Faulty praxis can undermine the truth of the gospel as effectively, if not more effectively, than false teaching. Protestants, who have so boldly sought to uphold the truth of justification by faith in theory, have often denied it in practice. The doctrine of justification by faith alone, which should result in freedom and assurance, has led in many circles to morbid introspection and doubt. People have placed their faith in faith itself and have lost the comfort of this glorious doctrine.
Galatians is one of Paul’s great defences of the doctrine of justification by faith alone and it should be prescribed reading for many Protestant churches today. For far too long people have presumed that the book is a polemic against ‘earn-your-own-salvation-ism’. This has enabled Protestants to use the book to justify themselves, rather than as a spur to godly change. Many Protestants have left the book with nothing but doctrinal indicatives and have missed its radical imperative.
One of the great blessings of the New Perspective on Paul is seen in its attack upon the hegemony of this reading of Paul over others within the Protestant church. As I have read Galatians in the light of the NPP I have been struck by how relevant the book is for the church today. I remain convinced that the NPP reading of Galatians is not a novel doctrine, but constitutes a rediscovery of a crucial aspect of the gospel that has been dangerously ignored for a long time.
The doctrine of justification by faith is preached in a radically individualistic manner in many Protestant churches. The doctrine is understood to be about how a sinner gets right with a holy God — by faith alone and not by moral effort. All of this is gloriously true, of course, but it falls short of Paul’s chief point. The fact that a man does not save himself by moral effort is elementary and straightforward in the light of the Bible. Paul’s doctrine of justification by faith, whilst presupposing and declaring this fact throughout, is far more radical and challenging than this.
Peter’s undermining of the gospel
In Galatians 2, Paul recounts the confrontation that he had with Peter in Antioch. It seems strange to many that the people that Peter choose to eat and not to eat with would be seen as such an issue. However, Paul realized that the gospel itself was at stake. By withdrawing from fellowship with the Gentiles as a result of his fear of certain Jews, Peter was undermining the truth of the gospel.
What is the Gospel?
The message of the gospel is simply this: Jesus the Messiah has achieved the promised victory of YHWH, the covenant God, at the very nadir of Israel’s history. By His death and resurrection He has fulfilled the vocation of Israel, defeated the adversary of God’s people, and ushered in the kingdom of God and the new creation. By His faithful death He has set the world to rights, resulting in deliverance for all who believe in Him. He has formed a new family, uniting people of every tribe, tongue and nation in the new community of the church, a community that is declared to be in the right in the present on the basis of His faithful death and resurrection.
This contrasts with a common evangelical explanation, which sees the gospel as little more than the fact that sinners can get right with a holy God by faith alone. Nothing in the gospel as I have presented it conflicts with this explanation. However, to describe the gospel in this way is to tell only a fraction of the story. The gospel cannot be abstracted from redemptive history as if it were some timeless message. It is not. The gospel is the message concerning that which the covenant God has achieved in the Messiah.
What did Peter’s error consist in?
I do not believe that we have any warrant to argue that Peter believed that the Gentiles had to be circumcised in order to be saved. Peter’s actions were prompted more by fear than by theological principle. Peter was not arguing for the position of Acts 15:1; he clearly did not hold this. What Peter was doing was dangerous in a far more subtle manner.
As Hays points out, there is no indication that the delegation from James was directly pressing for Gentiles to be circumcised. This question had already been settled by the Jerusalem council. Although there are clear suggestions that there were people within the churches who did not take the decision of the Jerusalem council to be binding and that false brethren (cf. 2:4) still existed, there is no reason to suppose that Peter would have understood his actions to constitute a denial of the council’s decision.
The manner in which Peter was ‘compelling’ Gentiles to be circumcised was by ‘manipulative group pressure’, not by physical coercion. By withdrawing from fellowship with them, Peter was exerting pressure upon the Gentiles to re-establish table fellowship by submitting to the dictates of the Torah.
What was the agenda of the Judaizers?
