When Wright is Wrong

A Reformed Baptist Critique of N. T. Wright's New Perspective on Paul

Phillip D. R. Griffiths

• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781532649219
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

In today's world the Christian is constantly being challenged with new teachings. Some of these are particularly dangerous because they are put forward by those with evangelical credentials. Tom Nicholas Wright is one of the leading proponents of the New Perspective on Paul. Wright sees himself as the new Luther, a discoverer of the true biblical understanding of key doctrines like that of justification by faith. According to him, the Reformation misunderstood the nature of justification by faith alone and the role of the law in the Old Testament. Wright maintains that this has continued to be the case for those of the Reformed Faith. He tells us that we are guilty of anachronism, whereby we interpret first-century Judaism in the light of medieval Roman Catholicism. In this work the writer not only defends the Reformed understanding of this vital doctrine but also seeks to show how Wright has misunderstood the nature of the new covenant and the place of ethnic Israel.

Part One

Methodology

In part one, I will seek to provide a general introduction to the NPP.1 However, one cannot understand the significance of this without knowing something about what is now called the old perspective or Lutheran view. I shall, therefore, start by briefly examining this position. This will be followed by looking at some of the main thinkers within the NPP. Here I will limit myself to examining the works of Stendahl, Sanders, Dunn, and N. T. Wright. More weight will obviously be given to Wright’s position, after all, this is a work about his understanding of the new perspective.

Although in part one I will confine myself to describing the views of NPP proponents, when examining Wright’s position, I will interject criticism, explaining to the reader why I disagree with some of his conclusions. Further criticism will be provided in part two where I shall examine certain passages of Scripture.

Because I am approaching this from a Reformed Baptist covenantal position, it will be necessary to explain its understanding of the covenant of works that God made with the first Adam, along with subsequent covenants, namely, those made with Abraham, Moses, and the new covenant in Christ. In the second part of this work, while I concentrate on texts drawn from Paul’s letters to the Romans and Galatians, I will, however, also seek to address some other texts employed by Wright, for example, 1 Corinthians 1:30 and 2 Corinthians 5:21.

It will also be necessary to examine other motifs in Wright’s new perspective, for example, the idea that being saved is not about going to heaven when we die, that Israel at the time of Christ was still in exile etc. Finally, I will, contrary to what Wright claims, seek to show that penal substitution lies at the very heart of Christ’s victory over sin and that the Christus Victor model should be understood within the context of Christ’s propitiatory offering.

Hermeneutic Principle.

It is essential to understand the nature of the various covenants because a misunderstanding here will affect other areas of theology. For example, the Reformed paedobaptist belief that the old and new covenants are of the same substance causes them to conclude that water baptism has replaced circumcision, and, of course, if the latter included children then so too must the former, and this significantly changes the way one views the makeup of the church.

God always deals with his people through covenant, and when interpreting a given text or passage one should consider which of God’s covenants the person(s) alluded to are under, for example, are they under the covenant of works or the covenant of grace? The old or the new covenant?

Scripture reveals two primary covenants– the covenant of works made with Adam and the new covenant made with Christ.2 Both men are federal heads, all humanity was represented by Adam, and those whom God has chosen to save are represented by Christ. We are all either under the first Adam, and under the covenant of works, where we stand condemned because of sin or else under Christ, the second Adam, and under the new covenant. There is no alternative or third position.

There is only one covenant of grace and this is the new covenant. There is no other covenant, for example, the old covenant, for which Christ is the mediator, hence, to benefit from his mediatorial work one must belong to this covenant. All of God’s people, whenever and wherever they may have lived, be it before or after Christ’s redemptive work, have been the recipients of new covenant blessings. Therefore, central to my understanding of Scripture is the belief that there is no salvation outside of the new covenant, as John Frame succinctly states:

[T]he work of Christ is the source of all human salvation from sin: the salvation of Adam and Eve, of Noah, of Abraham, of Moses, of David, and of all of God’s people in every age, past, present, or future. Everyone who has ever been saved has been saved through the new covenant in Christ. Everyone who is saved receives a new heart, a heart of obedience, through the new covenant work of Christ.3

Or as Woolsey puts it:

Christ was their Mediator too. Though his incarnation had not yet happened, the fruits of it still availed for the fathers. Christ was their head . . . So the men of God in the Old Testament were shown to be heirs of the new. The new covenant was actually more ancient than the old, though it was subsequently revealed. It was ‘hidden in the prophetic ciphers’ until the time of revelation in Christ.4

One objection frequently raised when one speaks of new covenant blessings being available before the covenant’s ratification concerns the words uttered by Jeremiah when he alludes to the covenant that will be made in the future, being “after those days” (Isa 31:31; Heb 8:10). Clearly, if it was futuristic and “after those days” how could the fruits thereof be available to those who lived before “those days”? Understanding the answer to this question is vital for understanding the unity that exists in Scripture concerning the way of salvation. John Owen, who was arguably the greatest theologian the English speaking world has ever produced, anticipated this, explaining it in the form of a question and answer:

First, ‘This covenant is promised as that which is future, to be brought in at a certain time, “after those days,” as has been declared. But it is certain that the things here mentioned, the grace and mercy expressed, were really communicated unto many both before and after the giving of the law, long ere this covenant was made; for all who truly believed and feared God had these things affected in them by grace: wherefore their effectual communication cannot be esteemed a property of this covenant which was to be afterwards made.

Ans. This objection was sufficiently prevented in what we have already discoursed concerning the efficacy of the grace of this covenant before it was solemnly consummated. For all things of this nature that belong unto it do arise and spring from the mediation of Christ, or his interposition on behalf of sinners. Wherefore this took place from the giving of the first promise; the administration of the grace of this covenant did therein and then take its date. Howbeit the Lord Christ had not yet done that whereby it was solemnly to be confirmed, and that whereon all the virtue of it did depend.5

Before Christ came in the flesh, the new covenant existed in the form of a promise, with its formal legal establishment occurring when Christ completed his work. Those Old Testament individuals who believed in the promise were made partakers of new covenant blessings because this covenant had a retrospective efficacy. From the first revelation of the promise in Genesis 15, salvation in the Old Testament was always through the promise and participation in the new covenant. All other covenants, e.g., those made with Abraham, Moses, and David, did not alter the essential fact that salvation comes through believing in the promise. They were, what we might call, subsidiary covenants.

My approach assumes that all other covenants are not as the paedobaptists would have us believe, simply different administrations of the one covenant of grace, but conditional covenants, separate from the covenant of grace or new covenant. These conditional covenants were dependent upon man’s obedience for their temporal blessings; an obedience he was incapable of providing. One can think of it as the ‘carrot and stick’ principle. These conditional covenants held up the carrot of temporal blessings upon obedience, with these serving as a type of the antitype that is found in the new covenant. They served to show human inability, for if man was incapable of attaining temporal blessings, then how much less is he capable of attaining that which is spiritual and eternal. Inevitably, Israel failed to abide by the covenantal conditio...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part One
• Part Two
• Conclusion
• Bibliography