The Upper Register Blog

As I said in my previous post, I have some reservations about Seyoon Kim’s argument that we can go where the NT authors themselves did not go. Even though Paul and Luke refrained from extending the implications of the exaltation of Christ into the political realm, we can do so, according to Kim. He writes:

It is … necessary to recognize that in many Western and non-Western countries our changed situation demands a more active Christian engagement in political processes than Paul and Luke exemplify. We have pointed out that both in Paul and Luke an imminent eschatology and political realism played their parts, along with other factors, in discouraging them from thinking about the present materialization of God’s reign or Christ’s Lordship in the political sphere … But most Christians today no longer feel the pressure of an imminent eschatology so greatly, and they therefore naturally are concerned about the present materialization of God’s reign or Christ’s Lordship, however tentative it may be … These … new factors make us free from the inhibition that an imminent eschatology and political realism laid on Paul and Luke. So we should actively seek what changes need to be brought about in the political sphere in obedience to Christ’s Lordship and thus help materialize the redemption of the Kingdom of God politically as well in other spheres of existence. (p. 201)

I disagree with this approach for at least two reasons.

First, I think Kim fundamentally misunderstands the nature of the eschatological context of the NT’s view of politics. For Kim, both Paul and Luke view the eschaton as imminent; therefore, they simply lack any interest in politics. We, on the other hand, “no longer feel the pressure of an imminent eschatology so greatly,” so we are free to develop the political dimension of the gospel. But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the eschatological position of the NT writers. It is not the timing of the eschaton but the nature of the eschaton that conditions their stance toward political issues. If the eschaton is going to bring about a radical change in the conditions of life such that the glory of the age to come totally transcends our present existence, then it matters little whether they viewed the eschaton as imminent (within their lifetime) or as far off in the future. The eschatological state, for the New Testament writers, is not continuous with the present state. Paul says that “flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable” (1 Cor 15:50). The eschatological state will be characterized by a glorified creation and glorified bodies to inhabit that glorified creation. The glorified state is one of incorruption and immortality. It is not merely the eternal continuation of our present fleshly state. Thus, for the New Testament writers, political questions, tied as they are to the fleshly state of this passing age, are necessarily secondary in importance. Furthermore, as a part of the fleshly state, political arrangements are not capable of being transformed or taken up into the state of glory, whether in its “already” state (experienced proleptically by the indwelling of the living Christ through his Spirit) or its “not yet” form (the glorified creation/body).
 
Second, I do not understand what Kim means by “the materialization of Christ’s Lordship” or “materializing the redemption of the Kingdom of God politically.” These sound like nice words, but what do they mean in practical terms? For those on the left it means increasing government funding for social welfare for the poor. Others on the left would say it means ending war in some sort of commitment to pacifism. Those on the right would say it means banning abortion, or having the constitution amended to exclude same-sex marriage, or reducing the size of government and government controls on the free market. What Kim concretely has in mind is left unstated. A related problem is that, even if we were to agree on a specific agenda, how do these things relate to Christ’s Lordship or the redemption of the Kingdom of God? In other words, why should any of the above items, left or right, be viewed in such exalted spiritual terms, as the materialization of the reign of Christ? In my view, the above policies can be debated pro and con, and perhaps some are pragmatically better for society than others, but none are distinctively Christian, and certainly they should not be characterized as the political materialization of the kingdom of God.

But I still have great appreciation for Kim’s book, particularly in the two main sections dealing with Paul and Luke-Acts. Although I am skeptical of his brief thoughts in “Some Implications for Today,” Kim raises some excellent critical doubts about the methodology and exegesis of counter-imperial reading(s) of the New Testament.

This is my third post in my series of posts reviewing Kim’s new book. The first two posts are available here and here. I plan to have one more post where I will interact with his final chapter, “Some Implications for Today.” Although I appreciate the substance of the book, in the final chapters he goes in a direction where I have some reservations.

Part 2:  Luke-Acts

Part 1 of Kim’s book was devoted to Paul’s view of the Roman Empire. Now, in Part 2, Kim addresses the issue of Luke’s view of the Roman Empire. He sets out two seemingly contradictory lines of evidence in Luke-Acts.

On the one hand, Luke in his 2-volume work is clearly at pains to show that both Jesus himself and the Jesus movement that continues in Acts, were politically innocuous and not a threat to Roman authority. In the case of Jesus himself, Luke shows that, even though the Jews accused Jesus, saying, “We found this man misleading our nation and forbidding us to give tribute to Caesar, and saying that he himself is Christ, a king” (Luke 23:2), Pilate concluded after investigating that Jesus was not a revolutionary or an insurrectionist. He said to Jesus’ accusers: “You brought me this man as one who was misleading the people. And after examining him before you, behold, I did not find this man guilty of any of your charges against him” (Luke 23:14). In the case of the Jesus movement, Luke shows that Paul, like Jesus, was accused of being a political threat to Rome, “advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to accept or practice” (Acts 16:19-21) and “acting against the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus” (Acts 17:7). And yet Luke also shows that the Roman magistrates consistently indicated that Paul was not guilty of the charges. See his favorable treatment at the hands of the magistrates of the Roman colony of Philippi (Acts 16:35-39); Gallio, the proconsul of Achaia (18:12-17); Porcius Festus, the governor of Judea (25:18, 25); and Herod Agrippa (26:30-32).

On the other hand, Luke also emphasizes that Jesus is the Davidic Messiah of Israel. He has the angel announce to Mary that Jesus will be the Son of the Most High, that the Lord God will give him the throne of David, and that his kingdom will last forever (Luke 1:32-33). This theme is continued in Acts which makes much of the fact that the risen Jesus has been exalted to God’s right hand as Messiah and Lord (Acts 2:29-36; cp. 4:25-28; 10:36; 13:23, 32-41; 15:17; etc.). In addition, the Messiahship of Jesus is presented as involving a liberation and redemption of Israel in fulfillment of the promises. Even more striking is the fact that Luke presents Jesus as the Davidic King against the backdrop of Caesar’s kingship in Luke 2:1 (“In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered”) and 3:1 (“In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea,” etc.). Although Luke only hints at it, he seems to be implying that Jesus is the true Lord and Redeemer, as opposed to Caesar.

So how do we reconcile these two themes in Luke-Acts? Why would the same work contain such tension within itself, making claims about Jesus that are bound to be misunderstood politically and yet at the same time attempting to make an apologia for Christianity to show that it is not a threat to the Roman political order?

Kim resolves the conundrum by arguing that, for Luke, the redemption that Jesus the Messiah brings is not an earthly deliverance from Roman oppression but deliverance from the kingdom of Satan. Kim shows how the various facets of Jesus ministry all indicate the spiritual nature of the kingdom that he brings. Jesus’ ministry of healings and casting out demons shows that the kingdom of Jesus is a spiritual kingdom involving deliverance from the power of sin, death, and Satan, not overthrow of the Roman government. And the spiritual ministry of Jesus is continued on the spiritual plane after Jesus’ death and resurrection through the apostles who are commissioned and empowered by the exalted Jesus and filled with his Spirit. Like Jesus, they heal the sick, cast out demons, and proclaim a spiritual kingdom consisting in liberation from the power of Satan, but not the overthrow of the Roman Empire.

Now, in Kim’s view, Luke’s spiritual conception of the kingdom that Christ brings does not mean that there are no implications for the here and now. The ascension of Christ and his present reign in and through the ministry of the church empowered by the Spirit have implications outside of the church and beyond the inner private sphere of the individual Christian’s faith. For Kim, Luke’s “ascension Christology” (as he calls it) can and ought to be materialized in the social, political, and physical spheres. However, Kim argues, Luke refrains from drawing out the materialization of the Lordship of Christ into the political arena due to various situational factors. In Luke’s theology, the political dimension of Christ’s lordship is implicit but postponed until the time of the restoration of all things (p. 156, citing Acts 3:20-21). In chapter 11, Kim lays out a variety of situational factors that may have contributed to Luke’s refraining from drawing out the here-and-now, political materialization of the reign of Christ:  his expectation of the imminent parousia of Christ; his political realism and relative appreciation for the benefits of the pax Romana, especially as providing an opportunity for the church to pursue its mission; Luke’s desire to present Christianity as compatible with allegiance to the Roman Empire; and so on.

As I said, in my final post I plan to explain my reservations with Kim’s final thoughts on “Some Implications for Today” (epilogue). However, my summary in the paragraph above already provides some hints of where my reservations lie. For Kim, the political materialization of the present lordship of Christ is implicit in Luke’s Christology, but Luke refrained from drawing out those implications due to certain situational factors that do not apply to us today. Therefore, we are free to draw out those implications ourselves, even though Luke himself did not. I’m not comfortable with this approach, and I’ll explain more in my concluding post.

In the first two chapters of Part 1, Kim examines the arguments of the “Paul and Empire” coalition with regard to four of Paul’s epistles – 1 Thessalonians, Philippians, Romans, and 1 Corinthians. In these epistles Paul employs a number of key theological terms that were also used by the imperial cult, such as:

kyrios (lord), parousia (official visit), epiphaneia (manifestation), apantesis (meeting of citizens with visiting dignitary), eirene kai asphaleia (pax et securitas), soter (savior), soteria (deliverance), ekklesia (the assembly of citizens of a polis), politeuma (commonwealth), dikaiosyne (justice), euangelion (good news), eleutheria (freedom), pistis (loyalty), elpis (hope), and katallage (reconciliation). 

While the impressive terminological parallels at first seem to invite a counter-imperial reading, Kim argues that the “Paul and Empire” coalition is guilty of methodological errors (chapter 3).

