The Blackwell Companion to Paul

Written by Stephen Westerholm, ed Reviewed By Joshua W. Jipp

“In the end, the story of Paul is the story of the power of Paul's message to create communities of faith and to transform the lives and thinking of their members” (p. 4). So says Stephen Westerholm in his introduction to the thirty-seven essays that make up The Blackwell Companion to Paul. The remark underlies Westerholm's conviction that the message of Paul is worthy of sustained reflection by biblical scholars, theologians, and simply those “who find themselves addressed by the letters of Paul” (p. 4). And the comment further betrays his methodological decision to divide the work into three sections: (1) Paul and Christian Origins, (2) Readers of Paul, and (3) The Legacy of Paul.

Part One is devoted to “the story of Paul” and is comprised of traditional historical topics and issues that have preoccupied historians and exegetes since (at least) the Enlightenment. After the first essay, “Pauline Chronology,” the next five essays are devoted to the historical relationships between Paul and his churches. Though necessarily quite general, each of these essays describes the city or region in Paul's day, examines Paul's visits and/or relationships to the church(es), and lays out the themes and content of Paul's letter(s) to the church(es). In Part One, the reader also enjoys essays devoted to traditional historical topics such as “Paul and Scripture” (J. Ross Wagner), “Paul's Christology” (Simon Gathercole), “Paul and the Law” (Arland J. Hultgren), and “Paul, Judaism and the Jewish People” (John M. G. Barclay). Barclay's essay demonstrates that Paul's treatment of Jewish identity and his relationship to the Jewish people cannot be understood in abstraction but demands to be situated within “the midst of social practices and social circumstances” (p. 198). On the one hand, Paul's commitment to the ongoing significance of Israel within God's redemptive history stems from the social practice of reading Scripture. On the other hand, his antithetical constructions (law/Christ) and his notion of “new creation” that transcends ethnicity allowed “later Christians to read him as establishing a sharp distinction between the church and Israel” (p. 200). Wagner's essay on Paul's use of Israel's Scriptures surveys a number of central topics including the role of Scripture in Paul's mission, Paul's sources, Paul's rhetorical techniques, and the way in which Scripture functions for Paul as providing the context for understanding the death and resurrection of God's Messiah and the inclusion of the Gentiles. Moving beyond traditional Pauline theological topics, however, one also enjoys essays on “Rhetoric in the Letters of Paul (Jean Noël-Aletti), “The Social Setting of Pauline Communities” (Gerd Theissen), “Women in the Pauline Churches” (Margaret Y. MacDonald), and “Paul and Empire” (N. T. Wright). Aletti demonstrates the numerous advances (and some setbacks) that have come from the application of rhetorical criticism to Paul's letters (e.g., Rom 7:7-25 as an example of speech-in-character). MacDonald calls attention to the impressive amount and role of women in Paul's mission. Wright's essay functions as a chastened and updated attempt to situate Paul and his message within the Age of the Augustan Empire and suggests that some of Paul's discourse may have been composed to challenge the claims of the Roman rulers (e.g., 1 Cor 15:20-28; Phil 2:5-11).

Of course, no one expects every historical matter related to Paul to be treated in a companion. Given the excellence, however, with which this companion covers both old and new concerns, I was surprised not to find a chapter devoted to “Paul and the Ancient Philosophers.” Abraham Malherbe and many of his students have demonstrated the relevance (especially) of the popular philosophers to some of Paul's language and topoi, and one might have expected this to come through more directly somewhere in the volume. Likewise, an essay directly devoted to the relationship between Paul and Jesus of Nazareth (including his teachings) would have benefited the volume.

But, Westerholm asks, are not the thoughts of such figures as Origen, Augustine, Calvin, Charles and John Wesley, and other great biblical interpreters of the past “at least as important as the most recently proposed reconstruction of what the apostle really thought by an associate professor at a local university” (p. 2)? Part Two, then, is devoted to “the story of Paul's message to create communities of faith,” namely, the effects of Paul upon those who have believed and been transformed by his message. It is obvious that a one-volume companion cannot be comprehensive here; nevertheless, in this section one finds an impressive set of essays devoted to numerous Church Fathers, Aquinas, the Reformers, Barth, contemporary Continental Philosophers, recent Jewish interpretations, Orthodox readings, and African readings of Paul. Peter Widdicombe nicely demonstrates how Origen's method for reading Scripture derives (largely) out of Pauline texts (2 Cor 3:15-17; Gal 4:21-31; 1 Thess 5:23). Christopher Hall shows how Paul functions as an exemplar and teacher who forms “his readers into the image of Christ” (p. 331). Richard E. Burnett recounts Barth's own experience of God through his encounter with Paul's letter to the Romans and the way in which his commentary on the epistle led to a break with both the dominant modes of theology and biblical criticism in the early twentieth century. P. Travis Kroeker tells the story of recent continental philosophers, such as Alain Badiou and Giorgio Agamben, who have appropriated Paul's messianic discourse to problematize “the political ontologies of our age” (p. 452).

The essays in this section are (predictably) excellent. If I had been permitted to make two suggestions I would have appreciated seeing an essay on Irenaeus, Athanasius, or Cyril of Alexandria and the way Paul's texts shape patristic soteriology (especially as related to notions of theosis). Also, perhaps no one has shaped the way in which Paul has been read in the past two centuries as much as F. C. Baur and his (now largely outdated) historical reconstructions. An essay on Baur would have been worthy of inclusion.

Part Three continues to demonstrate Westerholm's concern with effective history as six essays take up the topic of Paul's legacy as seen in art, literature, and four doctrines from Christian theology. Theologians and biblical scholars will be surprised, I imagine, to discover the abundant appropriations of Paul in art and literature. If I may be permitted a personal note here, I discovered (hitherto unknown to me) two diptychs devoted to the scene represented in Acts 28:1-10 (Paul on Malta), a passage which formed the topic of my dissertation. The final four essays explore how Paul and his epistles have influenced such Christian doctrines as sin and the fall, the Spirit, ethics, and the church.

I have no reservations about wholeheartedly recommending Westerholm's Blackwell Companion to Paul. It is comprehensive, well-written, and composed of the best scholars on each topic. The work further exemplifies the contemporary turn to reception history and the belief that the meaning of texts and individuals extends into their effects upon history, culture, and communities. While the language is not used, practitioners of the theological interpretation of Scripture will find many of their concerns validated by this volume as many of the essays do not separate Scripture from theology.


Joshua W. Jipp

Joshua W. Jipp
Trinity Evangelical Divinity School
Deerfield, Illinois, USA

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