Chapter 1
Christian communities have always been faced with the problem of interpreting the Scriptures theologically. Since it is the very nature of the Christian church to reflect upon God’s self-disclosure as witnessed by the biblical texts, these texts have always held a prominent and normative status in the Christian Community.[1]
Doctrine has served and continues to serve as a vital function in Church life. It forms the basis for liturgical and sacramental life as well as being instructive for the life of individual believers and the ethical praxis of the community. Doctrine, or simply what the Church believes and confesses to be true, stems from an engagement over time with culture, experience, tradition and reason, but primarily with its normative foundational document, the Bible.
As post-modern thinking has rightly pointed out, the Bible, as a collection of texts, can be interpreted in different ways by different communities. Thus, doctrine is not simply something that falls from the skies but is formed in the ‘hands-on experience’ of interpretation. The Christian Church enjoys some unity in doctrinal matters, such as the almost universal acceptance of the Nicene and Apostles creed, but it is deeply divided on some of the central features of doctrine. This is illustrated in the diversity displayed in the doctrine of justification by faith with different views being put forward as to what this means by traditional Catholics and Protestants, existential theologies, and from those that construct their doctrinal affirmations in accord with the ‘new perspective.’
This plurality in interpretation raises a number of important questions: Are some doctrines and interpretations more valid than other? Why are the same texts interpreted differently by different communities? Is there any Archimedean point from which the true ‘meaning’ of a text can be revealed? Does postmodernism lead to the death of doctrine and dogma?
The purpose of this paper is not to seek to answer these important questions. Its limited task, functioning within the backdrop of these larger questions, is to look at the relationship between text and the formulation of doctrine in the writings of Karl Barth and N.T. Wright, working in particular with their differing views on the doctrine of ‘justification by faith’. Although both scholars have found their spiritual home within the evangelical-reformed community, they both offer an alternative to the traditional evangelical view of justification. Wright and Barth, as we shall see, differ considerably in the methods which they use to formulate their doctrines. Barth uses a theological approach, whereas Wright uses a more historical and exegetical approach.
The format of this paper will be as follows: in this chapter I will set out Barth’s and Wright’s theologies of ‘justification by faith’ against the backdrop of mainstream evangelical theology. In chapter two I will analyse and critique the theological methodology of Karl Barth, followed in chapter three by an examination and critique of N.T Wright’s methodology.
Soteriological Subjectivism: Sola Fide and Mainstream Evangelicalism[2]
Being aware of the dangers of generalisation, we can describe the mainstream evangelical position of justification as ‘soteriological subjectivism’. It can be described as soteriological inasmuch as evangelicals locate their doctrine of ‘justification by faith’ within their discussion of how a person receives salvation. I choose to describe it as subjectivism as it emphasises that salvation can only be achieved in the personal act of faith of the individual Christian. We should, however, be careful not to caricature evangelical thinking as it still lays great stress on the atoning work of Jesus. Nevertheless, subjectivity is a valid description as it is only in the personal subjective act of faith that this salvation is appropriated.
It is plain from the New Testament teaching throughout that justification comes to the sinner by the atoning work of Jesus and that is applied to the individual sinner by faith. That God pardons and accepts believing sinners is the truth that is enshrined in the doctrine of justification by faith.[3]
Justification, in the mainstream evangelical perspective, is to be understood as a transaction. In this transaction the sinner, who is incapable of bringing from within themselves the standard of righteousness, receives, by faith, the righteousness of Christ (iustitia aliena) and is therefore declared to be righteous by God, knows that their sins are forgiven and can have confidence in their future vindication and resurrection to life after death. Justification, therefore, is not to be understood as a process that the individual takes part in but is to be understood as a change in status as opposed to a change in nature.
Those who do not have faith receive judgement and damnation because they do not have their own righteousness and are guilty of sin and so it is easy to see, from this stress on soteriological subjectivism, why evangelicals lay great stress on conversion and missionary activity.
