If you can’t see in Greek what others recognize in English, your Greek learning hasn’t done you much good.

The cause of your misinterpretation is the conflation of several categories. Our union with Christ encapsulates the entire Christian life, but justification is a very specific and distinct category. Justification refers to a legal verdict of acquittal. In sin man is condemned, in Christ man is justified (Romans 3). The ground for this acquittal in the lives of obviously guilty men is the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ, imputed to them by faith.

Second, Paul’s references to “works of the law” do not refer to Jewish ceremonies, as is very plain throughout his letters. While this was the particular focus of the judaizing controversy, Paul’s arguments against are arguments against works righteousness, and not against ceremonies. Indeed, Paul actually emphasizes the continuity rather than contrast between the old and new covenants in his arguments (Romans 4, Galatians 3). The mosaic law included many moral laws to which gentiles were always understood to be bound (as is evident in Paul’s own application of them to the new covenant Church).

>>18428105
>Justification refers to a legal verdict of acquittal.
But this assumes that Paul's primary framework for justification includes something like penal substitution, which is anachronistic. Paul's framework of justification is multi-layered, but in Romans 5-6 his emphasis turns to solidarity or "participation" with the Messiah. Hence he writes in Romans 6
>Do you not know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
>Therefore we were buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life.
Believers die with Christ in baptism in hope of a future resurrection, and he is basically refuting an antinomian interpretation of his argument laid out thus far. Paul emphasizes how it was Christ's own obedience which led to his exaltation, and also why he paints a juxtaposition between Adam and Christ (Philippians 2:6-11, Romans 5:15-17), and it is through this obedient act of Christ which wins a "superabundance" (literally "uperperrisos" in the Greek) of grace for those who put their faith in him. This is not the language of penal substitution. For Paul, the Law brings wraith, because of the failure of people to keep the Law. Paul charges both Jews and Gentiles with sin, for the Jews it is because of their disobedience to the Mosaic Law, for Gentiles it is because of their failure to live up to the natural law by idolatry. The Law is fleshly for Paul, it is the subject to the corruptible sublunary world, hence Paul's remark in Galatians 3:3 and 4:9, and yet clearly he also sees an inner spiritual or esoteric aspect of it (2 Corinthians 3:6, Romans 7:22), and it is precisely through Jesus that the veil of the letter can be lifted and Christians can be free from sin in the spirit (2 Corinthians 3:14-18).

>>18428105
Paul does use legal metaphors in Romans 4, but again it would be anachronistic to view this through the latter theologies of the reformers. Paul is emphasizing covenant and how even the gentiles can now be includes in God's covenant without the Law. It's why he starts out Romans 3 with the discussion about how Jews did have an advantage in receiving the first covenant, but due to the problem of sin, they could not actually keep the commandments of the law. Paul has a really bleak view of the gentiles in Romans 1, but his emphasis in Romans 4 is how the gentiles position can be shifted in God's eyes, and he basically uses Genesis 15 to justify this as a kind of Midrash in both Romans and Galatians.

Imagine wasting all your life reading all this bullshit instead of really learning what jesus meant by reading the old testament yourself

>The Pharisees and the scribes have taken the keys of knowledge (and) have hidden them. They did not go in, and those who wished to go in they did not allow.

>>18428151
>But this assumes that Paul's primary framework for justification includes something like penal substitution, which is anachronistic
It can be so simply dismissed as anachronistic if and only if one presupposes it is impossible a priori for the reformers to have been correct, since they claimed to have derived it from the scriptures themselves, and this presupposition is your secular bias inserting itself into the discussion.
1. Justification is a legal verdict of acquittal irrespective of how it is acquired. The ground of justification is the imputed righteousness of Christ contingently and not necessarily (Gal. 3:21) 2. Paul teaches penal substitution, eg Gal. 3:10-13
>Paul's framework of justification is multi-layered, but in Romans 5-6 his emphasis turns to solidarity or "participation" with the Messiah
This is union with Christ, which as I said is the basis of justification but not justification alone. In Romans 5 Paul is discussing our union with Christ as the federal head of the covenant of grace, and at the start of 6 he is applying our union with Christ as the basis of our sanctification and mortification of sin.
>This is not the language of penal substitution
Nor is it the language of atonement. Paul speaks here of the Christian’s union with Christ, not the nature of Christ’s atonement, of which he presents a substitutionary view at 8:33-34
>The Law is fleshly for Paul, it is the subject to the corruptible sublunary world
No, he expressly says the law is good, it is the men who fail its standards only which are bad.
>it is precisely through Jesus that the veil of the letter can be lifted and Christians can be free from sin in the spirit
Amen. This has nothing to do with justification, rather it was Paul’s whole point in chapter 6-7 that the believer is *already* dead to sin in Christ, it remains for them only to recognize it and live like it. There is absolutely no room in Paul’s theology for a concept like mortal sin.

