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PAUL AND THE RESURRECTION OF ISRAEL: JEWS, FORMER GENTILES, AND ISRAELITES. By Jason A. Staples. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2024. Pp. 435. Hardcover, $39.99. It is an honor to write a response to Jason Staples's incredibly learned, ambitious, and well-argued thesis in Paul and the Resurrection of Israel. Even more so as it appears in this edition of RSR, together with essays penned by scholars who have taught me much over the years. Here, we are treated to the cutting edge of Pauline scholarship by a master of his trade. I have learned a tremendous amount from Staples, and this book lands his wider project impressively. At various points, I found myself mentally readjusting my views in light of his arguments, seeing connections that had previously eluded me. Indeed, questions that have been swirling around in my mind since I read Brant Pitre's first book on “the historical Jesus,” namely Jesus, the Tribulation, and the End of the Exile, now seem to have found some resolution (Pitre 2005). Alas, in an essay like this, my task is to generate discussion by pointing out areas of potential disagreement, but I need to register first that I cannot read Paul again the same way post-Staples. In what follows, I will therefore outline areas where I think some discussion is deserved, especially as it pertains to Romans Chapters One and Two and various consequences of his judgments about these chapters in Paul. So, to Romans 1 and 2. I read parallel to Staples's book, a PhD dissertation by Andrew Rillera, entitled “Paul's Philonic Opponent” (Rillera 2021). I draw extensively on Rillera's research in assessing Staples at this point, as there are numerous areas of constructive overlap. Staples claims that Romans 1:18–32 has more to do with Israel than previously noticed. Related to this, he also argues that Romans 1 is not an empirical argument from natural law but rather an exegetical argument (126). The former thesis about Israel seems more promising, but the latter is more contentious. Either way, Staples's conclusions then, in turn, facilitate a covenantal reading of Romans 2, particularly 2:6–11, such that it becomes, for Staples, the “chief cornerstone of Romans” (179). He wants better to explain Romans 1–2 as belonging within restoration eschatology and then, and thereby, to make them central to Paul's theology. Indeed, if Paul's language in these chapters is within restoration eschatology they should be distanced, if I understand him correctly, from natural theology and natural law. This is evidently because empirical arguments and natural law and theology, understood as prior to “special revelation,” would potentially distract from the new covenant themes he wants to foreground, themes that are decidedly within “special revelation”—and here I am piecing together his argument on pp. 146–48. Were important verses in these chapters indebted more to natural law and “empirical argument,” the section may better fit alternative construals of the flow of Paul's argument. So let me focus now on Staples's engagement with Romans 1 and particularly the claim that it is not an argument about natural theology and law. I quote: “Paul is not making an empirical argument from natural law but rather an exegetical argument” (126, italics his). What to make of this category distinction in view of Romans 1:20? After all, it seems pretty straightforward that creation (τοῖς ποιήμασιν) is the means by which God's invisible qualities are known. That looks like natural theology. So, does the evidence in the text suggest that “exegetical” and “empirical” are best understood as sealed hermeneutical categories implied by Staples's argumentation? Indeed, Gregory E. Sterling argues in his essay, ‘“A Law to Themselves,” that the place of natural theology in Romans 1 (and 2, to which we turn shortly) is required for Paul's argument “to be cogent” (Sterling 2016, 39). I would have liked to have seen such claims engaged in the book, with refutations proffered. Moreover, we agree that the literary parallels with Romans 1 point beyond Wisdom of Solomon to a more Philonic influence. But I think this may, in fact, undermine the argument that Romans 1:18ff is not concerned with natural theology. At the very least, Staples needs to explain why both Philo and Wisdom exhibit precisely the kind of natural theology he tells us is not really in Paul's view in Romans 