Their primary error is “parallelomania,” a phrase coined by the Jewish scholar Samuel Sandmel in 1962 in protest against those who assumed that any parallels in language between the NT and its pagan and Jewish environment proved that the NT authors were dependent on the particular author whose language is paralleled in the NT. The imperial parallels listed above turn out to be superficial, because even if they were originally derived from a Roman imperial context, Paul does not use these terms with any counter-imperial intent or with the aim of subverting the Roman Empire.

Kim argues that while the words may have had political meanings in imperial contexts, it is not warranted to assume that Paul is using those words with the same political meanings or with the intent of deliberately describing his gospel in counter-imperial terms. This may of course occur, but it has to be demonstrated by examining the context of Paul’s usage of these terms.

The closest that Paul comes to critiquing Rome is 1 Thess 5:3 where Paul says, “While people are saying, ‘There is peace and security,’ then sudden destruction will come upon them” (ESV). But, Kim argues, while Paul may have the Roman propaganda of pax Romana in his sights here, he is merely warning Christians not to be lulled into complacency and is not attacking Roman imperialism per se.

But for the vast majority of the above terms, e.g., kyrios, euangelion, dikaiosyne, katallage, etc., analysis of how Paul uses these terms within the context of his writings and mission demonstrates that he used them to convey his own message about the gospel of Christ, not to critique the Roman Empire or the imperial cult. Such a reading must be imposed on the texts in question by assuming deductively that since the Roman order and the imperial cult were so pervasive, that Paul had to have had this political reality in view when using these terms and therefore could only have been using the terms subversively.

Kim writes:

Really they impose anti-imperial meanings onto these terms and string those passages up, sometimes extrapolating the meaning of one passage to another, in order to claim that Paul preached the gospel in deliberate antithesis to the imperial ideology and cult. This looks like a new application of the old-fashioned proof-text method that dogmatists employed to construct doctrines, and dispensationalists used to construct elaborate eschatological scenarios (p. 32).

Chapter 4 is titled, “Factors That Make an Anti-Imperial Interpretation Difficult.” Kim draws attention to 9 factors. I will not rehearse them all there, but here are a few that stand out.

Romans 13:1-7

The most obvious problem for the counter-imperial interpretation is Paul’s positive assessment of the governing authorities in Romans 13:1-7. As many other scholars have noted (e.g., Denny Burk in his recent JETS article, which I summarized here), this is a huge hurdle that the “Paul and Empire” coalition have struggled mightily to overcome with what appears to many to be tortuous exegesis. Kim calls Rom 13:1-7 “the Achilles’ heel for all anti-imperial readings of Paul” (p. 36).

The scarcity of references to the imperial cult

When Paul discusses the problem of pagan idolatry in 1 Cor 8-10 and Rom 1:18-32, he does not single out emperor worship itself. 2 Thess 2:3-12 is one place where Paul does have in mind the emperor cult when he speaks of one who “exalts himself … so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God” (v 4 ESV). Yet Paul appeals to the future appearance of the “man of lawlessness” as an event that has not yet occurred in order to convince the Thessalonians that the day of the Lord has not yet arrived. This “would indirectly confirm that at present he is not concerned about the imperial cult as much as his political interpreters claim he is” (p. 35).

Paul’s expectation of acquittal and release

In Phil 1:19-26, Paul expresses his confidence that when he gets his day in court before Caesar, he will be acquitted and released. Kim argues that Paul himself believed that his message was politically innocuous and, if given the chance, that he would be able to convince Caesar of this as well. “A man with such a hope could hardly have preached the gospel in an anti-imperial sense” (p. 50).

Paul’s socio-political conservatism

Paul’s expectation of the imminent parousia of Christ caused him to be content with the socio-political status quo. When writing to the Corinthian Christians he said, “each one should remain in the condition in which he was called” (1 Cor 7:20 ESV). Accordingly, “Paul never exhorts the believers to subvert the political system of the Roman Empire or change the social structure of their city or province” (p. 51). Instead, he exhorts them to be subject to the governing authorities and to live quietly* and mind their own affairs (Rom 13:1; 1 Thess 4:11). (*The verb is ἡσυχάζω: “Of conduct that does not disturb the peace. Christian leaders endeavored to keep their members free of anything that might be construed as disturbance of public order” [BDAG].)

Paul’s transcendent conception of salvation

This is my favorite of Kim’s factors that make a counter-imperial reading difficult. Paul believed that the fundamental problems confronting humanity did not have to do with political oppression, imperialism, and the like, but with humanity’s alienation from God and its enslavement to the powers of sin and death. In keeping with his view of the basic problem, he proclaimed a gospel of deliverance from sin and death through the atoning death of Christ. All who put their faith in the crucified and exalted Lord Jesus receive the forgiveness of their sins, are restored to a right relationship with God, and have the hope of obtaining a glorified body free from death. Paul also taught that the physical creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption at the parousia (Rom 8:21).

