Romans
I did want to do a post on Romans this week. Last week there were quite a few reading from that book and it did get me thinking. I also ran into some comments from Adomnan and Nick on Dave Armstrong’s blog. Adomnan pointed out an interesting fact. They key word that drives much of Protestant thinking on justification is logizomai translated imputed or credited or covered. Romans 4 is the only time it is used in regards to salvation/righteousness. That is interesting because the reformers asserted that the entire message of the gospel was centered around this concept. That our sins are covered but not removed. God simply chooses not to see them when we respond to Him with faith. But if that idea is really so central why does it not appear all over the New Testament? Why just in Romans 4?
Now protestants might reply that we give them a hard time about ignoring John 6. Why should we be allowed to ignore Romans 4? It is a fair question. I wish we challenged protestants more on John 6. I think it is entirely unacceptable to ignore a few verses of scripture you don’t like. So we need to explain why justification is talked about in these terms in Romans 4 but we need to first note that this language is the exception. It is not the rule.
First of all, we need to remember what the book of Romans is about. Romans is not, first and foremost, about justification. Paul’s focus was on the relationship between Jews and gentiles and between the old covenant and the new. So anything he says about faith, works, and salvation needs to be seen in this light. James 2, for example, is about faith and works. It addresses the question directly. Romans addresses it very indirectly.
Paul started by talking about sin and judgment. He makes clear he is not naive. He knows the gentiles have had less revelation about God and they do commit some serious sin. Homosexuality is one thing that was occurring in the gentile world in a big way. Jews would see that and feel pretty holy. At least we don’t celebrate abominations against God like some people do. Paul does not excuse any of it. He says that sin is serious and God will judge it.
5But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. 6God “will give to each person according to what he has done.” 7To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. 8But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. 9There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; 10but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 11For God does not show favoritism.
This is a very strange thing to say if the point you are trying to make is that God will not judge people by their works. You can suppose he is talking only about people who lack faith. He does not say that. You can suppose that verse 10 applies to nobody because nobody is good. Paul does not make that easy. The text reads pretty clearly like works matter in salvation. Is it reasonable to think Paul is saying the opposite of what he says in chapter 4? Protestants can explain the tension but Paul does not. Maybe because if you read him right there is no tension.
Paul goes on to show how Jews and gentiles are very similar in their position before God. This is key. They are not exactly the same but Paul is trying to emphasize the similarities rather than the differences. So he goes on to say “all have sinned.” What does he mean. Jews have sinned and gentiles have sinned. He quotes passage after passage where God points out the sin of the Jews. His point is not that every individual has sinned. He is just talking about people groups. His point is that the extra grace the Jews received in the form of the law and the prophets did not produce a people who were not deep in sin. They might not have been quite as deep as the gentiles but they were still over their head. Still deep enough to result in spiritual death.
But the Jews are children of Abraham. That is great. How did Abraham become so righteous? Paul quotes a amazing act of faith from Abraham recorded in Gen 15:
2 But Abram said, “O Sovereign LORD, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit [c] my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.”
4 Then the word of the LORD came to him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir.” 5 He took him outside and said, “Look up at the heavens and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”
6 Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness.
The interesting thing in that in verse 12 it talks about the sun setting. So verse 5 occurred in the daytime. So this is a great act of faith. To look at the stars in the daytime and see nothing. God says you believe stars are there. Also believe your descendants are there. Was this Abraham’s initial salvation. No. He had faith before that. Hebrews 11 says so. This righteousness was a purification for the covenant liturgy Abraham goes through in the rest of the chapter. Abraham came into God’s presence and needed to be holy.
Does this passage suggest works don’t matter? Not really. What work would you expect to flow from God giving this promise? Believing is all he could do in the short term. Does that imply that if Abraham had committed a mortal sin it would not have mattered? No. He is acting on his faith. When God says “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon” he does it. But in the short term the actions are not the focus. He believes. That lead to righteousness.
So why does Paul pick up this verse? First of all because the language of imputation makes clear that the starting point for faith is not so important. Abraham required faith. Jews require faith. Gentiles require faith. Whether you are a big sinner or a relatively holy man does not change that at all. So the Jews idea that they were ahead of the game was just not valid. That idea would only apply when viewing justification as a legal problem or perhaps the problem of owing a debt. This is only one analogy for justification but it suits Paul here because it show why the Jews think they should be in a better situation but in fact they are not.
Paul uses other images for justification elsewhere. You have the image of adoption into God’s family. You have the image of dying and being recreated. Those images make clear that works play a major role. The image of a superabundant credit to your side of the ledger makes that less clear. But it suits Paul’s purpose because it makes very clear that we rely not on who is holy but on who accesses the grace. It makes clear that Jews and gentiles are the same in the most important respects. They both need to access grace through faith.
So Paul keeps the focus on initial justification because he wants to see gentiles welcomed into the church as equals with Jews. Sure they Jews will know the Old Testament better and might have better habits developed for holy living. But they are the same in the sense they both require grace and the both get access to that grace through faith. He does not have to say that sacraments matter or that avoiding mortal sin matters or that sewing and reaping matters. He teaches the truth he needs to in order to achieve his pastoral aim.
This is an amazing topic and I believe is a new way of Catholic apologetics arsing. Some points I’d like to make:
1) The Greek term for “impute/credit/reckon” appears about 40 times in the New Testament (11 times in Romans 4). However, Romans 4 is the only time it is used in regards to salvation/righteousness. This is very odd if Imputation is such a central concept to the Gospel. What is worse, the Greek term for ‘impute/credit/reckon’ is not even used the way Protestants claim! Psalm 106:30f uses the same Greek/Hebrew phrase as Gen 15:6 (”Credited as righteousness”) and it clearly means the action was seen as a truly righteous act…that’s not what the Protestant wants to hear. This is why Psalm 106:30f is frequently ignored/downplayed.
