Source: “The Parting Of The Gods: Paul And The Redefinition Of Judaism**”**, By David Allen Brondos, 2021
This podcast explores a redefinition of how God saves as understood through the apostle Paul's teachings, contrasting it with traditional Jewish thought centered on the Torah. While Jewish belief saw the Torah, supported by various leaders, as the primary means for God to bring blessing and conformity to His will, Paul posited that salvation is given primarily through Christ, rather than the Torah independently. The text emphasizes that Paul's understanding of Jesus's centrality, particularly His death on the cross, profoundly shifted the understanding of God's saving activity. It argues that Jesus's death was not a penal substitution or a mystical event, but rather the consequence of His unwavering dedication to establishing a community defined by sacrificial love and obedience to God's will, a purpose also embodied by Paul and other believers.
Topic 1: The Jewish Understanding of Salvation Centered on the Torah. In Jewish thought, salvation and well-being, often referred to as shalom, are fundamentally linked to the Torah. The Torah is regarded as the divine means by which God grants his people, Israel, the blessings of life and wholeness. For the Torah to achieve this, God was believed to remain actively involved among his people, guiding them to conform to his will as revealed in the Torah. This involvement manifested in history through blessings for obedience and discipline for disobedience. Furthermore, God raised up various leaders and authorities—such as priests, prophets, teachers, rulers, and military figures—all of whom served as instruments to enable the people to live in accordance with the Torah and thereby attain God's blessings. Even the anticipated Messiah was seen as secondary to the Torah, existing primarily to establish the necessary conditions for Israel to observe the Torah in the land God had given them. The worship presided over by priests, the calls to repentance by prophets, and the interpretations provided by teachers like rabbis, all aimed at fostering faithful observance of the Torah as the path to God's desired life and shalom.
Topic 2: Paul's Redefinition of Salvation with Christ at its Center. Paul's understanding of how God saves represents a significant departure from common Jewish thought of his time. For Paul, the salvation and well-being God desires for all people are given primarily through Christ, rather than through the Torah independently of Christ. While Paul's proclamation that Jesus is the Messiah has roots in Jewish beliefs, he attributes a centrality to Jesus that is unparalleled in known forms of Second Temple Judaism, where the Messiah was generally secondary to the Torah. In Paul's view, the Torah serves to lead people to the Messiah, not the other way around. This is because it is through Jesus the Messiah that God's promises of salvation for both Israel and the nations will ultimately be fulfilled. While all of God's actions through his Son contribute to salvation, Paul specifically highlights Jesus' willingness to surrender his life through death on a cross as the pivotal event that enabled God's saving purposes to be accomplished. His ministry aimed to bring people to live under Christ as members of a new community, the ekklesia, seeing Christ himself, particularly Christ crucified, as the very content of his proclamation.
Topic 3: The Ekklesia (Community of Believers) as the Ultimate Objective. A core element of Paul's thought is his objective to bring others to live under Christ as members of the ekklesia, which is the community that looks to Jesus as their Lord. This community, rather than adherence to the Mosaic law or forming part of Israel, is the locus of salvation and well-being for Paul. He envisions a community where all live in the same love and self-giving spirit demonstrated by Jesus himself, under his lordship. Jesus' ministry and ultimately his death, from Paul's perspective, were dedicated to establishing this very community. Similarly, Paul's own apostolic ministry is centered on expanding and consolidating this ekklesia throughout the world. He believes that living as part of this community, characterized by love, righteousness, and faithfulness, is how believers attain the salvation and wholeness God desires. This community is distinct from one defined by adherence to the Torah, as it is formed by faith in Christ and a shared commitment to his way of life.
Topic 4: Paul's Interpretation of Christ's Death as a Consequence of Dedication, Not Penal Substitution. The sources highlight that Paul does not provide a precise explanation for how Jesus' death leads to salvation, leading interpreters to propose ideas like penal substitution, mystical participation, or a pattern/example. However, the sources strongly argue that Paul's thought is contrary to these popular interpretations. Paul does not suggest that Jesus' death fulfilled a requirement for forgiveness that God could not otherwise achieve, nor that it involved an actual, mystical participation in his suffering. Instead, Paul views Jesus' death as a consequence of God's unwavering efforts to bring human beings back to himself and to establish a community living in love, justice, righteousness, and freedom. Jesus was sent to be God's instrument for this purpose, and his dedication to this objective, even when it led to conflict with oppressive forces, resulted in his death. God, knowing the consequences, still willed Jesus to persevere in his mission, making his willingness to give up his life for that objective the "means" by which God's saving purposes were accomplished, rather than the death itself being a planned "effect" or a payment for sins.
Topic 5: The Nature of Suffering in Paul's Thought as Shared with Christ. Paul frequently compares his own sufferings and the "dying" he experiences in his apostolic ministry to the suffering and death of Jesus. This comparison is not to be understood in a mystical or ontological sense, as if Paul literally participates in Jesus' past crucifixion. Rather, Paul's sufferings are "the sufferings of Christ" because he is dedicated to the very same task and objective that Christ pursued: the proclamation of the gospel and the establishment of the ekklesia. His hardships, afflictions, persecutions, and even the constant threat of violent death are the direct result of his commitment to this work, just as they were for Jesus. Paul’s willingness to endure such suffering is proof of his profound love for the communities he serves. Crucially, suffering is not an end in itself for Paul; he does not seek to suffer. Instead, his suffering is an inevitable byproduct of his self-giving love and unwavering dedication to others' well-being and their growth in the gospel, reflecting the very same love and dedication seen in Christ.
