Commentary on Romans by Ernest Käsemann (review)

642 BOOK REVIEWS posed to the monarchical view of office. Fuellenbach himself argues for the " relative independence " of the Petrine ministry which would allow the papacy to develop along with the episcopal ministry. He explains the current shift in Catholic scholarship to the use of historical and critical methods found in New Testament research. As a result, a more objective approach has replaced the earlier co:1fessional and apologetic exegesis. Although the author is usually very careful in presenting and evaluating the various opinions-not an easy task in view of the complexity of the problem-in at least two instances there is some conflict. On page 76, for example, he says that the Catholic scholar, Wilhelm Scherer argues that a de facto primacy exists in Clement, but on page 114 he has Scherer holding just the opposite view. Moreover, he cites Quasten twice (p. 96 and p. 259, note 282) as accepting the idea of a " collegiate episcopate " in Rome in which one member would act as the presiding officer. Yet his reference to Quasten (p. 227, note 317) seems to be inaccurate. The notes and bibliography which comprise nearly half of the book are helpful; an index, however, would have added much to the book's value. Fuellenbach is to be commended for his thoroughly researched and well written study. Although he does not claim to "present any staggering new findings " (p. viii) , he does treat comprehensively the on-going understanding of the Clementine contribution. The Catholic University of America Washington, D.C. PATRICK GRANFIELD Commentary on Romans. By ERNEST KX.sEMANN. Translated and edited by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980. $22.50. The publication of the English translation of Kiisemann's 1973 German commentary on Paul's letter to the Romans is a major event in Pauline studies. The original was a theological best seller. This book is perhaps the most important commentary on Romans since Karl Barth's epochmaking exposition of 1919. It represents the culmination of a lifetime of wrestling with this inexhaustibly rich letter of St. Paul, a struggle which began for Kiisemann in 1925. In order to assess the significance of Kiisemann's commentary it may be well to locate it in the spectrum of previous Pauline studies. Over the centuries there have been two great lines of interpretation of this letter. I would like to sketch these two lines (A and B) briefly in general terms and then list some of 'the representative figures in each line. Line A may be characterized as a strictly historical interpretation which tries to understand the original situation which Paul was facing, namely, the Jewish BOOK REVIEWS 648 Christian converts, and the accusation that Paul's mission policy destroyed the continuity of God's revelation as found both in the Hebrew Bible and in the preaching of Jesus. The trouble with this interpretation is that once the Jewish Christian threat to Paul's mission ceased, the letter could be regarded as irrelevant, and as an historical interpretation of merely antiquarian interest. The advantages of this line are that it is historically correct, and that it retains a place for the moral law (Rom rn: 8-10) as law, that it presupposes that both Paul and his opponents are sane, healthy people with a serious practical-theological disagreement, and that it allows for a primarily social, corporate understanding of salvation centered on the body of Christ as the Spirit-filled Christian community. (Sometimes this line is described as mystical-sacramental in contrast with the forensic-legal line, but since the forensic-legal view includes sacraments and since mysticism is a vague word which could be applied or not to both views, we prefer to avoid this terminology.) Line B may be described as ahistorical or mytho-" theological " in the sense that it was developed by theologians after the fourth century who were more interested in their own contemporary problems than they were in an historically accurate reconstruction of the original Pauline problematic. Functionally, line B may be described as psycho-therapeutic in character, a form of interpretation which has been found helpful by people who suffer from various neuroses such as a blocked will, mental...