When Paul is expecting such individual and cosmic salvation from God, and very shortly at that, how interested would he be in changing the present “scheme of the world” that “is passing away” (1 Cor 7:31), in order to make life in it a little fuller during the short interim period (v. 29) before such total salvation? (p. 60).

In my next post I’ll deal with Kim’s analysis of the writings of Luke.

Seyoon Kim, Christ and Caesar: The Gospel and the Roman Empire in the Writings of Paul and Luke (Eerdmans, 2008). xvi + 288 pp. Paperback $24.00.

As many of you know, there is a new trend in New Testament scholarship that attempts to read the message of Paul as a critique of the Roman Empire. Paul’s gospel is interpreted as the antithesis of the Roman imperial cult and its propaganda. In the past I have followed John M. G. Barclay’s label and referred to this trend as the “Paul and Empire” coalition. Others speak of “counter-imperial” readings of Paul.

Some of the names associated with this coalition are Richard Horsley, N. T. Wright, Neil Elliott, Robert Jewett, John Dominic Crossan and others. Richard Horsley is the first of this group because he edited three books on the subject in the last 11 or so years:  Paul and Empire (1997), Paul and Politics (2000), and Paul the Roman Imperial Order (2004). N. T. Wright seems to have jumped on the bandwagon in recent years, as evidenced by his book Paul in Fresh Perspective (2005) in which he continues his advocacy of “the New Perspective on Paul” but with the added factor of the “Paul and Empire” approach, resulting in what he now terms the “Fresh Perspective on Paul.”

The “Paul and Empire” coalition may be a recent phenomenon in NT scholarship, but like all intellectual trends, it has its antecedents. For example, early in the 20th century, Adolf Deissmann wrote:  “It must not be supposed that St. Paul and his fellow believers went through the world blindfolded, unaffected by what was then moving the minds of men in great cities,” namely, the imperial cult (quoted by Kim, p. xv).

Another important antecedent is the postcolonial school of hermeneutics in the second half of the 20th century which self-consciously interprets texts (including the Bible) from the point of view of the various “subaltern” people groups that have historically been oppressed and exploited by the great European powers such as Britain, France, and Spain. Postcolonial theory is responsible for the rise of the vague concept of “imperialism” as something that allegedly continues today in various subtle ways – e.g., in the economic and cultural influence of the U.S., as well as its foreign policy – even after the literal colonial empires of the 19th and early 20th centuries have come to an end.

In the preface, Seyoon Kim says that his latest book, Christ and Caesar, grew out of his forthcoming commentary on 1 and 2 Thessalonians (an overhaul of F. F. Bruce’s Word Biblical Commentary). Kim says that he was initially impressed by the parallels between Paul’s theological terms and those of the Roman imperial cult, and so he began his study with the expectation that the counter-imperial approach would help uncover the neglected political dimension of Paul’s gospel. After looking into the matter more carefully, however, he concluded that the terminological parallels are more superficial than real, and that the concerns of Paul in the use of these terms lies not so much in countering the Roman empire as in proclaiming a transcendent salvation in Christ.

After a brief introduction, the book is divided into two main sections:  (1) The Epistles of Paul (pp. 1-71), and (2) The Writings of Luke (pp. 73-190). The book concludes with a Summary and Conclusion (pp. 191-99), an Epilogue titled, “Some Implications for Today” (pp. 200-3), and finally a select bibliography and two indices.

Seyoon Kim has informed me that his new book was released on October 8 and that he just received his author’s copies. As soon as I can get a hold of a copy I’ll read it and review it here.

Here’s the description on the Eerdmans site:

The slogan “Paul and the Empire” is much in vogue in New Testament scholarship today. But did Paul truly formulate his gospel in antithesis to the Roman imperial cult and ideology and seek to subvert the Empire? In Christ and Caesar Seyoon Kim first examines five epistles of Paul exegetically and shows how the dominant anti-imperial interpretation is actually difficult to sustain.

Next he examines the Lukan writings (Luke-Acts) to see how Luke talks about the encounters of Paul and other gospel preachers with Roman imperialism. Kim explores why it is that Luke makes no effort to present Christ’s redemption as materialized in terms of political liberation. Finally, Kim compares the exaltation Christologies of Luke, Revelation, Paul, and Hebrews and inquires about the hermeneutical possibility of developing a political Christology in our present-day context.