It has been suggested that the Judaizers wanted to make the fledging church more palatable to their Jewish compatriots. They were members of the church, but they also wished to be seen as good members of the Jewish community. The Jewish community would not have looked favourably upon Jewish Christians eating with Gentile Christians who did not submit to Torah. With a burgeoning Zealot movement, Jewish people who failed to observe separation from Gentiles might become targets for reprisals. By encouraging Peter and others to withdraw from fellowship with Gentiles, the Judaizers could reassure their countrymen that Jewish identity was not being compromised.
The Jerusalem council had already acknowledged the legitimate existence of a Gentile mission. Indeed, Peter’s speech at the council had maintained that God made no distinction between Jews and Gentiles. The problem at Antioch resulted from the fact that the Jerusalem council had failed to deal with the issue of how Jews and Gentiles were to relate together socially. I am sure that many of the Judaizers would have been able to acknowledge the reality of what God was doing among the Gentiles. Nonetheless, to maintain their Jewish identity, they refused to eat with them.
How does Paul Respond?
Paul responds to Peter by arguing that his withdrawing from the Gentiles was undermining the very truth of the gospel. Paul draws attention to the fact that Peter himself wasn’t even consistent in his observation of the Torah (cf. 5:3). It is very clear that Paul is not claiming that Peter had to be sinlessly perfect; blameless keeping of the law simply did not require this (e.g. Luke 1:6).
Paul, as a former Pharisee (although cf. Acts 23:6), was well aware that the Torah was not something that could be adopted piecemeal. By being circumcised a person was bound to submit to all of the requirements of the Torah. Submitting oneself to circumcision was tantamount to accepting the authority of Torah over every area of your life. Peter, by his failure to live consistently with Torah was being hypocritical in putting social pressure upon the Gentile converts to become circumcised and observe the Torah. Paul drew attention to this.
In Galatians 2:15f. Paul adds weight to his argument. He alludes to the Jewish tradition that would affirm its separation from Gentile sinners. Peter, Paul and the Judaizers all share this common ethnic identity. Paul proceeds to show that they also share a common confession about Jesus the Messiah. Their common confession is that a man is set right (‘justified’) by the faithful death of Jesus Christ (‘the faith of Jesus Christ’) and not by the badges of Jewish identity established by the Torah (‘the works of the law’).
In verse 17 Paul shows how their common confession is at odds with their common Jewish identity of separateness from Gentiles. Paul argument runs something like this:—
“Let’s grant you your point for the sake of argument; let’s say that those who eat with Gentiles are sinners. OK, where does this leave me and others like me? I am a Jew, but I eat with Gentiles. Furthermore, I am a believer in the Messiah. Nevertheless, if all that you have said is true, I am a sinner myself. So be it! However, where does this argument lead us? If bringing together Jews and Gentiles is sinful, then the Messiah Himself is the most guilty of this sin! Can the Messiah be a waiter upon a table of sin? Certainly not!”
Why is it wrong for Jewish Christians to withdraw from table fellowship with Gentile Christians? Paul answers this question by looking at his own situation. To withdraw from table fellowship would be a denial of the very essence of the gospel that he preached. Everywhere Paul had gone he had announced that the division between Jews and Gentiles had been removed, that God showed no distinction. By enforcing the separation of Torah observers from Gentiles who did not observe the Torah, Paul would be undermining his entire previous mission. He would be rebuilding the distinction he had previously sought to demolish. He would be effectively identifying the mission to the Gentiles as a ‘transgression’.
Paul argues that he has passed out of the realm of the Torah by the death of the Messiah. By returning to the distinctions of the Torah he would be turning his back on the fullness of the grace that the Messiah had ushered in and would be returning to the old age of the Torah. To return to the old age of the Torah is to imply that the Torah is sufficient in itself as a solution to man’s plight and thereby to deny the necessity of the death of the Messiah. Those who seek to circumcise Gentiles are in effect seeking to turn back the clock of redemptive history.
I hope to finish this brief study in the next couple of days.
