Reading Paul with the Reformers: Reconciling Old and New Perspectives. By Stephen J.

Rostislav Tkachenko

doi:10.29357/issn.2521-179x.2018.20.23

Abstract

Book review: Reading Paul with the Reformers: Reconciling Old and New Perspectives. By Stephen J. Chester. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2017, xxi + 478 рр.; ISBN: 978-0802848369 (hbk.); 60 USD.

Highlights

Reading Paul is an interdisciplinary study that examines the hermeneutics and exegetical theology of the great Protestant Reformers of the sixteenth century and their relation to crucial contemporary discussions in the field of Pauline studies. It is both a research into the reception history—the reception of Paul in the Reformation and of the Reformation Pauline interpretation in the contemporary scholarship—and an exercise in NT exegesis informed by historical theological data
The Reformation tradition of reading Paul used to be uncritically accepted by Protestant exegetes in the 17th-19th centuries but is frequently criticized and altogether rejected in contemporary scholarship, especially after the advent of the New Perspective on Paul whose proponents have convincingly shown that the earlier pictures of the Second Temple Judaism and religious context of the first century were extremely distorted and, they concluded, the Reformation exegesis of Paul’s writings must have been invalid
The second reason that forms Chester’s rationale is exegetical in nature: the Reformation exegesis has some relevance for contemporary discussions in Biblical Studies because these discussions are both shaped by the Reformers’ findings and can be further enriched by the critical engagement with their thinking

Summary

Introduction

The second reason that forms Chester’s rationale is exegetical in nature: the Reformation exegesis has some relevance for contemporary discussions in Biblical Studies because these discussions are both shaped by the Reformers’ findings and can be further enriched by the critical engagement with their thinking. Reading Paul is an interdisciplinary study that examines the hermeneutics and exegetical theology of the great Protestant Reformers of the sixteenth century and their relation to crucial contemporary discussions in the field of Pauline studies.

Results

Conclusion