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Paul's Theology: Consistent or Inconsistent?*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Extract

. Recent discussions of Paul's theology have reached a virtual consensus that Paul is not a dogmatic theologian, but rather an interpreter of the gospel. In this light we would expect that the tendencies of the history of Christian thought to discover a dogmatic ‘Mitte’, from which all other elements of his thought can be deduced, would have ceased. And yet the immense dogmatic pressure of the Christian tradition still persists: with their search for ‘die Mitte’ of Paul's thought which they locate in justification by faith and/or in the righteousness of God, both Barth and Käsemann show that the dogmatic quest of the church from the time of Augustine to Luther and Calvin is still alive.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1988

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References

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page 375 note 1 Cf. in this context Rom 4. 17: ‘in the presence of the God, in whom he (Abraham) believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist’.

page 376 note 1 Time and space forbid me to show the relation of chs. 12–15 (the most contingent chapters of Rom!) to the coherent flow of the argument.

page 376 note 2 The twin motifs of apocalyptic glory (ch. 15) and church-unity constitute also the coherent motifs of 1 Cor, albeit under quite different contingent circumstances.

page 377 note 1 Notwithstanding my emphasis on the contingent situation of the Roman church, it is clear that, because of Paul's own contingency (the experiences of his missionary career), Paul's letter not only applies to Rome, but also transcends the Roman contingency. For his argument has ecumenical validity and has, besides Rome, Spain and Jerusalem in mind. In this respect Bornkamm's characterization of Rom as ‘Paul's last will and testament’ is valid. (Cf. Bornkamm, G., ‘The Letter to the Romans as Paul's Last Will and Testament’, Australian Biblical Review 11 [1963] 214.)Google Scholar