The Gift of Christ: Grace in the Theology of Paul

In both the Christian theological tradition and in historical-critical scholarship Paul was often interpreted as the apostle of grace. In the late twentieth-century this pattern was disrupted by the recognition in New Perspective scholarship that, far from being distinctive to Paul, an emphasis on grace was characteristic of Second Temple Judaism. More recently, John Barclay’s influential volume Paul and the Gift (2015) has reasserted in new ways the significance of grace in Paul’s theology. In the context of these debates, this course explores grace in Paul through (i) an exploration of grace in the Greco-Roman world and more especially in Judaism, and (ii) detailed exegetical study of key Pauline texts concerning grace. Attention will be paid not only to recent interpreters of such texts but also to selected figures from reception history (e.g., Augustine, Aquinas, Luther etc.). Through such study students will critically engage key questions concerning Barclay’s thesis (e.g., Is incongruity indeed the principal characteristic of grace for Paul, is he distinctive in emphasizing it, does he consider that grace always demands a response from its recipients?) and responses to it, to discern its implications for interpreting Paul’s theology more broadly (e.g., for Paul’s Christology, for Paul’s place within Judaism), and to reach their own conclusions about the part played by grace in Paul’s theology.