Soteriological Objectivism: Karl Barth’s doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone[4]
Karl Barth’s doctrine of justification, in Church Dogmatics Vol IV/1[5] , is approached from two distinct angles; that of objectivity, which is discussed in the chapters entitled ‘The Judgement of God’[6] and ‘The Pardon of Man’[7], and that of subjectivity, which is discussed in the chapter entitled ‘Justification by Faith Alone’[8]. For Barth the justification of sinful humanity is realised in the death of Jesus Christ, yet is only comprehended by the act of faith. It is in these two approaches, which I will now discuss, that we see that for Barth faith does not lead to justification, but rather faith is the recognition that all of humanity is already made right with God and justified. With this formulation of the doctrine Barth differs from many others, in particular with that of the previously discussed mainstream evangelical view, as faith is not to be seen as the entrance way to salvation but as the way of comprehending that humanity has in fact already been saved. Barth, as with the mainstream evangelical view places his discussion of justification within that of soteriology.
Objectivity
The objectivity of justification, as Barth sees it, is to be found in the atonement. It is in the death and resurrection of Jesus, according to Barth, that sinful humanity is declared righteous. The justification of humanity takes place in the atonement, for this is the event in which God exercises his (i) right to (ii) judge (iii) and (iii) pardon humanity. It is universal in scope (iv).
i) The Right of God Justification, for Barth, is the act by which God replaces humanity back into a positive relationship with Himself. This restoration of a relationship is needed because humanity, since the fall, is “in the wrong relation to God. He makes himself impossible as the creature and covenant partner of God. He desecrates the good nature which has been given and forfeits the grace which is addressed to him. He compromises his existence. For he has no right as sinner. He is only in the wrong.”[9]
Justification, and in this Barth follows a familiar theme throughout his writings,
takes place because God exercises his sovereign freedom. This sovereign freedom
“is the backbone of the event of justification.”[10] Barth
associates the right of God with dikaiosunh. The people of
He [Jewish nation] plainly rests on God because he does not see in the election of Israel and God’s covenant with it a happy chance or in the free loving kindness of God a fortuitous favouritism, but the supreme inflexible right of God; because he is to Him One who is just in himself, and not a being who one time can will and act in one way and another time in quite a different way. [11]
God exercises his sovereign right by judging and pardoning sinful humanity in the death and resurrection Jesus. This is an event which is independent of the action of humanity, as “whatever may be the wrong of man, there can be no doubt that it does not belong to the same dimension as the right of God and cannot stand against it.”[12]
ii) Judgement: The justification of sinful humanity takes place because—and in this Barth builds on his previously written atonement theology[13]—in the substitutionary death of Jesus sinful humanity has been judged and handed over to death. For Barth, this act of Jesus as the God-Man is the justification of sinful man. In Jesus, sin is dealt with and justification has been achieved. Barth describes this as the negative aspect of justification.
It took place in Him as the true Son of God became true man, and in the unity of his person became the judge of all other men: their Judge as the One who was judged in their place- delivered up in his death, and reinstated in His resurrection from the dead. As it has taken place in Jesus Christ this is the justification of sinful man. [14]
iii) Pardon:- Barth describes the positive aspect of justification as the pardon which God pronounces in the death and resurrection of Jesus. In the death of Jesus the ‘man of sin’ is destroyed, and a new pardoned man is brought to life. This pardon, according to Barth, is unconditional.
Pardon-by God and therefore unconditionally pronounced and unconditionally valid—that is man’s justification…. Whether man hears it, whether he accepts it and lives as one who is pardoned is another question. Where men do hear it and accept it and dare to live as those who are pardoned, it is realised that its power is total and not partial, and there will be no refusal to give to it total and not a partial honour. [15]
In the above quote, and in many other places, we see clearly that Barth views the judgement, pardon, and justification of humanity as an objective event which cannot be altered by humanity, for it is neither dependant upon the faith nor the works of humanity and can only be viewed as the right of God being exercised over and above the right of humanity.
iv Universal in Scope:- The justification of sinful humanity is not just a reality for some, or for the majority of the human race, but is an event which has taken place for all.
There is not one for whose sin and death He did not die, whose sin and death He did not remove and obliterate on the cross, for whom he did not positively do the right, whose right he has not established. There is not one to whom this was not addressed as his justification in His resurrection from the dead. There is not one whose man He is not, who is not justified in Him…. Again, there is not one who is not adequately and perfectly and finally justified in Him. There is not one who is not forgiven sin in Him, whose death is not a death which has put the end to death in Him….Not one. That is what faith believes[16]
Although there is some debate as to whether Barth is a ‘universalist’,[17] it is clear, as the previous quotation illustrates, that the death of Jesus is to be seen as a death for all. For Barth, all humanity is justified.
