Part 4: https://universalistheretic.blogspot.com/2022/04/pauline-dispensationalism-dealing-with.html
In the last four posts of this series, it was shown that the only way to reconcile the many contradictions between Paul and the other apostles and writers of the New Testament is to recognize the fact that Paul preached his own, unique gospel to the uncircumcised Gentiles and Hellenistic Jews. The existence of this unique gospel is explicitly recognized in several places in the New Testament, including Romans 2:16, 16:25; 1 Corinthians 3:10; Galatians 1:11-12; 2:7; Ephesians 3:1-3; Colossians 1:25-26; and 2 Timothy 2:8, among other passages. A proper understanding of the distinction between the gospel of the Israelites and Paul’s gospel is necessary for a correct soteriology.
However, the issue of whether Paul preached a unique gospel is actually only secondary to a much more important issue, which is the difference between salvation under the two gospels. Essentially, the question is, did Paul believe that works were a necessary part of keeping oneself ‘right’ with God after salvation, as the other apostles seem to have believed? And what is the difference between “justification” under Paul’s gospel and under the gospel of the Circumcision [1]?
The Righteousness of God
In his epistle to the Romans, Paul spent three entire chapters on describing how not a single person is righteous before God. He concludes with these words:
What, then? Are we [Jews] better? Not at all! For we did before charge both Jews and Greeks with being all under sin, according as it hath been written — “There is none righteous, not even one; There is none who is understanding, there is none who is seeking after God”...
And we have known that as many things as the law saith, to those in the law it doth speak, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may come under judgment to God; wherefore by works of law shall no flesh be justified before Him, for through law is a knowledge of sin. And now apart from law hath the righteousness of God been manifested, testified to by the law and the prophets, and the righteousness of God [is] through the faith of Jesus Christ to all, and upon all those believing, — for there is no difference, for all did sin, and are come short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:9-11, 20-23)
In this passage, Paul is comparing human ‘righteousness’ to the absolute righteousness and sinlessness of God Himself. Based on this standard, no human being - apart from Jesus Himself - can be considered righteous. As I discussed in my earlier article on Christ’s atonement, anything less than full obedience to God demands the penalty of death (Rom. 1:32), or non-existence, because God is the sustaining force that provides life and existence to everything in the universe (Acts 17:25-28).
This is the undeniable fact that no human has, or will, ever live up to perfect obedience (apart from Christ who “did not know sin”, 2 Cor. 5:21), and therefore every human being is mortal. It is this absolute sense of ‘righteousness’ that led Solomon to write that “there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and sins not” (Ecc. 7:20).
Paul’s solution to the problem of human sinfulness is Christ’s own death “for our sins”, an integral part of his gospel, by which the absolute righteousness of God will be imputed through Jesus Christ’s faith to everyone who believes this gospel message (Rom. 1:17; 3:22; 2 Cor. 5:21; Php. 3:9). Because everyone owes a debt of obedience to God, and it is impossible to repay this debt with more obedience (works of Law), this absolute sense of “justification” cannot be achieved via the Law. This is why Paul wrote that
a man is not justified by works of law, if not through the faith of Jesus Christ, also we in Christ Jesus did believe, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by works of law, wherefore justified by works of law shall be no flesh... I do not make void the grace of God, for if righteousness [be] through law — then Christ died in vain. (Gal. 2:16, 21)
Using the absolute sense of “righteousness”, if righteousness on the level of God’s own sinlessness can be achieved through works of Law, then Christ died in vain because His sacrificial “blotting out” of our sins was not necessary for us to be justified.
With this understanding of “justification”, it is easy to see why Paul believed that attempting to do good works to remain in God’s favor was a bad idea. To him, there was and remains only one way to achieve absolute righteousness, and that is through Jesus Christ’s faith [2]; but once one achieves absolute righteousness by having one’s sins entirely blotted out, it is impossible to get more righteous than that by doing works of Law. In fact, to attempt to do works of Law only puts one further behind, because that denies the freedom into which we have been placed, as Paul explained to the judaizing Galatians (3:1-4, 10-13, 5:1-4, 13-18).
Furthermore, because once someone has been imputed absolute righteousness, no sin can be counted against them anymore, it is impossible that anyone (having been saved under Paul’s gospel) could lose their salvation. This is something that is reflected repeatedly throughout Paul’s epistles, for example, in Romans 8:28-30, the same number of individuals who were “called” under Paul’s gospel will also be “justified” and “glorified”. See also 2 Corinthians 1:21-22; Ephesians 1:13-14; 4:30; and Philippians 1:6.
