When Wright is Right
Posted by BryanJul 17
A few days ago, I uploaded my review of N. T. Wright’s book Justification
I wanted to write another post that hit on the things that I thought were good or right in the book, but I found that someone else has essentially said what I would have said, and said it better. Here are some notes from Kevin DeYoung’s pre-review:
Wright is right about a lot in this book. He is right to follow Calvin’s view of the law more than Luther’s. He is right to think that lawkeeping in Judaism was supposed to be a gracious response to God’s covenant mercy (“supposed to”, not “always was” in my opinion). He is right to see that the story of the Bible has God at the center and not us. He is right to see that Paul’s gospel is steeped in “single-plan-through-Israel-for-the-world” theology. He is right to think that not all his critics have taken the time to understand what he is saying (though Piper certainly has). In short, Wright is right more often than he is wrong. But I don’t think he is always right, nor is he always clear.
See the rest here: http://www.revkevindeyoung.com/2009/07/nt-wright-justification-gods-plan-and.html
3 comments
Comment by Matthew M. Dickie on July 17, 2009 at 10:33 pm
Bryan,
I stumbled upon your blog through the SBC voices page. I thought it might be of some use to bring up a driving factor in Wright’s theology, that of metanarrative. Wright approaches every text with a metanarrative in mind, which fact isn’t unique to him alone seeing that everyone approaches the Bible with a governing storyline; but Wright’s metanarrative and the way he applies it in exegesis is different from what evangelicals are accustomed to. I wonder if the main point of contention that people have with Wright stems primarily from both his different (novel?) metanarrative and the rigorous manner with which he applies it. For example, Wright’s metanarrative consists of a mixture of two things: his understanding of first century Judaism (via Sanders) and his concern to bring in the story of Israel (his understanding of the Old Testament). It is ironic that Wright has received much acclaim from evangelicals about his first three volumes in Christian Origins and the Question of God, where he applies this rigorous metanarrative to the gospels (all narrative), but he has been criticized rather sternly for applying it to Paul’s epistles. Could it be that it is more difficult for people to see a metanarrative at work in epistulary literature than in narratives? I for one have problems with Wright’s treatment of ‘righteousness’–that he nowhere gives a full dress word study (he merely refers the reader to his other works, which also lack a full word study). Yet his metanarrative, to me, seems right on. These are just thoughts that I think are worth exploring.
Comment by Bryan on July 17, 2009 at 10:44 pm
Matthew,
Glad you found the page, and thanks for commenting!
I think you’re right–evangelicals have previously tended to divorce Paul’s epistolary work from the Gospels in such a way that it damages the unity and metanarrative of God’s work in reconciling all things to himself. This is unfortunate because the most explicit statement of this comes from Paul (Col 1:19-20). At the same time, this doesn’t detract from the occasionalness of the letters either. Both must be understood, and worked out in tension.
Part of the problem, I wonder, is the rejection of any metanarrative at all by evangelicals in the past. The Bible was treated often as a “plan A” then “plan B,” instead of seeing both covenants as “the one plan.” Of course, this became their metanarrative, the two plans of God in reconciling the world.
Comment by tc robinson on July 18, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Still wanting to read this book so bad. It’s the longest it has taken me to read a new NT. In time…
But I’m especially in agreement with Wright on “He is right to see that Paul’s gospel is steeped in “single-plan-through-Israel-for-the-world” theology.”
But not in the terms of Dispensational Premillennialism.