In the phrase ‘justification by faith’ we are able to say that for Barth the ‘justification’ is an objective event which has taken place. We must now turn to the role of faith, and in doing so we see that it is, for Barth, the objectivity of justification being comprehended.
Subjectivity
Barth has made it clear that justification is neither a process nor an event which takes place in the present existential situation of the believer, but that which took place in the atonement. Faith, in Barth’s view, is not the way of salvation: “There is always something wrong and misleading when the faith of a man is referred to as the way of his salvation.”[18]
For Barth, any human attempt at gaining justification is to be abandoned because “being in opposition to grace they [those who work for justification] are opposed to the dikaiosunh Qeou because in despite of their claims and appearance they do not rest on right but wrong, because they are not dikaiosunh but ajdikia.”[19]
The supreme right of God makes any anthropocentric approach to salvation and justification false. Barth, as opposed to many evangelicals, believes that the act of faith is not a requirement for salvation to occur.
There is as little praise of man on the basis of faith as on that of his works. For there is as little justification of man ‘by’—that is to say, by means of—the faith produced by him, by his treading the way of faith, by his achievement of the emotions and thoughts and acts of faith, by his whole consciousness of faith and life of faith, as there is justification ‘by’ any other works. [20]
Faith, in Barth’s thought, can be negatively seen in that it stresses the bankruptcy of humanity before the right of God, yet at the same time it can be viewed positively as it is the act whereby humanity can cling to Jesus Christ and to the salvation which he has accomplished. Faith is “wholly and utterly humility”[21] but it is a faith which results in obedience.[22] Barth recognises that the act of atonement does not result in a change in the nature of humanity in the present. Humanity, in the present, is still sick with sin but the reconciliation achieved in the cross has been accomplished
He is still sick, but when this Doctor comes he is already healed. The sheep is still lost, but this father looks for him and he is already at home. Those two are still publicans and sinners, when the Saviour sits down to meat with them, are already holy people of God.[23]
As we have followed Barth’s discussion of justification, we have been able to see that Barth lays great emphasis upon the objectivity of justification for all. The apprehension of this event can only take place in the act of faith. We are able to agree with the Barthian scholar George Hunsinger, that Barth’s theology can be described as Soteriological Objectivism, differing from other soteriological models, in that salvation and justification have already been achieved.[24]
Covenantal
Eschatology: N.T Wright’s Doctrine Justification
by Faith Alone
It
is time now in our discussion of justification to move ahead 40 years from Karl
Barth and to discuss the theology of the contemporary
New Testament scholar N.T. Wright. As a New Testament scholar, N.T.
Wright’s main task is that of the interpretation and exegesis of the biblical
text, yet at the same time he seeks to derive from this research doctrinal
claims which he wishes the Church to embrace. It is necessary before describing
the methodological presuppositions of Wright to offer a quick sketch of his
doctrine of ‘justification by faith’, leaving aside for the moment any of the
detailed exegesis which he offers in support. Although reference will be made
to other publications, we shall be looking particularly at two of his recent
books: the argument of What Saint Paul Really Said[25] shall be
sketched out, with reference also being made to his commentary on Romans
in the New Interpreters Bible Commentary.
What
Although
only being a short book, written as an introduction to the general reader and in
anticipation of a larger volume which will appear as the fourth volume in the Christian
Origins and the Question of God series, it has come something of a storm
centre in recent years, attracting both criticism and wholehearted acceptance
by many within evangelicalism. The reason why Wright appears to have both a
positive and a negative effect is that he views the bible as being
authoritative and normative for the formulation of Christian doctrine and
praxis and, thus, is widely read by evangelicals. Wright, however, does differ
considerably in regards to the way in which he interprets the bible.[26]
In
his discussion of justification, Wright describes what many people interpret
the phrase ‘justification by faith’ to mean.
What many such people understand as the meaning of this phrase is
something like this. People are always trying to pull themselves up by their
own moral bootstraps. They try to save themselves by their own efforts; to make
themselves good enough for God, or for heaven. This doesn’t work,
one can only be saved by the sheer unmerited grace of God, appropriated not by
good works but by faith.[27]
For
Wright, the Church has responsibility to question whether their current usage
of the phrase ‘justification by faith’, has a basis in the Pauline texts. He
makes it clear that in his understanding of the phrase he is diverging from the
more mainstream position.
