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Wrath in Romans

1       The problem of ‘The wrath of God’

My problem with Paul’s letter to the Romans is based on ‘the wrath of God’. In Paul’s letters to the Corinthians the word ‘wrath’ is never mentioned, and though Paul criticises the church in Corinth, he is never angry. Indeed, the most memorable chapter, on love, is 1 Corinthians 13. But wrath is mentioned 10 times in Romans, and this means that many readers, and I include myself in this, have not actually found Paul likeable, though the accounts of his life in the Acts of the Apostles are inspiring. The contrast with the letters to the Corinthians is so great that I almost have to ask whether the writer to the Romans was the same person. The most difficult passage comes in Romans chapter 1.16-18.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek,  for in it the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith; as it is written, “The one who is righteous will live by faith for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of those who by their wickedness suppress the truth.

I have highlighted the words which appear so incongruous when they are together. Paul frequently refers to ‘my gospel’ in his letters, and here is the very word closely followed by ‘the wrath of God’. Although verse 18 is separated in most bibles from the earlier verses, starts a new sentence and is often given a new heading, the fact that it begins ‘for….’ implies a continuation from the previous sentence. Could this be the same person as the man who wrote so eloquently about love in 1 Corinthians 13?

This comes as part of a lifetime aversion to ‘the wrath of God’. I went to church from birth, loved singing, and was a choirboy by the age of seven. But even then the words of the Venite appalled me.

Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said, * It is a people that do err in their hearts, for they have not known my ways:
Unto whom I sware in my wrath, * that they should not enter into my rest.

This was not the God whom I knew and loved. God’s wrath has no part in the gospel of Jesus.

I had not attempted to address the issue, but it arose last year when Jane Williams, in giving the ‘Early Good Friday’ lectures referred to the ‘righteous anger of God’. My view, which I shared with her, is that God does not do wrath: it is one of the deadly sins, not a divine attribute. Her reply was that God has every right to be angry and, to cut matters short, St. Paul says so.

René Girard

My study and admiration of the work of René Girard, which began almost 20 years ago, had quite reassured me that ‘the wrath of God’ was not part of anyone’s gospel. James Alison, whose book The Joy of Being Wrong (1998) uses Girard as a basis for his case, has difficulties with ‘Romans’. He uses Girard’s insights to solve the problem of the wrath in Romans. He says ‘In the Johannine witness …. we have a later stage of the development where the anthropological working out of the insight is clearer, as is the clarification of the understanding of God from elements of discourse formed within human violence.’ Alison acknowledges a debt to Robert Hamerton Kelly’s Sacred Violence: Paul’s Hermeneutic of the Cross (1992 Fortress Press). My brief reply to Jane Williams was basically that I agreed with Girard and Alison, not her.

So my reading of Romans really followed from the way that I have treated much of the Old Testament. It is a ‘text in travail’ with some utterly inspiring passages, and quite a lot which is savage, primitive and diabolical. What is remarkable about the OT is

  1. The realisation from the covenant with Abraham, that God is good, loving, and gives life, rather than wrathful, bloodthirsty and requiring sacrifice or death to appease his anger. The central story is the NON-sacrifice of Isaac
  2. This understanding inspired a re-writing of Babylonian creation myths, in a way that God creates from nothing and loves what he has made. The rainbow after the Noah story reverses the message of the original myth.
  3. The story of Joseph, who, instead of being a scapegoat, driven out or murdered, becomes the saviour of his entire family.
  4. The writings of the prophets in exile.

So, with such a lot of anger and sacrifice in the OT, it is amazing that the evangelist managed to shake so much of it off. A lot of wrath remains in the Old Testament. But no-one tried to formulate a Christian doctrine around it.

‘The Deliverance of God’

Through discussions of the work of René Girard on the internet I was pleased to find a reference to the work of Douglas Campbell’s The Deliverance of God – an Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul (Eerdmans, 2009). Campbell appeared to have a way of dealing with ‘wrath’ in Romans. With 900 pages of close argument about the Greek text of Romans and 300 pages of references this is not a book for the faint-hearted. It took 15 years to write. However, for those who can follow the case which he builds, it is a bombshell.

