1 - Asking new exegetical questions

Summary

The work reported in this study of Rom. 1.16–4.25 springs from two main issues. The first is the church's present alienation from the Bible, a widespread concern shared by many Christian NT scholars and affecting NT studies most obviously in hermeneutical questioning and experiment. The second is a concern that mainstream historical-critical study fails to take with full seriousness its own dictum that Paul's letters are letters and pastoral and must be treated as such. Many colleagues will consider this concern unnecessary, but if it is justified it means that the picture of Paul, his activity and his thought which emerges from mainstream scholarship is suffering significant distortion.

The starting point of the study is a confessional statement about scripture, using the language of our post-Enlightenment culture but in contrast with its secularity:

The Uniting Church acknowledges that the Church has received the books of the Old and New Testaments as unique prophetic and apostolic testimony, in which she hears the Word of God and by which her faith and obedience are nourished and regulated … The Word of God on whom man's [sic] salvation depends is to be heard and known from Scripture appropriated in the worshipping and witnessing life of the Church.

Engaging as scholar and minister with the problem of alienation from the Bible has led me to conclude that it is not the fault of biblical scholars or of the historical-critical method, although both are often blamed.