If we are to understand Paul himself, and perhaps to provide a Pauline
critique of current would-be biblical theology and agendas, it is therefore
vital and, I believe, urgent, that we ask whether such texts have in fact been
misused. The answer to that question, I suggest is an emphatic Yes.[28]
For
Wright, justification is not what must happen for a person to enter the
covenant as this happens through God’s calling in the act of proclaiming the
gospel. The gospel, in Wright’s analysis, is not to be confused with
justification, but thought of as the announcement of Jesus as the crucified and
now risen Messiah.
Wright
believes that we need to understand justification in at least three ways. It is
to be seen as (a) covenant, (b) law court and (c) eschatological language.
a)
Covenant language:- The history of
The purpose of the covenant was never simply that the creator wanted to
have
Justification
is to be understood as “operating within the whole world of thought of
second-temple Judaism, which clung onto the covenant promises in the face of
increasingly difficult political circumstances.”[29] The covenant, in Wright’s opinion, is to
be understood as the relationship between God and the true people of God.
Therefore, according to Wright, justification has to do with the declaration of
covenant membership.
b)
Law-court language:- The forensic aspect of
justification is allowed, within evangelicalism and Barthian
theology, to play a dominant role. In contrast Wright asks that the law
court language be understood as “functioning within the covenantal setting.” He
states that justification “cannot be made into an absolute and free-standing
concept without doing violence both to itself and to the fundamental meaning of
the covenant” [30]
The whole world, in Wright’s opinion, will one day face the judgement and
justice of God and it is at this event that the true covenant people of God
will be declared righteous.
c)
Eschatology:- Justification must be understood eschatologically, for it looks forward to the “fulfilment
of
Within
this three-fold grid, according to Wright, Justification in the present is to
be understood, not as “a matter of how someone enters the community of the true
people of God, but of how you can tell who belongs to that community”[34] prior to the eschatological event. In
Wright’s opinion, faith can be understood as the ‘badge of membership’ which
allows people in the present time to realise that in the future, in the
eschatological court case, God will rule in their favour and will vindicate
them.. No longer, according to Wright, should the people of God be defined
according to race, class or gender, but should simply be defined by their faith
in God.
The Pauline doctrine of justification by faith
strikes against all attempts to demarcate membership in the people of God by
anything other than faith in Jesus Christ; particularly, of course, it rules
out any claim to status before God based on race, class or gender. Any attempt
to define church membership by anything other than allegiance to Jesus Christ
is, quite simply, idolatrous. [35]
Therefore
‘justification by faith’ is to be seen as the “doctrine which insists that all
those who have faith belong as full members of this family, on this basis and
no other.” [36]
‘Justification by faith’, for Wright, is not so much about “soteriology as
about ecclesiology, not so much about salvation as about the Church.”[37] Thus, for Wright, the doctrine of
‘justification by faith’ has nothing to do with how a person gets saved,
whether that be in the objectivist framework of Barth or the subjective approach of evangelicalism. This
mainstream view of justification has, in Wright’s opinion, “systematically done
violence to that text (Romans) for hundreds of years, and that it is time for
the text itself to be heard again.”[38]
Summary
In summary of this chapter it
is possible to draw together some of the main features of each theology.
[1]
Werner G. Jeanrond Theological Hermeneutics:
Development and Significance (London, Macmillan, 1991) 6
[2] By using the word
evangelical I seek to draw attention to a form of Christianity which is
cross-denominational. Its history can be traced through such figures as Martin
Luther, John Wesley, Jonathan Edwards and Billy Graham. The British historian
David Bebbington describes evangelicals as
those who adhere to conversionism, the need
for personal conversion, activism, the need to live and proclaim the
reality of the Christian life, biblicism,
a submission to the authority of the bible, and crucicentrism,
a particular stress on the substitutionary death of
Jesus the God-Man. David Bebbington
‘Scottish Cultural Influences on Evangelism’ Scottish Bulletin of
Evangelical Theology Issue 14.1
(http://www.rutherfordhouse.org.uk/journals/scottish.htm). See also Alistar McGrath. Evangelicalism and the Future of
Christianity (InterVarsity, 1995)
[3] Leon Morris
‘Justification’ in ed. Elwell Evangelical
Dictionary of Biblical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
1996) 443
[4] It will be
noted that the outline of Barth’s doctrine of
justification is significantly longer than that of N.T Wright’s. The reason for
this is two-fold. 1) Many within the biblical studies world are unfamiliar with
the writings of Karl Barth 2) Karl Barth has written more on the subject.