Denny Burk (formerly assistant professor of NT at Criswell College, but recently named as Dean of Boyce College) has published an article titled, “Is Paul’s Gospel Counterimperial? Evaluating the Prospects of the ‘Fresh Perspective’ for Evangelical Theology” (JETS 51 [June 2008]: 309-37). It’s a helpful article for several reasons: (a) Burk surveys the major players and books in this movement to read Paul as engaging in a “counter-imperial” polemic; (b) he shows that this movement is motivated by a critique of an alleged “American imperialism” and is therefore popular with the denizens of the evangelical left; and (c) he urges seven points of caution about the “Paul and Empire” movement for those committed to an evangelical view of Scripture:

1. Caution about the use of parallels. Certainly, verbal parallels can be found between Paul’s vocabulary and that of Roman imperial propaganda (e.g., kyrios, soteria, euaggelion, etc.). But Burk warns against “parallelomania” (Samuel Sandmel) and suggests that “we cannot rule out the possibility that some parallels are due to the fact that different movements are grabbing theopolitical language from the same linguistic bag” (p. 317). In addition, it is easily domonstrable that Paul’s use of some of these terms (e.g., kyrios) is driven more by his appropriation of the language of the LXX than by an alleged attempt to subvert the lofty claims of the Roman emperors. “Paul’s explicit and implicit allusions to the Septuagint stand as prima facie evidence that Paul’s theological lexicon was shaped primarily by Judaism” (p. 319).

2. Caution about the distinction between meaning and application (E. D. Hirsch’s distinction). Paul does not explicitly formulate his gospel as a critique of the Roman empire, but he does explicitly state that his gospel is the fulfillment of the OT scriptures. Thus, being “counter-imperial” is not part of Paul’s intended meaning, even if it could perhaps be a legitimate application.

3. Caution about the hermeneutics of the “Paul and Empire” movement. Burk points out that some of the more extreme practitioners like Richard Horsley self-consciously employ a postcolonial, reader-response hermeneutic that diminishes the role of authorial intent. The result is that this approach inevitably leads to distortion of Paul’s message, since the agendas and biases of the interpreter are given a controlling influence over the interpretive process. Burk quotes N. T. Wright (one of the more responsible members of this movement) as saying: “There is a danger — and I think Horsley and his colleagues have not always avoided it — of ignoring the major theological themes in Paul and simply plundering parts of his writings to find help in addressing the political concerns of the contemporary western world” (p. 325).

4. Caution about a narrow application to the Roman Empire. Paul opposed all false gods and pretended powers with the Lordship of Christ, not just the Roman emperors who claimed to be divine.

5. Caution about the “Paul and Empire” movement’s view of Scripture. Many of the members of this movement regard the disputed Pauline letters as pseudepigraphical. This is also related to the fact that they regard the genuine Paul as egalitarian, so obviously the passages in Eph and 1 Tim that teach the subordination of women could not have been written by Paul. Burk has an interesting comment about N. T. Wright in this section. Due to his higher regard for the OT-Jewish background of Paul’s thought and due to his less critical stance toward the disputed Paulines (at least Ephesians and Colossians), Burk thinks Wright’s “participation in this conversation is a needed counter-balance to some of the more radical, critical assumptions made by” others in the movement (p. 328).

6. Caution about the analogy between America and Rome. Here Burk makes an excellent point:  even acknowledging America’s huge economic, military, and cultural influence in the world, America cannot be simply equated with Rome. I loved this line: “Lining the Appian Way with crucified slaves is hardly the moral equivalent of lining the streets of foreign countries with outposts of American capitalism (like McDonald’s, Coca Cola, etc.)” (p. 329).

7. Caution about the interpretation of Romans 13:1-7. Paul’s positive statements about Rome in this passage seem to sit uncomfortably with the theory that Paul was engaged in “counter-imperial” polemic. So Burk looks at two scholars (Robert Jewett and N. T. Wright) who have written commentaries on Romans to see how they struggle to fit Rom 13 into their paradigm. Burk shows that their attempts to interpret this passage as a “subversive” or “implicit” critique of Rome are not convincing.

In conclusion, Burk argues that in spite of its popularity, this approach “does not offer a way forward for evangelical interpreters” (p. 337). I would have to agree.

I have little to say by way of criticism. I would only like to add an eighth item of caution to Burk’s list:  evangelicals should be concerned about this movement because it has the effect of shifting the focus of Paul’s gospel away from the existential issues of personal sin and guilt before a holy God, to structural issues in society as a whole. Sin is not that I have transgressed God’s will but that American foreign policy or global capitalism are oppressive forces causing suffering and pain. Instead of personal guilt, the focus is on systemic structural evil. Thus, Paul’s gospel is not (on this view) fundamentally a message about how Christ delivers us from the wrath to come through his atoning death and resurrection, but a message that God is on the side of the politically oppressed and the environment. And instead of calling fundamentally for a response of repentance toward God and faith/trust in Jesus Christ, this “gospel” (if one can call it that) calls for a new moralism with a political agenda. The “Paul and Empire” movement transforms Paul’s proclamation of Christ into a social gospel that in the final analysis could do without Christ. I do not think N. T. Wright is as guilty on this score as Horsley and others, but I fear that Wright is at least complicit in encouraging a social gospel interpretation of Paul’s gospel (witness his influence on Brian McLaren).

I was in Dr. Seyoon Kim’s office the other day and he showed me the finished manuscript of his latest book, Christ and Caesar: The Gospel and the Roman Empire in the Writings of Paul and Luke. It is scheduled to be released by Eerdmans this September. This monograph will be a helpful critique of N. T. Wright and the “Paul and Empire” coalition.