>>18428155
>but again it would be anachronistic to view this through the latter theologies of the reformers
This, again, is begging the question. I do not say to read through the lens of the reformers, but you say they must be rejected a priori at the outset.
>Paul is emphasizing covenant
Amen, but I think the kind of covenant you picture is erroneous. You seem to hold an understanding that the covenant was a national one made with the Jewish people on the basis of their law-keeping, this manifestly is not Paul’s understanding and it is his whole point in Romans 4 and Galatians 3. When Paul speaks of the role of the law as a tutor unto Christ and development out of it in Galatians 3 and 4, I say he does not speak of the old covenant transitioning to the new, but the covenant of works transitioning to the covenant of grace in the experience of every believer, including the gentile Galatians (for through Adam all men are made party to the former covenant, but only through Christ to the latter, Rom. 5). This is manifest, since he describes life under the law as “enslavement under the elemental things of the world” (Gal. 4:3), yet this is the very thing he says he called the Galatians out of to which they are returning by the judaizing heresy (v. 9).

>>18428171
Basically, what I’m saying is his argument is that the gentiles can be included in the covenant because it was always based on grace through faith in Christ, and it was always the plan for the gentiles to be grafted in in the fulness of time (as the many prophecies of the gentiles coming near unto Jerusalem testify). He turns the tables on the judaizers by showing them to be the ones to have induced a change

>>18428080
that no one would boast, citizens not strangers

>>18428170
>It can be so simply dismissed as anachronistic if and only if one presupposes it is impossible a priori for the reformers to have been correct,
Funny because Protestants will accuse Catholics or Orthodox of doing the same thing when they read their theology in. Suddenly this disappears when someone of Reformed stock does it. But this looks like nothing more than a sly attempt at an ad hominem on your part.
>Galatians 3:21
In context Paul is discussing the pedagogy of the outer law which aligns with Romans 3:20. Righteousness cannot come through the law since the law brings wrath (Romans 4:15), for "all have sinned, all have fallen short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23), which is why we need Jesus to make us righteous, that we too may come to be active participants in his righteousness through solidarity (Romans 3:22, 24-25). Paul uses this same language later in chapter 3 of Galatians:
>Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed.
>Therefore the law was our disciplinarian (παιδαγωγὸς) until Christ came, so that we might be reckoned as righteous by faith.
>But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian,
>for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.
>As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.
Again we see Paul invoking his famous idiom of being "in Christ".
>In Romans 5 Paul is discussing our union with Christ as the federal head of the covenant of grace, and at the start of 6 he is applying our union with Christ as the basis of our sanctification and mortification of sin.
Completely anachronistic theological jargon, totally forgein to Paul and his argument in Romans 5-6, which I explained in some detail above. Paul's point is that our obedience, in union with Christ, is what wins us a share in the world to come (Romans 5:20-21) in contrast to the sin that the Law brings.

>>18428170
>>18428171
>Paul teaches penal substitution, eg Gal. 3:10-10
Although I do agree that the New Testament certainly includes in it the language of substitution I am not convinced that Galatians 3:10 is an instance of this. Paul is contrasting the demands of the law with actual righteousness before God, so that even Jesus who was righteous was under the curse of the law, having been crucified (compare Deuteronomy 21:23). Therefore, he redeems those who were under the law by demonstrating how the law does not actually declare who is righteous or not, as showcased in Jesus's crucifixion. Jesus's faithfulness, which was demonstrated through his perfect obedience (again see Philippians 2:6-11), is what made him righteous and, which, in turn, can make us righteous.
>This, again, is begging the question. I do not say to read through the lens of the reformers, but you say they must be rejected a priori at the outset.
Well no I'm just saying their interpretation is wrong because their arguments are weaker than the one I've presented here. I don't actually think you know what begging the question is. You're the one already assuming their framework in the first place and, instead of actually engaging with my arguments front hand, you've basically just a priori assumed their theological framework and tried to proof-text. Not how this works, buddy.

>>18428171
>No, he expressly says the law is good, it is the men who fail its standards only which are bad.
>This is manifest, since he describes life under the law as “enslavement under the elemental things of the world” (Gal. 4:3), yet this is the very thing he says he called the Galatians out of to which they are returning by the judaizing heresy (v. 9).
There seems to be a lot of confusion here on your part. Yes, Paul says that the law is holy, good, and just. My point is that Paul sees the Law as an occasion to sin. He does not think it is sin, which is what he refutes in Romans 7:7. For Paul, the law is part of the corruptible order of this present age, pertaining to the "elemental principles" as he says in Galatians 4:9-11. Just as the gentiles were once enslaved to these principles through idolatry, now they are being enslaved again to them except through the law, which is what he says if you read the passage. This is the point of Paul's allegorical interpretation of Sarah and Hagar in Galatians 4:21-31. Those who are under the law have become slaves, belonging to earthly Jerusalem, but those who follow in Christ are set free and can enter into the heavenly Jerusalem. Paul is distinguishing the exoteric from the esoteric. The problem you have is you are neglecting to read Paul in a 1st century context and want to read him as a 16th century Lutheran humanist. You, a 21st century person, do not have the same cosmological framework as Paul would have had. For Paul, the cosmos is hierarchical, ruled over by other spiritual forces and beings, hence why he can say that the law was "given through angels" (Galatians 3:19). It does not come directly from God, but through mediators. The Law was under that same framework, it belongs to the present, corruptible, sublunary realm. That does not make it bad or evil, but it does make it imperfect.

