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R.Schnackenburg: The Church in the New Testament, Part 2, ch. 4
Pauline theology of the Church
The topic to be considered here is:what special importance had Paul for the development of
the idea of the Church in the primitive Church, what his personal
theological contribution consisted of, what particular ideas he sketched and
what fruitful impulses he bequeathed to the period that followed.
Paul's originality
In view of
our imperfect knowledge of Hellenistic Christianity before and contemporary
with Paul, it will not be possible to say with certainty to what extent he
had assimilated the ideas of other missionaries and theologians; nevertheless
his originality (cf. "Body of Christ") is incontestable and his
deeper penetration into the idea of the Church is evident. For that reason
his ecclesiology has not been dealt with until this point, although
chronologically it takes precedence over Luke and Matthew. {77}
2. Who are the People of God?
Very probably Paul, trained in Jewish theology as he was, had reflected on
the "people of God" very soon after his vocation and particularly
in view of his mission to the gentiles. The relation between Israel and the
gentiles in God's saving plan deeply preoccupied him, most of all in Romans
9-11 where he presents a unique survey of sacred history. This great conception
cannot, however, be taken as a starting point, for it was drawn up when he
was already at the height of his missionary activity, after the conclusion of
his work in the eastern half of the Roman Empire (cf. Rom 15:9), and, in view
of the readiness of the gentiles to believe, it is written from a special
standpoint: "Has God cast away his people?" (11:1). In order to
harmonize with the divine promises to Israel the fact, so hard for him as a
Jew, that the greater part of his nation was obdurate in unbelief regarding
Christ, he puts very penetrating questions: Whether the word of God had
become ineffectual (9:6); whether there is injustice with God (9:14); whether
perhaps God was responsible for Israel's failure (cf. c. 10), and whether
God's promises for Israel will still be fulfilled after all in an unsuspected
way (cf. c. 11). And with this he even warns the converted gentiles against
arrogance towards Israel, which indeed in large part was faithless then, but
remains nevertheless the root of the olive tree onto which the gentiles have
been grafted and in regard to which God still remains faithful to his
promises (cf. 11:17-24). All that is envisaged from a definite angle which is
partly explained by missionary experience; it must first be asked therefore
what positive judgment Paul passes on the vocation of the gentiles and what
picture of the Church he draws from it.
3. His treatment of the "two wives" image (Galatians 4), compared with "the old Olive Tree" (Romans 11)
On this, the Epistle to the
Galatians is significant, the document in which Paul emphatically defends
both his apostolic office, namely his legitimate right as apostle to the
gentiles and his equality of rights with the original apostles, as well as
his gospel without circumcision and legal observances, the foun- {78}
dation of his unrestricted world-wide preaching. In an allegorical exposition
of Scripture he views in one passage (4:21 to 31) Abraham's two wives as
types of freedom and bondage. The bond woman Agar who only bore
"according to the flesh" is linked by him with the Covenant of
Mount Sinai which bears children into bondage; she corresponds to the
"Jerusalem which now is" and which lies in bondage as its children
do. The free Sara, however, who bore her son "by reason of the
promise", becomes for him the representative of the "Jerusalem
above" which is "our mother"; "you, however, brethren,
are like Isaac, children of the promise". It must be remembered that
Paul is writing to combat the old obsolete order of bondage to the Law to
which, for him, the "Jerusalem which now is" is clinging, and
furthermore, that Paul saw that that empirical Israel as it in fact existed,
closed against Christ, was persecuting believers in Christ (v. 29).