About the time I used his work for the sermon based on Romans I emailed Campbell to tell him how much I appreciated it. He referred me to Chris Tilling at St. Mellitus College, and King’s London. Chris had edited discussions of Campbell’s work at King’s London, where Campbell had started the project, and a later conference at Duke University in the USA where Campbell is Professor of New Testament. The report of the conference clarifies and simplifies Campbell’s thinking.

From this I learned that one of the starting points had been James Torrance’s interest in Scottish religion in the 17th century, and the contribution of John McLeod Campbell who was expelled by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland for heresy in 1831. His ‘crime’ was preaching ‘universal atonement’ and ‘assurance of faith’ which the General Assembly said were contrary to Holy Scripture. McCloud Campbell had been a devoted pastor and preacher who was concerned that his flock did not feel worthy or good enough to be loved by God. Eventually the Church realised that their hard Calvinist doctrine was a mistake, and that their scheme, which prioritised justice over love, was wrong. (‘Christ died for us whilst we were yet sinners’ one might argue.) The controversy which Torrance, a Professor at Aberdeen University, had uncovered convinced Douglas Campbell that the issue was important, and his study was to take 15 years, first at King’s London and finally at Duke University in the USA.

Deliverance produced a storm of criticism and hostile reviews when it appeared, largely from evangelicals and people wedded to justification theory. But a greater problem was that many of those who were hostile clearly couldn’t follow the argument about the Greek text. Besides, a book which is so many years in gestation is not going to be read in a weekend. It demanded careful study. So two conferences were planned, at King’s London and at Duke University, to try to identify the main issues.

The edited conference discussions by Chris Tilling are collected in Beyond Old and New Perspectives on Paul – Reflections on the Work of Douglas Campbell (2014). The papers are rather more readable than Deliverance as I will call the book. Here the main issues turn from my limited concern that Paul appears in Romans 1 – 4 as an unpleasant character going on about wrath, to the bigger question, that people have regarded these words as central to what Paul describes as his gospel, and thus they have framed Christian theology. Quite simply, like McCloud Campbell’s parishioners, people can read Romans 1 – 4 and feel condemned rather than loved by God.

E P Sanders 1977 – Palestinian Judaism p 99

I did not know, because I had completed the tripos just before, that Sanders had begun to unravel Romans. The scholarship of the day appeared very anti-Jewish and, after the holocaust, this kind of opinion looked unfair to Judaism. Perhaps what Paul criticised was not the Jews so much as over legalistic Christians, Sanders argued. Ordinary Judaism wasn’t like this caricature, and he provided evidence, including reference to the Dead Sea Scrolls, to support this opinion. Sanders’ views form part of what are now regarded as ‘new perspectives’ on Paul, and they have been embraced by many scholars including Tom Wright. Those who have studied Romans more recently than I may know all this. However, these new perspectives leave my original difficulty with ‘the wrath’ untouched. Is wrath part of what Paul calls his ‘gospel’?

Campbell’s case for a new reading of Romans

It is time to examine the evidence which Campbell amasses to permit a new reading of Romans 1.18-32. (See Deliverance p. 356) The style of this passage is significantly different from Paul’s other writing. He says

