New Perspectives on Paul: A Reflection on Luther's Contribution to the Doctrine of Christian Grace on the Occasion of the Fifth Centenary of the Reformation

Abstract

New Perspectives on Paul:A Reflection on Luther's Contribution to the Doctrine of Christian Grace on the Occasion of the Fifth Centenary of the Reformation Paul O'Callaghan This study will deal with different ways (or "perspectives") in which Paul's central teaching on justification, faith, grace, and works have been interpreted in the context of the Reformation, and especially in the teaching of Martin Luther. It is made up of three parts. The first briefly considers Luther's own interpretation of Paul and its applicability or otherwise to the situation of the Church in society five centuries ago. The second part presents an interpretation of Paul commonly called the "new perspective," which has consolidated over the last fifty years or so, a perspective that recontextualizes Luther's view, situating it within challenges of an ethical and ecclesiological kind typical of the late-twentieth-century Christian world. The principal authors involved include E. P. Sanders (especially his work Paul and Palestinian Judaism), N. T. Wright, and James D. G. Dunn.1 In the third place, we shall consider how the "new perspective" has been contested in different ways of late, and not only by classical Lutheran authors who insist on the perennial value of Luther's intuition. We shall pay special attention to the recent work of the Anglican exegete John Barclay, Paul and the Gift.2 [End Page 797] Luther's Perspective on Paul's Doctrine of Justification by Faith Luther consistently envisaged his understanding of the Gospel as centered on the doctrine of justification by faith alone,3 without works, as a rediscovery of St. Paul's fundamental and determinative intuition as regards the justice of God. For Luther, iustitia Dei, the "righteousness of God," is not the justice by which God judges our actions and rewards (or punishes) them accordingly, but rather the justice by which God accepts the believer as being truly just. That is to say, justification is by faith, not by works: humans cannot win justification by their good deeds; they can only accept it gratefully in faith. Although the Christian is meant to carry out an abundance of good works, the latter are of no use in winning or maintaining divine favor. This, of course, decisively influences Luther's understanding of salvation, of the Church, and of ethical life. The context in which Luther's revolution took place, as he saw it, constituted an almost exact replica of the situation Paul found himself in when faced with the Judaizing movement within nascent Christianity. He applied the Pauline tension between "faith" and "works" (especially present in Galatians and Romans)4 to the tension that existed between his personal situation as a conscience-smitten monk seeking a merciful God and the late medieval Church enslaved (as he saw it) to a religion of works far-removed from the original Gospel message of simplicity and freedom. The comparison Luther made between the two historical situations, in spite of obvious religious and cultural differences that not even he denied, is highly significant. If Luther's contention was right, his would be an epoch-making rediscovery of authentic Christianity, and by insisting on "justification by faith alone," he would be paying signal service to the Church's evangelizing mission. His doctrine, as expressing anew Paul's authentic teaching, would necessarily constitute a living statement of the permanent and perennial core of Christian life and doctrine, in his own time as well as five hundred years after the Reformation began. [End Page 798] And on the same account, the medieval Church Luther encountered could well be accused of having severely prejudiced, at least in practical terms, the core belief of Christians that God, in his mercy, had sent his only Son to save his people from their sins. However, in attempting to re-present authentic Christian teaching in terms of the doctrine of justification by faith, Luther made two assumptions, both of which need to be carefully appraised.5 Paul's Conversion and Luther's Firstly, Luther took it for granted that Paul underwent the same experience he (Luther) had undergone before discovering the true meaning of iustitia Dei, the "righteousness of God," the justice by which...