Abstract

The Radical New Perspective on Paul distinguishes between two subgroups of believers in Christ in Paul’s time: gentile believers and Jewish or Judaean believers. The same distinction is utilised in supporting contemporary Messianic Judaism, which presupposes an ongoing covenantal relationship between God and contemporary Jews that exists over and above Christianity. Many proponents of Christian Zionism, a Christian movement that envisions the Jews’ return to the land of Israel, utilise aspects of both the Radical New Perspective on Paul and Messianic Judaism in support of their beliefs. Ironically, while the Radical New Perspective on Paul is a certain product of post-holocaust theology, Christian Zionism can be perceived as a perpetuation of a kind of imperial theology that brings injustice to Palestinian people, especially in view of a post-imperial South African context. While none of these connections are inevitable, to point out the relationship between these approaches to identity serves to rethink some of the preconceived notions behind them, as well as some of the (unintended) consequences that arise from them.

Highlights

  • The so-called New Perspective on Paul (NPP; Dunn 1983) and its variants certainly had a profound impact on Pauline scholarship

  • The Radical New Perspective on Paul (RNPP), Messianic Judaism and Christian Zionism can all be understood as preserving the particularism of the Jewish identity in the midst of or arguably against Christianity

  • It has been argued that all three movements share beliefs about an ongoing covenantal relationship between God and contemporary Jews that result in some form of distinction between God’s people

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Summary

Introduction

The so-called New Perspective on Paul (NPP; Dunn 1983) and its variants certainly had a profound impact on Pauline scholarship While these new perspectives on Paul brought new impetus to Pauline studies, studies in 1st-century Judaism and studies in identity formation, this article aims to take a step back and ask certain questions on a meta-level. The presupposition behind such an approach is that Pauline studies cannot exist in a vacuum, but are inevitably interwoven within the worldview, presuppositions, interests and even the religious and/or political agenda(s) of the researcher. The interests and focus areas of Pauline researchers are influenced by the religious expression (e.g. how the Pauline material is interpreted in the church) or political climate of the day (e.g. how Jews or Christians are perceived in the world that we live in)

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