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The shape of soteriology and the pistis Christou debate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2008

David L. Stubbs
David L. Stubbs*
Affiliation:
Western Theological Seminary, 101 E 13th St, Holland, MI 49423david.stubbs@westernsem.edu
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Abstract

A historic debate with great implications for theology has resurfaced in New Testament circles; however, it has not received the attention it should by theologians. It concerns how to translate and interpret approximately ten instances of the Greek phrase pistis Christou and its near equivalents in the letters of Paul. This phrase occurs within theologically crucial sections of Romans and Galatians, which have provided the foundation for the Reformation understanding of ‘justification by grace through faith’. The question is whether ‘faith’ in these phrases refers principally to the believer's ‘faith in Christ’, as traditionally understood, or should be translated and understood as ‘the faith of Christ’. In this article, I hope to introduce theologians to this debate and make a contribution to it from a theological angle, by describing the two primary ‘patterns of soteriology’ which are in play, and then examining how easily these different patterns of soteriology can be read onto what Paul writes concerning three crucial issues in his letters: salvation, the Law and the ‘righteousness of God’. I argue that the overall theological vision which includes three facets – a christologically centred understanding of the pistis Christou passages, a broader understanding of pistis, and the centring of soteriology around the concept of ‘participation in Christ’ – provides the most convincing interpretational matrix for reading Paul. I also point out implications this has for contemporary theology.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 61 , Issue 2 , May 2008 , pp. 137 - 157
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 2008

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References

1 The passages are Rom. 3:22, 26; Gal. 2:16 (twice), 20; 3:22, 26 (a textual variant); Phil. 3:9; Eph. 3:12 and 4:13. The debate resurfaced in the 1980s and continues to this day. See Paul, Pollard, ‘The “Faith of Christ” in Current Discussion’, Concordia Journal 23 (July 1997), pp. 213–28Google Scholar, for an excellent historical summary of the debate, 1795–1997, and a nearly exhaustive bibliography since the 1980s. For another extensive bibliographical list, see Richard, Hays, ‘πIσTIσ and Pauline Christology’, Pauline Theology, vol. 4 (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997), pp. 35–6Google Scholar. More recent articles and books include: Wallis, I. G., The Faith of Jesus Christ in Early Christian Traditions (Cambridge: CUP, 1995)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Dodd, Brian J., ‘Romans 1:17: A Crux Interpretum for the Pistis Christou Debate’, Journal of Biblical Literature 114 (Fall 1995), pp. 470–3CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Janzen, Gerald J., ‘Coleridge and Pistis Christou’, Expository Times 107 (June 1996), pp. 265–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Martyn, J. Louis, Galatians, The Anchor Bible (New York: Doubleday, 1997)Google Scholar; John, Dunnill, ‘Saved by Whose Faith? The Function of pistis Christou in Pauline Theology’, Colloquium 30 (May 1998), pp. 3–25Google Scholar; Cranfield, C. E. B., ‘On the πιστισ Xριστoψ Question’, On Romans and Other New Testament Essays (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998), pp. 81–97Google Scholar; Lindsay, Dennis R., ‘Works of the Law, Hearing of Faith and πιστιζ, Xσιστoε in Galatians 2:16–3:5’, Stone-Campbell Journal 3/1 (Spring 2000), pp. 79–88Google Scholar; Barry, Matlock, ‘Detheologizing the pistis Christou Debate’, Novum Testamentum 42/1 (2000), pp. 1–23Google Scholar; ‘“Even the Demons Believe”: Paul and pistis Christou’, Catholic Biblical Quarterly 64/2 (April 2002), pp. 300–18; Paul Foster, ‘The First Contribution to the pistis Christou Debate: A Study of Ephesians 3:12’, Journal for the Study of the New Testament 85 (March 2002), pp. 75–96.

2 Douglas, Harink, Paul Among the Postliberals: Pauline Theology Beyond Christendom and Modernity (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2003)Google Scholar.

3 The most common way to characterise the numerous positions is to indicate whether one understands pistis Christou to be an objective or a subjective genitive phrase. If one interprets Christou as an objective genitive, then Christ is seen to be the object of faith, so one translates the phrase as ‘faith in Christ’; if Christou is understood as a subjective genitive, then Christ is the subject of faith, and so one translates the phrase as ‘faith of Christ’. The attributive genitive is a third option; here Christou tells us of the quality of the faith, hence ‘Christic’ faith. However, I believe the most helpful way to frame the debate is whether the faith referred to in each phrase is fundamentally ‘christological’ or ‘anthropological’, i.e. whether the reality that Paul is pointing to with these phrases is at its root something to do with Christ or else the human response to Christ. Cf. Hays, ‘ΠIΣTIΣ’, pp. 39–40 and Harink, Paul, pp. 27–8.