This is a different viewpoint
from that of Romans 9-11 in which, as it were, the obverse of the phenomenon
"Israel" is shown. Paul is torn between the two extremes: on the
one hand, Israel as the people of God of whom the promises hold good, on the
other, Judaism unbelieving in regard to the heir to the promises in the
absolute sense, Christ (Gal 3:16), persisting in bondage to the Law in
opposition to the will of God and even persecuting the Christian believers
submissive to the new order of salvation. But from this dialectic, however,
there emerges, when Paul is judging calmly without regard to the empirical
Israel, his positive conception of the true people of God, which equally
comprises believers from Israel and the gentiles and has become "in
Christ" a totally new unity: "There is neither Jew nor Greek,
neither bond nor free, neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ
Jesus" (Gal 3:28). So it is clear that for Paul a new people of God has
taken the place of the old, and one which, it is true, is formed on the basis
of the old and more precisely on the promises of blessings made to it but for
the rest stands on an entirely new foundation {79}
that of belief in the one heir to the blessings and sole mediator of
salvation, Jesus Christ.
4. Ancient symbols reinterpreted: "Jerusalem on high" and true descent from Abraham
Paul, as we have just seen,
regards this new people of God as the "Jerusalem on high" (Gal
4:26), or as its earthly manifestation (it is the "mother" of the
Christians), and he also terms it "the Israel of God" (Gal 6:16).
The attempt has been made of course to interpret this expression in another
way; but the benediction should probably best be understood as follows:
"The Galatian Christians whom Paul primarily in mind when he speaks of
those who are following his rule, and in addition, the Israel of God as a
whole, the ekklesia, wherever
it may be, are to be blessed with peace and mercy from God. The apostle
probably had the nineteenth blessing of the Qaddish in mind. For here
something very characteristic is occurring. The apostle is transferring the
old title of honour to the new society of those who believe in Christ
(something that was not to be observed even in Matthew, see above, Part Two,
§ 3). In fact this must be regarded as a very deliberate theological
proceeding; for something similar occurs more than once in Paul: the blessing
that was promised to Abraham for his physical offspring is transferred to
Christ and through him to all who are bound to him by faith and baptism (Gal
3:14, 16, 29), and in the Epistle to the Romans the spiritual descent from
Abraham is directly ascribed to all who, like Abraham, allow themselves to be
justified by faith, the uncircumcised equally with the circumcised (Rom 4:11-17).
5. Inheriting the titles and priveleges of Israel
Where it seems appropriate, Paul can also reinterpret the terms
"circumcision" and "Jew" (Rom 2:25-29) or deny to some
"from Israel" membership of "Israel" and of some of
Abraham's offspring, that they are his children, and of his children in the
flesh, that they are God's children (Rom 9:6-8). For him the unbelieving
Israel is the "Israel according to the flesh" (1 Cor 10-18) and to
the unbelieving Jews and Greeks he opposes "the Church of God",
that is to say, the Christian community (1 Cor 10:32). He is not alone in the
primitive Church in this {80} view (cf. above, Part Two, §
1-3); but as well as the titles of honour of Israel, he also laid full claim
to its actual privileges, and presents the Church as the legitimate heir of
the old people of God. Furthermore, he attempted to provide a theological
basis for this inheritance by seeking to recognize the lineaments of the new
people of God of believers in Jesus Christ, in the text of the Old Testament
itself newly interpreted. By that he certainly heightened and developed the
primitive Church's consciousness of being an independent society and even
more prepared the way for the conception of the Christian believers as the
"third race".