[5] Karl Barth Church Dogmatics Vol 1V/1: The Doctrine of Reconciliation (
[6]
CD IV/1/528-568
[7]
CD IV/1/568-608
[8]
CD IV/1/608-642
[9] CD IV/1/528
[10] CD IV/1/ 531
[11] CD
IV/1/531
[12] CD IV/1/533
[13]
In particular CD IV/1/211-283 ‘The Judge Judged in our
Place’.
[14] CD IV/1/550
[15] CD IV/1/568
[16]
CD IV/1/630
[17]
Hunsinger and Kuiper differ
on whether Barth is to be labelled as a ‘universalist’. Hunsinger resists
this reading of Barth and merely says that “Barth deliberately leaves the question open, though not in
a neutral fashion, but with a strong tilt toward universal hope”. On the other
hand Kuiper, despite Barth’s
own objections, argues that his views of the atonement, election and
justification “must force him[Barth]
irresistibly to cast his lot with unrestricted universalism and to teach the
salvation of all men” Husinger Disruptive
Grace: Studies in the Theology of Karl Barth
(Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2000) R.B. Kuiper For whom did Christ die? A study of the divine
design of the atonement (Grand Rapids: Baker Book
House, 1959) 52
[18]
CD IV/1/616
[19] CD IV/1/532
[20] CD IV/1/616-617
[21] CD IV/1/ 618
[22] CD IV/1/620
[23] CD IV/1/592
[24]
“Soteriological Objectivism is a motif which Barth develops with perhaps uncommon and perhaps
unprecedented consistency. Even when not neglected, the objectivist moment in
the event of salvation is not usually understood, within any given Christian
theology, as taking unqualified conceptual priority at all points over the more
subjectivist or existential moments. Indeed, the more usual procedure, at least
in Western theology, would seem to be that the objectivist moment, is ordered,
whether loosely or tightly, implicitly or explicitly, as so to exist (at least
at some point) in the service of the subjectivist or existential moments, and
to that extent in subordination to them.” George Husinger
How to Read Karl Barth: The Shape of His Theology
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1991) 103.
Berkouwer
uses the illustration of a liberating army to illustrate how this Barthian Soteriological
Objectivism and its relation to the subjective. “Barth’s
meaning can also be indicated by the illustration of liberation from an
occupying enemy. The armies of liberation have already entered the occupied
city and the capitulation has taken place, but the wonderful news has not yet
penetrated into all the streets and suburbs of the city. Not everyone ‘knows’
the liberating event has taken place. This
detracts nothing, however, from the fact of objective liberation. The
subjective knowledge of it does not yet correspond to the objective situation.
This objective state of affairs is for Barth the
‘Christ for All’. In this way there runs through the whole of Barth’s dogmatics a strong
universalistic strain which comes to expression in a variety of connections.”[24]
G.D. Berkouwer The
Triumph of Grace in the Theology of Karl Barth: A
Scriptural Examination and Assessment (Paternoster Press, London, 1956) 265
[25]
Tom Wright What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the real founder of
Christianity (Lion, Oxford, 1997)
[26] As
Wright says in reply to one of his critics, “Please note, my bottom line has
always been, and remains, not a theory, not a tradition, not pressure from
self-appointed guardians of orthodoxy, but the text of scripture.” This was in
response to some criticism from Paul Barnett, Bishop of North Sydney, The Shape
of Justification (www.angelfire.com/mi2/paulpage/Shape.htm)
[27] Tom Wright What
[28] Ibid. 116
[29] Ibid. 117
[30] Ibid 117
[31] Ibid 118
[32] Ibid. 118
[33] N.T Wright
‘Putting Paul Together Again’ ed. Jouette M. Baasler Pauline Theology Vol 1(Augsburg:
Fortress, 1991) 200
[34] Tom Wright What
[35] Tom Wright What
[36] Ibid. 133
[37] Ibid 116
[38] Ibid 117