Misunderstanding, Nationalism, or Legalism. Richard Wellons Winston

9:30—10:13 is central to discussions on Paul and the law. Many have addressed the passage, but there exists still the need to explore the section in depth in order to understand Paul’s critique of Israel and his proposed solution. Attention must be given to the exegesis of the passage, Paul’s use of the Old Testament, rival interpretations of Paul’s critique, and the overall theological point that Paul is making.

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The following survey highlights major studies on Rom 9:30—10:13 as a whole (or significant portions of the passage).33 In 1971, Ragnar Bring published “Paul and the Old Testament: A Study of the Ideas of Faith, Election, and Law in Paul, with Special Reference to Rom. 9:30–10:13.”34 Bring authored the first extensive study that pioneered a new approach to the relationship between law and faith in Paul. For Paul, law refers to revelation.35 Many misinterpret Paul’s view on the law because they confuse the law with its misuse.36 Both the OT and the NT teach that God elects his people, and expects from them the response of faith.37 The law exists to demonstrate the faith and faithfulness God demands from his covenant people, and to bring them back to the right path when they stray.38 Humans err when they try to keep the law and glory in their obedience.39 In Rom 9:30—10:13, Paul faults Israel for zealously trying to keep the law because their zeal is based on false assumptions about how to obtain God’s promised blessing.40 “Works” refers to following the law with the wrong intent.41 Law and faith are not opposites, for faith is the fulfillment of the law.42

In 1975, C. E. B. Cranfield published “Some Notes on Romans 9:30–33.”43 Cranfield previously addressed the issue of Paul and the law in “St. Paul and the Law,”44 but failed to discuss Rom 9:30–33.45 For Cranfield, the νόμον δικαιοσύνης (9:31) refers to the law which promises a status of righteousness before God.46 The law was given to show Israel the way to a righteous status before God, but they have failed “to grasp its real meaning and to render it true obedience.”47 Paul criticizes Israel not for pursuing the law, but for the way they have pursued it.48 Israel should have responded to the claim to faith which God makes through the law.49

In 1977, C. K. Barrett published “Romans 9.30–10.21: Fall and Responsibility of Israel.”50 Barrett follows the trajectory established by Bring and Cranfield. Israel tried to keep the law and to achieve the righteousness it required, but failed to do so.51 The reason for their failure was that they misunderstood the law, thinking that it required works, when the obedience it truly demanded was faith.52 Israel was scandalized by this true meaning of the Law,53 but Paul uses Lev 18:5 and Deut 30:11–14 to show that there is a right and wrong response to the law.54

John Toews’s dissertation constitutes the first academic full-length examination of Rom 9:30—10:13.55 Toews first gives a history of biblical scholarship on the law in Paul,56 and then examines Rom 9:30—10:13 in order to test his hypothesis on the direction of Paul’s law-theology in Romans. He argues that “Rom. 9.30–10.13 read as a unit affirms the fulfillability of the law in faith, affirms the law accepted in faith as a way to righteousness for the Jews, while at the same time declaring that Christ has fulfilled the law.”57 The passage “asserts two ways to righteousness, faith in God via the law and faith in God via Jesus Christ.”58

In 1981, C. Thomas Rhyne published Faith Establishes the Law.59 The bulk of Rhyne’s monograph focuses on Rom 3:21—4:25, but includes a chapter on 9:30—10:21 because the central concepts of the earlier passage reappear here.60 Attaining the law is the same thing as receiving righteousness by faith.61 Israel did not understand that the law promises righteousness to those who believe.62 Instead, they used it as a tool of personal achievement.63 All who believe in Christ receive God’s righteousness and achieve the goal of the law.64 Rhyne writes, “the heart of Israel’s failure lies in their refusal to believe.”65 Paul cites Lev 18:5 to represent Israel’s mistaken notion of the way to righteousness.66

