"The gift of salvation": Its failure to address the crux of justification

Although exegesis alone must decide the meaning of righteousness language in Paul's letters, at least two other aspects of Kasemann's thought deserve attention at this juncture. On the one hand, under the influence of Bultmann, Kasemann strips Paul's soteriology of any conception of Jesus' death as an atonement: the passage which speak in this manner represent an unassimilated remainder of early Christian tradition. This theology of justification without atonement means that all emphasis is laid upon the obedience of the godless human being which is effected through the reduction to nothing by Christ's cross and the power of the risen Lord. There is an underlying moralism here which does not match the biblical witness, or Kasemann's broader intent. 12 On the other hand, under the influence of Schlatter, KAsemann interprets justification in terms of God's faithfulness as Creator to his creation. I certainly do not wish to contest the connection between justification and the new creation in Paul's thought or its significance. Nevertheless, the elevation of God's faithfulness as creator to a hermeneutical key for the understanding of justification robs the "reduction to nothing" of any real meaning, and makes one wonder what significance the expression .new creation" might have had for Paul. Again here KAsemann introduces an element of moralism: the cross no longer effects the death of the sinner as the punishment for sin. It merely strips the godless of his godlessness. In opposition to KAsemann, and on this matter Schlatter as well, I would argue that God the Creator is to be understood in terms of his action in the cross, and not the cross in terms of God's activity as Creator: crux probat omnia.

The exegetical question concerning Paul's understanding of justification centers upon the manner in which he takes up the biblical tradition of a saving righteousness of God, particularly in Romans. In the end it can be resolved only by a survey of the usage of the Hebrew Bible and early Jewish tradition, in which we cannot engage here. I shall simply summarize findings which shall appear in another format. 13 First, I find it difficult to think that in Romans Paul relied upon the notion of a "salvation-creating" power of God that entails the sort of "meta-justification"which is current in the literature. Paul's explication of our death to sin with Christ in Romans 6 would hardly have been necessary if he assumed that his addressees shared such an understanding of justification. Moreover, precisely in this passage Paul explains the origin and basis of the new obedience, not on the basis of a tradition of God's saving righteousness, but on the basis of Christ's cross and resurrection. Secondly, the common interpretation of God's righteousness as his saving "covenant faithfulness" is seriously misleading. A review of the usage of the Hebrew Scriptures shows quite clearly that the attribution of righteousness to God derives from the background of his "ruling and judging" and ultimately, I would argue, from the context of "creation," not from that of "covenant." This means in the first place that the idea of "God's righteousness" as it appears in the Psalms, the book of Isaiah and elsewhere cannot rightly be reduced to the mere idea of "salvation." God's righteousness involves his establishment of justice on behalf of his people. The executive and juridical functions are joined in God as ruler who does (Formula Omitted). God's vindicating action, his "righteousness" implicitly entails his verdict on behalf of his people. Verdict and vindicating action are joined to one another in practice, even as they remain conceptually distinct. Neither in Paul, nor in the Hebrew Scriptures do we find a "meta-justification" in which the two ideas merge.