  1. There are five clusters of unusual stylistic indicators, which don’t sound like the rest of Paul’s writing. Because of this, several commentators have gone so far as to suggest that the passage is a later insertion by someone else.
  1. Romans 1.18-32 is a carefully constructed complete argument in its own right and is marked by emphatic alliteration. Seven words beginning with ‘alpha’ in verse 18 are matched by 5 negative words starting with ‘alpha’ at the end. My brother who lives in Athens notes that when someone interrupts and wants to speak in Greek today, they will often begin ‘papapapapapa’, a kind of stuttering wanting to get a word in edgeways. The repetition of lists of sins and foolishness is also noticeable.
  2. There are no fewer than 17 negatives beginning with ‘alpha’ listing things the speaker condemns. The letter ‘a’ at the start of a word means a negative, as in amoral, asexual, atypical. The ‘a’ typically signifies something bad.
  3. There is a dense concentration of third person plurals. The accusing words ‘they’ and ‘them’ appear 27 times!
  4. 21 separate vices are listed – surely this is over the top even by Paul’s standard.So it looks as though the entire passage is cast in a deliberate style. Campbell remarks that ‘Modern readers tend not to notice this; their competence in ancient Greek is usually not advanced enough to detect stylistic shifts intuitively, so the differences must be laboriously reconstructed.’

Campbell now describes this speech as a kind of parody of a speech by and angry hard line Teacher. On page 547 he says that Paul’s audience ‘would have had as little trouble recognising him as a modern TV watcher would have in recognising a speech containing the words “hi-diddly-ho” as spoken by Ned Flanders’, the telly evangelist in “the Simpsons.”

  1. The main emphasis seems to be on pagan culpability with God’s wrath being visited on sinners NOW (verse 18). But surely this can only happen after they are judged?
  2. The charges are collective, not about one individual.
  3. The charges appear to be derived from the Wisdom of Solomon.
  4. There is a crude attack on a learned Jew in ch. 2 21-22. Has Paul got someone in mind?
  5. Who are the righteous pagans in Paul’s argument?

After this passage, Paul appears to address an individual directly. 2.17 has ‘But if you call yourself a Jew and (verses 21 – 22) you, then, that teach others, will you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you steal?’ So is Paul replying to the hard line Jewish teacher, now a Christian in Rome, who interrupted Paul in chapter 1 verse 18? This is what Campbell argues. If so, the ‘difficult’ passages in Romans chapters 1 to 4, with all their angry accusations and wrath might be what Paul is arguing against, rather than his ‘gospel’. And if this is so, then the issue is far bigger than my question about why Paul appears angry, because Christian doctrine has been based on this.

Opposition to Campbell’s view

Not surprisingly, many people who have written about Romans didn’t like this new idea. It attacked conservative evangelicals in particular, including Douglas J Moo. Tom Wright cannot quite endorse the book and says ‘even those of us who remain unconvinced by his bold and provocative proposals will have our breath taken away by the scale, the scope and, above all, the sheer surprise of this historical, exegetical and theological tour de force’.

But, to my mind, all this wrath in Romans always sounded wrong. It ISN’T the gospel. SOMEONE had to try to explain it. This is the best attempt I’ve seen.

Justification theory is demolished

Campbell’s demolition job is extremely comprehensive. Since justification theory requires these angry passages to be regarded as part of Paul’s gospel, the entire notion will be demolished. (Page 380). Cameron has bigger fish to fry than the references to ‘the wrath of God’.

Campbell will go on to point out that Paul’s ‘gospel’ is always proclaimed with reference to Christ. It is Christ’s revelation which is being declared, and, as such Campbell will argue that this is ‘Athanasian’. That is to say, it proclaims a faith founded on Christ as God. And everything in the rant of Romans 1.18 – 25 is just a generalised diatribe about what humanity thinks, so it is by definition ‘Arian’ – precisely the heresy that opposed the Christian Creeds in the 4th century and not a fun accusation to make of conservative Lutherans and evangelicals! J Warren Smith in the discussion, Beyond Old and New Perspectives p. 78 et seq. clarifies some of this.

James Torrance (p.39) saw with peculiar clarity that an especially popular way to introduce foundationalism into any modern account of the gospel in the west has been through the reinterpretation of salvation as a contract.  He says ‘A contract is prevalent… since the development of capitalism… But it supplies a fundamentally different account of the relationship between God and humanity mediated by Christ from an Athanasian one. It is basically a classic Arian subversion of the orthodox gospel.’

‘Contractualism builds the foundation for its truth claims on an account of the general problem facing humanity… God is fundamentally just: good deeds are rewarded and bad deeds punished.’

