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Paul (1971) is the English edition of Paulus (1969 Bornkamm), book. Translated from the German by D.M.G. Stalker.

Abstract

"This book makes a certain demand on its readers, though perhaps less on the professional theologian au fait with current research than on the layperson, for whom it is equally designed. The reader will look in vain here for much that from the beginning has been a familiar part of the church's tradition, deriving above all from the Book of Acts. The reasons for this slight, and critical, use of Acts are give in the Introduction. In the matter of Paul's own epistles, too, this book often goes ways of its own. If we are to think Paul's theology along with him and follow it, we certainly need to prepare ourselves and to persevere. At the same time, with a thinker of Paul's stature, it is impossible to make him seem easier than he is. Bornkamm has tried not only to give some account of his life and thought but also to let the reader share in the process of questioning and discovery.In Paul's theology many topics and ideas are so interrelated that the reader should not in every case expect exhaustive treatment of a particular subject under the relevant heading. For more detailed discussion he must refer to other related ideas and key words."--Publisher description.

"This is Bornkamm’s companion volume to his Jesus of Nazareth, which he wrote more than a dozen years before in 1956. Bornkamm is particularly concerned with demonstrating continuity between Jesus and Paul, thereby refuting the widespread idea that Paul was the pervertor of the pure spirituality of the man of Galilee. Paul is a summary of Paul’s life and theology with an emphasis on the way each influenced the other. The book breaks down into two parts. The first part addresses Paul’s life and work and is biographical in nature. The second part expounds his theology. Bornkamm emphasizes throughout the text Paul’s grounding in Hellenistic Judaism and OT theology, as well as his continuity with Jesus. Bornkamm was a German Protestant theologian; not surprisingly he considered justification by faith the centerpiece of Pauline theology. In his reconstruction of early church history he favors Paul’s own epistles over Acts, which Bornkamm believed oftentimes was ignorant of what actually happened." -- Ronald Ruark, University of Michigan

Editions

Published in London [England]: Hodder & Stoughton, 1971; and New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1971. Reissued in Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1995.

Table of contents

Part One: Life and Work

• 1. Paul’s descent and environment before conversion

• 2. Paul’s persecution of the church and his conversion and call

• 3. First missionary activity

• 4. The Apostolic Assembly in Jerusalem

• 5. The first journey to Cyprus and Asia, and the conflict at Antioch

• 6. The world-wide scope of the Pauline mission

• 7. The first church in Greece: Philippi, Thessalonica, and Athens

• 8. Corinth

• 9. Ephesus

• 10. Romans as Paul’s testament

• 11. Paul’s final journey to Jerusalem, imprisonment, and death

Part Two: Gospel and Theology

• 1. Paul and the gospel of the primitive church

• 2. Lost: man and the world

• 3. The saving event

• 4. Present salvation

• 5. Future and present (eschatology and ethics)

Conclusion: Paul and Jesus

Appendixes

• I. Authentic and inauthentic Pauline letters

• II. Critical Problems in 1 and 2 Corinthians, Philippians, and Romans

• III. Christology and Justification

External links