Romans 1:1-15—A Translation for Pagans

Romans 1:1-15—A Translation for Pagans

1 [A letter from] Paul

[known to his pagan friends as “Tiny”]:

who is in devoted lifelong service to the Messiah, Jesus,

and has been called to be his diplomatic envoy,

appointed to make a declaration—the declaration—

that comes ultimately from the Divine One; 2

this declaration was promised beforehand through the Divine One’s prophets,

whose words are preserved in the holy Scriptures, 3

and concerns his son,

the one who was born as a human being like us, from the seed of David, 4

but who was appointed the son of the Divine in power

by his resurrection from the dead,

 and who is now a cleansing spirit:

Jesus, the Messiah and divine ruler.

5 It was from him that I received the gift of being an envoy on his behalf

to the pagan nations,

 seeking the obedience that springs from a mind with a new, transformed, understanding; 

6 and you are numbered among them as those who have been called

by the long-awaited King of Israel who now rules on high, Jesus the Messiah.   

My Approach to the Translation of Romans

My Approach to the Translation of Romans

I’ve been offline for a while for one reason and another. But I’m back now, at least for a bit. My plan for the next several months is to publish here the Romans translation I prepared for a commentary that I subsequently withdrew from writing. (It wasn’t the right season for me to be attempting a Romans commentary, and I also discovered, while translating and working up the introduction, that I didn’t like the genre at all; it eliminates the most exciting part of the entire process of composition for me which is the discovery and articulation of the book’s internal argumentative structure.) Perhaps I will, Deus vult, write a book one day on Romans, and I certainly have enough material stored up to offer some suggestions about its interpretation, but I’m pretty sure that those won’t appear in a classical commentary form. I was left, however, after this difficult decision, with a Romans translation, attempted in very particular terms, moldering on my computer, along with 170 pages or so of introductory and architectonic material. What to do? And the answer in the digital age is, clearly, “to publish them bit by bit on the currently moribund website.” So here we go. I will be honored by any feedback offered here although, with my current energy pressures, I am unable to promise to respond. I do nevertheless hope you enjoy my “Romans for Pagans,” and find there what might turn out to be a rather different road through Romans…

The Future of New Testament Theology

My apologies for the long absence.

I am rebooting my web presence here, partly because I have renounced Facebook. (See this!)

A few months ago Joel Green--a scholar I much respect--invited me to contribute to a curated volume of Religions dedicated to "The Future of New Testament Theology." This is a subject I care about and have given some thought to, but I have never strung these thoughts together as yet in a single place (although I have thought about a short book on the subject). So my inclination was to accept his invitation, not anticipating the extreme difficulty of actually stringing those thoughts together when the moment arrived!

Nevertheless here we are. I am doubly pleased with the result because I now have something to point students to when they are reading Pauline Dogmatics and ask me, after reading chapter 1, what role I accord to Scripture. My previous answer was "please wait." I still give that answer, admittedly, but I do have something additional to offer while my students patiently hold their (dogmatic) scriptural questions until Chapter 23.

I am not so pleased with the compression in the argument forced by an article-length account of Scripture, but in the end of the day you just have to do your best with the opportunity in front of you. (You might be able to infer from this comment that I have been following the current World Chess Championship quite closely.)

What account should we give of Scripture if we are starting our account of the truth about God with the truth that God has revealed to us concerning "himself" definitively through the person of Jesus Christ, known now amongst us also through the presence of the Holy Spirit? Moreover, if we can follow this particular line of theological reflection through, journeying through the church, what do we do when we end up in a university, as a professor, teaching about the Bible? What should that work look like?

Click here for the answers I try to give here in nuce to these critical but difficult questions.

Welcome

Welcome

Welcome everyone to my blog.

I hope you will check in here from time to time to hear about what I am up to, whether in the world of Pauline scholarship, where I will be continuing to fight the good fight, or in relation to my wandering journey through life, which takes me down some interesting byways…