Kino npp thread

>>18428215
>Funny because Protestants will accuse Catholics or Orthodox of doing the same thing when they read their theology in
1. That’s because they’re reading their theology in, not deriving it from the text 2. While this is anachronistic on their parts, the proper category in the context of sacred scripture is eisegesis.
>Suddenly this disappears when someone of Reformed stock does it
Again, ignoring the category error of conflating me with traditionalists explicitly saying the text must be read in light of their traditions, this is begging the question. The question is whether the reformers were correct, so when you argue they were not on the basis they were Protestant, why even bother touching the text? Just make the inane observation Paul wasn’t a 16th century Lutheran and declare victory.
>But this looks like nothing more than a sly attempt at an ad hominem on your part.
You don’t know what ad hominem means.
>that we too may come to be active participants in his righteousness through solidarity
You were mostly fine until this statement which has nothing to do with Paul. I don’t even know what this is supposed to mean, do you? Paul is not discussing the pedagogical use of the law at this point, but the inability of fallen man to keep the law. My point in citing it was to show that even if justification was through perfect personal obedience, it would still be a verdict of acquittal (that is, a legal recognition that the person is righteous, only in this case on the ground of their own personal righteousness and not the righteousness of Christ).
(1/6)

>>18428215
>Completely anachronistic theological jargon, totally forgein to Paul and his argument in Romans 5-6, which I explained in some detail above
You may think you have “explained” something but I see zero argumentation here, you basically just said “no you’re wrong I’m right” (though perhaps that is compelling reasoning to the swine of academia) and again the circular reasoning that the reformers must have been wrong because the reformers must have been wrong. I’m saying the reformers were right, and I’m more interested in discussing that than your assumption that it’s impossible (not to mention the gross inconsistency in the circle, since if the reformers are to be rejected out of hand for no other reason than because they lived thousands of years after the fact, how much worse are you who lives still centuries later?)
>Paul's point is that our obedience, in union with Christ, is what wins us a share in the world to come (Romans 5:20-21) in contrast to the sin that the Law brings.
Now, your interpretation as to what Paul’s point is is derived apparently by leaping to the end of the passage instead of working through it from front to back. You have skipped over Paul’s pivotal discussion of the contrast between Adam and Christ in that death and condemnation came through the sin of the former upon all (that is, all of whom he is representative) while life and justification came through the righteousness of the latter upon all (that is, all of whom He is representative). Secondly, in making the decisive aspect our own obedience, you flip Paul on his head by making him agree with the judaizers.
(2/6)

>>18428216
>Therefore, he redeems those who were under the law by demonstrating how the law does not actually declare who is righteous or not, as showcased in Jesus's crucifixion. Jesus's faithfulness, which was demonstrated through his perfect obedience (again see Philippians 2:6-11), is what made him righteous and, which, in turn, can make us righteous
This, not only is found nowhere in the text of Galatians, it is radically different from the entire worldview of Paul. 1. Nothing could be further from the New Testament’s teaching than the idea that Jesus was as Himself condemned under the law, which He perfectly kept and therefore merited the reward of eternal life. The condemnation was not against Him, but the elect whom He stood for 2. If the law was not able to define who is actually righteous, it would obliterate everything Paul says of the pedagogical use of the law, since it would no longer reveal our sin but its own failure 3. It is the perfect obedience of Jesus, imputed to the believer, which makes him righteous before God and not his own perfect obedience performed in the likeness of Jesus which Paul emphatically repeatedly denies any man is capable of. Paul says if righteousness is by the law, Christ died for nothing.
(3/6)

>>18428216
Now, this is what the passage is actually saying: there is absolutely only one way to have peace with God, you must be perfectly righteous (since God’s own perfectly righteous character will not tolerate any unclean thing). There are two ways to acquire this righteousness, the righteousness of God: you may either keep the whole law, or you may place your faith in Christ. If you relate to God through works, then you are condemned and accursed, because you have failed the standard of the law and brought its curse upon you. But in Christ we are freed from the curse of the law, since we now relate to God through His perfect righteousness, and He took upon Himself the curse which had been against us for our failure. This is the meaning of Christ redeeming us from the curse by becoming a curse and the reason for Paul’s quotation from Deuteronomy (namely to show that Christ suffered the curse of the law).
>Well no I'm just saying their interpretation is wrong because their arguments are weaker than the one I've presented here. I don't actually think you know what begging the question is. You're the one already assuming their framework in the first place and, instead of actually engaging with my arguments front hand, you've basically just a priori assumed their theological framework and tried to proof-text. Not how this works, buddy.
Everyone pay attention, this is what projection looks like. You have explicitly begun by dismissing them out of hand, presenting zero interaction with my arguments and making more assertions than arguments, all because this theology is “anachronistic” (which is to say it must be incorrect because it is their theology). I have made no references to the reformers, the only one that keeps babbling about the necessity of Protestant theology is you. I say the reformers were right but you are unable to fight that battle, only being able to declare what side you’re on.
(4/6)