John M. G. Barclay, “Why the Roman Empire Was Insignificant to Paul” (conclusion) 

Imagine that we meet Paul into the street and he invites us into the house of a believer which we find to be arranged like a theater. He invites us to watch a play called “The Drama of History.” The main characters listed in the dramatis personae are not the Emperor or the Roman Empire but oddly named powers such as “Flesh” and “Spirit,” “Death” and “Life.” The play depicts a comprehensive account of reality, including the political and the historical dimensions. The play is about a conflict, not between the Roman Empire and its barbarian foes or between the church and the Roman Empire. None of the characters on the stage are distinguishably Roman. The children of God are engaged in a continual conflict. At one moment, we see Satan looking a bit like a Roman governor preventing the movements of an evangelist, but in another he is an angel of light or an apostle in the church who needs to be unmasked.

There are stage hands, some called exousiai [”governing authorities,” Rom 13:1], wearing the clothes of various nations, including Greeks and Romans. They are there to sustain the conditions under which the drama can unfold, thus supporting “the good” [Rom 13:4]. But since their ethnicity is not germane, they are listed in the program in small print as diakonoi theou [”servants of God,” Rom 13:4] not as Roman officials or Roman emperors.

The drama concerns the story of the gospel as it advances over the contested terrain of the world. The chief characters are Christ the Son of God and the archic entities we described above mysteriously working not only behind but within in every individual life, every human institution, and every superhuman power. The advance of the gospel is everywhere in danger and frequently frustrated, but we know that the life it imparts is as indestructible as the risen Christ, and that even the most terrible enemy on the stage, Death, is doomed itself doomed to die. Indeed we get a strong sense that the forces of darkness, though presently dominant, are in decline, that the night sky that looms over the stage may be lightening a little in the east. And we cannot help noticing that the children of light keep celebrating the victory of their King by faith, even before it is fully visible and fully enacted. [Minute 36-37]

After the play is over, we emerge into the bright light of the street and see a 10-foot high statue of Augustus.  Surely this must have been represented in Paul’s drama. We find Paul himself. “Brother Paul, surely you were not so naïve or pietistic to ignore this huge reality. What did I miss? Where was the central character, Caesar?” Paul asks us whether we stayed awake! We’ve clearly not seen reality as Paul’s play describes it. We know nobody kata sarka [”according to the flesh,” 2 Cor 5:16], i.e., in normal, “this age” terms. If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation. The play has invited us to a new epistemology.

Paul is not blind. Of course he sees the huge statue of Caesar, but he sees through it and behind it. When you see the world aright, you realize that Rome never was nor will be a significant actor in the drama of history. It is not itself an archic force, only sometimes co-opted by them. Rome does not rule the world, or write the script of its history, or offer anything new, or constitute anything unique. Its grand place has been most effectively subverted by Paul, not by direct challenge, but by subsuming Rome into the undifferentiated crowd of “the rest” (hoi loipoi) [1 Thess 4:13] and by placing her, even in her supporting role for the conditions of life, under the anonymous title diakonoi theou [Rom 13:4]. As we walk past the plinth of the deified Augustus, we realize that Paul’s cross-formed epistemology may be true. It may be the deepest insult that Augustus and his successors ever received.

I consider, then, that Tom’s reading of Paul and that of the “Paul and Empire” coalition is fundamentally misshapen. Tom has taken his expectations of Paul from the street and its Imperial dominated scenery and imposed upon Paul’s drama a rubric and a structure quite alien to it. Ironically, the framework of Tom’s reading of first century reality is much closer to that of Rome than to that of Paul. Like Rome, Tom insists on attributing to the Rome Empire a central role in history. He insists on the importance of the Emperor and that his agency was so powerful that it needed to be parodied or upstaged by Christ. In so doing, I submit, by Pauline standards, Tom is massively promoting the Emperor and massively demoting Christ. It’s hard for me to say this to my Bishop [laughter], but I believe he is reading reality kata sarka and not kata Christon. [Minute 43-44]

After a few more concluding words, thus ended Barclay’s brilliant critique of N. T. Wright and the “Paul and Empire” coalition. Next, I’ll blog N. T. Wright’s response.

John M. G. Barclay, “Why the Roman Empire Was Insignificant to Paul” (continued)

I continue my notes of John Barclay’s lecture critiquing N. T. Wright and the “Paul and Empire” coalition. Again, these are very close but not exact quotes, except as indicated by the use of block-quotes. The previous post was Barclay’s negative statement in which he showed Paul’s lack of interest in the Roman Empire. Now he turns to a positive statement of the drama of history according to Paul and the place of the Roman Empire within that drama.

