The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The ... - josephprestonkirk

MAGEN BROSHI 243
younger.” As it stands written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” (Rom
9:10–13) 31
Paul was fully aware of the basic moral difficulty that predestination
poses, i.e., damnation without having sinned:
What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Certainly not! (Rom 9:14).
The adequacy of Paul’s solution is beyond the scope of this paper, but
the fact that he felt the injustice inherent in predestination is noteworthy.
We could go on and quote a number of other predestinarian Pauline
passages (e.g., Phil 2:13b–14), 32 but we will conclude with only one more:
“Therefore He has mercy on whomever He wills and hardens the heart of
whomever He chooses” (Rom 9:18).
This was chosen by Otto as the pure and proper predestinarian expression. 33
Sanders is certainly right in saying that “precisely how we should formulate
the balance between predestination and decision is difficult to
say.” 34 Side by side we have a verse just quoted (9:18) and a chapter later
(10:13–17) we are confronted with the sequence preaching—hearing—faith
which absolutely disregards predestination. Caird has shown clearly how
Paul’s epistle irenically harbors contradictory, conflicting views. 35
On the influence of the Essenes on Paul there is almost a unanimous
agreement. 36 Even without the amazing passage in 2 Cor 6:14–7:1, which
reads like a classic Qumranic text, slightly adapted and Christianized, 37
there are numerous points of contact between the Pauline corpus and the
Scrolls. The channels through which the Essene influence reached Paul
are not known to us, but there is absolutely no doubt about the existence,
the intensity and significance of such an influence. In 1963 H. Braun
31. Fitzmyer, ibid., 524.
32. Günter Röhser, Prädestination und Verstockung: Untersuchungen zur frühjüdischen, paulinischen
und johannischen Theologie (Texte und Arbeiten zum neutestamentlichen Zeitalter
14; Tübingen: Francke, 1994), 93–94.
33. Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy (1950) 86–88.
34. Ed P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism (London: SCM Press, 1977), 447.
35. George B. Caird, “Predestination: Romans IX–XI,” ET 68 (1956–1957): 324–27.
36. “Almost.” Heikki Räisänen, “Paul, God, and Israel: Romans 9–11 in Recent
Research,” in The Social World of Formative Christianity and Judaism: Essays in Tribute to
Howard Clark Kee (ed. J. Neusner et al.; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988), 183–84, gives
the impression that the notion of double predestination in Romans was somehow a
Pauline invention. See also Elizabeth Johnson, in Pauline Theology. Vol. III: Romans (ed.
D. M. Hay and E. E. Johnson; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995), 22–24; reissued under
the same title by SBL (SBLSymS; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 2002), 21–23.
37. Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Essays in the Semitic Background of the New Testament (London:
Geoffrey Chapman, 1971), 205–17.