1. striking is the consonance of the language used in Rom 1:19–20 and Philo that rarely, if ever, is used by Paul outside of this passage. Rom 1:20 says that God's “invisible qualities” (τὰ ἀόρατα) and “eternal power” (ἀΐδιος αὐτοῦ δύναμις) can be known from what has been made. The adjective ἀΐδιος is never again used in the Pauline corpus. . . . And, ἀόρατος is not used in the undisputed Pauline corpus. . . . Yet ἀόρατος appears 113 times and ἀΐδιος 62 times in Philo, often with reference to God. (Rillera 2021, 266–67) Staples goes on to make claims about Romans 2 on the basis of these moves regarding Romans 1:19–20. So he writes, when examining Romans 2: “it is difficult to fathom Paul using such loaded language as ‘Torah written on their hearts’ to represent the concept of natural law among gentiles, especially on the heels of Rom 1:18–32” (148, italics mine). Not only does this build upon a questionable pacifying of the import of Romans 1:19–20, to be noticed is that Staples has translated νόμος as specifically Torah here without sufficient discussion. In an excellent excursus in his introduction, Staples rightly sets about explaining his translation of key terms, such that Pauline language is rightly made weird again.2 But he rather rashly explains that “[w]hen translating νόμος, I have preferred ‘Torah’ rather than ‘law’” (33). OK, but always? Even if one is to assume monosemy for a moment, I doubt this is justifiable. Ryder Wishart uses “computational linguistic tool vector space modeling in order to analyze the lexeme νόμος and its semantic domains with the ultimate goal of providing a monosemic linguistic description of this lexeme” (Wishart 2019, 31). Wishart's result is that “the baseline semantic contribution of νόμος is customary norm.” It follows that a case needs to be made for the gloss “Torah” on the basis “of co-text and context” (Wishart 2019, 57). So it seems hasty to conclude, with Staples, that “it is difficult to fathom Paul using such loaded language as ‘Torah written on their hearts’ to represent the concept of natural law among gentiles” (148). [T]he syntax of Rom 2:15 (τὸ ἔργον τοῦ νόμου γραπτὸν ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις αὐτῶν) does not say that the νόμος is written on the heart, but rather that the “work” (ἔργον) of the νόμος is. The accusative neuter singular adjective γραπτὸν is modifying the accusative neuter singular noun τὸ ἔργον, not the genitive masculine noun τοῦ νόμου. (Rillera 2021, 184) The last clause of 2:14 (οὗτοι νόμον μὴ ἔχοντες ἑαυτοῖς εἰσιν νόμος—“those who are a law to themselves”) corresponds well with this judgment. As Rillera points out, it is astonishingly “similar to what Philo says of those who did not have the Law of Moses but rather followed the natural law” (Rillera 2021, 300). it is possible for a Jewish teacher of Paul's time to evoke this language and not be evoking “covenantal,” let alone new covenant overtones. Philo uses this language of the (natural and written) law written on the heart (even of gentiles), but ignores all notions of covenant theology in his writings and even redacts it out when he is quoting from “covenantal” passages.3 (Rillera 2021, 185) But in Staples's exegetical hands, Romans 2, because it is threaded with new covenant themes, becomes central to his construal of Paul. The result is that the Romans 2 “doers of the νόμος” who will be dikaioed are “Messiah-followers who have received the spirit promised to new covenant Israel” (171), a not unfamiliar argument others have proffered of course, despite the absence of key supporting terms in the immediate textual frame. We have offered some reasons to doubt this conclusion already on the basis of details in the text of Romans 1 and 2 and links with Philo, but perhaps more important is how these judgments now allow a conditional and meritorious dynamic into the whole of Staples's theology of Paul. Take, for example, the following claims. Staples writes: “God's mercy does not involve changing the standard of judgment to accommodate the people but instead changing the people to accommodate to the standard of judgment” (146). In other words, “Paul did not abandon covenantal nomism for another ‘pattern of religion’” (346). Hence, “God therefore demonstrates his justness (δικαιοσύνη) by redeeming Israel, while Israel must be ‘justified’ (that is, made morally competent) to be redeemed” (102n.145, italics mine). And “[t]he elect will still be