‘The genius of the Western contractual reading of Paul’s gospel is the way it develops a second, softer, and specifically Christian contract. It is a tale of two contracts. Everyone breaks the first.’

‘Following Melanchthon salvation is offered ‘sola fide’. Punishment is directed the Christ on the cross. But people must hear this through preaching. And people without this are doomed. T. F. Torrance called it ‘the Latin heresy’ as it is present in Augustine’.

The atonement rescues, like the Exodus. In dying and rising Christ judges the sinful situation, shoulders it and deals with it. This is not a penal act. God is not punishing Christ.

Page 48  All this is a single problem, and is larger than most people imagine. The problem is Paul’s interpretation in terms of contractual foundationalism (Lutheran justification theory)

Reading all of Romans with one voice, as though it is all Paul’s gospel, creates the problem.

Intrinsic difficulties in Justification theory – ch 2 of Deliverance

  1. Epistemology. It is part founded on ‘natural theology’ of a kind and part on revelation and scripture, producing a muddle.
  2. Natural revelation Links theism > monotheism > divine transcendence > divine retributive justice > divine concern for human heterosexuality > etc. So, who says we are all supposed to think this?
  3. Law. Justification theory asserts two sets of law within one soteriology. It looks unfair.
  4. Anthropology. JT presupposes that people will know how to behave but will behave badly.
  5. Theodicy. God is supposed to be strict, and holding people to an impossibly high standard. This is unjust.
  6. Christology. JT does not explain why Christ must atone. The monetary image is offensive. How do you ‘pay’ the creator of everything?
  7. Faith. Is this going to be Arminian or Calvinist? These two cancel each other out.

Systematic difficulties to Justification theory

If we only had Romans 5 – 8 we would have a different, but completely coherent salvation story, based on Christ, the Holy Spirit…  Details are on pages 72-3 of Deliverance.

The final problem – Romans 1.17-8

There is no new speaker indicated at verse 18, even though it is easy to see that ch 1.18-32 reads as a single unit, in a distinct style.

However, the dialogue form is clear in chapter 2. Paul replies to the Teacher

Do you reckon, O man, that when you judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself, you will escape the judgement of God?

And then

Do you reckon, O man, that when you judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself, you will escape the judgement of God?

This is clearly part of a dialogue and the Teacher answers. Paul goes on the attack

17 But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast of your relation to God 18 and know his will and determine what is best because you are instructed in the law, 19 and if you are sure that you are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, 20 a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth, you, then, that teach others, will you not teach yourself?

I have used the phrase ‘O man’ rather than something gender-neutral because it appears that Paul has a particular Jewish male individual in mind. However, I appreciate the fact that the ordinary reader will find it more helpful if they see the phrase ‘whoever you are’ or something like that, to steer them away from what Paul criticises.

Then, internal dialogue is familiar from other letters Paul writes. And it is clear that Romans, like the letters to Corinth, is written in answer to particular problems. Everyone will know 1 Corinthians 15.35-6

But someone will ask, ‘How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?’
Fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.

The coup de grace – Douglas Moo answered in Beyond Old and New page 140

Sanders had rightly protested about the caricature of legalistic Judaism in Romans 1.18-32, but then the generic Jew and pagan both fail, because as legalists they have to admit that no-one is without sin. This entire scheme is a dead end. Campbell argues that until 1500 commentators never read this story as having led to salvation sola fide (on faith alone). Moo is singled out for criticism when Campbell quotes him as saying (p.140)

We must consider 1.18-32 as a preparation for, rather than part of Paul’s exposition of the gospel of God’s righteousness. But it is a necessary preparation if what Paul wants to emphasis about this righteousness is to be acceptable to the Romans. For only if sin is seen to be the dominating, ruling force that Paul presents it to be in this section will it become clear that God’s righteousness can be experienced only by humbly receiving it as a gift – in a word, by faith. (emphases are from Campbell)

Campbell says ‘Moo endorses other constructs as well, but the result then is just a conceptual mess.’ I would add that to base one’s story of salvation on what is evidently a tirade from a parody of a ‘telly evangelist’ (my Greek is just good enough to recognise the tone of Romans 1.18-32) turns the idea of using this into a joke. There is always a danger in an over literalist reading of scripture, and it doesn’t end after Genesis, or even the Old Testament.

