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GOSPEL AND THEOLOGY IN GALATIANS
(Originally published in Gospel in Paul: Studies on Corinthians, Galatians and Romans for
Richard N. Longenecker, eds.
L. Ann Jervis and Peter Richardson, 1994, pp.
222–239.
Journal for the Study of the New Testament, Supplement Series 108.
Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press.
Reproduced by permission of the author.)
N.T. Wright
1. Introduction
The word ‘gospel’ has had a chequered career in the course of Christian history.
During
the first century, as we shall see, it could refer both to a message proclaimed by word of
mouth and to a book about Jesus of Nazareth.
In more recent times it has been used to
denote a particular sort of religious meeting (a ‘gospel rally’) and as a metaphor for
utterly reliable information (‘gospel truth’).
Many Christians today, when reading the
New Testament, never question what the word means, but assume that, since they know
from their own context what ‘the gospel’ is.
Paul and the others must have meant exactly
the same thing.
The trouble is, of course, that though there are obviously difficult concepts in the
New Testament, which send any intelligent reader off to the commentaries and
dictionaries, there are others which are in fact equally difficult but which are not
recognized as such.
‘We turn to the helps only when the hard passages are manifestly
hard.
But there are treacherous passages which will not send us to the notes.
They look
easy and aren’t.’1
Part of the purpose of scholarship, within both the academy and the
church, is to expose the frailty of regular assumptions, to ask the unasked questions and
to sketch out alternative possibilities.
Whether or not he agrees with the proposals I shall
advance, I know that Richard Longenecker shares this vision of the purpose of
scholarship.
Indeed, it is partly because he and others have carved out ways of pursuing
this vision that I, in company with a good many today, now have the courage to do so as
well.
I am therefore confident that he will be as happy to entertain, and perhaps to
controvert, my arguments as he has been to engage in debate on many previous
occasions, which, whether formal or informal, have always been warm and cheerful.
In order to arrive at the meaning of ‘gospel’ within the confines of the letter to the
Galatians, we must go back to the old question: where did the idea come from and what
echoes did the word in consequence carry both for Paul and for his readers?
I shall
suggest that the two normal answers to these questions have been wrongly played off
against one another, and that when we examine them both more closely we will discover
convergences which have not hitherto been explored.
This will enable us to survey the
occurrences of ‘gospel’ within Galatians, with our ears retuned to the nuances which may
after all have been present for both Paul and his hearers.
We shall thus discover an
emphasis within the letter which is not normally given the weight which, in my judgment,
it deserves.
2. Isaianic Message or Imperial Proclamation?
The two backgrounds regularly proposed for Paul’s use of
and
are, predictably, the Hebrew scriptures on the one hand and pagan usage
on the other.
The line between the two tends to follow the old divide between those who
suppose Paul to be basically a Jewish thinker and those who see him as having borrowed
his fundamental ideas from Hellenism.2
The evidence has been rehearsed often enough,3
though it is my impression that the right lessons have not always been learned from it.
We must set out the main features briefly.
The LXX occurrences of the relevant root include two well-known verses from
Isaiah:
Get you up to a high mountain,
O Zion, herald of good tidings (
);
lift up your voice with strength,
O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings (
);
lift it up, do not fear;
say to the cities of Judah,
‘Here is your God!’ (40.9)
How beautiful upon the mountains
are the feet of the messenger who announces peace (
),
who brings good news (
),
who announces salvation.
who says to Zion, ‘Your God reigns’.
(52.7)
These passages, in company with others,4 are among the climactic statements of the great
double theme of the whole section (Isaiah 40-55): YHWH’s return to Zion and
enthronement, and the return of Israel herself from her exile in Babylon.
They are not
simply miscellaneous ‘good news’, a generalized message of comfort for the downcast;
they are very specific to the plight of Israel in exile.
That they were read as such in the
second-temple period is clear from two post-biblical passages which echo or evoke them.
The first is Psalms of Solomon 11:
Sound in Zion the signal trumpet of the sanctuary;
announce in Jerusalem the voice of one bringing good news,
for God has been merciful to Israel in watching over them.
Stand on a high place, Jerusalem, and look at your children,
from the east and the west assembled together by the Lord.
From the north they come in the joy of their God;
from far distant islands God has assembled them.
He flattened high mountains into level ground for them;
the hills fled at their coming.
The forests shaded them as they passed by;
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