Why Trust a Cross? Reflections on Romans 3:21-26

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ROMANS 3:21-26 has for a long time been a focal text for debate about the atonement. With the rise of the 'new perspective' on Paul, some of the parameters of these debates have shifted. Within the constraints of this essay, I cannot attempt the full-blown interaction that the subject demands. My aim is more modest. I intend to discuss ten of the turning-points in the text that affect the outcome of one's exegesis, and briefly indicate at least some of the reasons why I read the text as I do.

The Significance of the Preceding Passage 1 :18-3:20

Disputants are unlikely to agree on the solution to a problem if they cannot agree on the nature of the problem. Today's disputes focus on whether or not the situation envisaged in 2:5-16 is real or hypothetical; the extent to which 2:17-28 focuses on the failure of the nation of Israel rather than on the individual; the extent to which Paul's theology, which on the face of it runs from plight to solution, betrays his own experience, which was (it is argued) from solution to plight; the nature and focus of his rhetoric; the extent to which covenant categories control this section; and much more. Each of these topics could call forth a very lengthy chapter.^[1]

However such matters are resolved, the framework must not be forgotten. The section opens with the wrath of God being revealed from heaven 'against all the godlessness and wickedness of men'^[2], and ends with a catena of texts to prove that no one is righteous, not even one.^[3] Jews and Gentiles are alike condemned. Nor will it do to make the failure exclusively national (though it is not less than national): if it is true to say that Jews and Gentiles collectively are alike under sin, Paul carefully goes farther and specifies that they 'alike are all under sin.'^[4] Indeed, every mouth is to be silenced on the last day, and there is no one righteous.^[5]

What these observations establish, then, is the nature of the problem that Rom 3:21-26 sets out to resolve. The problem is not first and foremost the failure of Israel (national or otherwise), or inappropriate use of the law, or the urgency of linking Jews and Gentiles (all genuine themes in these chapters), but the wrath of God, directed against every human being, Jew and Gentile alike-a wrath elicited by universal human wickedness. This is not saying that human beings are incapable of any good. Clearly, even those without the law may do things about which their consciences rightly defend them.^[6] But the flow of argument that takes us from 1:18-32 to 3:9-20 leaves us no escape: individually and collectively, Jew and Gentile alike, we stand under the just wrath of God, because of our sin.'^[7]

Moreover, the closing verses of this section establish two other points that support this analysis, and help to prepare for 3:21-26. First, the second half ofv.19 paints a picture that is unavoidably forensic; and second, the slight modification of Ps 143:2 (LXX 142:2) in Rom 3:20, by the addition of the phrase 'by the works of the law' , establishes (a) that although the indictment of 1:18-3:20 embraces all of humanity, there is special reference to Jews, precisely because to them were given the oracles of God;^[8](h) that in the light of the forensic catastrophe summarized in the preceding verse the expression 'works of the law' cannot easily be reduced, in this context, to boundary markers such as laws relating to circumcision, kosher food, and Sabbath, for in fact these 'works of the law' by which one cannot be justified must be tied to the judgment according to works^[9], to the unyielding principle of performance (2:13);^[10] and (c) that therefore the law itself was not given, according to Paul, to effect righteousness, for even 'if the deeds by which one hopes to be justified are deeds laid down in the law, this fails to alter the universal indictment that no one passes the judgment, no one is righteous.'^[11] This does not mean the law is intrinsically evil, of course^[12]; it does mean that Paul adopts a certain salvation- historical reading of the law's role, and according to that reading the law (by which he here means the lawcovenant), while it enabled human beings to become conscious of sin and doubtless performed other functions described elsewhere, could not, in the nature of the case, justify anyone.^[13]

Nuvi OE ('But now'), 3:21

Although this expression can signal a logical connection, here it is almost certainly temporal14, indeed salvationhistorical. But granted the contrast between the old era of sin's dominion and the new era of salvation, or between the old era of the law covenant and the new era that Jesus Christ has introduced (these most basic of contrasts in Paul's eschatology). what is the precise nature of the temporal contrast here? If 3:21-26 is contrasted with all of 1:18-3:20, then it is possible, with Moo, to say, 'As the "wrath of God" dominated the old era (1:18). so "the righteousness of God" dominates the new.'IS But perhaps that is not quite Paul's focus. In general terms, the New Testament writers, including Paul, do not encourage us to think that God presents himself in the old covenant as a God of wrath, and in the new as a God of grace Gustifying grace?). Although the point cannot be defended here, it would be truer to say that, just as the portrait of God as a God of justifying grace is ratcheted up as one moves from the old covenant to the new, so the portrait of God as a God of holy wrath is ratcheted up as one moves from the old covenant to the new. Moreover, in this very paragraph, the earlier period is characterized as the time of God's 'forbearance' .16

A closer contrast lays at hand, one that nevertheless presupposes the shift from the old era to the new. On this reading, 3:21-26 is tied more tightly to the immediately preceding verses. If in the nature of the case the law covenant could not effect right-

Notes

1. ↑ Apart from the major commentaries, see the admirable treatment by Andrew T. Lincoln, 'From Wrath to Justification: Tradition, Gospel, and Audience in the Theology of Romans 1:18·4:25', in Pauline Theology. Volume III: Romans, ed. David M. Hay and E. Elizabeth Johnson (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995), pp. 130·159.
2. ↑ Romans 1:18.
3. ↑ Romans 3:9-20.
4. ↑ Romans 3:9.
5. ↑ Romans 3:19, 10.
6. ↑ Romans 2:15.
7. ↑ Surprisingly, B. W_ Longenecker, Eschatology and Covenant: A Comparison of 4 Ezra and Romans 1-11 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1991),175-81, argues that Paul's indictment, especially in 1:18-32, is rhetorical polemic typical of the technique of ethical denunciation, but without any empirical correspondence. Not only does this argument presuppose that polemic cannot have pedagogical purpose, it presupposes that rhetoric cannot be deployed to make points about empirical reality. That would cut the ground out from Paul's conclusion in 3:9-20.
8. ↑ As Romans 9 puts it.
9. ↑ Romans 2:8.
10. ↑ For the narrower view that connects 'works of the law' to ethnic boundary markers, see, inter alios, B. W. Longenecker, Eschatology, pp. 200·202, 206-207; and James D. G. Dunn, Romans 1-8, WBC no. 38a (Dallas: Word, 1988), pp. 153-5. For the broader view espoused here, see, e.g., Ulrich Wilckens, 'Was heisst bei Paulus: "Aus Werken des Gesetzes wird kein Mensch gerecht"?' in Rechtfertigung als Freiheit: Paulusstudien (Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag, 1974), pp. 77-109; idem, Der Brief an die Romer, EKKNT vol. 6 (ZUrich: Benziger Verlag, 1978) 1.130·31, 145-6, 175-6; and especially Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans, NICNT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), pp. 204-217.
11. ↑ Andrew T. Lincoln, 'From Wrath to Justification,' p. 146.
12. ↑ Romans 7:12.
13. ↑ Romans 3:20b.