In Douglas A. Campbell’s provocative tome, The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul, he sets out to demonstrate that the Western presuppositions, unacknowledged cultural commitments, have unwittingly constructed Paul’s gospel of salvation in its own image and as a result created theological idolatry and unnecessary exegetical conundrums. While Luther is the in-vogue and current classical whipping boy for such a critique, Campbell redirects the attack to a broader realm and addresses the nomenclature issue by labeling this nefarious Western system “the Justification Model.”
In his introduction he starts his critique with the a load of qualifiers, mentioning that for him to address the faults with this model, he cannot just jump to the exegesis but must lay out the presuppositions, lines of reasoning, root metaphors, and problems with the current system before he sets out a competing model. After Campbell gives a short introduction for how he came to his realizations, a map of his journey, if you will, he then speaks of “three classic interpretive conundrums” in the Western reading and understanding of Pauline thought. These conundrums include
1) a tension between a forensic / contractual justification (law & faith) Lutheran simul iustus et peccator perspective & a participatory / mystical union model.
2) the debate over what was the nature of 2nd Temple Judaism in which Paul lived and moved and had his being. Was this environment one of a legalistic rubric or one of badges of inclusion in the people of God, or of a different nature altogether? “Thus a second major interpretive scandal seems to hold that for the conventional construal of Paul’s justification texts – its distorted account of Judaism” That is, simply reading Judaism as if it were a “works” religion is a misunderstanding of the climate in which Paul was writing. Said differently, it was not as if the Jews of Paul’s day were committing the same errors as the Roman Catholics in Luther’s day.
3) Furthermore, in light of point (2) above and because of a multitude of other considerations, there remains important and unresolved debates over why he wrote his major deployment of Romans, when he wrote his important ancillary discussion in Galatians, or in relation to whom (Judaizers? of what kind?)
With all of these conundrums sketched out in brief, Campbell suggests that
“all three of these apparently unrelated problems are in fact generated by a common underlying cause…A single culprit seems to generate our difficulties, namely, a particular individuals – and so possibly also rather modern – reading of Paul’s justification terminology and argumentation that devolves into a conditional understanding of salvation (that is, salvation is granted in relation to individual actions). If therefore also construes Paul’s soteriology – at least as it is articulated in these texts – in fundamentally contractual terms” (3).
As Campbell moves forward with his challenge to the status quo, he goes through sketching out the Justification theory of salvation based both on its primary presuppositional and articulated argumentative propositions as well as the root metaphors that all work together to reinforce this model’s conclusions.
Consider his Summary of the Argumentative Progression [of the Justification Model] in Propositional Form:
The First Phase: The Rigorous Contract
1a. Humans are rational
1b. Humans are self-interested.
1c. Humans are therefore ethical, in order to be saved (and this is largely in relation to 1b.)
2a. God is omnipotent (and presumably also omniscient and omnipresent).
2b. God is just.
2c. 2a is known to everyone from the cosmos without.
2d. 2b. is known to everyone from the conscience within.
3a. The content of righteousness derives from God’s nature (see 2b).
3b. God’s ethical demands are revealed to Jews through written legislation.
3c. God’s ethical demands are known to everyone else innately (2b via 2d).
4. Reward and punishment will be apportioned by God (so 2a) in relation to individual’s fulfillment or not of God’s ethical demands (so 2b), that is, in accordance with righteous actions, which constitute righteousness, or their converse, and hence on the basis of desert. “If you do x, then you will be rewarded; if you do not, and/or do y, then you will be punished.”
The Future Eschatological Caveat
5a. The injustices of life on earth will be rectified by a final judgment at the end of the present age.
5b. Those dead will be resurrected in order to take part in the judgment (through 2a).
5c. The future age will be constituted in positive and negative states (again through 2a).
5d. God will determine on this “day” (through 2a) which state each individual will enter on the basis of desert (see 4, effected at 5a through 5b).
The Introspective Twist
6a. Humans are inherently sinful; that is, everyone violates God’s ethical demands (and probably often, in which case see also the supplementary “loop’ immediately following).
6b. Honest self-reflection notes the consistent production of unethical deeds (6a, apparent in the light of 3a through 3c).
6c. Such self-reflection concludes – in an accurate anticipation – that God’s final judgment will be negative (see 4, 5c, and 5d).
6d. Rational individuals are now afraid and desire somehow to avoid this inevitable consequence.
