[The following is part of an ongoing series in which I blog my thoughts to Douglas A. Campbell, The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul.]
In my previous post, most excellent 
Theophilos, I wrote of all that Deliverance of God began to do and teach with respect to the Reformed Tradition and its combination of justification with a more elective understanding of salvation. Today I want to follow up with some more concerns about the presence of both strands in this tradition. Mostly, I want to suggest that in holding onto both strands the Reformers might be imitating Paul, Judaism, and the Old Testament.
I’ll pass quickly by the possibility that justification and election are mutually informing in Paul, because I’m sure that we’ll get to this in the exegetical sections. But in the back of my mind I’m thinking, “Those whom he foreknew he also predestined to become conformed to the image of his son; and whom he foreknew these he also called, whom he called these he also justified; whom he justified these he also glorified.” In Romans 8, not only do predestination and justification come together, they come together in an eschatological (already/not yet) context entirely conditioned both by union with the dead and resurrected Jesus and the coming final judgment in which justification will be realized. We might similarly ask about Gal 3 where reception of the Spirit and justification by faith are mutually inclusive rather than representative of divergent soteriologies.
But as I said, I’ll hold back judgment on these Pauline matters for the time being, assuming they’ll be covered in due course.
The second issue that keeps springing to mind in this regard, however, is that of early Judaism.
Now I know that on many of these issues you don’t think Ed Sanders has gotten things as straight as needs be. Fair enough. But one thing he said around the seminar table has stuck with me and resonated as true to much of early Jewish literature: “Paul believed both in predestination and free will, and so did the other Jews of the first century. Do you know what the Qumran community called themselves? The elect. You know what else they called themselves? The volunteers!”
It seems more than a little likely to me that what we consider theological contradiction a first century Jew might consider paradox or mystery. This is one reason I’m less than eager to base my assessment of Paul on an idealized reconstruction of theories. I’m not persuaded that our only other option is to relegate Paul to the realm of contradiction and confusion.
Both/and might be an alternative to either/or.
I was already pondering these things in my heart when I stumbled across the following from Walter Brueggemann. He discusses the OT, delving into YHWH’s identity as it is tied to the people of Israel. When talking about the covenants, he bids us not press the distinction between “conditional” and “unconditional” covenants.
On the whole, however, in my judgment it is futile and misleading to sort out unconditional and conditional aspects of YHWH’s covenant with Israel. The futility and misleading quality of such an enterprise can be stated on two quite different grounds. First, even the covenant with the ancestors of Genesis includes and imperative dimension…Second, if this relationship is indeed one of passionate commitment, as it surely is, it is undoubtedly the case that every serious, intense, primary relationship has within its dimensions of conditionality and unconditionality that play in different ways in different circumstances. The attempt to factor out conditional and unconditional aspects of the covenant is an attempt to dissect and analyze the inscrutable mystery of an intimate, intense relation that, by definition, defies all such disclosure. (An Unsettling God, 24)
Much of the argument depends on the inherent incompatibility between what are assessed as two ways of thinking. I’m wrestling with this idea, now, from a couple of different angles: (1) are these ways of thinking inherently incompatible as claimed? (2) is there any reason to think Paul would have thought so–or are there good reasons to think he might not have? and (3) what about the actual theories that have held the two elements together? where do they fall apart?
The weight of the coming argument about Romans is going to rest, in large measure, on the power of the division. Am I asking for more prolegomena?! Maybe just different…
Daniel,
Great blog. Question. At Qumran, what puts what into context? Did they volunteer to be chosen or were they chosen to volunteer? The ontology of the covenant never seems to be in doubt. At Qumran were they volunteering to become true Israel, or were they volunteering to remain true Israel?
Alan, I think probably the latter: volunteering to remain true Israel, or to be a faithful remnant or some such.
But I wouldn’t push an agenda for one end to be more encompassing than the other. It seems that part of the point is for either to be able to be the point of focus at any given time.
I actually think it’s vital to maintain appropriate theological emphases on both election and freedom. But in the end of the day neither a group of Jews camped grumpily by the Dead Sea nor a group of grumpy theologians in Switzerland are going to be authoritative on these issues. Neither is any resolution on this front going to be a “paradox” or a “mystery” (unless post-Enlightenment constructions are being freely and foolishly projected around). It’s going to be what it always was–a determination of Christology, since that will condition our soteriology and saved anthropology, to say the least. Hence, Barth never has a problem with full simultaneous emphases on election and on human freedom–the latter appropriately defined. Paul does not seem appreciably different to me, at least in general terms. Neither do other NT documents. But as Barth repeatedly points out, God’s election of us, his covenant with us, and his affirmation of our freedom, are NEVER conditional. God’s commitment in Christ is unconditional, both to all of creation and to his covenant people. Hence I think it is probably necessary to resist Brueggemann at this point, and much as there is to admire about his work and insightfulness on other grounds.