Posts
I finished N.T. Wright's The Climax of the Covenant: Christ and the Law in Pauline Theology.
A question that has been in my mind as I have read this book is whether, according to Wright, Paul believed that the Torah was for all people, not just Jews. My final impression is that Wright thinks that, for Paul, the Torah was given to Israel alone, and that concentrated sin into one nation, Israel, but Christ's death and resurrection resulted in blessings flowing out to all of humanity. Picture a device that contracts, then expands.
But was the Torah one of those blessings that flowed out to all of humanity? On page 244, Wright states that all have Torah now, for the Torah is fulfilled when one confesses that Jesus is Lord and believes God raised him from the dead. On page 250, however, Wright refers to the promise in Micah 4:5ff. that Torah will go out to the nations, but Wright affirms that Christ has replaced the Torah's "outgoing", for Christ and the Spirit accomplish what the Torah could not (presumably righteousness, and also the union of Jews and Gentiles into one body). I'll leave this particular topic right now.
In my reading yesterday, Wright tackled other significant issues, such as Christian supersessionism and eighteenth century deism. I agreed with Wright's critique of certain scholarly tendencies to argue that Paul was not supersessionist, for, as Wright notes, Paul did believe that Jews should embrace Christ. Against those who argue that this sort of thinking led to the Holocaust, Wright states on page 253 that neo-paganism and Christian complicity with it contributed to the Holocaust, and that Romans 9-11 counters Christian arrogance. What's ironic, Wright notes, is that Paul felt that refusing to evangelize the Jews was anti-Jewish, which is the exact opposite of the sentiment that is held today in influential circles. Wright then says that the denial that Christianity is for Jews "actually agrees in form with the German Christian theology of the 1930s---while of course disagreeing in substance, because [such a denial] denies that Christianity is the only way of salvation." That's pretty cheeky!
Regarding eighteenth century deism, Wright states on page 254: "Saying 'all roads lead to God' has of course been the trend in the West since (at least) the eighteenth century, but this facile view, in which the recognition and critique of idolatry becomes very difficult, is not Paul's." Wright also says that it is "within Paul's theology itself, not through some modern mutation of it, that genuine multi-racial religion is to be found."
I suppose that there would be a multi-racial religion if all believed the same way. I myself admire Christianity because it is embraced by different people---of various nationalities and races. I'd like to think, though, that God interacts with people in a variety of ways, since what makes life interesting is diversity, and I have issues with telling people to abandon who they are (though, at the same time, there are cultural practices that are harmful and abusive, which is what makes this issue particularly thorny). Of course, there would be common ground in how God approaches people, since the same righteous and moral God is interacting with those of different cultures.