4 Exceptions to this include the exchange between Torrance and Moule: Torrance, Thomas F., ‘One Aspect of the Biblical Conception of Faith’, Expository Times 48 (Jan 1957), pp. 111–14CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Torrance, Thomas F., ‘The Biblical Conception of “Faith”’, Expository Times 48 (1957), pp. 221–2Google Scholar; Moule, C. F. D., ‘The Biblical Conception of “Faith”’, Expository Times 48 (1957), pp. 157, 222Google Scholar. New Testament scholars who have raised important theological implications about the translation are Richard Hays, ‘πIσTIσ’, pp. 55–7, Morna Hooker, ‘πIσTIσ 㩷PIσTΟY’, NTS 35 (1989), pp. 341–2, and Dunnill, ‘Saved by Whose Faith?’; Martyn, Galatians; Pierre Vallotton, Le Christ et la Foi: Étude de théologie biblique (Genève: Labor et Fides, 1960). Ian Wallis's historical study, Faith of Jesus Christ and Harink, Paul, begin to treat the theological issues with greater depth.

5 Sanders, , Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977), p. 549Google Scholar.

6 Ibid., p. 441. Other arguments Sanders makes are that (1) participation language about Christ's death is much more typical than sacrificed ‘for us’ language, (2) the human problem is characterised not so much as ‘guilt’ before God, but that we are ‘under sin’, (3) Paul understands that the main problem with transgression is that it establishes unions not compatible with union with Christ, 1 Cor. 6 and 10 being good examples. Ibid., pp. 502–8.

7 A possible exception may be Dunnill. He argues for a christologically centred understanding of the passages, and has a more expansive view of Christ's ‘faith’, but he does not also stress the believer's participation in Christ. Instead, he makes a distinction between Christ's faith and the faith of those who follow Christ.

8 Hooker, ‘πIσTIσ 㩷PIσTΟY’, p. 341.

9 Hays, ‘πIσTIσ’, pp. 59–60.

10 Hays, Theological Students Fellowship Bulletin 7/1 (September/October 1983), pp. 4–6. Yet another author who illustrates this pattern is Coleridge. In Janzen's examination of how S. T. Coleridge interpreted the pistis Christou passages and Pauline theology in general, we see the christologically centred interpretation once again linked to both a broader understanding of ‘faith’ – which for Coleridge refers most fundamentally to an ‘energy’, ‘disposition’, ‘will’ or ‘principle’ within a person – and a soteriology centred on participation in Christ's ‘faith’, ‘disposition’, ‘mind’ or ‘will’. Janzen, ‘Coleridge’.

11 At least among Protestant interpreters of Paul. Aquinas, in his Galatians commentary, sometimes interprets these phrases as references to the believer's faith or trust in Christ, but most often ‘the faith of Christ’ is taken to refer to the Christian religion or ‘manner of life’ or ‘living according to the precepts of the faith’, which is opposed to the Jewish religion or works of the Law. St Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Saint Paul's Epistle to the Galatians (Albany, NY: Magi Books, 1966), pp. 52–4. Thus Aquinas seems to take the ‘attributive’ genitive position.

12 Referring to E. P. Sanders's work again, one can understand this pattern to be similar to what he describes as ‘covenantal nomism’, his description of the Jewish pattern of religion, but now ‘faith’ rather than the ‘works of the Law’ describes the boundaries of the community. Cf. Paul, p. 422.

13 Arland, Hultgren, ‘The Pistis Christou Formulations in Paul’, Novum Testamentum 22 (1980), p. 259Google Scholar.

14 James, Dunn, ‘Once More, πIσTIσ ≥PIσTΟY’, in Johnson, E. and David, Hay (eds), Pauline Theology, vol. 4 (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997), p. 74Google Scholar.