Tom Wright 2013

Unsurprisingly, Tom Wright in his latest fat book refutes Campbell (page 764-). He argues that Romans 1.17-18 are a single sentence and part of the same thought.

My first question is ‘Why is the wrath of God the starting point for Paul’s ‘gospel’? Wright asserts that Campbell’s view is ‘the exegetical equivalent of the marathon runner who jumps on a bus in the middle of a race to get out of the hard slog and go straight to the finish.’ I find this kind of argument childish and devoid of reasoned content. My reply in similar vein would be to quote the silly story ‘How do you get to Dublin?’ and the classic Irishman’s reply, ‘If I were you, I wouldn’t start from here.’ In other words, if you are trying to expound the gospel, why begin with a concept which is not the basis of the good news in any of the gospels, nor in Paul’s letters to the Church in Corinth? No-one starts a proclamation of the Christian gospel with wrath, and certainly not with ‘the wrath of God.’ It doesn’t make sense.

My more serious answer is that wrath is one of the seven deadly sins, and if ‘wrath’ was not God’s response to the crucifixion (Luke 23.34) nor Stephen’s at his stoning (Acts 7.60) we are always wrong either to preach or threaten any ‘wrath to come’ because in the last resort Paul tells the Romans in 12.19 ‘Brothers, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for wrath’ (and note, this is not God’s wrath)

Wright then attacks the standard ‘standard-plight argument’ which appears from Luther onward, and insists that instead something new has been ‘unveiled, disclosed, made known in a new dramatic and unexpected fashion. For the standard western understanding of 1.18-32 there is nothing much new about the sinful state of humankind and the divine response. Paul seems to think there is’ (Wright’s italics) However, Paul doesn’t enlarge on this, and it is manifestly clear that naughtiness always was and always will be naughty. So what is supposed to be new?

Wright also rejects Barrett, Dodd, and Ed Sanders. However, to my mind he comes unstuck when he says of Sanders ‘here Paul simply repeats a standard Jewish critique of humankind, and then throws into the mix what amounts to a kind of synagogue sermon (2.1-16) which does not really cohere with what he says elsewhere.’ But this is precisely the point: the style is a parody of a sermon delivered by a hard line Jewish convert to Christianity who is a member of the Roman church; one who is both judgemental and a Jew, but exposed as being as much of a sinner as anyone else.

Wright disagrees, largely on the grounds that no-one appears to have spotted the change of voice at 1.18 before Campbell. I would disagree. It is very obvious that someone familiar with Paul’s letters to Corinth would find a strikingly different tone in what is unleased at 1.18, and it may be that only the original recipients were able to deduce the object of the parody. Whilst one could argue that the gospel writers, and John in particular might have been conscious of composing something to be received as scripture and handed on, Paul would appear to be writing to address the current situations of the churches with which he was in touch.

I’m not sure what comfort I am supposed to take from Wright’s claim that the ‘wrath’ is the righteous judgement at the end of the age. If this is supposed to make Christians gloat over the fate of the great unwashed, then that would appear to be a sin rather than a matter for rejoicing. I agree (page 768) that 2.1 is Paul’s ‘rhetorical sting’ but it is against the hard-line Ned Flanders as Campbell calls him (p 547).

Campbell’s reply – Paul – An Apostle’s Journey 2018

As I was pursuing this topic, a new readable paperback appeared from Douglas Campbell. It is a reconstruction of Paul’s entire life and mission. What I find is that the Paul revealed here is altogether more likeable than most portraits have depicted him. The critical issue appears in chapter ten, entitled ‘Enemies’.

