[Dialogue] 1/14/10, Spong: The Origins of the New Testament, Part XII: Romans -- Paul's Most Thorough Epistle

[elliestock at aol.com]

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 Publisher's Note:
Christ Community Church in Spring Lake, Michigan, is offering an e-course on Bishop Spong's book Eternal Life: A New Vision, beginning Monday, January 25. Those interested in enrolling can get details at the Christ Community Church Web site. The e-course is open to people all over the world.




Thursday January 14, 2010 

The Origins of the New Testament
Part XII: Romans — Paul's Most Thorough Epistle

If there is one book in the New Testament that might be called "The Gospel of Paul," it is the Epistle to the Romans. This letter is different from all of Paul's other work in several ways. First, Paul had never been to Rome and so he had no relationship whatsoever with the Roman church. He was not unknown to these Roman Christians, but this church did not view him as related to them in any special way. Neither Paul nor any of his disciples had been its founder. He was thus not in charge of its ongoing life and it was not his responsibility to adjudicate their disputes or to solve their problems. These were the things that had in large measure framed the context of Paul's other letters. Second, and as a direct consequence of this first distinguishing mark, this letter was a reasoned theological treatise with universal themes rather than a response to critical but nonetheless local issues. Third, Paul was a supplicant in this letter to Rome. He was in the position of asking a favor from them, so he was eager to present himself favorably in order to win their support. Paul wanted this congregation in Rome to assist his missionary endeavors by providing him with a base of support, so that he might expand his journeys to places as far away as Spain. To gain that support, Paul was concerned to put his theological understanding of the Christian faith clearly before them and to minimize the negativity that always followed him from conservative parts of the Christian community. For these reasons, Paul's Epistle to the Romans reflects a clear and concise statement of Paul's conception of Jesus, the meaning of salvation as he understood it and his version of what Christianity was all about.
The Epistle to the Romans is Paul at his studied best. It is also the longest and most carefully organized piece of Paul's writing that we possess and is a logical, orderly and systematic treatise. He moves from his introductory and salutary opening verses (1:1-15) to the statement of the theme basic in all of Paul's work. Salvation, he argues, is the gift of God and it is available to all people. This theme is overtly stated in 1:16-17.
Next, he proceeds to build his case by articulating his perception of the need present in both the Gentile world and the Jewish world for the Christian gift (1:18-3:30). Then he spells out his understanding of the Christ (3:21-4:25). He concludes this section of the epistle with what is probably the most crucial and carefully stated words of Paul's career by articulating his understanding of what life in Christ is and can be (5:1-8:39). That brings his basic theological argument to its climax and conclusion as he reaches his crescendo in verses 38 and 39 of chapter 8, where he pens these climactic words: "For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord." We will return to the totality of this Pauline argument in the columns over the next few weeks in order to explicate the earliest understanding we have of the role of Christ in the drama of human salvation. For now, however, I want to move quickly in an effort to create in the minds of my readers a clear picture of the totality of this epistle.
Having come to his powerful conclusion at the end of Chapter 8 Paul next moves on to what can only be understood as a large parenthesis that consumes him in chapters 9 through 11. Here he addresses a question close to his heart as a Jew and about which the Christian movement was at that time still torn in conflict. Why was it that the people of his Jewish nation as a whole appeared to be rejecting the promised gift of salvation that Christ came to bring, which he believed had been promised to them and for which, in Paul's mind, both the Jewish Scriptures and all of Jewish history had been preparing them? So deeply did the Jesus message resonate with the Jewish Paul that he found it all but unfathomable that all Jewish people did not see it as he saw it. So he wrestles with this question in this great parenthesis in a very public way.