>>18428218
>Just as the gentiles were once enslaved to these principles through idolatry, now they are being enslaved again to them except through the law, which is what he says if you read the passage.
You are hanging too much weight on the word “elemental” and inserting things not in the text. The word here refers to rudimentary elements, i.e. “basic building blocks” and was often used figuratively to the beginning of learning, a context which Paul has already established by the analogy of tutorship. By this word he is only saying that they are in the state of a child, dispossessed of an inheritance and subject to a tutor (namely the law, which serves to expose to a sinner his sinfulness and his need for Christ). Though the gentiles did not possess the law, nevertheless they were under the law and able to be condemned under it in common with the Jews (Rom. 3). Note also that your interpretation disregards the sudden shift from first to second person in verses 5-6 (which happens because the “you” to whom he speaks are included in the “we” of whom he speaks). The reason he speaks of their idolatry is to show the enslaved condition they were under when they were under the covenant of works.
(5/6)

>>18428218
>The problem you have is you are neglecting to read Paul in a 1st century context and want to read him as a 16th century Lutheran humanist
This is firstly a false assertion, since you have yet to give any reasoning why Paul could not have meant what he plainly did in the 1st century (indeed, I doubt the historical context is something you would want to bring in because it only enhances my case), only that it must be accepted a priori. Frankly, I think you’re an idiot. You keep rambling errantly about my insertion of 16th century Protestantism, while mindlessly regurgitating what the priests of the academy have fed you. By “reading Paul in a 1st century context” you mean blindly accepting the theories of 20th century secular academics. But if it was impossible to understand this context in the 16th century, why is it possible for you in the 21st century (not to mention, the necessity of truncating the Pauline corpus to defend this modernistic interpretation)? Of course, every generation of priests before us were idiots, they were always wrong when they claimed to have the real truth, they weren’t wise like us, now we’ve got the real truth. Nothing you said after this is meaningful or relevant, except that the law being imperfect as to itself is an idea found nowhere in the writings of Paul.
The presupposition behind your circular reasoning is obvious: there is no God, therefore there is no Spirit of God, therefore the Spirit of God could not guide His people into all church even after thousands of years, therefore it must have been impossible for the reformers to have believed as Paul believed.
“But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
(6/6)

>>18428165
he was actually talking about the magic scrolls kept in the Temple

>>18429125
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>>18429135
>1. That’s because they’re reading their theology in, not deriving it from the text 2. While this is anachronistic on their parts, the proper category in the context of sacred scripture is eisegesis.
Ah yes, just blatantly accuse all of your opponents of engaging in eisegesis, with no facts of evidence to back that claim up, all so as to appear like you have taken the rhetorical high ground. This is the kind of toxic polemical rubbish you'd only expect to see your friendly neighborhood e-Calvinist toying with.
>Just make the inane observation Paul wasn’t a 16th century Lutheran and declare victory.
We're not going to be playing games here. If you can't see this is what you're doing as well then I cannot help you. You immediately came into this discussion gung-ho to read Paul as a Calvinist would read Paul without any consideration for the alternative. If anyone is question begging here, it's you. Once again I'm not playing games with you. This is just a clever red-herring to distract from the real issues at hand. Is it true or is it false that you are reading the text in light of a highly systematized and presupposed theology? That's all I was pointing out. You immediately jump to saying the other side is acting in bad faith. This is a clever rhetorical technique on your part but it's not going to work here.

>>18429125
>>18429127
>>18429128
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>>18429135
>My point in citing it was to show that even if justification was through perfect personal obedience, it would still be a verdict of acquittal (that is, a legal recognition that the person is righteous, only in this case on the ground of their own personal righteousness and not the righteousness of Christ).
But this point rests on the premise that Paul has something like penal substitution in mind, which he evidently does not. My point is that Paul's language of atonement fits squarely into a participatory/solidarity atonement model. Now there is wiggle room for exactly what this means for Paul. Is it mystical? Is it apocalyptic? I'm open to different conceptualizations of what Paul thinks this participation is, but my real concern here is reading him in the original historical setting.
>You have skipped over Paul’s pivotal discussion of the contrast between Adam and Christ in that death and condemnation came through the sin of the former upon all (that is, all of whom he is representative) while life and justification came through the righteousness of the latter upon all (that is, all of whom He is representative).
Actually I did address this in one of my above explanations here >>18428151 , my point being that Paul compares and contrasts Adam and Jesus in terms of obedience and disobedience (Romans 5:19), each of which result in different effects for humanity and their relationship with God. I don't use the language that you use, because it is anachronistic, and built on premises which I do not find sound. Nevertheless I'm not in the business of undermining the traditional western reading of Paul. I uphold it and see that it is vindicated here.

