Category:New Perspective on Paul (subject)

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New Perspective on Paul

Overview

The "Old" Perspective on Paul maintained that while "Late Judaism" was a religion based on "works" and characterized by legalism, Paul believed that salvation came by grace through faith. Paul's rejection of the Law was radical; he saw the Law as an antagonistic force from which human beings needed to be redeemed.

Early critics of the old perspective included Claude Montefiore, George F. Moore, and Krister Stendahl.

The turning point came with the publication of Paul and Palestinian Judaism (1977 Sanders), book. Sanders stressed that Second Temple Judaism was not the legalistic religion of past caricatures. Grace played an important role in the soteriology of the period. God's election was the necessary premise for "getting in" the covenant while the Law was the condition for "staying in." In Sanders'd view Paul proposed a different "pattern of religion", where Jesus' grace replaced the old covenant.

According to Dunn and Wright the "failure" of Judaism was not legalism or works-righteousness, but "national righteousness."

Against the New Perspective, the Radical New Perspective on Paul stressed that in his letters Paul addressed a non-Jewish audience, being a proponent of two-ways of salvation. The Jewish covenant remained valid for the Jews, while the new covenant in Christ is a path to salvation for the Gentiles.