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Paul and the Old Testament – His Legacy and Ours

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Geoffrey Turner
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Abstract

The legacy that Paul received was the Jewish scriptures that he quoted extensively in Greek from the Septuagint. This was a legacy not widely appreciated, for various theological reasons, until relatively recently. However, a count of Paul's citations, quotations from and allusions to scripture comes to over 250. Paul's thinking was framed by his re-reading of scripture and emphasises how Jewish was his historical context and theological frame of reference. How this affects our interpretation of Paul's theology is illustrated by four examples from Wisdom, the Psalms in general, Ps 78 in particular, and Paul's rewriting of the Shema Israel in 1 Cor 8.6. There are some brief comments on the difficulties that Paul's use of scripture leaves us with.

Keywords

PaulOld Testamentscripturecitationshermeneutics
Type
Original Articles
Information
New Blackfriars , Volume 91 , Issue 1032: Special Issue: Catholic Theological Association 2009 Conference Papers: The Legacy of Paul , March 2010 , pp. 128 - 141
Copyright
Copyright © The author 2010. Journal compilation © The Dominican Council.

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References

1 Hengel, M., The Pre-Christian Paul (London: SCM Press, 1991)Google Scholar.

2 We note that there are now some distinguished Jewish scholars who take a lively and sympathetic interest in Paul.

3 E.Ellis, Paul's Use of the Old Testament (Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1957). He says 87 on p.11 but the count in Appendix A 1 (A) seems to be 88.

4 D-A.Koch, , Die Schrift als Zeuge des Evangeliums: Untersuchungen zur Verwendung und zum Verständnis der Schrift bei Paulus (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1986)Google Scholar.

5 O.Michel, Paulus und seine Bibel (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1972, originally 1929).

6 Stanley, C., Paul and the Language of Scripture: Citation Technique in the Pauline Epistles and Contemporary Literature (Cambridge: CUP, 1992)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7 Ibid., p. 37.

8 Ibid., p. 359f.

9 Hays, R.B., Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (New Haven: Yale UP, 1989), pp. 16 & 30Google Scholar.

10 Francis Watson makes this point repeatedly, for example where he says, “Paul's doctrine of righteousness by faith is an exercise in scriptural interpretation, and intends itself to be understood as such”, Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith (London: T & T Clark International, 2004), p. 53Google Scholar.

11 Francis Watson discusses this text in Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith pp. 405–9 and makes the point that Paul turns the next chapter, Wisdom 15, which praises pious Jews, against Jewish readers by alleging that they fail to keep the law.

12 Campbell, D.A., The Quest for Paul's Gospel (London: International, T & T Clark, 2005)Google Scholar, ch.11 ‘Reading Romans 1.18–3.20’, pp. 233–261.

13 Sanders, E.P., Paul and Palestinian Judaism (London: SCM Press, 1977)Google Scholar.

14 A detailed exposition of these ideas will appear sometime in the future in the Scottish Journal of Theology under the title ‘The Righteousness of God in Psalms and Romans’.

15 See D.A.Campbell, Op. cit., pp. 178–207, ‘The Meaning of “Faith” in Paul's Gospel’ for a detailed argument for consistently translating pistis as faithfulness or, alternatively, as trust or loyalty.

16 For the subjective genitive, the faith or faithfulness of Christ, see Hays, R.B. ‘PISTIS and Pauline Christology’ in Looking Back, Pressing On, ed. By Johnson, E.E. and Hay, D.M., Vol 4 of Pauline Theology (Atlanta 1997), pp. 35–60Google Scholar, or the more recent D.A.Campbell, Op. cit., pp. 208–232; and for the objective genitive, faith in Christ, see Dunn, J. D. G., ‘Once More: Pistis Christou’ in the same volume edited by Johnson and Hay, pp. 61–81, or more briefly in the more accessible The Theology of Paul the Apostle (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1998), pp. 379–385Google Scholar.

17 Fee, G.D., Pauline Christology (Peabody, Massachusetts: Hendrickson, 2007), p. 90Google Scholar.

18 These brief comments were meant to provoke discussion at the conference. For a fuller discussion see Richard Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul, final chapter, pp. 154–192 and Francis Watson, Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith.