Nov
18
2009
Wright on Justification
David Mathis reviews N.T. Wright’s latest on Justification.
Closing paragraphs:
Exegesis has two different flavors for Wright and Piper. Piper wrestles word by word, proposition by proposition, and then paragraph by paragraph. Wright moves much quicker through large chunks of Paul’s thought, refers frequently to whole chapters and paragraphs, and quotes phrases (often as technical terms) seemingly removed from their immediate context. It is surprising that Wright would remind us that “the text is the text” (p. 249) when he has dealt so little with the actual biblical text in its context. For this reason, Wright’s exegetical chapters are a serious disappointment as his exegesis proves to be a kind of hovering above the text—rarely, if ever, landing, while supplying his own meaning for a phrase here and there that contributes to a coherent whole but neglects to explain the connections between Paul’s propositions and paragraphs. Does Wright not see that the discussion cannot go forward if he will not convincingly engage Paul on Paul’s own terms but instead keeps the text at arm’s length?
The student who takes the time to work through Wright’s exegesis, with both a good English translation and the Greek text nearby, will see that Wright’s claims do not follow Paul’s text proposition by proposition. Wright has selected a few words, phrases, and so-called technical terms, accounted well for them in his system, and then made sweeping claims about whole chapters and paragraphs, relating one to another without pausing sufficiently to mind the conjunctions and show that Paul is thinking the same way. Reading Wright with Paul’s texts open reveals that Wright is not yet demonstrating that he can explain Paul as well as his most careful critics.
Despite the impressive fact that he has published yet again, it does not seem that Justification will advance the discussion or benefit Wright’s esteem at present or long term. Wright has done much outstanding work in the past, and it is a shame that he may have sullied his name with this disappointing volume.
47 Comments
This reviewer, who is in some way related to Piper’s church, is obviously unaware of the advances in evangelical exegetical methodology as well as Wright’s own proposed method in the first volume of his Christian Origins and the Question of God series. Wright is actually closer to someone like D. A. Carson because he is reading individual Pauline texts in light of a biblical theology, rather than simply “proposition by proposition” which is what we now call proof-texting. That’s how to understand Wright’s appeal to “technical terms.” It’s not just, as this reviewer misleads us, that Wright arbitrarily defines terms that “fit well in his system” and then just reads them into the text. He is reading Paul in light of Paul’s context, the history of Israel, and draws preeminently on the Old Testament for knowledge of concepts like “righteousness” and “justification.” If Mathis would have been paying better attention, instead of just looking for Wright to do what Piper did, then he would have noticed Wright’s appeal to Daniel, for example.
I absolutely agree with Mathis that Wright’s exegesis is more expansive than Piper’s. But that’s a good thing, because it takes the canon seriously and the history of redemption seriously. It doesn’t treat Paul as if Paul wrote in a vacuum, but understands Paul according to the larger story of God’s saving work, and that, I think, is taking Paul on Paul’s terms. Reading Paul in the abstract is practically denying Paul’s own arguments because it denies what Paul takes for granted, God’s salvific work in Israel. Wright is just more biblical-theological than grammatical-historical. How anyone who is Reformed or evangelical can find that an exegetical error?
Relevant reading material here is Piper’s exposition of Romans 9 “The justification of God”. Though it predates Wright, in it he extensively explores the exegetical method used here by Wright and finds it wanting. To me, The Justification of God is the most thorough demonstration that Piper is not just attempting to prop up a failing traditional understanding of the righteousness of God. He has tested this understanding against its many challengers, and has then developed it in a way that is very faithful to the detailed text of both Old and New Testaments.
John Piper’s view seems to be that as this is the Word of God, every word is worth exploring in its context, not just taking a broad brush feeling of paragraphs, and I do honour him for that.
Propositional exegesis is not proof texting. I’m just saying.
Agreed, that certainly is a “novel” definition of proof-texting, to say the least.
I just finished Piper’s book and am in the middle of Wright’s. I think the clearest difference between their approaches is that Piper is wary of the extrabiblical material forms the backround of Wright’s understanding of Second Temple Judaism. Piper would rather start with the words on page and move to propositions and then to paragraphs. Wright starts with the historical context and looks to see how Paul’s thought emerges within it.
