help to  those Gentiles who were exposed 
to this language.

If the above thought is on the right track, we may be able to modify
the quotation from Sanders as follows:

"being justified by faith" and "being in Christ" point to the
same reality, but the "juristic" category was used when the 
inclusion of Gentiles to the people of God was an issue (
because being "righteous ones" were the hallmark of those
covenant partners with God), and the "participatory" 
category was used when the Jew-Gentile relation was not an issue.

If the above line of reasoning is right, then 
Sanders' position that the "participatory" categories serve to 
DEFINE the "juristic ones" seems to be a theological reconstruction.

Any comments?

Respectfully
Moon-Ryul Jung
Assistant Professor
Dept of Computer Science
Soongsil University, Seoul, Korea