judged and therefore still remain at risk of condemnation if they do not live in accordance with fidelity” (321n.209). Elsewhere he writes that “advantage is contingent on obedience” (166), that “election is no guarantee of salvation” (298), and that “election is by grace but salvation is by obedience” (298n.125, italics suppressed; citing Enns 2001, 98). Given all of this, Staples can conclude that “Paul's arguments about justification and Torah by no means entail the rejection of the importance of obedience or ‘works’”; note that: works (333, italics mine). So it seems we end up with a slightly off-color Paul who might write the following: “the wages of Sin is death, but the wages of faithful obedience to the Torah written on the heart is eternal life” (cf. Rom 6:23). It is almost as if Staples's Paul could write “nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ, except your disobedience to the Torah from the heart” (cf. Rom 8:39)! Now I am not a Lutheran, nor am I unaware of John Barclay's important work on gift language (e.g., 175–176), nor opposed to restoration eschatology, nor am I ignorant of judgment passages such as 1 Corinthians 6:9 and Galatians 5:21 beyond Romans 2, which many academic as well as pop-level Protestant readings struggle to accommodate. But Staples's claims just listed above, I would argue, throw too much wider Pauline rhetoric under the bus. Both Staples and I would hope to present a Paul that involves some measure of coherence—I could note the many times he uses the word “coherent” (even “fully coherent”) in his book to justify one or other particular reading of a Pauline passage (331; see also 276–78). Both of us would also agree that this does not mean ending up with a pristine and consistent abstract theology that is one detached from the particularities of Paul's cultural encyclopedia, symbolic universe, or whatever you want to call it (cf. 174). And I think both of us would ideally like to explain as much of the data as possible. But endorsing Romans 2 as a description of life in Messiah, I think, means he will struggle to accommodate the breadth of Pauline language. I can only point briefly to those wider themes in this essay, but that breadth will at least include a more exact take on Romans 2. I have made a few points about Staples on that text already, but more can be said. As Rillera reminds us: In Romans 4:4, 6–8 “Paul himself sets out clear criteria for determining whether something is a gift: ‘the recompense for the one who works [is] not counted according to grace but according to what is owed (ὀφείλημα).’” It follows that Romans 2 is “meritorious according to Paul's own terms.” In Romans 2, “eschatological life” (ζωὴ αἰώνιος) is “what God is under obligation to give back (ἀποδίδωμι) (2:6)” (Rillera 2021, 195). This seems to contradict at least Romans 6:23 which presents eschatological or eternal life as specifically gift. As noted, Staples claims: “Paul's arguments about justification and Torah by no means entail the rejection of the importance of. .. ‘works’” (333, italics mine). Sure, obedience, and sure, we would both want to account for Paul's coherence, keeping restoration eschatology in mind. But doing so hardly thereby explains Paul's repeated dichotomy between “faith” (irrespective of how pistis be understood) and “works” throughout Romans chapters 3, 4, 6, 9, and 11, and Galatians 2, 3, and 5. I am not persuaded that Staples's essentially rhetorical strategy to contrast an “abstract, universalizing theological argument” with a “Jewish eschatological framework” answers the problems his own account generates (cf. 174). And what about evidence in Paul involving the moral incongruity of those in Messiah? The language we find in Paul is mixed, for sure, but it must also include the Corinthians. This divided and relatively small community was riddled with problems: divided in multiple ways (cf. 1 Cor 8, 11, 12), it contained families who go to court against one another (1 Cor 6:6), some who visited prostitutes (1 Cor 6:15–16), one caught in incest (1 Cor 5), and more besides. These very people Paul describes as the “assembly of God,” as “sanctified in Messiah Jesus” (1 Cor 1:2), as given grace and enriched in Messiah (1 Cor 1:4–5). Despite all the evidence to the contrary, Paul says to them, “you really are unleavened” (καθώς ἐστε ἄζυμοι, 1 Cor 5:8).4 Moreover, and crucially, even the disobedient and apparently unrepentant of this community are ultimately “saved on the day of the Lord,” according to texts in 1 Corinthians 3:13–15 and 5:1–5. So this isn't simply about “incongruity at the start” with necessary ethical congruity going forward or damnation. If Romans 1 and 2 really were cornerstone material, this Corinthian lot—or at least many of them—would be doomed (cf. Rom 2:7). Indeed, is not life in Messiah more complicated than simply being made morally competent? After all, righteousness remains a hope, something not yet “obtained,” even for Paul as apostolos (Gal 5:5; Phil 3:12). The inner/outer language of 2 Corinthians 4–5 also suggests things are more complex (e.g., 2 Cor 4:16; 5:4). Either way, this is why for Paul, the ontology of the righteousness, sanctification, and redemption of the Corinthian messianics is the Messiah (1 Cor 1:30), in much the same way the pistis of the Galatians is (Gal 2:19–20). For Staples, however, we are told that Jesus facilitates a few important things (such as the gift of the spirit, repentance, and justification) (e.g., 236, 247), but does this not underestimate the scope and depth of the language used by Paul to describe the saving significance of the Messiah? An account of Paul that can account comfortably for these dynamics is, I think, preferred. It is why I continue to endorse the claim that Paul is dealing with an interlocutor in Romans 1–3. Of course, this approach is associated with Douglas Campbell, but it has now found strong confirmation, adjustment, and development in the work of the aforementioned Andrew Rillera (Campbell 2009; Rillera 2021). Rillera lays out the unanimous conventions for identifying speech-in-character in the primary sources, such as the grammarians, the rhetorical handbooks, and practiced as a central part of rhetorical education in the Progymnasmata. Primarily, διαφωνία and the “criterion of appropriateness” signaled the presence of different “voices”. Once this work is done, alongside a thick description of the particularity and purpose of Romans, and Romans 2 is situated on the right side of Paul's debate with an interlocutor, the reader can resist theological dynamics that can jeopardize a more fulsome account of Paul's occasional texts. It can then understand redemptive judgment and justice in Paul (e.g., Rom 14:10–12 and 1 Cor 3:13–15),5 and those wider themes and concerns that I have suggested sit uncomfortably next to Staples's scheme.6 It will do so by holding firm to an underpinning of fully unconditional (not just unconditioned) divine benevolence, which does not override human agents (Barclay's worry) but indeed liberates them into lives of obedience and faithfulness. But such obedience is not the condition for eschatological life—that remains a gift—but a consequence of that eschatological reality already expressed and existing and to be finally and fully known when flesh is destroyed in redemptive judgment.7 This approach at least keeps more of the evidence on the table, even if it has much to learn from Staples and his emphasis on restoration eschatology and a proper understanding of Israel. I have so many more questions that I cannot address due to space, a sign of how rich and important Staples's book is. But I must finish on one more point. Staples has persuaded me about the importance of restoration eschatology. He has convinced me that I misunderstood the relationship between the words “Israel” and “Jew”. He has changed my mind on smaller issues, too. However, I always apply an important litmus test to readings of Paul, and the results concerned me. Namely, if Romans 2 really is the chief cornerstone of Paul's theology, why the relative paucity of references to Messiah Jesus in these chapters of Paul as well as in Staples's opening chapters discussing them? If Paul regards everything as loss to the of Messiah Jesus his if Paul Messiah more than life if indeed his ultimate goal and is to be the (1 then I would to claim be the of in chapters where Jesus is hardly this, there are more references to the of in the of Staples's text in his opening chapters not found in Paul's This is like a in a Of course, this need not be a it all on the particular and arguments being But Staples claims Romans 2 at the very of the Pauline the to be for in the of the of the one that is other than the “chief cornerstone of Romans” italics mine). this in of from the one Paul, in fact, the chief cornerstone only (1 Cor and very of his life (Gal namely Messiah Jesus