Adam,
What you observe is correct. As Moo put it (paraphrastically), “Wright backgrounds what should be in the foreground and foregrounds what should be in the background.” Wright is historically conditioned and believes the text is, too. Piper is myopic, though not entirely ignorant of extrabiblical texts; he just does not give them the weight, whereas Wright brings extrabiblical texts to bear on the “Text.”
On any reading, “proof-texting” is NOT doing exegesis proposition by proposition in the context of an overall flow of argument (which includes the overall biblical-theological narrative), nor is it even conceptually related to such an endeavor. Mathis’ point (whether you agree with him or not) is that Wright generally does exegesis of Paul in his popular-level books by making several overall observations about a passage where they fit his system, but without making the pain-staking effort to relate to his readers how ALL the details of a given passage connect to his larger vision. Thus, aspects of a given passage that may seem to argue against Wright’s vision are simply not addressed, one away or another, for those who wish to know how Wright’s understanding accounts for them.
Perhaps Wright will do this in his forthcoming book, but let’s not inaccurately and unfairly throw out a term like “proof-texting” to nullify Mathis’ critique. That’s not the point.
Agree with Adam somewhat. He is correct that Piper is wary of the 2nd Temple background in a way Wright is not (and I think this is Piper’s weakness in the end). But it is not the only difference. Mathis points out another–namely, that Piper tries to at least show how the specific details (not just overall thrust) of the relevant Pauline texts support his understanding. And, so far, this is Wright’s weakness. At some point he needs to get down to the level of the minute details of the text. And, of course, Wright is obviously capable of doing this at an extraordinary level–just see his “Climax of the Covenant” for some older work in which he does precisely this. Unfortunately he just hasn’t done it on justification yet. Here’s hoping he will soon, since I think he has some valid observations and arguments to make.
I think several points should be made:
First, like a lot of critics, Mathis does not actually take a detailed look at Wright’s exegesis, but is as sweeping as he alleges Wright to be in making broad-brush comments about it without actually looking how Wright engages the texts.
Second, “proof-texting” is the right term and I stand by it. Proof-texting is done when someone isolates a text from its context. As D. A. Carson is known for saying: “A text without a context is pretext for a proof-text.” Anyone committed to a redemptive-historical understanding of biblical revelation acknowledges that the proper context for understanding any biblical passage is at least canonical, if not also the historical and cultural as well. Piper’s exegesis, as Adam admits and Nick seems to agree, tends to be very narrowly focused on the words and assertions, but is not reflective on the canonical, redemptive-historical (or biblical-theological) context of the terms and topics being employed. It’s old school grammatical-historical exegesis at best.
Third, I really just dispute that Wright’s exegesis is “sweeping” or “broad brush” or however one puts it. Sure, right doesn’t parse verbs or rehearse every occurrence of a word to make decisions, but I don’t think that means he is just making this stuff as he goes along.
Fourth, being narrowly focused on words and immediate context to the neglect of canonical themes and context is no guard against reading into the text concepts. It must be said, in the first place, that Wright gets his concepts from a biblical-theological reading of the history of salvation. When he interprets terms like “righteousness” he is doing so with reference to their context in the history of salvation, not simply lexicography (again, in my view, this is a good thing because TDNT and BDAG were composed mostly by historical-critical scholars who bought into the old religionsgeschechte schule). So there is a context to Wright’s understanding of terms, it’s just broader than a couple of verses in Romans or, even, the Pauline epistles. In the second place, Piper has to make interpretive judgments about what is at stake in any given Pauline argument. Wright’s point is that if you don’t understand the covenant, if you don’t have the history of salvation in view and the key canonical moments when issues like “righteousness” rose to the surface as determinative, then you will inevitably read Paul according to a different context. When Piper encounters language of “righteousness” he interprets it according to an abstract context of ethics – how one is morally praise- or blameworthy before God – which is post-Biblical because it arises in the Enlightenment not the more specific context of covenantal membership, the plan to save the world through Israel. At the end of the day, I don’t think the two are at odds with each other (one can translate the specific covenantal stuff out into general issues of morality). But the point is that this is not how Paul would have understood the term “righteousness.” At the very least, we can’t just say Piper is taking Paul on his own terms while Wright is not. That’s an oversimplification, because it begs the question of what it means to take Paul on his own terms. Wright’s contention is that if you don’t pay attention to the larger salvation-historical context, you will inevitably import your own context and read Paul according to a modern Western understanding of morality and eternal salvation. Critics should at the very least appreciate and acknowledge that WRight is trying just as hard as Piper to read Paul “on his own terms.” The debate is about how one does that.