6. Turning-point: acceptance of the mystery of Christ
The bond between Jews and
gentiles in the Church is most profoundly indicated in the Epistle to the
Ephesians. It is "the mystery of Christ, which in other generations was
not made known to the sons of men as it has now been revealed to his holy
apostles and prophets in the Spirit" (3:4f.). Through Christ who proclaimed
peace to "those afar off" (gentiles) and to "those that were
near" (the Jews), both groups who formerly were separated have equal
access to the Father in the one Spirit (cf. 2:16 ff.). It is only with the
incorporation of the gentiles that the essential eschatological picture of
the Church emerges and God's economy of salvation reaches its culmination and
"the manifold wisdom of God" is "made known to the
principalities and powers in heavenly places through the Church", that
is, through her actual reality and her preaching, and so the destruction of
their power is announced (cf. 1:21-23; 4:8-10). In this perspective the
Church cannot be envisaged in any other way than as comprised in God's
eternal salvific plan as the Church of Jews and gentiles which Christ
represented in his body on the cross and made into "a new man"
(3:15), and which he has redeemed (5:23) and sanctified (5:26f.); the one
Body of Christ directed and built up by him, its heavenly head, whose growth
is promoted and brought to the "full measure of the plenitude of
Christ" (cf. 4:11-16). {81}
7. Equal rights of Jewish and Gentile Christians
That Paul also ensured the
freedom of the gentiles in the Church is already sufficiently plain from what
has been said. It was chiefly due to him that the settlement at the
"Council of Jerusalem" which accorded the gentiles entry to the
Church without circumcision or adoption of the Jewish Law was not only
maintained in the ensuing period despite the intrigues of Judaizers, but was
also understood. His thesis of the one way of salvation for all in faith in
Jesus Christ, presented with polemic intensity in the Epistle to the
Galatians and with doctrinal serenity in the Epistle to the Romans,
dissipated any doubts that might have been possible: "There is no
distinction; for all have sinned and have need of the glory of God, but are
(all) justified by way of gift by his grace on the ground of the redemption
in Christ Jesus" (Rom 3:22 f.). Consequently the gentiles have equal
rights as brethren in Christ and there may not be any tutelage or neglect of
the gentile Christians by the former Jews (cf. Gal 2:15-18). On the other
hand, of course, this must again be stressed, the gentile Christians
must not despise the old Israel on account of its failure (cf. Rom 9—11
passim) and must show loving consideration for their Jewish Christian
brethren who perhaps may have a more rigid conscience in matters of food and
drink (cf. Rom 14).
8. Promoting unity between the two branches
And so Paul admonished and
educated all his churches to Christian concord and also promoted harmony
between the mother-church in Jerusalem and his new foundations (cf. the great
collection). In that way he made an essential contribution, both theological
and practical, to the formation of a common consciousness of the Church as a
whole. One of the chief reasons, humanly speaking, why the Church which was
quickly growing in extent, did not split up, is to be found in Paul's
theology, which made all the faithful vividly conscious of the unity
conferred on them by God and which imperatively called for concord: the one
faith in Jesus Christ the Lord (cf. 1 Cor 8:5 f.), the one baptism knitting
into unity in Christ (Gal 3:26ff.; 1 Cor 12:13; {82}
Col 3:11; Eph 4:3-6), the common sharing in the one eucharistic bread and
thereby in the Body of Christ whereby the many are themselves a single body
(1 Cor 10:16f.).
9. Church as Temple of God
From this it is clear that Paul
had reflected profoundly on the nature of the Church. For him it is not
merely the association of those who believe in Christ, the people of God of
the new Covenant, the earthly community of the exalted Lord. The metaphor of
the temple of God (1 Cor 3:16; 2 Cor 6:16) which the apostle probably took
over from later Judaism and early Christian views (cf. Ezek 40:44; Is
28:16f.; 1 (Etbiopic) Enoch 90:28 f.; 91:13; Jubilees 1:17; 1 QS VIII, 5 f.;
Mk 14:58 and parallel), gave him the opportunity of bringing out the holy
nature of the Church. In this sanctuary God's Spirit dwells and anyone who
destroys it, God will destroy (1 Cor 3:16). His clear and realistic
conception of the Holy Spirit who fills every individual believer (1 Cor
6:19) as well as the whole edifice of the Church (cf. Eph 2:22) gave the old
idea new richness and depth. His sacramental theology penetrating to the
inner process of sanctification was also an enduring vital influence for the
idea of the Church.
10. Who are The Saints?
"The saints", probably originally a term used
by the Jerusalem Christians to designate themselves (cf. above, Part Two, §
1), now become "those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus" (1 Cor
1:2) in a sense understood quite realistically on the ground of baptism (cf.