In 1985, Sanders addressed Rom 9:30—10:13 in Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People.67 Building on his new approach to Paul and the law in Paul and Palestinian Judaism,68 in this work Sanders devotes eight pages to a discussion of Rom 9:30—10:13.69 While he credits Cranfield with coming close to rightly understanding the passage, he disagrees with Cranfield’s assessment that Israel pursued the law in a legalistic manner.70 Instead, Sanders argues, “Israel’s failure is not that they do not obey the law in the correct way, but that they do not have faith in Christ.”71 They are preoccupied with the righteousness that Jews exclusively possess because they possess the law, and they stumble over the fact that God in Christ has now ended the law and provided righteousness for all believe.72 Israel’s greatest error is that they did not believe in Christ.73

The same year saw Robert Badenas publish Christ the End of the Law: Romans 10.4 in Pauline Perspective. As part of Badenas’s study of the meaning of τέλος in Rom 10:4, Badenas offers a detailed exposition of Rom 9:30—10:13.74 Badenas defines νόμος generally as divine revelation.75 Israel has not attained the goal of Torah, and they have not attained righteousness by faith because they have looked at Torah as a legal code rather than a record of God’s saving interactions with his people.76 Israel’s failure to attain the law is their failure to recognize from Scripture Jesus Christ as the promised Messiah.77 Their refusal to submit to the righteousness of God is their refusal to submit to the Christ-event.78 In Christ is manifested the righteousness to which the law witnessed.79

James Dunn contributed to the discussion in 1988 with “‘Righteousness from the Law’ and ‘Righteousness from Faith’: Paul’s Interpretation of Scripture in Romans 10:1–10.”80 Dunn locates himself within the New Perspective on Paul, yet approaches the passage differently from Sanders. Dunn argues that Israel is zealous to protect their distinctives, the covenant righteousness which is theirs because they are the chosen people of God.81 Christ has ended the era during which righteousness was focused on ethnic Israel.82 This attitude towards righteousness as belonging only to Israel is summed up in Lev 18:5, which Paul now regards as passé.83 God, not Israel, establishes the covenant, and he does this in response to faith, as Deut 30:12–14 demonstrates.84 The contrast between the two texts is essentially salvation-historical.85

Frank Thielman surveys Rom 9:30—10:8 in From Plight to Solution: A Jewish Framework for Understanding Paul’s View of the Law in Galatians and Romans.86 Thielman surveys the major interpretations of the passage and argues that the simplest explanation is the correct one: Israel tried to keep the precepts of the law but failed to do so, and exists under the curse of the law.87 Paul’s criticism of Israel’s own righteousness is a criticism of their insufficient righteousness (9:32; 10:3 echoing Deut 9:4—10:10) and a failure to submit to God’s gracious provision for solving her plight.88

In 1990, Glenn Davies published Faith and Obedience in Romans: A Study in Romans 1–4.89 Like Byrne, Davies’s monograph focuses on an earlier section of Romans yet addresses 9:30—10:13 at the end since that section revisits the main topics of the earlier part of Romans.90 With a growing tide of interpreters, Davies argues that Israel failed to read the law properly and thought they could follow it in their own strength rather than by faith.91 They did not realize that the righteousness the law requires consists in trusting and believing.92 Christ accomplished the righteousness promised in the law to those who believe.93 The obedience which Lev 18:5 and Deut 30:11–14 command is that which flows from faith.94

In 1991, Stephen Bowser Pattee wrote “Stumbling Stone or Cornerstone? The Structure and Meaning of Paul’s Argument in Romans 9:30–10:13.”95 Pattee studies Paul’s use of the OT in 9:30—10:13, and makes much application to the theology of the passage. He argues that the nature of Israel’s error is that they have misunderstood the law’s fundamental goal and requirement. The law’s goal was to save all people, Jew and gentile alike. Its most fundamental requirement, therefore, was that Israel love the gentiles as they loved themselves and grant them the same privileges that they themselves enjoyed under the law. Israel, in her pride and hypocrisy, failed to do this, and thus by misunderstanding the law, the law has become her downfall. Christ, however, accomplished the goal of the law in his death on the cross, and all may be saved by faith in Christ.

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