The Piper–Wright Smackdown (3): grace before justification?
I begin this third post looking at Piper’s critique of Wright with an attempt at a longish summary quotation. (You can find the first post here, and the second here.) I have tried to mark off the main line of his thought, and used ellipses to mark missing material.
It has seemed to most interpreters of Paul that something decisive and once-for-all happens at justification. Justification is not a mere declaration that something has happened or will happen. For example, in Romans 5:1, Paul says, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” In other words, something decisive happened that resulted in peace with God. … In fact, it seems that the divine act of justification actually establishes the peace because in it God does not just declare but determines our new identity. … This divine act of justification determines or constitutes an essential aspect of the new relationship with God. Without it there would be no saving covenant membership. Therefore, justification is not a declaration that one has become a covenant member by virtue of God’s prior call. Rather, together with the call, justification is an essentially saving act.1
This is not, of course, the only possible text of Romans 5:1. I have argued previously that we should follow the reading “let us have (ἔχωμεν) peace with God” here. If this is right, then a large part of Piper’s argument falls to the ground. I may be wrong, but it is irresponsible exegesis for Piper not to acknowledge that there is an alternative textual tradition here, and a debate to be had about it that potentially transforms the meaning for which he is arguing.
It is also important to note that Paul does not use the language of justification quite so univocally as Piper. For example, he seems entirely to overthrow the dogmatic distinctions of reformed thought when he cheerfully says: “you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified” (1 Corinthians 6:11). Paul may indeed have – I think he does – a coherent system of thought, but he is not a systematician either in the later sense, or in the way he uses language. One cannot read the same meaning into every use of the word, which Piper, I think, tries to do.
There is also a logic in Wright’s thought that Piper seems to miss. It is the regenerative work of the Spirit (in classical language often spoken of as the work of prevenient grace) that leads to faith. God’s act of new creation precedes the work of faith which is its fruit, and so precedes justification. Justification, for Wright, is about the declaration of the relationships (both with the covenant God and the other covenant people of God, Jew and Gentile together) which this new work has already established. Piper seems to collapse regeneration, salvation and justification into the same thing, which surely results in making faith a human work: the very thing he would want to avoid, and which many Catholics have regularly accused the heirs of the reformation of doing.
(PS. In the interests of celebrating the birth of the Prince of Peace, exploring Piper’s polemic will take a rest for Christmas Day.)
Notes- Future of Justification pp42-43 [↩]
December 25th, 2007 at 12:45 am
It seems rather simple me… Justified by faith. Where is the confusion coming from?
December 25th, 2007 at 12:46 am
If I was pious would I make less typos?
December 25th, 2007 at 11:53 am
Well, welcome, radical atheist. I don’t thnik pitey affects typso, sorry.
And the confusion comes from a mix of translation (does the Greek word mean faith or faithfulness) and at least 500 years of arguments about that and related matters.
January 3rd, 2008 at 6:53 am
[...] The Piper–Wright Smackdown (3): grace before justification? [...]
January 3rd, 2008 at 5:45 pm
doug,
I think Piper may have misunderstood Wright on this point. It is true that Wright emphasizes the declarative aspect of justification, but that isn’t in denial that justification actually accomplishes something crucial in the ordo salutis. In this article Wright says, “They are declared to be righteous; the verb dikaioo has that declarative force, the sense of something being said which creates a new situation, as when a minister says ‘I pronounce that they are husband and wife’ or when a judge says ‘I declare that the defendant is not guilty’.”
Also, I believe that Piper believes regeneration precedes faith, and that faith is not a human work. As he says in this article, “Man is dead in trespasses and sins. He cannot make himself new, or create new life in himself. He must be born of God. Then, with the new nature of God, he immediately receives Christ [through the gift of faith]. The two acts (regeneration and faith) are so closely connected that in experience we cannot distinguish them. God begets us anew and the first glimmer of life in the new-born child is faith.”
You seem to disagree with Piper that Paul uses justification univocally, but does not Wright do the same thing albeit with a different definition of justification? I think I pretty much agree with Wright, but I wanted to get your thoughts on this.
January 3rd, 2008 at 7:39 pm
Justin, I think Piper regularly misunderstands Wright, and I have suggested in another post in this series that it is because he cannot remove his Reformation spectacles.
I note your comment on Piper believing regeneration precedes faith. He just doesn’t seem to me to talk in that way in most of his objections to Wright.
I’m not sure whether Wright uses justification univocally. I would need to go back to some very heavy duty reading to check that out.