Bob,
Biblical Theology is the byproduct of combining a whole bunch of good grammatical-historical exegesis. Biblical Theology is dependent upon the quality and quantity of one’s exegesis.
What Piper and others are arguing is that Wright’s Biblical Theology is bogus because his exegesis is sloppy at best (quality) and spotty throughout (quantity).
No one can claim a good Biblical Theology without proving it exegetically.
For you to say Wright has a new method that starts with Biblical Theology just goes to show why his method and results are suspect.
I disagree. First, I would dispute it’s even possible to do grammatical-historical exegesis independently of salvation-history. Secondly, I would argue that even if it were possible, it’s theologically suspect because it doesn’t take the text as the canon.
Bob, you have some good points to make, but you are doing some serious misrepresentation of both Piper and what proof-texting is. I can’t believe you connect the grammatical-historical method with proof-texting! The POINT of the grammatical-historical method (which Wright, as much as Piper, adheres to) is to prevent proof-texting! Sorry, Bob, but you are dead wrong here. To pay attention to the “for” and “therefore” and “but” of an argument is not to proof-text (which is what Mathis is talking about, and in a short review of course he is justified in being brief). Also, Adam and I did not say that Piper ignores the broaders CANONICAL sweep of biblical theology…rather, that he downplays the 2nd temple background. Without minimizing the importance of the 2nt temple milieu in which the NT was written (I think it is quite important), it is a HUGE overstatement to say that Piper’s ignoring of this means that he ignores the canonical sweep of redemptive history and therefore takes Paul out of context!! Can Piper do better? Of course. But let’s be serious here. Way too much overstatement and exaggeration going on…
Nick, we’ll have to agree to disagree about “proof-texting.” By way of clarification, though, I’m not saying that paying attention to the logical flow of an argument is proof-texting. I’m saying to treat terms as though they don’t have a larger frame of reference (i.e., canonical context) is proof-texting.
I don’t dispute that Piper has a typical understanding of salvation-history. I’m sorry if I was unclear. I’m saying that he doesn’t use that in coming to understand themes of scripture.
Wright speaks much of maintaining covenant faithfulness but how does he does he understand how people enter into covenant with God within the Anglican communion in the first place? Is it through infant baptism or the circumcision of the heart by the Holy Spirit of God?
Does Wright in the end interpret 2 Cor. 5:21 as God imputing our sin to Christ, and Christ’s righteousness to us? If he does that, then he has done a good work in exegesis I would think.
“For our sake [the elect] he [God] made him [Christ] to be sin [Isa. 53:5-8] who knew no sin [perfect righteousness], so that in him [Christ] we might become the righteousness of God [Isa. 61:10].”
Bob, totally agree that terms in a specific biblical text find their context in the overall biblical storyline, and not just in (say) Romans or Matthew. There is definitely a dialetical relationship between how words are used in the immediate surroundings, and the overall use of the word (say, “righteousness”) in the canon. The canon is always the ultimate context. But I think grammatical-historical exegesis works within this framework, not against it. Thanks for the clarifications.
Yeah, but is he wrong?
Has anyone here actually read “Justification”? To describe what Wright does as “exegesis” is generous. His purpose is to explain how he understands justification. He does so by appealing to a limited range of passages. This is usually called proof texting. The biggest disappointment in this book is that he doesn’t engage the text, nor explain why his understanding of a particular term should be accepted. I was hoping to come away from Justification with a better understanding of Wright’s views. Instead, I came away disappointed.