Paul introduces Chapter 9 with assertions that cause us to recognize how painful this dilemma was for him. "I am speaking the truth in Christ, "he begins. "I am not lying," he assures them. "My conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit." No one uses those particular phrases unless that person is quite apprehensive as to whether his argument will prevail. Then Paul goes on, with much emotion, to express his "great sorrow and increasing anguish in my heart." He would rather, he says, find himself accursed and cut off from Christ forever than to find his people, his tribe, in their present negative position. He argues that the people of Israel have been given a special relationship with God, which he characterizes with the word "sonship." He recites the treasures found in Judaism: "The glory of the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship in the Temple and the promises of God." He traces this Jewish heritage as it flowed down the centuries from the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph until it came to what Paul believes is God's ultimate gift of salvation found in Christ Jesus. Yet he is aware that the majority of his own kinsmen stand apart from and are even negative to that gift. "Has the word of God failed?" he asks. He finds some consolation in that part of biblical history that suggests that not all the descendants of Abraham were destined to share in the promise. God had chosen Isaac, Abraham's second-born son, over Ishmael, the firstborn. God had chosen Jacob, the younger twin, over Esau, the older twin. These were not examples of God's injustice, he argues, but a recognition of the fact that no one receives the promise of God as a birthright, but only as a gift of grace. It is, he argues, God's prerogative to have mercy on those on whom God decides to have mercy. It is a matter of being receptive. The clay, he states, does not tell the potter what the potter can mold the clay into being. He quotes first from Hosea and then from Isaiah to fortify his argument. He calls Moses to his aid. H e suggests that Israel is still caught in its tribal identity and does not yet recognize that there is no distinction between the Jew and the Greek since God is Lord of all and does not limit divine grace by nationality or even religion.
Paul wants no one to suggest that God has rejected the chosen ones. He reminds them that he is an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. He then recalls that the Jewish scriptures inform us that both Elijah and Elisha were sent to others and not just to the Jewish people.
Finally, as if the answer he was seeking dawned on him as he wrote, Paul came to a new insight, a new conclusion. The rejection of Jesus by the Jews was simply part of God's plan. Because of Israel's apparent inability to hear or to see, the door to salvation had been opened for the Gentiles to enter the Kingdom of God and thus the message of salvation could reach the entire world. Israel's negativity must be seen as playing a role in the divine drama. The hardness of heart that Jews now displayed toward the gift of salvation was an act of divine providence since it was the means whereby God would offer salvation to the world.
In many ways this was a strange argument, but it managed to bring resolution to what was for Paul an enormous conflict. Salvation was God's free gift to all beyond every human division and even Jewish rejection was destined to serve that purpose. So Paul, greatly relieved by this new insight, brings this segment of his letter to the Romans to an end with a doxology: "O the depth of the riches and the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways." Even as Paul says this, he offers his explanation of how the mind of God works.
Having completed this long parenthesis, Paul now employs the word "therefore" to hook together the theological argument of his first 8 chapters with the ethical implications of that argument, to which he now turns in chapter 12. He reminds his Roman readers that they are to treat their bodies as a living sacrifice, "acceptable to God." He urges them not to be conformed to the world, but to be transformed so that they do not think of themselves more highly than they ought to think. He repeats his body analogy that the church must be like the human body, a single whole but with many members. Christians are to rejoice in the gifts of all the members. He urges them to let their love be genuine, to hold fast to what is good, to contribute to the needs of the saints and to practice hospitality. Followers of Jesus are not to be overcome with evil but to overcome evil with God.
Next Paul addresses the responsibility of Christians to the civil authorities. He suggests that all authority comes from God so they are not to resist political power. All earthly rulers, he declares, are "God's servants on earth." It was a variation of the later divine right of kings argument. We might note in passing that this or similar texts have been used throughout history against all revolutionary movements. The British used it against the Americans in 1776 and the North used it against the South in 1860. Martin Luther King, Jr., had to set Paul's words aside to carry out his role as the leader of the Civil Rights Movement. It is a perennial tactic of the established authority against the rising of a new consciousness.
Paul finally introduces relativity into things when he says that nothing is unclean in and of itself, but it is unclean for those who think it unclean. This idea was contained in Paul's plea for followers of Jesus to be sensitive to the values of one another. Christ, he concludes, was even willing to become a servant to the circumcised in order that Gentiles might glorify God.
Having glimpsed the sweep of his entire argument, we will turn in the next weeks to examine the core of Paul's thought in much deeper detail. I hope you will stay tuned.

– John Shelby Spong
 



Question and Answer 
With John Shelby Spong


Sally and Jon from Washington, D.C., write:
Would you comment on the recently passed law in Ireland on blasphemy?
Sally and Jon from Washington, D.C., write:
Would you comment on the recently passed law in Ireland on blasphemy?



