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4 “Is the God Who Inflicts Wrath Unrighteous?” (Rom. 3:1-8) I have argued that judgment functions as an accusation against the Gentile world in Rom. 1:18-32 and as an accusation against the Jewish people in 2:1-29. Paul draws his accusation to a close in 3:9-20, but first he answers several objections. Romans 3:1-8 is a digression in the larger argument of the letter,1 and thus my discussion of judgment in the passage may strike readers as a digression from the larger thesis of the book. However, just as Rom. 3:1-8 is integral to the argument that precedes and follows it,2 so this chapter will both support my previous points and anticipate the discussion to come. First, it will implicitly confirm my argument that Paul employs judgment as an accusation against the Jewish people in 2:1-29, because 3:1-8 presents objections to that accusation. Second, it will demonstrate that divine judgment is one component of the righteousness of God in Romans, a point that will be significant in my discussion of justification in chapter 7. The meaning of 3:1-8 is notoriously difficult and has challenged interpreters since Origen.3 My goal, therefore, must be stated modestly: In this chapter, I will examine the meaning and function of the judgment motif in Rom. 3:1-8. I will argue that the motif functions as a defense of the righteousness of God. In order to provide a context for this argument, I will begin with an introduction to the debate surrounding the “righteousness of God” in Romans. 1. So Käsemann: “As if taking a breath before stating his conclusion, Paul finds a place for two objections” (Ernst Käsemann, Commentary on Romans, trans. and ed. Geoffrey W. Bromiley [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980], 78). To say that the passage is a digression, however, is not to say that it strays from the main argument of the letter (pace Stanley Kent Stowers, “Paul’s Dialogue with a Fellow Jew in Romans 3:1-9,” CBQ 46 [1984]: 707–8). 2. Dunn observes that the text “is something of a bridge between earlier and later parts of the letter, or like a railway junction through which many of the key ideas and themes of the epistle pass” (James D. G. Dunn, Romans 1–8, WBC 38a [Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1988], 130). 63 The Righteousness of God in Romans Paul’s phrase the “righteousness of God” has been the subject of much debate. It occurs seven times in the epistle to the Romans (1:17; 3:5; 3:21, 22, 25, 26; 10:3 [2x]).4 Historically, the phrase received attention through Martin Luther’s “discovery” about the righteousness of God in Romans. Luther first read δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ in Rom. 1:17 as the iustitia distributiva of God, the distributive justice by which God would render a righteous judgment and punish sinners. This understanding led Luther to hate the phrase because of his own sin and the prospect of divine judgment.5 However, as Luther labored to understand 1:17 and attended to its context, he realized that his interpretation was incorrect. Rather than the righteousness by which God judges human sin, Luther discovered that δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ referred to the righteousness God gives as a gift: “There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of God is revealed by the gospel, namely, the passive 3. Origen was the first to note the confusion in Paul’s sequence of thought in 3:1-8 (Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans: Books 1–5, trans. Thomas P. Scheck, Fathers of the Church [Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2001], 179). Dodd says, “The whole argument of iii.1-8 is obscure and feeble” and suggests that “the argument of the epistle would go much better if this whole section were omitted” (!) (C. H. Dodd, The Epistle of Paul to the Romans, MNTC [New York: Harper & Bros., 1932], 46). Hall calls 3:1-8 “one of the most puzzling passages in the epistle” (David R. Hall, “Romans 3.1-8 Reconsidered,” NTS 29 [1983]: 183). So Thomas R. Schreiner, Romans, BECNT (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998), 147. 4. Outside of Romans the phrase occurs only in 2 Cor. 5:21. Cf. also τὴν ἐκ θεοῦ δικαιοσύνην in Phil. 3:9 and δικαιοσύνη in 1 Cor...

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