The righteousness of man
But if this is true, how could James have said that “out of works is man justified” (Jas. 2:24)? To properly understand this, it is necessary to recognize that (apart from the absolute sense of “righteousness” that is only inherent to God Himself) there is a relative sense of righteousness by which even sinful human beings can be considered “righteous”. For example, see the following passages:
“And the Lord commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that He might preserve us alive, as it is this day. Then it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to observe all these commandments before the Lord our God, as He has commanded us.” (Deut. 6:25 NKJV)
YHWH rewarded me according to my righteousness; According to the cleanness of my hands He has recompensed me. For I have kept the ways of YHWH, And have not wickedly departed from my God. For all His judgments were before me, And I did not put away His statutes from me. I was also blameless before Him, And I kept myself from my iniquity. Therefore YHWH has recompensed me according to my righteousness, According to the cleanness of my hands in His sight. (Ps. 18:20-24 NKJV)
“But if a man is just And does what is lawful and right; If he has not eaten on the mountains, Nor lifted up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, Nor defiled his neighbor’s wife, Nor approached a woman during her impurity; If he has not oppressed anyone, But has restored to the debtor his pledge; Has robbed no one by violence, But has given his bread to the hungry And covered the naked with clothing; If he has not exacted usury Nor taken any increase, But has withdrawn his hand from iniquity And executed true judgment between man and man; If he has walked in My statutes And kept My judgments faithfully — He is just; He shall surely live!” Says the Lord YHWH. (Ezek. 18:5-9 NKJV)
“Then you shall again discern Between the righteous and the wicked, Between one who serves God And one who does not serve Him. For behold, the day is coming, Burning like an oven, And all the proud, yes, all who do wickedly will be stubble. And the day which is coming shall burn them up,” Says the LORD of hosts, “That will leave them neither root nor branch. But to you who fear My name The Sun of Righteousness shall arise With healing in His wings; And you shall go out And grow fat like stall-fed calves. You shall trample the wicked, For they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet On the day that I do this,” Says the LORD of hosts. “Remember the Law of Moses, My servant, Which I commanded him in Horeb for all Israel, With the statutes and judgments.” (Mal. 3:18-4:4 NKJV)
According to these passages and several others, it is possible for a human to be righteous (relative to other men), but only if they repent of sins and keep the statutes and judgments of the Mosaic Law.
Based on these criteria, many people throughout the Old and New Testaments were considered “righteous”, including (but not limited to) the following: Abel (Matt. 23:35; Heb. 11:4; 1 Jn. 3:12), Noah and his family (Gen 6:9; 7:1), Abraham (Gen. 15:6), Lot (2 Pet. 2:7-8), David (Ps. 18:20-24), Daniel and Job (Ezek. 14:14, 20), Zacharias and Elizabeth (Lk. 1:5-6), Joseph (Matt. 1:19), Simeon (Lk. 2:25), John the Baptist (Mk. 6:20), Joseph of Arimathea (Lk. 23:50), and Cornelius (Acts 10:22, 35). Obviously, many more Israelites and Gentile proselytes could have been considered “righteous” in this relative sense, but these are the only people specifically said to be righteous throughout scripture.
None of the people listed above were righteous according to the absolute standard set by God, since as Paul said, “by works of law no flesh shall be justified before Him” and “all... are come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:20, 23). However, they (and anyone else who repented from sin and kept the commandments of the Law) could have been righteous relative to other humans, and thereby were considered more highly by God. This is the sense of “righteousness” by which the believing remnant of Israel (the Israel of God) is justified, and because of which they will receive the covenant promises in the Day of the Lord (Isa. 60:21; Mal. 3:18-4:6; Matt. 13:49).
Under this relative sense of righteousness, although faith is certainly necessary to be righteous, it is impossible to be declared righteous (or “justified”) unless one also continues in the works of the Law. This is why James (writing to the Circumcision) said that:
And dost thou wish to know, O vain man, that the faith apart from the works is dead? Abraham our father — was not he declared righteous out of works, having brought up Isaac his son upon the altar? Dost thou see that the faith was working with his works, and out of the works the faith was perfected? And fulfilled was the Writing that is saying, “And Abraham did believe God, and it was reckoned to him — to righteousness;” and, “Friend of God” he was called. Ye see, then, that out of works is man justified, and not out of faith only; and in like manner also Rahab the harlot — was she not out of works declared righteous, having received the messengers, and by another way having sent forth? For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also the faith apart from the works is dead. (Jas. 2:20-26)
If James were referring to the same sense of “justification” when writing to the Circumcision as Paul did when writing to the body of Christ, we could rightfully say that this is an utter contradiction. However, if Paul was referring to the absolute justification which only God can impute to us through faith (and which works of Law actually hinder, as I explained above), which the body of Christ is currently experiencing [3], whereas James was referring to the relative justification which is experienced by a combination of faith and obeying the Law, then the contradiction disappears.