Some people just don’t get it. I’m starting to think the differencec between the Wright-ites and the Piperians is more cultural than anything else. To say that working through Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Corithians, and Philippians as a whole is appealing to “a limited range of passages” is strange. At the end of the day, I am coming to see, is between two different styles of exegesis and two different understandings of the Bible. A fascinating fissure in evangelicalism – no wonder why so many are running to Rome. Maybe sola scriptura isn’t workable after all.
Now I get the whole “geocentric vs. heliocentric” illustration at the beginning of Wright’s book.
BAM! Direct hit, Bob!
Bob,
It is possible to take the right from Wright and spit out the bones. Not everyone takes one or the other of the two sides you mentioned. I am not Piper-ite, as I am a presbyterian with baptized babies, but neither am I a Wright guy, although I have more in common with him than I do Piper. It is a mater of thinking through issues and playing with the text so as to come to a new understanding of the faith.
Even if you wholly disagree with Wright, and view him as an enemy, you can still benefit from him. The side-taking thing is, it seems to me, a polarization that is creating an inability to see the good in Wright’s views. Why not take from both men and learn from them? The reviewer, Mathis, criticizes Wright’s methodology but this, again, is a bifurcated view of what is the correct way to do exegesis. Wright is no slob when it comes to getting into the text, just as Piper is not the last word on what it does say. To assume that either men are at polar ends is a mistake, in my humble opinion.
“Do not be excessively righteous and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself?” — Ecc. 7:16
Bob,
Apologies for addressing that last post directly to you. I meant to simply “talk”, but ended up sounding like I as correcting you. I agree with much that you have said, and take your points to heart.
But, not all who have sympathies toward Wright are running to Rome. We are, in fact, seeking to uncover that Reformation in toto. Rome is still quite a distance away. Thankfully.
You started by saying that Mathis was unaware of the advances in evangelical exegesis. Whether or not that is true, from my reading it cannot be true of Piper. In his book on Romans 9 he has challenged some of the teachings on righteousness on which Wright draws by reviewing its usage in both Old and New Testaments and then pointing out in detail in Paul that it doesn’t really stand up to a word by word exegesis.
From what you are saying it is a critical subject – what righteousness and justification are and how they are applied to us affects our eternal salvation, and for those of us who preach, what we tell people that the Word of God is. I am not convinced though that the answer is to throw up our hands in despair and run to Rome!
“Running to Rome” the only ones I know of are the Anglicans who have no where else to run. The Pope is offering a “you can come to my house and bring your own scepters, prayer books, and robes” deal. It’s either that or stay with the effeminate uncle at your own house.
“To say that working through Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Corithians, and Philippians as a whole is appealing to “a limited range of passages” is strange.” I agree. But Wright does not work through them. He tells his reader what he thinks they mean, usually entirely absent any explanation. For example, on pages 111-117 he tells us his view of what is going on in Galatians, without engaging it (only sprinkling a few phrases and sentances in here and there). Then he writes, “For reasons I have given elsewhere, I have come to read the passage as follows…” Really? At least tell me where this “elsewhere” lies. Understand, we are talking about a book review. The validity of Wright’s perspective is not the issue, but rather the validity of this work. I came away with a better understanding of what Wright believes, but with no better understanding of why he believes it. In my mind, that makes it a fail (especially as I generally fit the description of his target audience).
“I came away with a better understanding of what Wright believes, but with no better understanding of why he believes it.”
Excellent point John, I think you’ve highlighted one of the key concerns here.
“I came away with a better understanding of what Wright believes, but with no better understanding of why he believes it.”
I continue to think this must be a cultural rather than exegetical problem. Other reviewers and endorsers of Wright’s book have said it to be the clearest presentation of his arguments yet. I too find myself very clear on his arguments and evidences. It must be a matter of plausibility structures, exposure and what one is accustomed to. That’s not a way of saying those who get it are more enlightened or educated, but simply to note that this debate ultimately exposes a deep divide within evangelicalism about what the Bible is and how one interprets it (and so what counts as “proof” of one’s interpretation).
