You guys probably think I'm slacking. It's actually crunch time, as in, we are in week 5 of 7 of class and EVERYTHING is due at once. I'm knee-deep in a close reading assignment (I chose Romans 1:18-32 - 'cause you know, I'm nothing if not easy and non-controversial) and am still trying to answer these weekly assignments with as much fervor (and annoyance to my classmates) as possible. All that to say...not slacking, just tired and crazy which is my preferred m.o.
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(2) Heralds of the Good News: “Lord, who
has believed our report?”:
(A) Discuss your basic understanding of Paul’s main point(s)
in Romans 9:30 – 10:21. What might Paul mean when he says that Christ is the
“end/goal/destiny (Greek =τέλος; telos) of the L/law” (10:4)? How does Paul
read both Leviticus (18:5) and Deuteronomy (30:12–14), and how does this relate
to the role of the Law (Torah) and the resurrected Christ? (What do you think is Paul’s message? How does this section relate to what
comes before [9:1–29] and after [11:1–36]? Moo, Romans, [p. 618] claims that this section
is “something of an excursus from Paul’s main argument in chaps. 9–11.” Do you
agree?)
2a. I
find myself, in Week 5, perhaps being weighed down a bit not necessarily (since
it would be easy to blame) by Paul’s incredible mind but rather, by my own as it
continues to try diving so deeply into what we are learning that I might fail
to step back and go, “Ok, big picture – don’t miss it.” While Paul had his regular main points all
interwoven and tied back to Old Testament Scripture, the “big picture” main
point in 9:30-10:21 is his effort to hammer home his entire point of the epistle:
to display God’s righteousness in the salvation that comes through the
crucified and risen Christ. I read this passage as a continuation of
Paul’s tireless effort to bring those in Rome to Christ, and he is doing it in
such a way that maybe, just maybe they won’t miss this time.
I believe that Paul might mean (in fact, I think he does mean…) that Christ is the end of
the law for righteousness to everyone who believes, as righteousness comes
through Jesus, not through the Law.
Jesus is the fulfillment of
the Law of Moses. Christ is the end of
the law; He is (and was always) the goal
of the law. Christ is what the law was
always pointed toward. Jesus Christ is
the culmination of the Torah so that there can be right standing and covenant
membership for all who believe.
David Lincicum’s Chapter 14 in Blackwell/others book
painted a helpful picture in terms of understanding how Paul read both
Leviticus 18:5 and Deuteronomy 30:12-14 in relation to the role of the Torah
and Christ’s resurrection. Basically,
Paul’s argument here is that it was not only because of God’s divine hardening
that Israel missed the Messiah they had been awaiting, but also because they failed
to approach the law in the right way.
The law should have led Paul’s fellow Jews to faith in Jesus as the
Messiah, but Paul adduces they messed it all up and because of that, there is
now an inclusion of Gentiles in the righteousness of covenant community. “The ‘righteousness’ that Israel
unsuccessfully sought and the Gentiles unintentionally found, Paul argues, is
available to all indiscriminately on the basis of faith in the Messiah
(10:5-13).”
The fact that Paul writes about this situation/concept
here (that Christ is the end goal of the law), in this section [of 10:4], has
an absolute direct and brilliantly calculated bearing on the whole topic of
election which preceded it in Chapter 9.
It was, in my mind, a rhetorical Paul-like cry out of “How could you?” to God’s chosen people
(Israel). Paul had to bring home the
concept that there had always been a process of election inside the perceived
impenetrable walls of Israel. And
because of that, of course God’s word
had not failed and of course it was
entirely conceivable that some (of the chosen) hadn’t believed.
Therefore, Paul may have very well read the Leviticus and
Deuteronomy passages strictly in an effort to emphasize the “why” behind the
fact that they (again, Israel, God’s chosen people) were unrighteous since they
had failed to have faith in Jesus as their Messiah. Paul obviously knew wholeheartedly what the
misguided belief/response/reaction had been to the law to date, and thus had to
appeal to additional texts to substantiate further his claim and illuminate the
differences of the “kinds” of righteousness.
But I believe it goes beyond that. The more I thought about Moo’s response to
Johnson, the more I began to question if Paul perhaps went to those passages to
sort of appease the Jews and their disgruntled mindset regarding (some of)
their exclusion and Gentile inclusion.
The Gentiles did not have the Jews’ “stories” or their chosen “lineage”
and therefore their knowledge of Leviticus and Deuteronomy. Sure, they may have known or heard or even
memorized the passages, but it wasn’t the
same. Humans are proud of their
heritage, their genealogy, and knowing where they “came from” because it
carries the most emotional sense-of-belonging weight. So, if you’re Paul, and you are trying to
reassure the Jews that God is still faithful to His promise to them, but yes,
there are other “chosen” people whom He loves too, wouldn’t you use the
equivalent of what we call today “an inside joke?”