Works necessary for Israel’s justification
But does the rest of scripture support the idea that works of Law are necessary for the (relative) justification and salvation of Israel, in stark contrast to the (absolute) justification of the body of Christ? As a matter of fact, it does. Jesus Christ, during His earthly ministry to Israel (Matt. 15:24; Rom. 15:8), repeatedly emphasized the necessity of keeping all the commandments of the Law for entering into the Messianic kingdom. See the following examples:
“Do not suppose that I came to throw down the law or the prophets — I did not come to throw down, but to fulfill; for, verily I say to you, till that the heaven and the earth may pass away, one iota or one tittle may not pass away from the law, till that all may come to pass. Whoever therefore may loose one of these commands — the least — and may teach men so, least he shall be called in the kingdom of the heavens, but whoever may do and may teach [them], he shall be called great in the kingdom of the heavens. For I say to you, that if your righteousness may not abound above that of the scribes and Pharisees, ye may not enter to the kingdom of the heavens.” (Matt. 5:17-20)
And lo, one having come near, said to him, “Good teacher, what good thing shall I do, that I may have life age-during?” And he said to him, “Why me dost thou call good? no one [is] good except One — God; but if thou dost will to enter into the life, keep the commands.” He saith to him, “What kind?” And Jesus said, “Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, honour thy father and mother, and, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Matt. 19:16-19)
Then Jesus spake to the multitudes, and to his disciples, saying, “On the seat of Moses sat down the scribes and the Pharisees; all, then, as much as they may say to you to observe, observe and do, but according to their works do not, for they say, and do not” (Matt. 23:1-3)
It is clear that Jesus did not consider keeping the commandments of the Law as something peripheral to salvation. Instead, He considered it essential that Israel keep the Mosaic Law if they wanted to enter into the age-during life in the Messianic kingdom. This is in accordance with the relative sense of justification described above, for which keeping the statutes of the Law is necessary.
Likewise, in stark contrast to Paul’s expectation of eternal security for the salvation of the members of the body of Christ who had been (absolutely) justified, Jesus repeatedly warned His audience against backsliding and transgressing against God’s law. Transgressing against the Law would mean going up against the sentence of Gehenna (Matt. 5:27-30; Mk. 9:43-48), which would entail missing out on the benefits of the Messianic kingdom. Jesus also told His disciples that, to be saved, they needed to “endure to the end” and avoid lawlessness (Matt. 24:12-13).
In accordance with these teachings, Christ’s disciples continued to preach that keeping the Law (specifically, the royal law “love your neighbor as yourself”, see Jas. 2:8) and doing good works were necessary for salvation, and that it is possible to lose one’s entrance into the Messianic kingdom by transgressing. For example, Peter wrote in his epistles to the Jewish dispersion that
when once the long-suffering of God did wait, in days of Noah — an ark being preparing — in which few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water; also to which an antitype doth now save us — baptism (1 Pet. 3:20-21)
wherefore, the rather, brethren, be diligent to make stedfast your calling and choice, for these things doing, ye may never stumble, for so, richly shall be superadded to you the entrance into the age-during reign of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. (2 Pet. 1:10-11)
for, if having escaped from the pollutions of the world, in the acknowledging of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and by these again being entangled, they have been overcome, become to them hath the last things worse than the first, for it were better to them not to have acknowledged the way of the righteousness, than having acknowledged [it], to turn back from the holy command delivered to them, and happened to them hath that of the true similitude; “A dog did turn back upon his own vomit,” and, “A sow having bathed herself — to rolling in mire.” (2 Pet. 2:20-22)
These passages are clear that Peter believed that salvation and entrance into the Messianic kingdom, for the audience he was writing to, required both water baptism and the avoidance of transgression (“stumbling”). Likewise, he recognized that it was possible to lose one’s privileged status in the Israel of God by turning away from the commandments delivered to them. This is entirely compatible with the relative sense of “righteousness” and “justification”, which requires one to keep the Law and could be lost (Ezek. 18:24).
