This chapter works through Romans 10 and Galatians 3:10–14 in conversation with other early Jewish evidence, arguing that Paul is participating in a long-standing Jewish debate about the relationship between repentance and Israel’s redemption. Specifically, will Israel’s repentance initiate the restoration or will God’s redemptive intervention produce Israel’s repentance? Paul comes down squarely on the latter side, arguing for a divinely-initiated redemption through the obedient fidelity of Jesus, whose status and authority as “the just one”—the figure divinely appointed to bring about redemption—was validated by the resurrection. In the process, this chapter provides an elegant solution for the longstanding problem of how to understand Paul’s citations of Lev 18:5 and Deut 30:12–14 in these passages.

This chapter works through Romans 9 in conversation with other early Jewish evidence, arguing that Paul consistently cites the prophetic promises of the restoration of northern Israelites “from the nations” as promises that gentiles themselves (by definition not YHWH’s people) would become incorporated into Israel as part of Israel’s own redemption. Faced with potential accusations of divine injustice, Paul argues that this is in keeping with God’s prior dealings with his people, who have persistently resisted God’s purposes, leading God to achieve his purposes through new processes.

This chapter acknowledges that Paul’s gospel of divine self-sacrifice may seem too good to be true, even a fairy tale, to some people. We need a reality check for it, and Paul’s injunction to “test everything,” including ourselves (2 Cor. 13:5), lends support to this cause. This chapter identifies Paul’s approach to the needed testing, and thereby clarifies the foundations of his perspective on human knowledge of God. Paul’s message of divine self-sacrifice rests on resources needed to commend that message as not just helpful but also true. According to this chapter, Paul’s message of self-sacrifice in Romans 12:1–2 itself holds the key to suitable assessment of his good news. A key consideration is that suitably apprehending divine righteousness in self-sacrifice will confirm God’s reality and redemptive will. Such apprehending enables one to experience firsthand the divine self-sacrifice in one’s own life, with its distinctive power to obey God. There is no circularity here, because the relevant experience is not the same as a message of divine self-sacrifice, but it can be a truth indicator, and thus evidence, for such a message. The chapter explains why Paul does not rely on arguments of natural theology.

This chapter summarizes Paul’s gospel of divine self-sacrifice, giving special attention to the character of the righteous God responsible for his gospel. It identifies how divine righteousness figures in a solution to the human predicament of the corrosive powers of sin and death by offering a remedy in reparative self-sacrifice. The needed reparative sacrifice begins with divine self-sacrifice that includes the sacrifice of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, but it does not end there. It calls for human reciprocity in self-sacrifice to God, as voluntary sharing in the life-giving obedience of Jesus Christ to God. The chapter identifies how God agitates in human history to attract the cooperation of humans in such reparative self-sacrifice. This divine effort is at the center of God’s righteous love for humans, regardless of their national, ethnic, or religious background. Paul focused his calling from God on the good news that God has intervened in human history, climactically in Jesus Christ, to attract humans to cooperation with this good news.

This chapter clarifies the relation between sacrificial love and human faith in God in Paul’s gospel of divine self-sacrifice. Paul offers a critically important but disputed connection between the two: “In Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that counts is faith working [or made effective] through love” (Gal. 5:6). The chapter contends that Paul understood faith in God to have a formative basis in divine agapē, and that this basis secures a foundational role for divine grace. The case benefits from a neglected appreciation of a bimodal, combined middle and passive voice of a participle for Paul. The result is Paul’s view of a divinely intended ground and expression of faith in divine agapē. The chapter explains how this approach illuminates Paul’s view on the fulfillment-expression of the law of God in divine agapē. It thus offers an underappreciated basis for the importance of such agapē in faith and in pursuing the law, according to Paul. It also relates faith in God to dying with Christ, as sharing in his obedience to God.

Chapter 2 summarizes the key principles of Confucian philosophy and the influences of Confucian values on individuals, societies, and modern economic activity in East Asia. As the chapter explains, the most important principle in the development of internal ethics is benevolence, and it is part of the virtues that are considered to be preconditions for a hierarchically structured, harmonious society. The impact of Confucian principles on business activities in East Asian countries has been reflected in internal moral development (business ethics), interpersonal relations (organization and management structure of companies), and business culture in general. The chapter discusses the significant variation of this impact in East Asian countries and regions (specifically, in mainland China, the Hong Kong and Taiwan regions, Japan and Korea). It explores the impact of Confucianism on business culture; and then, in light of that discussion it considers the implications of Confucian business culture for competition law and policy in East Asia.