We know from the Acts of the Apostles that the argument about whether pagan converts to Christianity was resolved. Peter accepts Cornelius and family (Acts 10) after the vision in which all foods are declared clean, and Gentiles receive the Holy Spirit.

Later ‘a new conflict threatened to split the entire early church apart… A report reached Paul’s ears in Ephesus of a major problem in the church in Syrian Antioch, the cradle of Paul’s mission’ (Campbell, page 127). Peter, Barnabas and some emissaries from Jerusalem were insisting that pagans had to convert fully to Judaism. This undermined Paul’s missionary breakthrough. An agreement was made (Acts 15) but about a year and a half later the enemies travelled through Paul’s communities in 51 AD exhorting everyone to convert fully to Judaism as the only path to salvation.

Paul couldn’t be everywhere at once, so he wrote letters. ‘Paul wrote a storming letter to his churches up in Galatia – the letter that Martin Luther loved so much’! (page 131) He wrote an equally strong letter to the Philippians. Philippians contains an Anti-Enemy section from a previous, lost, letter in Phil. 3.2 – 4.3. Galatians would have been read by Ephesus, Hierapolis, Laodicea and Colossae on the Way and Philippians by Christians in Athens, Bereans, and Thessalonians. The ‘Enemies’ as Campbell describes them, were zealots, as Saul had been, and prepared to kill, so they tried to put Paul on trial in Corinth. Paul calls them ‘enemies of the cross (Phil 3.18) and ‘dogs, evildoers and mutilators’ (Phil 3.2). Fortunately, Paul’s judge, Gallio, refused to be drawn into the fight. There is a beautiful fragment of an inscription at Delphi, which says Gallio’s tenure as governor began on 1st July 51 A.D. Campbell argues that Romans 13.1-7, about being subject to authorities, is a recognition of Gallio’s judgement. Paul has then to return to Jerusalem (with money for the widows) and defend his views. This means he can’t get to Rome where the Enemies are already at work, so he writes a letter. Romans 5 to 8 ‘contains the fullest account we find in Paul of the resurrected ethic that undergirds Christian behaviour.’ (p.134)

Campbell now says p 136-7

We are going to spend a bit of time unpacking these two neighbouring clumps of material – Paul’s famous opposition between justification through works of the law and justification through faith, and the stories he tells about Israel’s past, present and future… We might learn some key things about the handling of the Old Testament in our Bibles…The Christian city is built on Jewish foundations.
But there is another reason… Much interpretation of Paul has gone disastrously astray at this moment…. Shipwrecked and destroyed (Romans 9.6)
At its centre it is, as the Book of Revelation sees so profoundly, ruled by a lamb who has been slain. (Rev.5.6) It is ruled by a victim, not a perpetrator of violence. However, if we deviate from our course on the hazard that awaits us in these passages in Galatians, Philippians and Romans, we will wall our city in and install a new ruler. Moreover, this new ruler is not characterised by compassion, inclusion and healing but by retribution, exclusion and punishment. Our city will be ruled by a lion, not a lamb.

Campbell ch. 13 – Covenant versus Contract pages 139 – 149

This Chapter goes over the issues first raised by James Torrance, harking back to the strict Calvinism of 17th Century Scotland and John McCloud Campbell who felt that his people did not feel loved by God.

In short, Paul’s gospel is of God’s love and generosity, first expressed in the covenant with his people, and described as a family relationship. God always loves his children, as a parent always loves theirs. This, Paul feels, is being replaced by regarding God’s love as conditional on maintaining a contract by perfect observance to the Torah. A critical issue is Galatians 3.11, from Habakkuk 2.4 ‘The Righteous One through fidelity will live’. This, Campbell says, is a prophecy about the Messiah, not a statement that good people go to heaven.

So, does everyone go to Heaven? Campbell’s conclusion is that Paul affirms that God’s covenant with his people means that all Jews are saved, even if they don’t accept the Messiah, and if so, then there is no getting away from the idea that God loves everyone. Campbell admits that it makes him a universalist, but then, who are we to judge God?