Bob,
Not so much “a limited range of passages” as a “not as detailed” look into those passages. Has Wright done that before? Will he do it in the future? I don’t know, and perhaps. But, with this particular review of this particular book, that is the allegation. This is a fairly small (size-wise, not small in importance) point of disagreement that you keep blowing up into a larger argument. Many besides Mathis have come away from this book wishing Wright would say more, be more specific, or dig into the text more. This is not a new critique.
Aaron, I’ve got to go prepare lunch for the kids, but what else do you want Wright to do? What is this “more” that people keep clamouring about?
I guess I’d want to say that everyone’s cry for more is just smokescreen for “I don’t really know how to respond to the points Wright actually made.” I may be “blowing this up into a larger argument,” or maybe I’m just pointing out the fact that people who don’t want to agree with Wright (for whatever reason) but cannot respond to his claims can only say that he doesn’t make arguments in the way they are accustomed to and so that must be some sort of fault. It seems to me that few people actually take on the substance of WRight’s argument, but just keep saying “it’s not enough” or “it’s not yet clear.”
Bob, an example that becomes problematic with Wright not going far enough is that his interpretation of the righteousness of God is based on what God does and not who he is. It is from this shallow interpretation of the righteousness of God that Wright grounds justification, and that is, I think, part of where his critics want him to go deeper and become more clear. It’s not necessarily that Wright is wrong in his interpretation, it’s that his interpretation is confusing because he leaves open the possibility that God is only following the book on what is right that was written by someone else instead of affirming the reality that God defines right in terms of himself, not in terms of what he does. And with that confusion comes the implication that our justification is based on our own righteousness instead of relying on his righteousness to be our own through faith in Christ.
Your comments are very thought-provoking, thank you.
Noah, thanks. I’m not sure what to make of this distinction between “who God is” and “what God does.” I know Piper makes it. But surely what God does is consistent with who he is, though one shouldn’t collapse God into simply what he does. I’m 99.9% sure WRight would not say God is just following the book on righteousness someone else wrote. What he’s saying is that we only know about God’s righteousness from how he acts and displays himself in history. And when we look at that history as revealed in Scripture, we find more often than not that the phrase “righteousness of God” refers not to some abstract ontological attribute, but to God’s fidelity to his covenant with Abraham. Sure, that tends to focus on “what God does,” but, after all, it is God that does it so surely we can’t err when we look to the acts by which he’s chosen to reveal himself to us? I just don’t see the problem in this at all, and I really think Piper is more confusing on this than Wright is.
I would warn against the perception that Wright teaches that we are justified by our works and not by the righteousness of Christ. That is not the case. What he does say that gets him in trouble with Reformed folk is that “righteousness” and “justification” are not synoymous with “salvation” but have in view the more specific issue of how one is a member of the people of God. Most evangelical Reformed have learned to think about “justification” and “righteousness” as referring to the abstract question “how can one be morally perfect in the eyes of God and so have eternal life.” Wright says “righteousness” refers to one’s status with respect to the covenant God made with Abraham – one is “righteous” when he or she has fulfilled the covenant obligations and “unrighteous” when he or she has failed to do so. Same for God. Thus, the question Romans 1-4 is addressing is how can God be “righteous,” i.e. faithful to his covenant which promised salvation through the family of Abraham when the family of Abraham has been unfaithful to their end of the covenant. And Wright is very clear that the answer is only because Christ fulfills, as Israel’s representative, or Messiah, the covenantal obligations of the children of Abraham so that all who have faith in him are “righteous” with respect to that covenant and therefore members of God’s people through whom God blesses the world (per Genesis 15). The person who has faith in Christ has been justified because Christ has fulfilled humanity’s covenantal burden. Thus, God can be faithful to his covenant (righteous) by the work of Christ. It’s very similar to the traditional Reformed view, and many people have now noticed that, but he’s just refusing to answer some of the questions most dear to evangelicals (i.e., how does one get to heaven when they die?). To be sure, Wright does have answers for those questions, but his point is that those questions aren’t the one’s most dear to the text of Scripture; God is much more concerned with blessing the world – restoring the created order and humans into his image – through his chosen people than with trying to collect souls for eternal bliss. Wright wants our focus to be more biblical in this way. But he clearly says that it is Christ’s work, not ours that justifies us and makes us “righteous” which, again, is a member of the family of Abraham, not “morally acceptable in God’s eyes.” He’s just tweaking the concepts and definitions, but in a way that he thinks more closesly adheres to the canon of SCripture.
