Luke Timothy Johnson wants us to read Paul in all his complexity
“What advantage do we gain by possessing a Pauline theology that lies outside and above his writings?”
(Courtesy of Emory University / Candler School of Theology)
Luke Timothy Johnson is professor emeritus of New Testament and Christian origins at Emory University. He recently published Interpreting Paul, the second volume in his set The Canonical Paul. His memoir, The Mind in Another Place: My Life as a Scholar, is forthcoming from Eerdmans.
Every few years, a scholar publishes some form of a Pauline theology. In your two-volume set you resist this endeavor. Why do you think it is problematic to try to map out a theology of Paul?
The ambition to construct a theology of Paul is inherently misguided—and therefore fatally flawed—for three basic reasons.
