Corpus-Paul

["Tim Gallant" <tim AT rabbisaul.com>]

John and Jim,

No time to respond in detail. Let me just say this:

(1) Paul thinks eschatologically, which means that he doesn't reinvent 
everything, but it also means dramatic newness. We should not expect that he 
completely redefines the tzedekah/dikaiosune terminology.

(2) Paul himself tells us what God accounts as righteousness - faith (Rom 
4). This faith stands over against the unbelief of Rom 1.18ff, which failed 
to give glory to God; note the contrast with Abraham in Rom 4.20.

(3) Virtually the entirety of Romans resonates with Isaiah, particularly 
from Isaiah 40-55. In this portion of Isaiah, Israel's struggle and Israel's 
hope is depicted in terms of a great courtroom event and the crisis is this: 
God has given Israel certain promises, and yet His covenant also requires 
faith and faithfulness, which has not been forthcoming. How then will those 
promises come to pass? God's own righteousness/truth/faithfulness (the terms 
are virtually synonymous in these contexts) be upheld in the face of 
Israel's suffering and her own unfaithfulness? The whole of 40-55 (and 
frankly, much of the rest of the book to the end) is about who God Himself 
provides the way for His promises to hold true. He finds none to help, and 
so His arm must save. And ultimately we find Him "treading the winepress 
alone." Only in Yahweh will Israel boast (familiar?) and be justified. Now: 
In that context, what is "justification"? Justification is when God relieves 
His people from their misery and says that the sins which have hung over 
them collectively are forgiven ("comfort, comfort My people....").

(4) Because Paul has a representative view of Messiah, he insists that Jesus 
has been raised "because of" our justification (Rom 4.25). That means that 
the emancipation, the triumph in the great battle of cosmic justice (for 
that is what Isaiah is about) has been definitively secured, even though 
only consummated for one Man. But that one Man is the representative head of 
His people, and therefore what is available in Him is real eschatological 
justification.

(5) Well then, is justification on the *basis* of something intrinsic in 
God's people? Is that Paul's point in Romans 4? No, I don't think so, since 
he indicates pretty clearly that Christ's own resurrection is the basis of 
their justification. But God does count faith as the righteous response to 
His own righteousness, truth, and faithfulness (Rom 1.17), and the one who 
has faith in Him as the One who raised Jesus from the dead will thus be 
justified. Meaning, in short, a pretty much instrumental view of faith, 
although I seriously question that Paul worked in Aristotelian categories to 
the degree that the Reformers did, if at all.

tim

Tim Gallant
Pastor, Conrad Christian Reformed Church

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