Positively: The drama of history according to Paul

The main players in this drama are the Spirit and grace, on the one hand, and sin, flesh, and death, or what Paul calls “the powers,” on the other. The Roman Empire is not itself one of these powers, because they operate across all levels simultaneously – individual, social, political, cosmic. Like any empire, the Roman Empire may be co-opted in whole or in part into the ranks of the sons of darkness, but only as an undifferentiated mass whose identity is determined by its allegiance to the powers. Paul’s most subversive act vis-à-vis the Roman Empire was not to oppose it but to relegate it to the ranks of a dependent and derivative entity and to deny it any significance.

We are at a loss at how to categorize the powers such as sin, flesh, and death:

If we call them “cosmic,” it sounds like they are otherworldly, whereas they operate very much in human lives on the earthly stage. If we call them “anthropological,” we lose the sense that they cover the whole gamut of existence – from the sin of lust, to social disintegration, to the corruption and decay that infests the whole cosmos … We have to reckon with comprehensive features of reality covering all levels and dimensions of existence … Following the Greek term archai [”powers”] I shall label this mode of world-description “archic.” These entities are both the principles behind and the powers over every sphere of life. In this sense, there is nothing in this world that is not archic, lining up on one side of the battle or the other. [Minute 24]

Romans 5:12-21. The reign of grace versus the reign of death. The power that has reconfigured the world in Christ sweeps away old divisions, crosses ethnic, social, and political boundaries and creates new boundaries. Formerly, Paul divided the world between Jews and Gentiles. Now he divides the world between those who are being saved and those who are on the way to destruction. Paul saw no interesting or archic differences between Romans and Greeks, only between this present cosmos and the new creation. The crucifixion is what creates this new distinction. The cross divides the world anew.

Paul’s Christ-shaped communities have a radically new understanding of power – not force but service of the other. They are controlled by the love of Christ. These communities do not return evil for evil. They welcome one another as Christ has welcomed them. They strive for peace not warfare. They provide a socio-political alternative, a sign against and a bridgehead into the realm of sin and death.

Undoubtedly Paul saw many fleshly and sinful aspects of the Roman Empire, indeed of all nations and even of the church itself. The battle-line between flesh and Spirit does not pass neatly between the Roman Empire and the rest, because the archic division is pervasive and affects the whole of humanity.

Paul never names any of the idols, not because he’s never heard of Artemis, Dionysus, Serapis, Jupiter, Caesar, or the deified emperors, but because they all reflect the same thing, deflection of worship from the Creator. The emperors and their cult are simply further items in a general category of “many lords and many gods” [1 Cor 8:5], no more significant than any other. There was no need to single any one out. They are all eidololatria [“idolatry”].

Although the present contest is certainly intense, fought out at every level from inner temptation to social conflict to cosmic warfare, Paul knows that the victory won in the cross and resurrection has sealed the fate of the opponents of Christ. With a striking use of the present tense, he declares that “the form of this world is passing away” (paragei) [1 Cor 7:31], and can assure believers that “the night is far gone, the day is at hand” [Rom 13:12]. The stoicheia tou kosmou [”the elemental forces of the world,” Gal 4:3; Col 2:8, 20], powerful and wealthy as they might seem, are shown to be weak and abjectly impoverished (asthene kai ptocha) [Gal 4:9] in the light of the power of the cross and the resurrection and in comparison to the charis [”grace”] of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the wake of the cross of Christ, the rulers of this age are being nullified or de-activated (katargoumenon) [1 Cor 2:6], as is the whole structure of the present state of affairs.

These rulers, we note, are nameless and undifferentiated, because what matters about them is not whether it was this king or that governor who crucified the Lord of glory, but that they belong to this age whose obsolescence and inadequacy is defined by the work of God in Christ. Their defining characteristic is not that they are Roman or Hellenistic or Jewish or whatever. When we hear that they are rulers of this age, that’s all we need to know, because we then know that and how they are on the wrong side, and that and how they are being de-activated by Christ.

In the midst of this crumbling present age, believers can live to their Lord in every sphere of life, since he is the Lord of the cosmos in every dimension, the only Lord who will last. With the hos me [“as if not”] policy of involved detachment [”those who are married should live as if they were not,” etc., 1 Cor 7:29-31], they know that only the work of the Spirit will survive the collapse of the present evil age.  What is of the flesh even in their own lives will be burned up, but they will sow to the Spirit in every dimension of their existence – personal, social, and political – as the imminent harvest will be rich. In their worship they anticipate their eschaton, celebrating the grace that has already begun to reconquer and reconstitute the world. [Minutes 30-32]

Stay tuned for the last installment of Barclay’s lecture.

I was present but my memory was fading, so I began listening to the MP3 of the debate between John M. G. Barclay and N. T. Wright on “Paul and Empire” held at SBL in San Diego on Monday afternoon, November 19, 2007. Here are my notes, at times verbatim, from the first 20 minutes of Barclay’s lecture. When I do quote verbatim, I use the block-quote format.