>>18429125
>>18429127
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>>18429135

>Secondly, in making the decisive aspect our own obedience, you flip Paul on his head by making him agree with the judaizers.
You only think this because you mistakenly categorize Paul's ideal of transformation in with what you consider "works". But that's not what Paul thinks "works" are.
>This, not only is found nowhere in the text of Galatians, it is radically different from the entire worldview of Paul. 1. Nothing could be further from the New Testament’s teaching than the idea that Jesus was as Himself condemned under the law, which He perfectly kept and therefore merited the reward of eternal life. The condemnation was not against Him, but the elect whom He stood for
>If the law was not able to define who is actually righteous, it would obliterate everything Paul says of the pedagogical use of the law, since it would no longer reveal our sin but its own failure
The issue is that you're conflating the different senses that Paul has for law, because for Paul there are two senses to the law. The outward law of slavery which leads to condemnation, and the inner spiritual aspect of the law which even the gentiles appear to be conscious of on some level, hence Paul can write in Galatians 5:16-18
>Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh.
>For what the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you want. >But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.
Which is in harmony with what Paul speaks about in Romans 7:7-25.
What Paul shows in Galatians 4:1-6 is that Jesus, just like us, was born under the yoke of slavery to the law ("born of a woman born under the law") in his human condition. By exacting perfect obedience to God he redeems us from the demands that the law exacts on us by becoming himself subject to it.

>>18429125
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>>18429135
Part 1 of Reply 4
>You are hanging too much weight on the word “elemental” and inserting things not in the text. The word here refers to rudimentary elements, i.e. “basic building blocks” and was often used figuratively to the beginning of learning, a context which Paul has already established by the analogy of tutorship. By this word he is only saying that they are in the state of a child, dispossessed of an inheritance and subject to a tutor (namely the law, which serves to expose to a sinner his sinfulness and his need for Christ). Though the gentiles did not possess the law, nevertheless they were under the law and able to be condemned under it in common with the Jews (Rom. 3). Note also that your interpretation disregards the sudden shift from first to second person in verses 5-6 (which happens because the “you” to whom he speaks are included in the “we” of whom he speaks). The reason he speaks of their idolatry is to show the enslaved condition they were under when they were under the covenant of works.
Except for Paul the problem is not the law per se, rather the problem is sin. Paul begins Romans 3 with a discussion about the covenant that the Jews received, and how their failure to obey it leads to their condemnation. Paul switches to the first person plural because he includes himself in this corporate failure, which he discusses in Romans 7. Sin " "seizing its opportunity through the commandment" brings condemnation. Hence, as Paul discusses in the latter part of chapter 3:

>>18429125
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Part 2 of Reply 4
"For no human will be justified before him by deeds prescribed by the law, for through the law comes the knowledge of sin.
But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been disclosed and is attested by the Law and the Prophets,
the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction,
since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God;
they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,
whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over the sins previously committed;
it was to demonstrate at the present time his own righteousness, so that he is righteous and he justifies the one who has the faith of Jesus."
What this showcases is Paul's strongly deterministic salvation history, which he further outlines in Romans 11, whereby God uses the failure of the Israelites to keep the law as a way to bring the gospel to the gentiles and include them in the Abrahamic covenant and bring them to salvation from the reign of sin which they share in common with the Jew. The law could not bring them salvation, but God had other plans! This is the point that Paul is making in Romans 3 and which he expounds upon further in Romans 11:11-24.

>>18429125
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>>18429135
>Frankly, I think you’re an idiot.
>The presupposition behind your circular reasoning is obvious: there is no God, therefore there is no Spirit of God, therefore the Spirit of God could not guide His people into all church even after thousands of years, therefore it must have been impossible for the reformers to have believed as Paul believed.
Yeah I'm not even going to engage with this kind of awful rhetoric. If you cannot have a meaningful discussion about the Bible without throwing around insults and ad hominem attacks, as I said in my opening, there just is no hope for you. Any intelligent person here will he able to see right through your slimy rhetorical tactics, which you employ time and time again in every debate I've engaged you in. It's only meant to distract people who are really inquiring into the real matter of things here. It's not worth wasting my time with this garbage, close-minded, anti-intellectual slop that you constantly parrot to anybody with the slightest disagreement with you. You've ironically become just as, if not more, dogmatic than what you so vigorously enjoy labeling your opponents as. Disgusting.

>>18429125
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>>18429135
>Now, this is what the passage is actually saying: there is absolutely only one way to have peace with God, you must be perfectly righteous (since God’s own perfectly righteous character will not tolerate any unclean thing). There are two ways to acquire this righteousness, the righteousness of God: you may either keep the whole law, or you may place your faith in Christ. If you relate to God through works, then you are condemned and accursed, because you have failed the standard of the law and brought its curse upon you. But in Christ we are freed from the curse of the law, since we now relate to God through His perfect righteousness, and He took upon Himself the curse which had been against us for our failure. This is the meaning of Christ redeeming us from the curse by becoming a curse and the reason for Paul’s quotation from Deuteronomy (namely to show that Christ suffered the curse of the law).
No, that's not what Paul is saying. That's not at all what Galatians 3 says, and anybody can go and see this for themselves. Paul is rather highlighting the imperfection of the law and the superiority of the covenant promised to Abraham and his descendants, whereby "those who believe are blessed with Abraham who also believed." Christ takes on the curse in his crucifixion because he falls under the same yoke of the Law, the difference being he is not bound to the Law because he is able to demonstrate actual obedience, whereby God "highly exalted him, and gave him a name above all other names". Through a superabundance of grace which Paul discusses at the end of Romans 5, this leads to a renewal of anybody who puts faith in Jesus. They now becomes slaves to righteousness through obedience, the end of which is eternal life and a share in the life of the world to come (Romans 6:15-23).

