Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of abbreviations
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Theology in a nutshell: The opening of the letter as a foretaste of what follows
- 3 Theology in process: An outline of the argument of the letter-body
- 4 Major concerns
- 5 Sorting the sources
- 6 To the Romans a Roman? The rhetoric of Romans as a model for preaching the Gospel in Rome
- 7 Romans in its canonical context
- 8 The impact of Romans and interactions with Romans in Church history
- 9 The relevance of Romans reconsidered
- Further reading
- Index of authors
- References
- Index of subjects
2 - Theology in a nutshell: The opening of the letter as a foretaste of what follows
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of abbreviations
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Theology in a nutshell: The opening of the letter as a foretaste of what follows
- 3 Theology in process: An outline of the argument of the letter-body
- 4 Major concerns
- 5 Sorting the sources
- 6 To the Romans a Roman? The rhetoric of Romans as a model for preaching the Gospel in Rome
- 7 Romans in its canonical context
- 8 The impact of Romans and interactions with Romans in Church history
- 9 The relevance of Romans reconsidered
- Further reading
- Index of authors
- References
- Index of subjects
Summary
For didactic reasons the opening formula of Romans offers itself as an entrance into the theology of the letter. These seven verses are easy to memorise and can serve as a helpful frame for keeping important topics or aspects of Romans in mind.
All letter openings of Paul share a structure of three parts: sender, addressee, greeting. In some cases the opening contains little more than the names of persons and places (see 1 Thess. 1:1; Phil. 1:1–2). In others we find substantial extensions of certain parts (e.g., of the address in 1 Cor. 1:2 or of the greeting in Gal. 1:3–5). These extensions are no mere embellishments but a deliberate, premeditated prospectus of the following letter. Thus in Gal. 1:1 the double ‘no’ ‘apostle not of human origin nor through human mediation’ anticipates Gal 1:10–24, where Paul insists on his independence from Jerusalem because of his being called by a direct revelation from God. His mentioning of Christ's death in Gal.1:4 interprets the term ‘grace’ of the greeting in v. 3 in a way which recurs in Gal. 2:20–21. The address of Galatians is the shortest of all: apparently Paul had no mind to pay compliments to the Galatian churches: they were still churches, of course, but … (see Gal. 1:6–8).
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- Information
- The Theology of Paul's Letter to the Romans , pp. 21 - 29Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2003