15 A ‘participationist’ interpretation of Luther is argued quite persuasively by Tuomo Mannermaa and the Finnish school of Luther scholars that surround him. See Mannermaa, Christ Present in Faith: Luther's View of Justification (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005), and Braaten, Carl E. and Jenson, Robert W. (eds), Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998)Google Scholar. Sanders thinks ‘faith in Christ’ refers to the believer's faith, but this introduces tensions in Paul in at least two areas. First, Sanders argues the ‘juridical language’ or ‘righteousness’ language of Paul is best understood as controlled by Paul's ‘participationist’ language. Paul ‘presses into service’ the inherited language of righteousness into his theology, with the result that his righteousness language is not equivalent to typical Jewish usage, nor is it systematically worked out in and of itself: ‘It is precisely because he pressed the term [righteousness] into meanings which it does not easily bear that the exegesis of what he wrote has always been so difficult and confusing’ (Paul, p. 508). In response to Sanders, while the ‘faith of Christ’ interpretation does not make Paul easy reading, it does smooth out and make more coherent many traditionally difficult ‘righteousness’ passages, as will be pointed out below. Second, Sanders argues a common problem with Pauline interpretation is that interpreters assume the opening arguments of Romans and Galatians are good clues to the centre of Paul's theology. Sanders believes this ‘is ultimately misleading’, presumably because these arguments are about ‘juridical’ concerns, while the centre of Paul is ‘participationist’ (p. 441). However, given a ‘faith of Christ’ reading, these opening arguments are good indications of the centre of Paul's theology, which is reasonable to expect. In these passages, the ‘juridical’ and ‘participationist’ languages are merged, and in a way in which the juridical language is more coherent with itself and with the participationist language than in a ‘faith in Christ’ reading. In sum, I agree with Sanders that ‘participationist’ language is at the heart of Paul's theology, but think that a reading of Paul which includes a christological ‘faith of Christ’ understanding will smooth out the tensions Sanders highlights in the ‘righteousness’ language of Paul's letters.

16 Vallotton, Le Christ et La Foi, pp. 13–19; A. G. Herbert, Theology, 58/424 (Oct. 1955); T. F. Torrance, ‘One Aspect’, pp. 111–14; Dunn, ‘Once More’, p. 75, citing his own Romans 1–8 (Dallas, TX.: Word Books, 1988), pp. 200–1. Wallis, Faith of Jesus Christ, pp. 9–23. Dunnill, ‘Saved by Whose Faith?’, pp. 4–5.

17 Hays, ‘πIσTIσ’, pp. 40–1.

18 Hooker, ‘πIσTIσ 㩷PIσTΟY’, pp. 334–5.

19 Ibid., p. 335.

20 Dunn, ‘Once More’, pp. 75, 80. Romans 4 will be treated in greater depth below. Dunnill, while arguing for a christological reading of the pistis Christou phrases (p. 10), does share Dunn's distinction between divine and human pistis, although for Dunnill Christ is included in the divine side. He argues this on the basis of Rom 4 and the reduced semantic range of the verbal, as opposed to nominal, forms of the pistis word-group (pp. 11, 15–16). When Paul uses pistis in reference to God and Christ, it is in the nominal form, which Dunnill interprets often as ‘faithfulness’, while the verbal form always refers to human forms of believing, their responsive faith or trust (p. 12).

21 Dunn, ‘Once More’, pp. 77, 77, n. 69. In Dunn's conclusion on p. 79, this point, along with the grammatical arguments and the general argument that Paul's letters read more smoothly when reading ‘faith in Christ’, are his three summary arguments which convince him of the ‘objective’ or ‘anthropological’ reading.

22 While Sanders understands salvation differently, he understands justification and righteousness similarly in that he sees them as ‘transfer terms’ that have the primary connotation of being forgiven for past sins. Sanders, Paul, pp. 470–2.

23 E.g. Galatians, pp. 97–105, 246–60.

24 Harink, Paul, p. 45. Cf. Beker, J. Christian, Paul the Apostle: The Triumph of God in Life and Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1980), pp. 11–36Google Scholar. ‘Narrative substructure’ is a term Hays uses in The Faith of Jesus Christ: An Investigation of the Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1–4:11 (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983).

25 Hultgren, ‘Pistis Christou Formulations’, pp. 259–60.

26 James, Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998), esp. pp. 354–71Google Scholar.

27 Ibid., p. 369.

28 While Paul's argument about the Law in Gal. 3 is different from his treatment in Romans, this understanding of what the problem with the Law is makes sense of Paul's argument there as well, as Hooker's exegesis shows. Hooker, ‘πIσTIσ 㩷PIσTΟY,’ pp. 326–31.

29 Richard, Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989), pp. 73–83Google Scholar.

30 Hooker writes that there is an ‘antithesis’ between ‘the works of the Law and the saving work of Christ’, but I would clarify that this antithesis is in reference to the means and not the ends. Hooker, ‘πIσTIσ 㩷PIσTΟY,’ p. 341.

31 Martyn, Galatians, p. 271.

32 Dunnill, ‘Saved by Whose Faith?’, p. 17.

33 Harink, Paul, pp. 105–207.

34 Calvin, Institutes, II.VII.12.

35 But see n. 15 above; a new school of Finnish interpreters of Luther argues for the importance of ‘in Christ’ language in Luther's understanding of the new covenant. They argue that the emphasis on ‘imputation’ without ‘participation’ is found in the Formula of Concord and Melancthon but not Luther.