John M. G. Barclay:  “Why the Roman Empire Was Insignificant to Paul”

This is the second round of a fight that started in March earlier this year. Tom and I are old friends. We go back some 28 years. I regard Tom’s work as the most balanced, measured, comprehensive, and theologically developed in the “Paul and Empire” coalition. Yet I regard his thesis as fundamentally wrong.

Areas of agreement with N. T. Wright:

Shared deep suspicion of imperial power, whether Roman, British, or American. Paul does not recognize the boundary between religion and politics. Agreement that we should not consider Paul an apolitical figure with a privatized piety. Paul is very interested in power, but does not line up on either right or left of political spectrum. Agreement that Paul’s gospel is deeply confrontational, the reign of Christ versus his enemies. The cross creates a distinction between this age and the new creation. Endorse Tom’s attempt to integrate Paul’s political thought with the rest of his theology. Agreement that we should learn from Classical scholars that the imperial cult was extremely important for most of Paul’s contemporaries in the form of festivals, games, statues, coins, temples, etc. Even agree that some of Paul’s language (euangelion, soter, kyrios, parousia, ereine, etc.) could have been heard as analogous to the language used in Imperial propaganda. But the question is not how it could have been heard, but how Paul meant it, how he framed and focused it.

Tom reads Paul’s theology as intended to counter the propaganda claims of the Roman Empire, to parody and upstage Caesar, and to undermine the Imperial cult … Tom finds this assault on Rome sometimes explicit, often implicit in Paul’s language and narrative, and occasionally – as in Philippians 3 — in code. I think, to the contrary, that Tom is simply hallucinating [laughter], that there is no evidence that Paul had the Roman Empire or the Imperial cult particularly in view, and that better understood, Paul’s theology is deeply political, but in a way that makes Rome, not a central player in the history of the world, but a bit-part, a member of a largely undifferentiated crowd in a drama governed by much greater and much more pervasive powers. [Minutes 6-7]

Negatively:

There is no evidence that Paul accords special role to Roman emperor. He never refers to any Roman governors or emperors by name, although he does mention King Aratus, thus showing he’s not averse to naming rulers. Paul never refers to Roman deities. He never refers to his Roman citizenship positively or negatively. He never identifies the cross as a Roman punishment. It is the Jews (1 Thess 2:14) or the nameless ”rulers of this age” (1 Cor 2:6-8) who killed Christ. The offence of the cross is drawn out in relation to the Jews and the Greeks, never in relation to the Romans in particular. Paul attributes his punishments and persecutions to the Jews, never to the Roman authorities. When he does refer to civil rulers, they are always anonymous and never specifically identified with Rome.

Tom and others in the ”Paul and Empire” coalition argue that Paul uses “code” or “hidden transcripts.” This whole scenario strikes me as absurd. There is not a single hint in Paul’s writings of a second meaning. Why on earth would Paul need to write in code? Paul’s letters are private communications carried by trusted friends. There were no secret police in Paul’s day opening the early Christians’ mail to look for signs of political insubordination.

What would Paul be saying that needed to be coded? That Caesar is not God or son of God? Philo said so openly and more or less directly to the emperor’s face. That Roman governors were responsible for terrible miscarriages of justice? Josephus says that time and again in public writings that were even presented to emperors. That the empire brings as much war as peace, injustice as justice? Even Tacitus, from the heart of the establishment, can see that and say that in his famed history of Rome. That one should not take part in the Imperial cult? Paul said that in 1 Corinthians with regard to eidolothuta.  Josephus said the cult was useful neither to God nor human beings. The image of Paul as too afraid to say what he thinks strikes me as bizarre. Paul expected persecution. He would hardly have tried to avoid it by speaking in code.

We should learn from the history of exegesis:  the Valentinians teach us that once you start looking for code in Paul, you can end up just about anywhere you want.

At base, Tom’s argument works by inference:  the Roman Empire was so important, Paul must have said something specifically about it. Rome and Caesar must be somewhere in Paul’s letters. We just have to adjust our spectacles. But if we are determined to find it, we will.

You know the story of the little boy in the crowd watching as the emperor paraded down the street in his supposedly new clothes and was bold enough to say, “But the emperor is naked!” I feel like that little boy, only in this case, when I am bidden to watch the emperor walking around Paul’s letters, I rudely blurt out, “But I see no emperor!” [Laughter] Sorry to be so impolite, but I try to tell the truth. 28 years ago you taught me, Tom, in reading the New Testament to pay very close attention to what is actually there and not to read any theologies or history-of-religions backgrounds that have to be imported into the text. I learned well from you during those two enthralling years of Cambridge supervision and I have come back to remind you of your lesson. [Laughter]

But what if Paul has his own peculiar perception of the world? What if the event that dominates history for Paul is not the Roman Empire but the cross and resurrection of Jesus and the new creation that these events inaugurated? What if that event changes Paul’s understanding of history? We have to read Paul’s letters according to his vision of reality, not according to that of his contemporaries.