Introduction to the New Testament Notepack 2

Reading 1: Who was the historical Jesus?

Definitions:

 Apollonius of Tyana: A pagan philosopher and holy man of the 1st century C.E reported to do miracles and to deliver
divinely inspired teachings, a man believed by some of his followers to be a son of God.

 Asclepius: A popular Greek god known in particular for his ability to heal the sick.

 Hanina ben Dosa: A well-known Galilean rabbi of the 1st century, who was reputed to have done miracles comparable to
those of Jesus.

 Criterion of contextual credibility: One of the criterion common used by scholars to establish historically reliable material;
with respect to the historical Jesus, the criterion maintains that if a saying or deed of Jesus cannot be credibly fit into his own
1st century Palestinian context, then it cannot be regarded as authentic.

 Criterion of dissimilarity: One of the criteria commonly used by scholars to establish historically reliable material; the
criterion maintains that if a saying or deed of Jesus does not coincide with the agenda of the early Christians, it is more
likely to be authentic.

 Herod (Antipas): Son of Herod the Great, and ruler of Galilee from 4 to 39 C.E. This is the Herod who executed John the
Baptist and who was involved with the trial of Jesus according to the Gospels of Luke and Peter.

 Josephus: 1st century Jewish historian, appointed court historian by the emperor Vespasian, whose works The Jewish War
and the Antiquities of the Jews are principal resources for information about life in 1 st century Palestine.

 L: A document that no longer survives, but that evidently provided Luke with traditions that are not found in Matthew or
Mark.

 M: A document that no longer survives, but evidently provided Matthew with traditions that are not found in Mark or Luke.

 Mishnah: A collection of oral traditions passed on by generations of Jewish rabbis who saw themselves as the descendants
of the Pharisees, finally put into writing around 200 C.E.

 Passion: From a Greek word that means “suffering” used as a technical term to refer to the traditions of Jesus’ last days, up
to and including his crucifixion.

 Pliny the Younger: Roman aristocrat who ruled the province of Bithynia-Pontus in the early 2 nd century C.E and whose
correspondence with the Emperor Trajan contains the earliest reference to Christ in a pagan source.

 Pontius Pilate: Roman aristocrat who served as the governor of Judea from 26 to 36 C.E, and who was responsible for
ordering Jesus’ crucifixion.

 Q: The source used by both Matthew and Luke for the stories they share, principally sayings, that are not found in Mark;
ffrom the German word Quelle, meaning “source”. This document no longer exists, but can be reconstructed on the basis of
Matthew and Luke.

 Son of God: In most Greco-Roman circles, the designation of a person born to god, able to perform miraculous deeds and/or
to convey superhuman teachings; in Jewish circles, the designation of a person chosen to stand in a special relationship with
the God of Israel including the ancient Jewish Kings.

 Suetonius: A Roman historian of the early second century C.E best known for a multivolume work giving biographies of the
Roman emperors, The Lives of Caesars.

 Superstition: In the ancient world, superstition was understood by the highly educated upper classes as an excessive fear of
the gods that drove a person to be excessively scrupulous in trying to avoid their displeasure.
 Tacitus:

 Talmud: The great collection of ancient Jewish traditions that comprises the Mishnah and the later commentaries on the
Mishnah, called the Gemarah. There are two collections of the Talmud, one made in Palestine during the early fifth century
C.E and the other in Babylon perhaps a century later. The Babylonian Talmud is generally considered more authoritative.

 Traditions: Any doctrine, idea, practice, or custom that has been handed down from one person to another.

Reading 2: Who was the Apostle Paul ?

Definitions:

 Apocalypticist: A worldview held by many ancient Jews and Christians that maintained that the present age is controlled by
forces of evil, but that these will be destroyed at the end of time when God intervenes in history to bring in his Kingdom, an
event thought to be imminent.

 Apostle: Generally, one who is commissioned to perform a task, from a Greek word meaning “sent”; in early Christianity,
the term was used to designate special emissaries of the faith who understood to be representatives of the Christ.

 Canon: From a Greek word meaning “ruler” or “straight edge”. The term came to designate any recognized collection of
texts; the cannon of the New Testament are thus the collection of books that Christians accept as authoritative.

 Contextual method: A method used to study a literary text by first determining its social and historical context and then
using that context to help explain the text’s meaning.

 Covenant: An agreement or treaty between two social or political parties that have come to terms used by ancient Jews in
reference to the pact that God made to protect and preserve them as his chosen people in exchange for their devotion and
adherence to his Law.

 Deutero-Pauline epistles: The letters of Ephesians, Colossians, and 2 Thessalonians which have a secondary (Deutero)
standing in the Pauline Corpus because scholars debate whether they were written by Paul or not.