36 Hultgren, ‘Pistis Christou Formulations’, pp. 258–62.

37 Studies in Rabbinic interpretation have helped to explain some of the ways that Paul interprets scripture, yet problems still remain given the ‘faith in Christ’ paradigm. Richard Hays's work on Paul's use of the Old Testament has done much to open up a renewed interest in Paul as an interesting and skilful interpreter of scripture. Hays, Echoes of Scripture.

38 Dunn, ‘Once More’, p. 75.

39 Dunn, Theology, p. 354.

40 See Hays, ‘πIσTIσ’, pp. 52–3. Here Abraham is analogous to both Christ's faith and ours. Paul on this reading appears to be searching the scriptures for general patterns of the relationship between God and humanity (thus Abraham's faith is on a trajectory that reaches its fulfilment in Christ and in our participation in Christ), rather than looking to the word ‘reckon’ as a technical term upon which he bases his whole soteriology, as Paul appears to do in Dunn's exegesis of Rom. 4. Dunn, ‘Once More’, pp. 75–76.

41 See Dunn, Theology, p. 139.

42 One can also see why Calvin's third use of the law seems so mistaken to many Lutherans.

43 Pierre Vallotton provocatively writes in his introduction that ‘redemption through the mystical theology of life in Christ contains all of soteriology, not only of the apostle, but of the New Testament’ (p. 9).

44 Looking once again to James Dunn as a representative of these opposing arguments, in the conclusions of his ‘Once More’ article, he argues the ‘faith in Christ’ reading is superior for three primary reasons (pp. 79–80). First, he believes the grammatical considerations weigh in its favour. However, authors such as Sam Williams have forcefully made the case that the grammatical scales tip slightly in favour of the christological ‘faith of Christ’ reading (Sam Williams, ‘The ‘Righteousness of God’ in Romans’, JBL 99 (1980), pp. 241–90; ‘Again Pistis Christou’, CBQ 49 (1987), pp. 431–47; ‘Justification and the Spirit in Galatians’, JSNT 29 (1987), pp. 91–100). Dunnill argues the grammatical questions have ‘largely been resolved’ with the burden of proof resting on the traditional reading (pp. 5–6). Second, Dunn questions whether the theme of ‘the faith of Christ’ can be seriously considered as the key to Pauline soteriology given it is only mentioned in the disputed phrases. But, as shown above, if the ‘faith of Christ’ is taken to mean Christ's obedient faithfulness to God, even to the point of death on a cross, then many substantial passages in Romans, Galatians, Philippians, and 1 and 2 Corinthians specifically refer to it and Paul's ‘theology of the cross’ is linked to it. Third, Dunn argues that the flow of Paul's arguments is more coherent given the ‘faith in Christ’ reading while the ‘faith of Christ’ throws them into confusion. Again, while Dunn's particular ‘faith in Christ’ reading improves upon some problem points in the typical Lutheran reading, the ‘faith(fullness) of Christ’ reading makes better sense of certain specific passages, the overall flow of Paul's argument in at least Romans and brings coherence to certain problems within Pauline theology as a whole, not least of which is the arguably problematic way Paul is seen to interpret scripture and his overall construal of the covenant in the ‘faith in Christ’ readings.

45 E.g. in Paul Achtemeier's response to Hays's and Dunn's papers in the Pauline theology group, he apparently does not consider linking participation in Christ with the ‘faith of Christ’ and consequently questions whether the ‘faith of Christ’ reading might lead again to a kind of ‘work’ on the part of the believer and in the end make Christ dispensable once this ‘faithfulness’ is achieved. Achtemeier, ‘Apropos the Faith of/in Christ’, Pauline Theology, vol. 4 (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997), pp. 90–1.

46 E.g. Aquinas writes, ‘I answer that . . . the object of faith is a Divine thing not seen . . . . Now from the first moment of His conception Christ saw God's Essence fully, as will be made clear (Q34 A1). Hence there could be no faith in Him.’ Summa Theologica III.7.3.

47 Cf. Sanders, Paul, pp. 523, 552.

48 Participation is a consistent theme characterising the church's relationship to Christ in Harink's book, e.g. ‘The Church participates in the new creation; it does not bring it about by its own actions . . . it is a participation in “the cross” . . . a participation in the resurrection’ (pp. 102–3).

49 Reinhard, Hütter, Suffering Divine Things: Theology as Church Practice (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000)Google Scholar; Henri, de Lubac, The Mystery of the Supernatural (New York: Herder & Herder, 1967)Google Scholar; Alexander, Schmemann, For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir's, 2000)Google Scholar.