The Rhetorical Paul: Philip Melanchthon’s Interpretation Of The Pauline Epistles

Abstract

In the sixteenth century, no Protestant interpreter of Paul had more influence on his contemporaries than Philip Melanchthon. To say that Melanchthon saw how to rescue dialectics for use in the humanist curriculum, however, does not undermine his deep commitment to the rhetorical methods of his time. In the Romans commentaries of the 1530s, he goes on the warpath against the Romanists, enthusiasts and Origenists, defending his Apology of the Augsburg Confession in the process. Large portions of Luther's preface were in fact merely a reworking of Melanchthon's exegesis. Scholars have expended an inordinate amount of effort to locate and date Melanchthon's earliest biblical lectures. The construction of introductions and outlines to biblical books stretches back into the history of the early church. In Pauline studies today, the role of justification by faith in the apostle's writings looms large.Keywords: Augsburg Confession; humanist; Paul; Philip Melanchthon; Romans