I side with Johnson on her position that Paul was
teaching the content in Romans 9-11 because of Jewish unbelief, but ALSO
because (and probably equally if not more
importantly because) the acceptance of the Gospel among great numbers of Gentiles
was a big deal. How could you, as a Jew
and part of “chosen Israel” not think that maybe God didn’t mean they were actually chosen or worse, that they
could even believe at all what He said and His promise would remain true? Paul had to work double-time in Chapters 9-11
to show both God’s impartiality and His faithfulness.
That Paul has a “positive evaluation” (Moo) of Israel in
the subsequent Chapter 11 substantiates my position further. To me, the 9:30-10:21 section is not an
excursus from Paul’s main argument within the three Chapters (9-11) as a
whole. Rather, I liken it to an age-old
tactic of “parents outsmarting their kids”:
Paul was saying that “Hey, just because I volunteer in your classroom
and am nice to that other little girl/boy does not mean that what I have been
saying to you since they day you were born isn’t true. It just means I want them to succeed in
school too.”
2b. According to Lincicum (Blackwell/others book, Chpt. 14),
in the “most puzzling element of a passage that could by no means be called
straightforward, Paul apparently contrasts two kinds of righteousness in
10:5-8: ‘righteousness that is by the law’ and the ‘righteous that is by
faith.’” These different “kinds” of righteousness are
supported by Paul’s Old Testament references, Lev. 18:5 and Deut. 30:11-14,
respectively.
I found the comparing and contrasting of Philo of
Alexandria to Paul helpful in un-muddying the waters under the heading of
righteousness in this part of Paul’s argument.
Philo apparently paraphrases Deut. 30:11-14 more than once in his works,
and specifically in his treatise On the
Virtues, he uses it to speak of three “ways” of repentance – in thoughts,
intentions, and actions (which correspond to the Septuagint’s heart, mouth, and
hands.)
Contrarily, when Paul quotes Deuteronomy in Romans
10:6-8, he makes three meaty allegorical assessments. First, in Deut. 8 and 9, Israel is warned not
to grow proud after they have entered the land of promise and subsequently say
in their hearts “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this
wealth for me.” This is paralleled to
Rom. 9:4 where Paul is warning against self-reliance. Next, Paul removes the idea of any thought of
“doing” the commandment within the Deuteronomic text, paving the way for his
third assessment: replacing the commandment (in Deuteronomy) with Christ.
Immediately before this passage, Paul argued that the
“righteousness” which Israel unsuccessfully sought and the Gentiles
unintentionally found, is available to all indiscriminately on the basis of faith in the Messiah (10:5-13). Thus, the “righteousness of God” was in
direct relation to the “faith in Jesus Christ.” If they simply had faith in
Jesus – the end of the law – then they would see God’s righteousness in
action. His promise would be fulfilled
in the resurrection.
(C) Next,
discuss how you see Paul engaging the message of the Prophet Isaiah
(particularly Isaiah chs. 51–55, & 65:1–2). How does Paul relate his own
mission to the mission of the herald of the good news in Isaiah’s prophecy
(Isa. 52:7; Rom. 10:15)?
2c. According to Keck, Paul is using Isaiah’s words
(10:20-21) to reference the current abnormality which he had already stated in
9:30-31. The believing Gentiles – who
had not striven for righteousness based on faith - “have attained it,” whereas
Israel “stumbled.” Paul then uses the prophet a second time to
drive home his point by applying what Isaiah said first to the Gentiles: “I am sought of them that asked not for me; I
am found of them that sought me not: I
said, Behold me, behold me, unto a nation that was not called by my name (Isa.
65:1, KJV). Paul then goes on to point
out in v.21 that the next quotation does
apply to Israel and that is: “But of
Israel he says, ‘All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and
contrary people’ (Isa. 65:2). Keck makes
sure to remind us not to miss that this quote expresses both Israel’s enduring
obstinacy and God’s persistent
“Nevertheless,” which then cues up chapter 11 nicely.
In Romans 10:8-13, Paul has outlined an amelioration “from
the word of faith that we preach” to the response of a person who calls on the name
of the Lord and thus participates in righteousness and salvation. He then retraces this progression in 10:14-15
from an antithetical perspective via very Paul-like rapid rhetorical
question firing. Those questions build
on each other in almost anticipatory fashion culminating in the necessity for
preachers to be sent out with the Good News.
His language connects to the texts he has just cited (i.e. “call” 10:12-13,
cf. Joel 2:32; “believe” 10:9-11, cf. Isa. 28:16; “preach” 10:15, cf. Isa.
52:7; “believe” 10:16, cf. Isa. 53:1; “hear” 10:16, cf. Isa. 53:1). Paul’s very
last question of “How will they preach unless they are sent?” references
Isaiah 52:7, revealing (and probably reassuring his own mind and self which had to doubt/wonder sometimes, just like
all of us) the crucial role that his own mission plays in the outworking of God’s
redemptive plan.
