In these verses in 1 Co it may be assumed that St. Paul is interpreting the principle on which he had acted when at Corinth, and on which he acted everywhere. The man who is called (i.e. who becomes a Christian) uncircumcised is not to cir- cumcise himself ; the man who is cireumcised when the call comes to him is not to undo or disguise the fact: as far as the gospel and membership in the Church are concerned, circumcision and uncireum- cision are neither here nor there. It is of this principle and practice that St. Paul says: so I ordain in all the Churches (1 Co 7!7). The Jewish opposition to St. Paul at Corinth seems also to have fastened on this aspect of his work: it no longer flowed from Pees jealousy, as probably in Galatia. The charge laid against him before
Gallio was that he persuaded men to worship God παρὰ τὸν νόμον (Ac 18:8), by which is no doubt meant, in violation of the Mosaic law. Judaism was 8 religto licita, and as the teaching of St. Paul was frankly inditlerent to the national character in virtue of which the law possessed this public standing, his enemies thought to bring him within the scope of the Roman law as violating it. Yet with all this he was anxious to maintain com- munion with the mother Church at Jerusalem, and at the close of his journey formally paid his re- spects to it once more (Ac 18”).
(Ὁ) To the third mission of St. Paul, which is ordinarily dated as commencing 55 or 56 [Turner, 52] A.D., belong the great controversial Epistles, 1 and 2 Co, Gal, and Ro, in which his doctrine of the law (for he was obliged both by his spiritual earenienve and by the challenges of his adversaries to have a doctrine) is expounded in all its aspects. Law in a sense is the subject of all, but especiall of the two last named. The very frequency with which the word occurs is significant. It is found 32 times in Gal, 76 times in Ro, 8 times in 1 Co; elsewhere in the Epistles ascribed to St. Paul only 6 times. In Gal the reference is mainly to what we should call law in its ritual aspect, for the claim made on the Christians of Galatia by the Judaizers was that they should submit to be circumcised ; in Ro, on the other hand, it is the moral law which is the subject of discussion. Yet this distinction is not one which would be present, at least vividly, to St. Paul’s mind. He thinks of the law as one, and as the law of God; and his point is that statutory obedience is not the way of salvation. Much of the dithiculty which his opponents had in understanding St. Paul must have been due to the apparently (and inevitably) equivocal atti- tude which he assumed to the religion of Israel. On the one hand, the gospel was a specifically new thing. It was independent of the law. It did for him what the law could not do (Ro 8°). It had to be defined by contrast with the law ; sometimes it seemed as if it could be defined only by opposition to the law, as in 2 Co 3 where they are confronted as γράμμα and πνεῦμα, as ἀποκτέννειν and ζωοποιεῖν, as κατάκρισις and δικαιοσύνη, as Td καταργούμενον and τὸ μένον. Even in Ro, which is written in a more conciliatory mood, pains are taken to show that in principle the two religions (the law and faith, works and grace, wages and promise) are mutually exclusive (Ro 4). On the other hand, the con- nexion of the new religion with the old is as in- dubitable. The δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ preached in the gospel may be χωρὶς νόμου, yet it is witnessed to by the law and the popnels (Ro 3", οἵ. 13.117 10°). The last passage referred to is particularly striking, for in it St. Paul applies to the gospel words spoken by Moses about the law, and that for the very poxpone of pointing the superiority of the gospel to the law. In other words, he read the OT as a Christian book, and yet proved from it the thesis that the OT religion was not Chris- tianity. But though this inevitable formal diffi- culty must often have led to misunderstanding in controversy, it is no more than formal, and the apostle’s position is intelligible enough. The OT, ΑΞ as a code, is not Christian, is indeed antichristian, as every religion based on statutes and therefore legal in spirit must be; but as a revelation it has the promise of Christianity in it, and bears witness tu the gospel.
(c) Before examining St. Paul’s doctrine, or the various suggestions of his Epistles, oa the law, it is necessary to observe more closely lis use of the word. (a) He sometimes has it with, sometimes without, the article. The question has been raised whether the meaning is the same in the two cases. If we ask questions which were not present
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78 LAW (IN NEW TESTAMENT)
to the mind of the writers whom we are interpre- ting, we are apt to get unreal and unreliable answers; and in answering this question there has been little agreement among scholars. No doubt when St. Paul says ‘the law,’ without any quali- fication, he is thinking of the law of Moses. There was nothing else in the world to describe by that name. The one specimen exhausted the species. Is anything else meant when he speaks of ‘law’ without so defining it? The answer given by such scholars as Lightioot and Gifford is that in such cases what St. Paul has in view may indeed be the law of Moses, but it is that law not arises as Mosaic, not as the historical institute with which the Jews were familiar, but indefinitely, and simply in its character as legal. In spite of the objections of Grafe, this view seems thoroughly sound. Even what is regarded as a decisive case on the opposite side (Ro 5” νόμος δὲ παρεισῆλθεν) is much more effective and relevant to the apostle’s argument if we render ‘ Law came in,’ instead of ‘The Law.’ St. Paul is writing of the great pears forces which have dominated the history of humanity, Sin, Law, and Grace, and it is in their character as such, not in their historical definiteness, that he is concerned with them. It is only when this is admitted, that what St. Paul says of law has any interest for others than Jews. It was because he could conceive of the law of Moses not as Mosaic, but simply as legal, that he could find an analogue to it among the Gentiles, and preach to them also a gospel (and the same gospel) which meant emancipation from legalism.