Topic 6: The Centrality of Love and Self-Giving in Salvation. Both God and Christ are characterized by a boundless, self-giving love that holds nothing back, even the life of God's Son. This type of love is at the heart of Paul's understanding of salvation. Paul exhorts believers to adopt the same self-emptying mindset as Christ, considering others' interests above their own. Jesus, "though he existed in the form of God," emptied himself by taking the form of a slave and humbly became obedient to the point of death on a cross, not out of self-interest, but out of love for others and in obedience to his Father's will. Similarly, Paul's own ministry is driven by this same love, prompting him to endure hardships and "spend" himself for others, desiring their well-being and growth in faith. The sources emphasize that this love, which God now pours into the hearts of believers, is indispensable for the existence and character of the ekklesia. It is through this transformative love, manifested supremely in Christ and replicated by believers like Paul, that individuals are reconciled to God and one another.
Topic 7: The Nature of the Conflict with Sin and the "Present Evil Age". Paul understands sin, unrighteousness, and injustice not merely as individual transgressions but as powerful forces or systems that hold human beings in subjection within what he calls the "world" or "the present evil age." These forces are deeply ingrained in human ways of thinking and behaving, and those who do not live under Christ are, unknowingly, under the sway of "the god of the present age." Jesus' efforts to free human beings from these oppressive powers and to establish a community based on love and righteousness inevitably generated intense conflict and opposition, leading to his death at the hands of those allied with these forces. The "war" or "struggle" that must take place, according to Paul, is primarily fought in human hearts and minds, involving the overcoming of destructive ways of thinking and behaving, rather than a supernatural battle. God's response to this ingrained sin is not to crush it by sheer force, as love cannot be coerced, and such an act would destroy humanity itself. Instead, God's chosen path, through Christ, is to bring about voluntary, heartfelt love in people.
Topic 8: The Purpose of Jesus' Death: Enabling the Community of Limitless Love. According to Paul's thought as interpreted in the sources, Jesus' death did not save or redeem anyone in a strict sense, nor was it primarily designed to fulfill a requirement for God to forgive sins. Instead, its purpose was to enable the existence of a specific type of community: one characterized by limitless, self-giving love. What was truly impossible without Jesus' death was not the forgiveness of sins or the destruction of evil powers, but the establishment of this community. God and Jesus, knowing that Jesus' dedication to forming this community would lead to his violent death at the hands of those who opposed his work, chose for him to persevere rather than back down. By willingly embracing the cross, Jesus demonstrated and made possible the profound, self-sacrificial love that defines this new community, the ekklesia. His faithfulness and dedication to this task, even unto death, is what ultimately reconciles believers to God and to one another, making them part of a new family conformed to the image of God's Son.
Topic 9: Reinterpreting Isaiah 53 in Light of Jesus' Death. The sources provide a non-penal substitutionary interpretation of Isaiah 53, suggesting how Paul might have understood it if he had seen it as foreshadowing Jesus' death. In this reading, when Isaiah 53 speaks of the servant bearing infirmities or being handed over for sins, it means that the servant's sufferings were caused by the people's transgressions, and he bore their sins by taking on the responsibility to bring them to abandon those sins. The chastisement the servant endured was for the people's correction and discipline, leading to their peace and healing through their repentance, not through the servant enduring punishment in their stead. God was responsible for the servant's suffering indirectly by sending him into a sinful context and insisting he remain, despite the violence. The people's recognition and repentance of their sins resulted from their contemplation of the servant's brutalized appearance, his patient endurance, meekness, and unwavering love, which included interceding for them even as he went to his death. This commitment and love, even unto death, enabled the people to turn back to God, leading to their peace, healing, and justification. Paul would have seen Jesus as bearing sins in this same sense: patiently enduring the sins committed against him, and by his dedication to transforming others' lives even at the cost of his own, making their reconciliation and justification possible.
Topic 10: Christ's Exaltation as Lord is Linked to Self-Giving Love. Paul emphasizes a crucial connection between Jesus' obedience to the point of death on the cross and his subsequent exaltation by God as Lord. God highly exalted Jesus because of his humility, self-emptying, and ultimate obedience to death. This exaltation is not for Jesus' own self-glorification or to establish dominance. Rather, it serves to magnify and perpetuate the boundless love of God in Christ Jesus. Paul's message is consistent: just as Jesus considered others' interests above his own, suffering and dying out of love, so too God exalted him to ensure that this same self-giving love could be continually poured out and manifested in the lives of believers. If Jesus had sought personal acclaim, his death would have been motivated by self-interest, undermining the very message of selfless love that Paul proclaims. Therefore, Christ's current exalted state as Lord signifies the eternal triumph and perpetuation of that self-emptying, other-centered love, making it available to all who come to faith in him.