>>18429199
>Ah yes, just blatantly accuse all of your opponents of engaging in eisegesis, with no facts of evidence to back that claim up, all so as to appear like you have taken the rhetorical high ground.
I’m sorry, are you a Romanist sir? Are you a member of the Greek church? Why are you so offended by the point, which you should not dispute? Of course no evidence was presented to support it, which was a comment in passing about a third party whom you tried to equate me with. Now you accused me of reading into the text, so perhaps I have license to be a woman like you and cry about your “toxic polemic”.
>You immediately came into this discussion gung-ho to read Paul as a Calvinist would read Paul without any consideration for the alternative.
This is the same intellectual dishonesty described above, because you are pretending that you were neutral and perfectly willing to “consider the alternative” despite repeatedly asserting that the reformers must be dismissed at the outset. You are correct that I was ready to read Paul as a Calvinist (to speak anachronistically) and unwilling to consider the alternative, because I am not ignorant of Paul. I already knew what Paul had said and taught (which had not changed since the last time I read him), which again is the source of my conviction. You are in error that begging the question means you have strong convictions, there is no logical burden to “consider the alternative”. You have begged the question because your argument is contingent on the conclusion it is supposed to support.
(1/6)

>>18429199
>Is it true or is it false that you are reading the text in light of a highly systematized and presupposed theology?
It is false, because said systematized theology is derived from these very texts.
>You immediately jump to saying the other side is acting in bad faith.
This really is embarrassing. Who are you trying to fool? I had not said anything about you acting in bad faith, although you have not hesitated to accuse me of it.
>>18429211
So you can come at me, but if I respond then I’m bad. The second quote is not even an insult, and you expose your own blind hypocrisy and intellectual dishonesty by whining about it, because all I have done is point out the presuppositions you carried into the text, which you claim to be the very thing you were doing against me. The first quote was a single sentence in an ocean of argumentation, which was itself a part of a point (namely, I was saying you have chosen to be an idiot by simply choosing to mindlessly accept what intellectuals tell you and not even considering what the reformers thought, I mean considering enough even to argue against it) but I set a kind of trap for you, because I anticipated just this, for you to hinge on this single sentence (which a mature man should pass by) to give yourself an excuse to dismiss wholesale the actual argument without engaging it, demonstrating you to be the very empty rhetorician you have painted me as to poison the wells. Now that you have thoroughly discredited yourself, Lord willing I shall be brief in responding to the actual substance you have given, so that this will not become infinitely long.
(2/6)

>>18429200
>But this point rests on the premise that Paul has something like penal substitution in mind
You are missing the point. If we could be justified before God by our own good works, it would still be a legal verdict of acquittal, although there would be no substitution. This is a distinct category which Paul assumes when he teaches substitution.
>I don't use the language that you use, because it is anachronistic
You can use whatever words you like, the concepts to which “covenant of works” and “covenant of grace” refer are what is being described by Paul in the text.
(3/6)

>>18429202
>You only think this because you mistakenly categorize Paul's ideal of transformation in with what you consider "works"
No, sir, it is because Paul’s arguments are aimed at rejecting the idea of human obedience being the cause of their own justification. This misunderstanding is perhaps related to your error that Paul is rejecting the law, despite his explicit teaching that “we establish the law” and his continued use of it and application of it to the Church (as a standard of obedience) and to the world (as the basis of condemnation).
>The issue is that you're conflating the different senses that Paul has for law, because for Paul there are two senses to the law
No. There are multiple applications, but only one sense (namely, the body of commandments of God to which we are bound to obey). If a gentile because of the law written on his heart refrains from murder, this is still obedience to the written law, since although the gentile was unaware it said “Thou shalt not kill”.
>hence Paul can write
Paul can write that because he is not an Antinomian. Part of the problem is that you are assuming synergism, while Paul is a monergist who teaches that it is impossible for those who are in the flesh to do what is pleasing to God, and those who are in the Spirit do not do the deeds of the flesh.
>By exacting perfect obedience to God he redeems us from the demands that the law exacts on us by becoming himself subject to it.
That could only be true by imputation. His perfect obedience removes the burden from us by being imputed to us.
(4/6)

>>18429209
>Except for Paul the problem is not the law per se, rather the problem is sin
Sin is a problem with the law for two reasons, 1. It leads us in our sinful nature to sin more, because we rebel against what God commanded 2. We, being sinners, must be destroyed according to the law. So for Paul the law considered as to itself is perfect, but as to us it is death.
(5/6)