The Loop of Despair (Correct)
1’. Accordingly, individuals might undertake a renewed attempt to be righteous.
2’. This attempt, however, will also fail, as 6a continues, noted by 6b, and so the conclusion of 6c will be reiterated, leading to a strengthened 6d!
The Loop of Foolishness (Incorrect)
1a”. Resistant individuals perceive and claim themselves to be righteous.
1b”. They are in fact not righteous (no one is free from all so: so 6a).
2a”. Therefore, they are being dishonest with themselves, specifically, by underestimating their sinfulness and/or overestimating their rectitude.
2b”. Their judgment is ethically deficient (see 2a”).
2c”. This holds the more, the more ethical information they have (so Jews).
3a”. If they boast of their righteousness, they are liars and fakes.
3b”. If they invoke the name of God and religion, they are religious charlatans.
3c”. If they upbraid others and exhort others to imitate them, they are judgmental hypocrites.
3d”. If they continue this calculus this calculus and its behavior, they are irrational and obstinate, courting hell.
4”. They correct conclusion (obvious to the outsider): they doubly deserve the negative judgment awaiting them in 4-5d.
The Satisfaction of God’s Justice
7a. God redirects, generously, the punishment due sinners to Christ (who dies).
(7b. Christ, being sinless and divine, can offer limitless satisfaction through dying.)
7c. God redirects, generously, the perfect righteousness of Christ to sinners, who are now viewed as if it were theirs.
(7d. Christ, being sinless, supplies perfect righteousness.)
The Appropriation of Salvation
8a. God, again generously, stipulates a manageable criterion (see 6a) for accessing or appropriating these redirections, namely, “faith.”
8b. Individuals who have “faith,” and thereby access 7a (and perhaps 7c), technically fulfill the criteria of requisite punishment and perfect righteousness and will receive a positive evaluation (via 4) on the day of judgment (5a, 5b, and 5d), proceeding to the state of blessed eternal life (5c).
In addition to this linear logical progression, Campbell argues that two root metaphors or fundamental images supply the glue, if you will, to hold the above progression together. In essence, “Justification theory begins with a particular image of humanity and a particular image of God”(30). He states that the key metaphors and their additional metaphorical layers can be summarized in propositional form as follows:
I. A conception of humanity as individual, rationalistic and self-interested. We begin our analysis with “philosophical man” – humans as fundamentally cognitive. I discerns first II.
II. A conception of God as an authority figure of strict justice. Philosophical man discerns the existence of God as a strict authority figure – his basic divine attribute is retributive justice. II is discerned by I.
I’. Humanity’s self-perceived ethical incapacity. Humans attempt to be ethical in light of II, but only repeatedly transgress, and realize this: I’ layers I in the light of II.
II’ A compensatory mechanism of satisfaction, namely, Christ’s atonement. Christ’s death pays the appropriate compensation for all these transgressions, and any more that may or do occur: II’ responds to I’ on behalf of I and the standards of II.
I”. A stipulated criterion of salvation’s appropriation, namely, faith. Salvation is grasped by individuals through an act of belief that takes place in some relation to Christ: I”, possible for anyone within I but constrained by I’, activates II’ for anyone so inclined. (As an action, it also corresponds to other actions taking place within I and I’.)
If nothing more, Campbell has laid out a fairly decent summary of what will be his opponent. With a few exceptions, this overall outline is not a straw man. A few points that I’d want to address is whether the Justification model does indeed place as much emphasis on knowledge as mere rational or intellectual assent. Faith as a form of knowledge and love as an epistemology are also high aspects of the Justification model. Indeed, I’d argue that the later aspect is the “knowledge” that is eternal life, the love of God that is lived out with childlike faith. In addition, the high emphasis on God as oppressive judge with justice being the defining or driving element of God’s character is pushing the point too far. While, let’s say the Reformed community, certainly emphasizes the holiness of God and thereby His perfect justice, this is the same community that teaches that all covenant children, marked and in covenant with God in their baptisms, are loved by the Father, and so taught from their earliest years the love of their Father for them. The emphasis here is surely on the gracious love and promises of God to His people.
While there are a plethora of minute issues that I might have a few disagreements with, the Introduction and first chapter have me hooked to see where Campbell is going to go with his critiques, and more interestingly, what his positive proposals and his exegesis in light of those proposals might reveal about the Pauline corpus and in particular the doctrine of justification.