Chris, yes, there are some really good things to take away from Wright. And yes, Bob, I think that we can get really caught up on how Wright is saying things so that we don’t really pay attention to what he has said.
According to him, his understanding really isn’t that different from the Reformed understanding (247, 252), he just gets there a different route.
One central issue to me in the discussion in the differences between concept and judgment in exegesis and theology. He mentions McGrath in the first part of the book regarding this. David Yeago has been most helpful to me. I think there is a bridge out there that stretches between Minneapolis and Durham, it just make take a satellite view to see it.
An exegetical fallacy is to go word by word, proposition by proposition, without regard for the larger story.
Mathis writes: “Is he creating space for basing the final judgment on Spirit-wrought works by setting up two justifications and divorcing obedience from the phrase “works of the law”? Is it telling that he leaves out the word “now” in his own translation of Rom 8:1 (pp. 250–51)?”
What’s with all the suspicious questions? Mathis seems to be wondering, not just if Wright is a bad exegete, but if he is a fiendishly clever Straussian exegete who is masking his “real agenda”
That makes me a bit suspicious of Mathis
N.T. Wright is taken to task for His Exegetical Approach to Paul…
The November 2009 issue of Themelios features yet another review of N.T. Wright’s Justification: Paul’s Vision and God’s Plan, this time by one David Mathis. David Mathis calls N.T. Wright’s exegesis into question: Exegesis has …
N.T. Wright is taken to task for His Exegesis…
The November 2009 issue of Themelios features yet another review of N.T. Wright’s Justification: Paul’s Vision and God’s Plan, this time by one David Mathis. David Mathis calls N.T. Wright’s exegesis into question: Exegesis has …
Thanks for the rare dose of sanity, Chris! I’ve also noticed time and time again that it is only from those who think (either) that Piper is entirely right OR those who think Wright is entirely correct who throw out the despairing, self-annoyed (and annoying) charge of no one else “getting it” or “listening”. Super unhelpful, guys. Tone down the disdain for others a bit, for all our sakes. It gets old real fast:)
Rather, what is being pointed out here is that BOTH the overall story of Scripture AND the individual contours and specific flow of thought in particular passages are important. To focus on one at the expense of the other is the true exegetical fallacy (it goes both ways, not just the one way T.C.R. mentioned). Both Piper and Wright agree on the proper methodology here (which is why these kinds of fussy debates between their followers is always so bizarre). Both men agree that the larger canonical storyline, grounded in history, AND the grammatical-historical details of individual texts must both be brought in to inform our exegesis. They just differ on what they think is there in Paul and the Bible with respect to justification. So let’s start dealing with the arguments, not with straw men.
I actually think Wright has a lot of helpful, right things to say, and I likewise think Piper is mistaken on numerous aspects of justification passages in Paul. But what is indisputable, clearly, at this point, is that most of Piper’s specific questions or objections in his book on justification were ignored by Wright in his new book, as he did not even attempt to provide answers or responses to Piper’s detailed exegesis. Wrong Piper may be on some issues here, but the “fly over” treatment Wright gives in his latest book is insufficient whether he is correct or not (simply giving superficial treatments of a host of NT letters does not count for in-depth exegesis, a point I am sure Wright himself would acknowledge).
Wright can (and no doubt will in his forthcoming book) do such exegesis. What people like Mathis are asking for is the kind of exegesis that some of Wright’s older stuff, like his articles in “Climax of the Covenant”, manifest. Actually dealing with the nitty-gritty of what Paul actually SAYS in the flow of argument in meticulate detail. So far, Piper has done this but Wright has not in any of his popular level treatments of justification. That doesn’t mean Piper is right. It just means that Wright has work to do, and it is absolutely appropriate for Mathis to ask for it.
Nick,
It was a rare moment for me as I am rarely sane.
Chris
Nick,
We need a balance. I concur. But I’m afraid I haven’t seen that from the critics of Wright.
At least, Wright is approaching that balance.
I wonder if Themelios did itself a disservice by publishing a review from someone so closely tied to Piper, rather than a review from someone else, perhaps one who had done substantial work of their own in this theological area. I’m certain there wasn’t a shortage of scholars who would have done so.
Just a thought from someone who likes aspects of other areas of both Wright and Piper’s works.
Noah, a good Jew would be puzzled by your statement that there is a difference between what God does and who God is. There is no such thing as a non-covenantal righteousness of God. The righteousness of God in the OT comes from Israel’s experience of God. To suggest that there is some non-relational ontological quality of God that exists is to be a reader of Plato, not of the Hebrew scriptures. May I ask you, do you believe in the Trinity? And if so, is the Trinity ever static? Or is the relationship between Father, Son and Spirit something that has been ongoing forever? If so then you need to rethink the ontology you have of God that is reflected in your statements.
As one who has been reading Wright for twenty years I can guarantee you he is anything but shallow in any opinion that he ever takes. Perhaps Wright could be describing a world that you have yet to encounter. I am not a Wright apologist (no true scholar ever needs one) but he has always struck me as one who will humbly reconsider everything for the sake of the Scripture being what it is. How can he do this? Because the man trusts God. Hopefully we will have the same kind of confidence.
i disagree. st paul did not sit down to write propositions. he did not sit down to write words for people to do word studies on. he wrote about the gospel to bring about the obedience of faith among the nations [Rom 1.5, 16.26]. this was the fulfillment of YHWH’s covenant with abe in Gen 12, 15, and 17. is word-for-word study helpful? yes. is propositional analysis beneficial? absolutely. should those be our only two guidelines for exegesis? no.
Honestly, he’s David Mathis- Piper’s longtime personal assistant; do you really think he’s going to do anything but side with Piper?
“Some people just don’t get it. I’m starting to think the differencec between the Wright-ites and the Piperians is more cultural than anything else. To say that working through Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Corithians, and Philippians as a whole is appealing to “a limited range of passages” is strange. At the end of the day, I am coming to see, is between two different styles of exegesis and two different understandings of the Bible. A fascinating fissure in evangelicalism – no wonder why so many are running to Rome. Maybe sola scriptura isn’t workable after all.”
This is spot on. The whole thing boils down to how Scripture is read. Is every single word to be exposited with earnestness. If someone says, “The whole town awoke,” does that mean every single person? Did Jesus really say, word for word, the Beattitudes? Etc Etc. Or, is the Bible the book of the Church in that it is all inspired, but not meant to be decoded in a sermon series on Romans lasting seven years? After all, four Gospels take up alot more space than one epistle in the canon. So, we get back to the question of the nature of the Bible, and why, if every word is inspired, we are not all encouraged to study the original languages versus Piper, Wright, or better yet, Eugene Peterson. On top of that, are Piper and Wright followers that devoted to truth, or to their respective church cultures. Given my observation of most peoples understanding, I’d have to say the latter. Both guys have hit on important aspects of truth. Both could be wrong on lots. Remember, Luther wanted at one point to trash several books of Scripture (think about that on the modern blogosphere” “Hey, guys, James is bullsh-t!”), and Calvin had a guy burned at the stake… after striving with him in love. It’s a fallen world. We need to choose carefully the swords we die on. How many people think C.S. Lewis would champion John Piper?
I just love the warmed-over playground behaviour that this discussion has. “Wright-ites” and “Piperians” – are you sure this isn’t Gulliver’s Travels or something similiar? I honestly wish they had stuck to their own corners and let each other be…
Sorry if my American playfulness offends your British propriety. It’s obviously shorthand for “followers of Wright” and “followers of Piper,” not all that different from “squishitude.” Maybe next time you’ll have something substantive to say rather than, well, resorting to playground behavior (or “behaviour”) and taking a cheap shot.