1 Cor 6:11), but not only as individuals but also precisely taken as a whole
(cf. Gal 3:27 f.). The congregation renders actual again and again this unity
in Christ (1 Cor 10:16f.) which at the same time imposes the obligation of
holiness and brotherly love (cf. 1 Cor 10:1-13; 11:20-29).
11. Responsibility within The Body of Christ
The whole assembly
stands responsible before the Lord and is chastised by him (1 Cor 11:30-32).
Even the idea, familiar from the people of God of the old Testament, that the
community must watch over its purity and remove offenders from its ranks, is
placed on a new plane in view of the sanctification that has taken place in
Christ (cf. 1 Cor 5:7 f.). {83}
The decisive advance
over previous ideas, however, was taken by Paul with his view of the Church
as the Body of Christ. This conception which appears in the First Epistle to
the Corinthians and is immediately richly developed (6:15-17; 10:17;
12:12-27) is also met with in the Epistle to the Romans and then under a new
aspect reaches its full splendour in the Epistles to the Colossians and the
Ephesians, must probably be considered a creative achievement of, and
theological concept proper to St Paul, for in this form it is not found anywhere
else in the New Testament. On account of its importance for an understanding
of the nature and mystery of the Church, it is to be dealt with separately
later (cf. below, Part Four, §4). Here it may be sufficient to indicate that
it is only in this perspective and especially when it is fully unfolded in
the Epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians that Paul fully and completely
envisaged the heavenly dimension of the Church, its reality under which
earthly categories break down.
12. Eschatological Dimension
Nevertheless, the Church also appears with him
under other aspects, too, as a society centred in heaven and striving towards
eschatological fulfilment and the real nature of which is not grasped in its
earthly, historical shape and form. It has already been seen as the
"Jerusalem on high" which in accordance with the old Jewish
personification of the holy city is also regarded as the mother of many
children (Gal 4:26 f.). In another metaphor the Church (or the church of
Corinth which is directly addressed here) is the chaste virgin who is
espoused to Christ (2 Cor 11:2) and who is led to him (for the Messianic
marriage at the Parousia). In Philippians 3:20 the apostle says that
"our citizenship is in heaven", so that is where we have our true
home. Certainly in these passages the Church is not expressly named; it is
rather the life of the Christians that is characterized as being
eschatological and only externally linked to this aeon; but that occurs in
symbolic language which adopts metaphors, some of which had already been
created in the Old Testament and {84} Judaism to express the
eschatological fulfilment of the old people of God or of the city of God
(temple, Jerusalem, marriage) and which therefore have ecclesiological
significance.
13. No "individual" Christianity
Like all the early Church, Paul knows no "individual"
Christianity but always has the church community in mind in which the
individual accomplishes his Christian life. Consequently the eschatological
conception of the Christian life which is so powerfully worked out by him
also benefits the concept of the Church: the Church itself becomes an
ultimately non-cosmic reality, one already removed from this aeon in Christ.
Even without the idea of the Body of Christ it is the sphere of rule of the
heavenly exalted Christ enthroned with God (cf. Col 1:13) and looks towards
its fulfilment in the future kingdom of glory (cf. below, Part Four, § 6).
14. Essentially spiritual, but with earthly structures
This idea, perceptible in the
primitive Church from the beginning but not yet clearly formulated, regarding
the essentially spiritual, eschatological character of the Church, was
considerably assisted by Paul to establish itself and find characteristic
expression. The Epistle to the Hebrews then shows it perfectly worked out
(cf. below, Part Two, § 5).
The attempt has already been
made to show that Paul nevertheless also recognized an earthly structure and
constitution of the Church (cf. above, Part One, § 4). The pastoral epistles,
which present precisely this aspect of the Church, will, in accordance with
their unmistakably late position in the development of the idea of the Church
(despite their Pauline or Paul-inspired authorship), be dealt with later'
(cf. below, Part Two, §6).
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