The contribution by Peter T. H. Hatton is dedicated entirely to conceptions of reward and retribution in the wisdom literature. He considers how well-placed and sometimes misplaced the paradigm can be, namely that wickedness brings retribution and righteousness brings reward. Such doctrines, he says, remain ‘key claims of a dominant interpretive tradition’ and have consequently formed a ‘pejorative paradigm’ that leaves the book of Proverbs out of favour in comparison to more nuanced books of the OT. The seminal work of 1955 by Klaus Koch – ‘Gibt es ein Vergeltungsdogma im Alten Tesament?’ (Is there a Dogma of Retribution in the Old Testament?) – receives special attention, as do subsequent, critical responses to it. Hatton suggests that the moral mechanism of act-consequence is just not that predictable and that in Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes the paradigm is principally relational. For ‘reward’ and ‘retribution’ are not mechanical but are rather conditioned by one’s relationship with the Lord.

John Thompson describes how Martin Luther and John Calvin treated conscience. For Luther, natural conscience is beset by knowing that a person can never meet the rigorous requirements of the law. Faith can relieve a person’s downtrodden conscience, which would otherwise condemn him. Once a person accepts the favor of God that flows solely from trusting him, his conscience is liberated. He knows he can do nothing himself to merit that favor. His conscience is freed “to trust God’s promise of mercy and forgiveness.” The highest functioning conscience for Luther, then, is the one that does not depend on its own goodness or perfection. Calvin teaches that, though a person’s conscience is a natural faculty, it is marred and affected by the fall. Once a person is saved, however, his conscience is transformed so that he desires to obey the will of God found in the law. This is true even though adherence to the law will not add in the least to his salvation. For this reason, Calvin created a catechism to train and chasten Genevan Christians’ consciences. Calvin also helped to establish the Geneva consistory, which was less a disciplinary body, and rather “a school for consciences.”

This important chapter focusses on the development and core characteristics of Augustine of Hippo’s views on justification, which were one of the most significant factors in shaping the western theological tradition’s reflections on this theme in the Middle Ages and during the Reformation debates of the sixteenth century. The chapter opens by considering the overall trajectory of Augustine’s views on grace, and how Paul’s concept of justification fits into this development. Augustine consistently interprets the Pauline concept of ‘justification’ to mean ‘a making righteous’, and does not develop a reputational or forensic approach to the concept. Augustine’s concept of the ‘righteousness of God is considered in some detail, with particular attention being paid to the manner in which Augustine distinguishes this theological use of the concept from its secular counterparts – as seen, for example, in the works of Cicero. The chapter also considers the ways in which Augustine’s approach to justification was affected by the Pelagian controversy, which tended to focus on the framework within which the concept of justification was set, rather than the notion of justification itself.

This chapter continues the exploration of the development of the doctrine of justification during the Middle Ages, focussing on the important concept of the ‘righteousness of God (Iustitia Dei)’. The chapter opens with some preliminary reflections on medieval understandings of Iustitia Dei, before moving on to discuss the highly significant contributions of Anselm of Canterbury to early medieval discussions of divine righteousness and the rationality of faith. This leads into a discussion of whether the ultimate basis of divine justice is to be discussed within an intellectualist or voluntarist framework, noting the quite distinct approaches found in writers such as Aquinas and William of Ockham. An important development which becomes of considerable significance in the fourteenth century is the use of covenantal understandings of the nature of divine righteousness, and the process of causality which lies in someone being ‘made righteous’. This theology of the Pactum, particularly associated with the via moderna, is explored, and its potential implications assessed. Finally, the chapter considers the discussion of the nature of the analogy between divine and human justice, and its implications for wider discussion of theological themes in this period.

Chapter 12 considers the critically important question of the origins and development of Martin Luther’s distinctive and highly influential views on justification ‘by faith alone (sola fide)’. The chapter presents an analysis of Luther’s reflections on the nature of justification and the question of the meaning of the Pauline term ‘righteousness of God’, identifying the turning points in Luther’s thinking on justification, and its implications for the nascent Protestant movement. It is emphasised that Luther’s changing views on justification were developed in interaction with biblical texts, particularly Paul’s letter to the Romans. Luther initially saw justification as a transformative process, and adopted a generally Augustinian understanding of its dynamics – as seen, for example, in his illustration of a patient being cared for by a physician, who is gradually being restored to health. Luther came to the view that the medieval church had lost sight of the graciousness of justification, and gave an increasingly significant place to the doctrine of justification by faith in his theology – a process which is completed in his assertion that the doctrine was the ‘article by which the church stands or falls’.

This chapter explores the difficulties in moving from concepts of righteousness and justification shaped by a Hebraic understanding of divine faithfulness to secular Roman and Greek concepts of justice. Particular attention is paid to the Latin translations of the Old Testament, which served as the basis for theological reflection for the Latin-speaking western church from late classical antiquity to the close of the Middle Ages. At multiple points, difficulties were encountered in rendering the rich theological meaning of the Hebrew term sedaqa by the Latin term iustitia.