A Tribute to E. P. Sanders

E. P. Sanders, perhaps the most influential New Testament scholar in the last 50 years, passed away on November 21. Ed Parish Sanders was 85.

Sanders’s Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion (Fortress Press, 1977) became a trend-setting work that sparked the new perspective on Paul. Prior to this work, many Christian scholars, especially those influenced by Lutheran and other Protestant traditions, taught that first-century Judaism was typically a legalistic religion of righteousness by works.

Sanders’s work undermined this perspective by showing through ancient Jewish-Palestinian literature (c. 300 BCE to 100 CE) that the Judaism of Paul the Apostle’s day was a religion of grace. It did not generally seek to secure God’s approval through human merit.

E. P. Sanders’s Covenantal Nomism

For Sanders, these Jews held to covenantal nomism: “Briefly put, covenantal nomism is the view that one’s place in God’s plan is established on the basis of the covenant and that the covenant requires as the proper response of man his obedience to its commandments, while providing means of atonement for transgression.”[1]

In Sanders’s own words: “The ‘pattern’ or ‘structure’ of covenantal nomism is this: (1) God has chosen Israel and (2) given the law. The law implies (3) God’s promise to maintain the election and (4) the requirement to obey. (5) God rewards obedience and punishes transgression. (6) The law provides for means of atonement, and atonement results in (7) maintenance or reestablishment of the covenantal relationship. (8) All those who are maintained in the covenant by obedience, atonement, and God’s mercy belong to the group which will be saved. An important interpretation of the first and last points is that election and ultimately salvation are considered to be by God’s mercy rather than human achievement.”[2]

A covenant relationship with God and adherence to Mosaic law (the Torah) are central to understanding rewards and punishments from God. For God’s elect people, the aspect of “getting in” a covenant relationship with God happened as a sheer act of grace. Jewish people were to keep the Torah in obedience to God, which constituted their “staying in” that covenant relationship. For Sanders, works are thus the condition of staying in, even though they do not merit salvation. In short, Israel’s salvation is by grace and its judgement is according to works.

Sanders’s Perspective

With covenantal nomism intact, Sanders taught some other influential points regarding Paul the Apostle, such as:

1. When Paul became a Christ-follower, his experience led him from solution to plight. He started with God’s redemption in Christ (solution) and then attempted to explain why humans were in need of salvation (plight). This view makes it unlikely that what is at stake with the Torah for Paul is not that it is impossible to obey or that it leads to self-righteousness. He agreed with Krister Stendahl that Paul did not have a troubled conscience as a Pharisee struggling to keep the Torah. Rather, he could claim to have confidence in his status and considered himself “blameless” regarding righteousness in the Torah (Phil 3:4-6).[3]
2. Justification for Paul involves salvation through participation in Christ. Sanders prefers to interpret the verb dikaioȏ (δικαιόω) as “to righteous” rather than “to justify.” The accent is not to be placed on the forensic aspect of God’s declaration of acquittal but on a person being “righteoused” by participation in Christ. The righteoused person is transferred over into the community of God’s people in Christ.
3. Paul’s negativity towards the Torah in his letters resulted from his conclusion that faith in Christ was the only way to salvation. He objected to the Law because for him it attempted another way of righteousness. It is not that Judaism is legalistic. Rather, “this is what Paul finds wrong in Judaism: it is not Christianity.”[4]
4. For Paul, to remain a member of God’s covenant people, God’s will is to be fulfilled, not by particularisms of observing things such as Sabbath and food laws, but by loving one’s neighbor.

The New Perspective on Paul and Sanders’s Legacy

E. P. Sanders’s viewpoint influenced scholars such as James D. G. Dunn and N. T. Wright, who helped shape this new perspective on Paul. Likewise, the new perspective influenced other viewpoints such as the radical new perspective, better known these days as the Paul within Judaism perspective. Post-new perspectives, such as those of Douglas Campbell, Francis Watson, and John Barclay likewise are influenced by Sanders and the new perspective, as are those who seek to find common ground between the new and more traditional perspectives, such as Bruce Longenecker, Mike Bird, Stephen Chester, Brandt Pitre, and others.

Here are Some of Sanders’s Most Influential Publications:

(1977). Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1977.

(1983). Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Publishers.

(1985). Jesus and Judaism. London: SCM Press.

(1989). Studying the Synoptic Gospels. (with Margaret Davies). Harrisburg: Trinity Press International, 1989.

(1992). Judaism: Practice and Belief. London: SCM Press.

(1993). The Historical Figure of Jesus. London: Penguin Books.

(2001). Paul: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

(2015). Paul: The Apostle’s Life, Letters, and Thought. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.

(2016). Comparing Judaism and Christianity: Common Judaism, Paul, and the Inner and the Outer in Ancient Religion. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.

Notes

[1] Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism, 75; cf. 180.

[2] Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism, 422.

[3] See further on this and other points about Sanders in B. J. Oropeza and Scott McKnight, “Paul in Perspective: An Overview of the Landscape More Than Forty Years after Paul and Palestinian Judaism,” in Perspectives on Paul: Five Views (Baker Academic, 2020), 1–23 (esp. 1–6).

[4] Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism, 552.