>>18429216
>That's not at all what Galatians 3 says, and anybody can go and see this for themselves
I hope they do, in fact do one better and read all of Galatians, because it’s very clear in the text.
>Christ takes on the curse in his crucifixion because he falls under the same yoke of the Law, the difference being he is not bound to the Law because he is able to demonstrate actual obedience, whereby God "highly exalted him, and gave him a name above all other names"
Galatians 3 is not Philippians 2. Jesus is bound to the law because He is human, as you yourself pointed out, “born under the law”. What the difference between bondage and a yoke is, I do not know. His actual obedience means He was able to satisfy the burden of the law, not that He was not under it. I think the text is very clear: if you seek to be justified by law, you are under a curse, because “cursed is everyone who does not do everything in the book of the law”, but if you seek to be justified by Christ you are redeemed from the curse of the law because He took that curse instead, “cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”. Also take note of the other scriptures he quotes: the law offers eternal life to those who keep it, “do this and live”, yet those who live do so not because of their doing but because of their faith, “the just shall live by faith”. How is that? Precisely because those who seek to do this and live instead die, because they were bound to keep the whole law, but the just live by faith because by faith alone they are made just through the doing of another, namely Christ. They do not become slaves of righteousness through obedience, they obey because they are slaves of righteousness.
And now Lord willing I am done.
(6/6)

>>18429476
>>18429478
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>>18429483
>I’m sorry, are you a Romanist sir?
Nobody in good faith talks like this.
>despite repeatedly asserting that the reformers must be dismissed at the outset.
I mean your incredulous attitude toward my position because you perceive it as liberal and atheistic (based on literally no evidence whatsoever) due to your anti-intellectual bias is the hallmark of dismissiveness. Seems like you're the one projecting here, bucko.
>because I am not ignorant of Paul. I already knew what Paul had said and taught (which had not changed since the last time I read him), which again is the source of my conviction.
And the convictions that you feel in your reading of Paul are also the convictions I feel in my reading of Paul. Stop trying to turn this into some kind of personal testimony. No one's convictions about what they think a text says means that it actually says what they are convicted about. Nevertheless it is evidently false that you derived your theology from a plain reading of Paul, because if you had you wouldn't be reading anachronistic theological technical terms from covenental theology in which developed centuries after Paul wrote. It's not begging the question to point this out. Your hypocrisy is plain before all, and you're just butt-hurt when the tables get turned on you. Anyone who has any experience with you immediately knows who you are because you demonstrate this same disgusting, elitist, behavior time and time again in every single thread.

>>18429476
>>18429478
>>18429480
>>18429481
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>>18429483
>It is false, because said systematized theology is derived from these very texts.
It's plainly not ever from the text alone, as anyone with the slightest shred of common sense will tell you. But I know you'd never be willing to admit that because of your fanaticism for the reformation slogans.
>(namely, I was saying you have chosen to be an idiot by simply choosing to mindlessly accept what intellectuals tell you and not even considering what the reformers thought, I mean considering enough even to argue against it) but I set a kind of trap for you, because I anticipated just this, for you to hinge on this single sentence (which a mature man should pass by)
Or maybe because I find the arguments in the position I've presented far more convincing than the ones that the reforms held to? You know it's really not that hard to grasp the idea that someone can reasonably hold to another viewpoint.
>demonstrating you to be the very empty rhetorician you have painted me as to poison the wells. Now that you have thoroughly discredited yourself, Lord willing I shall be brief in responding to the actual substance you have given, so that this will not become infinitely long.
It's just so laughable to me how haughty you are acting. I'm actually sitting here laughing at your stupidity. You really think your farts don't stink, do you? Only an e-Calvinist, everyone! Not my first rodeo with you.

>>18429476
>>18429478
>>18429480
>>18429481
>>18429482
>>18429483
>You are missing the point. If we could be justified before God by our own good works, it would still be a legal verdict of acquittal, although there would be no substitution. This is a distinct category which Paul assumes when he teaches substitution.
But Paul isn't teaching about substitution in Romans. His language in Romans 5-6 frames justification in terms of participation, not in acquittal. Yes, Paul does use that language in Romans 4, but he's not thinking in transactional terms whereby one is punished in the place of another, his point is actually much more simple in that anybody who joins themselves to the Abrahamic covenant through faith is reckoned righteous by God. But Paul has to qualify what he means by this, and does so in Romans 6 by showcasing how righteousness is a lived, participatory, transformational experience, the end of which is eternal life.
>You can use whatever words you like, the concepts to which “covenant of works” and “covenant of grace” refer are what is being described by Paul in the text.
I don't in principle object to the words you used or the basic concept presented in that dichotomy, but you're being deceptive about the baggage those terms carry in that they're usually framed through the interpretive framework of covenental theology, which is a later theological development anachronistic to Paul.

>>18429476
>>18429478
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>>18429483
>No, sir, it is because Paul’s arguments are aimed at rejecting the idea of human obedience being the cause of their own justification. This misunderstanding is perhaps related to your error that Paul is rejecting the law, despite his explicit teaching that “we establish the law” and his continued use of it and application of it to the Church (as a standard of obedience) and to the world (as the basis of condemnation)
No your misunderstanding comes from the different senses in which Paul uses the word law since he makes a distinction between the letter and spirit, a teaching which ultimately derives from Jesus. It's the entire impetus behind what Paul writes about in Romans 2 and how he can make a distinction between those who are outwardly Jews only as opposed to those who are inwardly Jews, it's part of his allegorical interpretation of the law, which he justifies with the words of Deuteronomy 10:16 and the prophet Jeremiah.
>If a gentile because of the law written on his heart refrains from murder, this is still obedience to the written law, since although the gentile was unaware it said “Thou shalt not kill”.
Good except that the written law alone is not able to produce righteousness since "it is not the hearer of the law who are righteous before God's sight, but the doers of the law who are justified", which sets up the next part of Paul's argument. The problem in Romans 2 is sin, which Paul elaborates on in Romans 7, it is not the law per se. Paul is arguing in Romans 2-3 that the Jews aren't any better off than the gentiles just because they have the law, since all have sinned.