Dear Sally and Jon:
The recently passed law in Ireland against blasphemy, which threatens $35,000 fines for any person who "publishes or utters matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion," is a weird throwback to the medieval mentality. It also reflects a period of Irish history in which the tie-in between church and state was so intertwined as to be synonymous. To be Irish was to be Roman Catholic. To be Roman Catholic was to be Irish. If this law is not overturned, Ireland can no longer claim to be a participant in the modern world.
The existence of this law also reveals the low status now enjoyed by traditional forms of religion that needs to be examined and raised to consciousness. First, do religious leaders not understand any religion that needs to be protected from criticism by an imposed legal requirement indicates that it has no ability to stand on its own? Second, surely it must be assumed that any religious system seeking the protection of such a law is admitting that it intends to force its agenda on the entire nation and that this law will be used to mute any opposition to that agenda. I have no problem with any religion entity requiring that its beliefs and values be honored by its own members, even by the imposition of excommunication from that faith community of those who in good conscience cannot accept those beliefs and values. No one, however, should be subjected politically or legally to the values of a religious system that is not his or her own. It seems to me that the separation of church and state was designed to meet that situation quite specifically. We have seen the harm created in the past when this line was crossed and the legal process was used to obstruct birth control and family planning, to outlaw abortion in all situations and to make illegal any end of life counseling, including the use of palliative techniques that end suffering, but may shorten life. Such practices almost inevitably will make religion a political issue, and this law would require opponents of such practices to be silent. Did the Muslims who were being killed as infidels by Christians during the Crusades not have a right loudly and publicly to denounce Christianity for initiating these killings? What would this law have done to them? Did those Christians, atheists or the non-believers who were defined by their attackers as "infidels" and killed or who had their loved ones killed by fundamentalist Muslims not have a right loudly and publicly to denounce the religion that was destroying them? Would the existence of a law like this Irish law not have commanded their silence? Do the Jews, who have suffered centuries of anti-Semitism at the hands of the Christians who have controlled the governments of most Western nations in modern history, not have a right loudly and publicly to condemn their persecutors and the religion that seems to inspire their suffering? Would not a law like this have criminal their just protest?
The assumption behind such a law seems to be that it is impossible for religion to do wrong and thus religion is allowed legally to stand above criticism. History has rendered such a sentimental judgment to be nonsensical. I was raised inside an evangelical Southern Christian tradition that taught me that segregation was the will of God, that women were by nature inferior, that it was OK to hate other religions and especially the Jews, and that homosexuality was a lifestyle choice made by morally depraved people and so ought to be suppressed, punished and even executed. Matthew Sheppard in Wyoming is a recent victim of this reality. If homosexuality is not a choice, I was taught that it was a mental disease for which a cure should be sought. That was what their religion had taught them to believe and so they passed it on to me as a virtuous thing to do. The leaders of my Southern church quoted the scriptures that they called "the Word of God" to justify each of these evils. Had this Irish law been in effect, members of the civil rights movement, the women's liberation movement, those who worked against anti-Semitism and the Gay Rights movement, to say nothing of the movement toward critical biblical scholarship in the life of Christianity itself, would all have been subject to these fines. Criticism of the abuses of religion is as essential to human freedom as criticism of the abuses of government is. This law would make such criticism illegal and punishable by significant penalties. 
It I lived in Ireland and had to face the imposition of this law, I would begin my attack on its credibility by seeking to discover and to expose the sources of support for such a law. Who is pressing for the creation of such a law? What is their agenda? How hidden are their real motives? Since the overwhelmingly dominant religious tradition in Ireland is the Roman Catholic Church, I would be compelled to wonder how and why its passage might serve that institution's needs. Would such a law, for example, be used to stop Irish citizens from criticizing the behavior of Roman Catholic leaders in Ireland as the atrocious record of child abuse on the part of its priests and nuns and its hierarchy's shameful record in covering up these overt crimes becomes public knowledge? Is this the source of the public pressure to pass this law? Would it be used to stop lawsuits that are based on both the abuse and the official cover-up that have now resulted in multi-million-dollar settlements as well as the resignation of several bishops and the documented fact that successive Irish archbishops were thoroughly involved in the cover-up? Only when I see who and what would be protected under this law, and who and what might be imperiled, can I make sense out of such an arcane and offensive new law. Religion, no less than any other human institution, can become demonic. No state should assist in that process by making critical statements about religious practices that might be offensive to religious adherents illegal. I hope this law will be overturned by the good sense of the Irish people. To start that overturning process today would not be soon enough.

– John Shelby Spong






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