What St Paul Really Said
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Product Description
Product Description
This is a riposte to A.N. Wilson's book, "Paul: The Mind of the Apostle", which posited that Paul of Tarsus, not Jesus of Nazareth, was the founder of Christianity. The book aims to show how Wilson's arguments cover ground already well covered by biblical historians, and that these arguments fail to take account of the evidence which shows that while Paul's achievement was indeed to make Christianity available beyond the bounds of its original Jewish context, this did not involve re-inventing Jesus in the process. Tom Wright is the author of "The Climax of the Covenant", "Colossians and Philemon", "Romans", "Who Was Jesus?" and "The Original Jesus".
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
51 of 55 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
N.T. Wright, whose books I always find enriching, presents a very clear, comprehensive, and enlightening look at the letters of Paul in the context of new scholarship about Paul's time and place. Wright is very orthodox in doctrine, however innovative some of the ideas may be, and shows, once again, that the historical perspective is perfectly compatible with solid Christianity. Highly recommended.
17 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I would describe Wright as a radical conservative. He deeply desires to be submitted to God's word but also challenges the traditional understanding of the Bible. His critique of justification theology is not as radical as some have portrayed it. An important thrust is an ecumenical one: that all who be believe in Christ are in the kingdom irrespective of their position on 'justication by faith alone'. For people who want to think through their Christian faith this is an excelent book.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Written some years before his book `Paul: Fresh Perspectives', this is one of the first of Tom Wright's books to try and work out the implications for ordinary readers of recent developments in thinking about Paul's theology. Penned in Wright's characteristically forthright style, it serves both as a useful introduction to the broad tendencies of the last century of scholarship on Paul, and as a careful re-evaluation of him in his - now understood to be profoundly Jewish - context. Wright's overall message is clear: in getting to grips with Jesus, Paul has revised his Jewish beliefs about the coming of God's Kingdom at the end of time and instead now sees that event - which opposes the rule of Rome with claims of the lordship of Christ - as having already happened, in `the midst of history'. This is the Gospel of Christ, and obedience to him is what it means to be saved.
These are the broad outlines of Wright's helpful book. But a number of aspects of the work detract, in my view, from its overall value. Firstly, his insistence that the Greek word 'dikaiosune' means (only) the righteousness of God, with its implication that this guarantees God's impartiality in judging, risks obscuring the element of justice and partiality to the poor implicit in this word and its Hebrew equivalent. But the implications of this for `Jesus versus empire' are barely explained, despite Wright's professed (and surely correct) belief that Jesus' coming is about his lordship over against that of Rome. Again, while I think Wright is correct to translate the Greek word 'pistis' and its cognates as referring to Jesus' faithfulness to the God of the Israelites and to the Covenant (and not as referring to faith in God as a mental act or effort of belief), he doesn't use a similar term to talk of the believers. So we are left with the impression that faith is primarily about mental assent, rather than about faithfulness to a person, as is surely fundamental to any proper relationship with Jesus.
In his writing on Romans, there is more than a hint of supersessionism - the idea that Christianity has somehow replaced Judaism (for a different interpretation see Keith Elliott's chapter on Romans in the collection `A Postcolonial Commentary on the New Testament Writings', edited by Fernando Segovia and R.S. Sugirtharajah). Finally, Wright is unconvincing about Paul as a Trinitarian believer, for example in his construal of the syntax of Romans 9:5, and in his interpretation of Philippians 2: 5 - 11, where he doesn't take account of how Roman ears would have heard the words. Again, for a different interpretation, see Erik Heen's chapter on this in Richard Horsley's book `Paul and the Roman Imperial Order').
So, for me Wright is not completely convincing. But this is nonetheless a valuable introductory overview of important strands in contemporary thinking about the apostle's approach - and it will certainly be a lively discussion starter for study groups, for example.
These are the broad outlines of Wright's helpful book. But a number of aspects of the work detract, in my view, from its overall value. Firstly, his insistence that the Greek word 'dikaiosune' means (only) the righteousness of God, with its implication that this guarantees God's impartiality in judging, risks obscuring the element of justice and partiality to the poor implicit in this word and its Hebrew equivalent. But the implications of this for `Jesus versus empire' are barely explained, despite Wright's professed (and surely correct) belief that Jesus' coming is about his lordship over against that of Rome. Again, while I think Wright is correct to translate the Greek word 'pistis' and its cognates as referring to Jesus' faithfulness to the God of the Israelites and to the Covenant (and not as referring to faith in God as a mental act or effort of belief), he doesn't use a similar term to talk of the believers. So we are left with the impression that faith is primarily about mental assent, rather than about faithfulness to a person, as is surely fundamental to any proper relationship with Jesus.
In his writing on Romans, there is more than a hint of supersessionism - the idea that Christianity has somehow replaced Judaism (for a different interpretation see Keith Elliott's chapter on Romans in the collection `A Postcolonial Commentary on the New Testament Writings', edited by Fernando Segovia and R.S. Sugirtharajah). Finally, Wright is unconvincing about Paul as a Trinitarian believer, for example in his construal of the syntax of Romans 9:5, and in his interpretation of Philippians 2: 5 - 11, where he doesn't take account of how Roman ears would have heard the words. Again, for a different interpretation, see Erik Heen's chapter on this in Richard Horsley's book `Paul and the Roman Imperial Order').
So, for me Wright is not completely convincing. But this is nonetheless a valuable introductory overview of important strands in contemporary thinking about the apostle's approach - and it will certainly be a lively discussion starter for study groups, for example.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Helpful
This book was a big help for me to catch up on recent thinking about Paul. Wright's usual ludid and accessible style.
Published 19 days ago by J. Lidstone
Starting place to understanding Paul
For those who want to know more about the new perspective on Paul, this is a good place to start. The reader is gently introduced to the contributions of key Twentieth Century... Read more
Published on 15 Jan 2010 by Mr. M. Parnell
Not the Whole Truth!
When I first read this book I thought it was refreshing and true, and written in Tom Wright's usual easily accessible form. Read more
Published on 20 Jun 2008 by TimBall
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