>>18429476
>>18429478
>>18429480
>>18429481
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>>18429483
>Paul can write that because he is not an Antinomian. Part of the problem is that you are assuming synergism, while Paul is a monergist who teaches that it is impossible for those who are in the flesh to do what is pleasing to God, and those who are in the Spirit do not do the deeds of the flesh.
I don't know if those categories are useful right now in this discussion and I don't even necessarily think my viewpoint has to be in conflict with monergism per se. It may conflict with your type of monergism, but that's about all I can say or am willing to discuss about that topic right now. I'm happy to discuss this issue with you elsewhere but I think it's irrelevant right now. I'm happy to take either a monergistic or synergistic approach to this, but I do understand how the approach I've presented does bend in a synergistic direction.
>That could only be true by imputation. His perfect obedience removes the burden from us by being imputed to us.
But the language which Paul uses is not imputation, it is participation. Hence why Paul can constantly speak about being "en Christo", sharing with Christ in sufferings and tribulations and persecutions, being United with the Messiah, in order to experience a resurrection just like his (Romans 6:8-13, Philippians 3:7-11). This is the language of transformation, not of covering.

>>18429476
>>18429478
>>18429480
>>18429481
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>>18429483
>Sin is a problem with the law for two reasons,
>1. It leads us in our sinful nature to sin more, because we rebel against what God commanded
>2. We, being sinners, must be destroyed according to the law. So for Paul the law considered as to itself is perfect, but as to us it is death.
I find about most of what you said here unobjectionable, and I uphold a traditional "western Augustinian" reading of Romans 5:12, or at least something very close to that.
>His actual obedience means He was able to satisfy the burden of the law
His obedience signifies his offering himself up to God as a divinely appointed sacrifice in unity with his will and full sovereignty. This is the obedience Paul has in mind in Philippians 2 (v 8), the self-emptying "kenosis" of Christ, and his crucifixion, for which he merited greatly!
As for what else you've said, I think it greatly obscures the heart of Paul's theology, namely that Christ's obedience to the will of the Father was of such value that anyone who puts their faith in him by uniting to him will become glorified like him, being resurrected from the dead, and receiving imperishable spiritual bodies,
>But Christ indeed has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
>For sin death came through one man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through another man
>For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive
The law does not do this, the law brings wrath (Romans 4:15), it leads to the knowledge of sin and the multiplication of it, but "where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more!" (Romans 5:20)
>And now Lord willing I am done.
Good. "The impious flee, though no one pursues..." (Proverbs 28:1)

>>18428080
>I hate God
Cool!

>>18428080
James the Just = Coolest guy ever
Paul of tarsus = raging faggot

Luther read this error into Paul where it doesn't exist.
His own harrowing scrupulosity and self purported dialogue with literally Satan lead him to this conclusion.

He was a mental patient and a lot of trouble could have been averted if someone realized he wasn't cut out to be a priest and needed to get married, and the idea of assurance through belief alone (his so called pearl of great price) helped him cope even if it's not really biblical.

This is the kind of person Paul was talking about, who if they couldn't control their carnal urges should simply get married.
Instead of seeing that message for what it is, he imagined he could just go on sinning knowingly and it was okay because he consciously affirmed his own belief in Jesus. Gluttony, indolence, arrogance, etc.

His idea of justification without righteousness, imputed righteousness as a field covered in dung with a layer of snow on top so that someone who didn't know better would say it was clean, is really indefensible and actually betrays his scatological fixation. He literally compared human nature to dung.

That is not how God would describe the pinnacle of his creation, literally made in his image, and I think of Luther cared enough to reflect on this catastrophe he would have repudiated himself.
But Luther cared more about satisfying his personal appetite for assurance, among other things, at any cost no matter how deprecating.
Yes, for Luther even the bride of Christ is a turd wrapped in white.

That's the kind of wedding with the divine he must imagine.
Does Christ actually wash his bride, or merely call her clean and leave it at that.
Total depravity is an insult to his faith, not the truth.

In truth, it was Luther himself who was full of shit.
Both figuratively, and literally constipated chronically.
From the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

Is Jesus a good doctor, who actually heals his patient?

Or does he merely declare them to be healed of leprosy, and give them some makeup to cover up the blemishes.
And then allow them to spread this ailment around to others, since they don't visibly appear to be sick anymore.

When your doctor prescribes you a treatment plan, a strict diet, exercise regimen, medicine, etc, are you healed simply by believing this plan is correct and trusting your doctor even if you don't actually do any of the things your doctor tells you to do and don't take your medicine?
No, clearly not. Your personal cooperation is a critical part of the medical healing process.
In the same way, obedience is a critical part of the new covenant.

Jesus is literally identified as a good doctor in the bible, and yet this analogy seems totally lost on most protties.
It's really disconcerting, I have to say.