John, another disciple of Christ and apostle to the Circumcision (Gal. 2:9), also repeatedly wrote that keeping the commandments (specifically, to love one another) was just as necessary as having faith in Jesus Christ for salvation and age-during life. See the following passages:
if we may say — “we have fellowship with Him,” and in the darkness may walk — we lie, and do not the truth; and if in the light we may walk, as He is in the light — we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son doth cleanse us from every sin; if we may say --”`we have not sin,” ourselves we lead astray, and the truth is not in us; if we may confess our sins, stedfast He is and righteous that He may forgive us the sins, and may cleanse us from every unrighteousness (1 John 1:6-9)
in this we know that we have known him, if his commands we may keep; he who is saying, “I have known him,” and his command is not keeping, a liar he is, and in him the truth is not; and whoever may keep his word, truly in him the love of God hath been perfected; in this we know that in him we are. He who is saying in him he doth remain, ought according as he walked also himself so to walk. (1 John 2:3-6)
Love not ye the world, nor the things in the world; if any one doth love the world, the love of the Father is not in him, because all that [is] in the world — the desire of the flesh, and the desire of the eyes, and the ostentation of the life — is not of the Father, but of the world, and the world doth pass away, and the desire of it, and he who is doing the will of God, he doth remain — to the age. (1 John 2:15-17)
Ye, then, that which ye heard from the beginning, in you let it remain; if in you may remain that which from the beginning ye did hear, ye also in the Son and in the Father shall remain, and this is the promise that He did promise us — the life the age-during. (1 John 2:24-25)
Every one who is hating his brother — a man-killer he is, and ye have known that no man-killer hath life age-during in him remaining (1 John 3:15)
These passages, and many others from John’s other writings, demonstrate that he understood the salvation of the Circumcision to be dependent on whether they kept the commands of God and loved their brother. Furthermore, and perhaps most significantly, he saw the forgiveness of sins as something that required one to confess one’s sins first, which is incompatible with the absolute sense of “justification” (by which the absolute righteousness of God is imputed to anyone who believes in the gospel).
In total accordance with this relative sense of “justification”, Jesus’ exhortations to the seven assemblies in Revelation 2 - 3 indicate that their eventual inheritance of the kingdom hinged upon their “overcoming” (2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21). Based on the larger context of all of John’s writings, to “overcome” means “to keep the commands of God” (1 John 5:1-5), which shows that the salvation being considered here was one that depended on both faith and works; again, this is entirely compatible with the relative sense of “righteousness” and “justification”, but is entirely separate from the absolute “justification” that Paul preached.
Finally, the anonymous author of the epistle to the Hebrews is perhaps the most clear about the place of works in the salvation of Israel:
[Christ] did become to all those obeying him a cause of salvation age-during (Heb. 5:9)
for [it is] impossible for those once enlightened, having tasted also of the heavenly gift, and partakers having became of the Holy Spirit, and did taste the good saying of God, the powers also of the coming age, and having fallen away, again to renew [them] to reformation, having crucified again to themselves the Son of God, and exposed to public shame... for God is not unrighteous to forget your work, and the labour of the love, that ye shewed to His name, having ministered to the saints and ministering; and we desire each one of you the same diligence to shew, unto the full assurance of the hope unto the end, that ye may not become slothful, but followers of those who through faith and patient endurance are inheriting the promises. (Heb. 6:4-6, 10-12)
The implication of this is that those who do “become slothful” will no longer be “inheriting the promises”, and will no longer receive the New Covenant nor enter the Messianic kingdom at Christ’s second coming.
For we — willfully sinning after the receiving the full knowledge of the truth — no more for sins doth there remain a sacrifice, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment, and fiery zeal, about to devour the opposers; any one who did set at nought a law of Moses, apart from mercies, by two or three witnesses, doth die, of how much sorer punishment shall he be counted worthy who the Son of God did trample on, and the blood of the covenant did count a common thing, in which he was sanctified, and to the Spirit of the grace did despite? (Heb. 10:26-29)
This passage not only demonstrates that the Mosaic Law is still in effect for the Hebrews to whom this epistle was written, but also that it is possible to turn away from the Law after having been saved, therefore losing one’s age-during salvation. I don’t think it would be possible for this to be any clearer that the Circumcision is still under the Law and that works are necessary for their salvation.
Conclusion
Although both Paul and the other New Testament writers used the terms of “righteousness” and “justification”, a close examination of the way that these terms are used makes clear that they did weren’t using them in the same way. Paul, by comparing humanity to the absolute righteousness of God, comes to the conclusion that no person can achieve (absolute) righteousness by their own merit and works, and that only Christ’s death can blot out our sins and thereby impute to us the absolute righteousness of God. Because of this, for the body of Christ, attempting to remain in God’s favor by works of Law is impossible (because we are already imputed righteousness) and actually denies the freedom into which we have been placed.
In contrast, for the Circumcision, the term “righteousness” is used in the same way as it was in the Old Testament, to describe human beings who (by repenting of sins and continuing in the statutes of the Law) are righteous relative to other humans. This (relative) righteousness requires both faith and works of Law to maintain, and can be lost, in contrast to absolute righteousness (which, once imputed, is impossible to lose). The non-Pauline writings of the New Testament support this relative sense of “righteousness” and “justification”, as Jesus, Peter, and John all preached that keeping the commandments of the Law were necessary for age-during salvation, and that it is possible to lose one’s place in the Israel of God (as did the anonymous author of Hebrews).
Therefore, although the Circumcision will also eventually receive absolute justification at the consummation along with the rest of humanity [2], their place in the believing remnant of Israel is still dependent on their keeping of the Mosaic Law along with faith that Jesus is the Christ, whereas the Gentiles in the body of Christ are already justified absolutely and actually should not be attempting to keep the Law.
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