I STRONGLY SUGGEST YOU READ THIS ARTICLE, it will change your life and any Protestants you show this to!
http://www.pugiofidei.com/logizomai.htm
2) I am glad you are bringing up the long standing almost ‘fear’ of Romans (esp ch4) that Catholics exhibit. That is wrong and needs to change. The fact is, Romans (when properly read) – especially ch4 – actually refutes Protestantism far greater than James 2:24 ever could. My dream is that Catholics dump James 2:24 as their “go to” passage and shift focus on the solid and powerful arguments Paul has to offer.
For a long time Protestants have had a strangle hold on texts like Romans 4 (v1-8), Ephesians 2 (v8-10), Galatians 3(v10-13, Philippians 3(v9), etc. However, upon my careful study, these texts – especially when read in context – cause serious damange to Sola Fide theology.
This led me to write an apologetics article on Ephesians 2:8, showing how it solidly supports Catholicism:
http://catholicdefense.googlepages.com/eph2
I hope to do the same, at least in a basic form, for the above texts as well. The key is understanding Sola Fide as CLASSICALLY defined, that way you know what you’re supposed to look for when reading Paul – and thus see if Paul is really saying that or not (which he most often is not!)
3) You make a good point about the final judgment according to works and how that is so illogical if Paul’s point is that we wont be judged according to our works. Interestingly, Paul doesn’t focus on the final judgment when speaking of ‘justification by faith’, indicating that is a different event in Paul’s mind. Astonishingly, Romans 14:9-12 says we will all give an account before the judgment seat for how we lived. This is far removed from a ‘justified by faith’ granting us full access into Heaven.
4) You begin to speak on Romans 4. What is astonishing is that Paul INTERPRETS verse 3 “credited as righteousness” in verses 18-22! Yet these verses are almost NEVER discussed! In those versese we see nothing relating to imputation of Christ’s righteousness, but rather how God considered Abraham’s faith as righteous precisely because it grew and persevered and hoped. It is this type of stuff Catholics need to zoom onto when talking with Protestants, because Protestants only see 4:2-8, ignoring the rest and thus misreading the former.
Great discussion! I love this stuff!
October 20th, 2009 at 3:54 pmThanks for the compliment. I do not know how to do what you suggest. I shall look around the preferences again and see if anything is there I did not see before.
The Greek term for “impute/credit/reckon” appears about 40 times in the New Testament (11 times in Romans 4). However, Romans 4 is the only time it is used in regards to salvation/righteousness.
Sorry, I must have misunderstood what Adomnan said on Dave’s blog. I will correct it.
I STRONGLY SUGGEST YOU READ THIS ARTICLE, it will change your life and any Protestants you show this to!
I did read this a while ago. It is interesting. I decided not to get into the greek. Partly because I could not find this article back, thanks for that. But partly because many people tune out when you get into such a detailed word study.
My point is that it is way easier to explain why Paul focuses on crediting in Rom 4 than to explain all the other times works are connected with salvation. The meaning of logizomai is not completely clear but even if protestants are mostly right about it they do not create much of a problem for Catholics.
My dream is that Catholics dump James 2:24 as their “go to” passage and shift focus on the solid and powerful arguments Paul has to offer.
I do feel that James 2 is the fullest explaination in scripture of the faith, works, salvation question. In Romans Paul’s focus is on Jews and gentiles, not on faith and works. That is just obvious to anyone reading Romans and/or Galatians. After James my next “go to” passages would be in the gospels. Mat 25 and the sheep and the goats. Mat 7 and the “not everyone who says to me Lord Lord.” If I talk about Paul is is normally Gal 5:19-21, “those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God”. Then of course Cor 13, “if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing”. No shortage of “go to” texts!
October 21st, 2009 at 8:09 amIn the case of Logizomai (the term translated in English as impute/reckon/count/etc) a startling fact emerges: the term ‘impute’ doesn’t actually appear in Romans 4, that’s a Protestant translation of Logizomai in Romans 4 (and even then most Protestant translations don’t translate it as ‘impute’). So basically we have a foundational term – imputation – that doesn’t technically appear in Scripture.
Looking at how a Greek term is used and translated elsewhere in Scripture helps us get a better understanding of its meaning. One of the biggest tragedies in Protestant exegesis, especially of Romans 4, is their lack of analysis on how Logizomai is used. I’ve looked repeatedly in Protestant texts, both old and new, and they wont do a word study of Logizomai in the New Testament. This is very telling to me, because it indicates to me they don’t like where the evidence points and the consequences would be too serious. This is also why Protestants shy away from Psalm 106:30-31, the only other time “credited as righteousness” appears. Rather than ‘interpreting Scripture with Scripture’, Protestants have not followed their own advice when it comes to Logizomai.
Catholics are ‘taking back’ Scripture, and basic Greek word studies like this are essential to doing so. It is extensive, fair, and honest Biblcal exegesis, so it’s nothing we nor Protestants have to fear, if the truth is all we’re after. When you say the meaning of Logizomai is not clear, I’m not sure where you’re getting that – of the 40 times it’s used, it overwhelmingly means to consider something as what it really is, which is the exact opposite of what the Protestant claims.
October 21st, 2009 at 4:40 pm