 Diaspora: Greek for “dispersion”, a term that refers to the dispersion of Jews away from Palestine into other parts of the
Mediterranean, beginning with the Babylonian conquest in the sixth century B.C.E.

 Epistle: Another designation for a private letter. Some scholars have differentiated between “epistles” as literary writings in
the form of a letter, which were meant or general distribution, rather than for an individual recipient, and “letters” which
were nonliterary form of personal correspondence.

 Essenes: An apocalyptic and ascetic Jewish sect started during the Maccabean period, members of which are generally
thought to have produced the Dead Sea Scrolls.

 Firstfruits of resurrection: It is a phrase used by the apostle Paul to refer to Jesus as the first one to be raised from the
dead. It is an agricultural image referring to the celebration held at the end of the first day of the harvest, in anticipation of
going out to being the rest of the crops the next day. If Jesus is the “firstfruits”, then the rest of the resurrection, everyone
else’s will happen very soon.

 Gentile: A Jewish designation for a non-Jew.

 Gospel: When this word is capitalized, it refers to a literary genre: a written account of the “good news” brought by Jesus
Christ, including episodes involving his words and/or deeds. For example, the Gospel of Luke.

 Law/Torah: A Hebrew word that means “guidance” or “direction” but is usually translated to “Law”. As a technical term, it
designated either the Law of God given to Moses or the first five books of the Jewish Bible that Moses was traditionally
though to have written” Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

 Messiah: From a Hebrew word that literally means “anointed one”, translated into Greek as Christos, from which derives
our English word Christ. In the 1st century C.E, there was a wide range of expectation about whom this anointed one might
 be, with some Jews anticipating a future warrior-king like David, others a cosmic redeemer from heaven, others an
authoritative priest, and still others a powerful spokesperson from God like Moses.

 Pastoral Epistles: New Testament letters that Paul allegedly wrote to two pastors, Timothy and Titus, concerning their
pastoral duties.

 Pauline Corpus: All of the letters of the New Testament that claim to be written by Paul, including the Deutero-Pauline and
Pastoral Epistles.

 Pharisee: A Jewish sect, which may have originated during the Maccabean period, that emphasized strict adherence to the
purity laws set forth in the Torah.

 Polytheism: The belief that there are many gods, a belief that lies at the heart of all of the ancient pagan religions.

 Pseudepigrapha: From the Greek, literally meaning “false writings” and commonly referring to ancient non-canonical
Jewish and Christian literary texts, many of which were written pseudonymously.

 Pseudonymous: The practice of writing under a fictitious name, evident inj a large number of pagan, Jewish, and Christian
writings from antiquity.

 Resurrection: The doctrine originally devised within circles of apocalyptic Judaism that maintained that at the end of the
present age those who had died would be brought back to life in order to face judgment: either torment for those opposed to
God or reward for those who sided with God. The earliest Christians believed that Jesus had been raised, and concluded
therefore that the end of the age had already begun. In Christian apocalyptic thought it was believed that the rewards and
punishments in the future resurrection would hinge on one’s relationship to Christ, as either a believer or a nonbeliever.

 Sadducees: A Jewish party associated with the Temple cult and the Jewish priests who ran it, comprising principally the
Jewish aristocracy in Judea. The party leader, the high priest, served as the highest ranking local official and chief liaison
with the Roman governor.

 Seneca: Probably the greatest Roman philosopher of the second half of the first century C.E and tutor to the young Nero,
later thought to have entered into a prolonged correspondence with the apostle Paul.

 Septuagint: The translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, so named because of a tradition that seventy Jewish
scholars had produced it.

 Tarsus: A city in Southeast Asia Minor (Modern day Turkey) that, according to Acts, was home to the apostle Paul. This city
was known as one of the great philosophical centers in the Roman Empire, leading some scholars to suspect that Luke
located Paul there in order to further his credentials. Paul never mentions his hometown in his letters.

 Traditions: Any doctrine, idea, practice, or custom that has been handed down from one person to another.

 Undisputed Pauline Epistes: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon – letters
that scholars overwhelmingly judge to have be written by Paul.

Reading 3: Sex, Money, and Power in the Churches

Definitions:

 Insula: Ancient apartment buildings in which the ground floor was used for shops and businesses, and the upper floor for
residences. The apostle Paul evidently set up his business and stayed in an insula in the various towns where he evangelized.

 Justification by Faith: The doctrine found in Paul’s letters that a person is “made right” with God by trusting in the effects
of the Christ’s death, rather than by doing the works prescribed by the Jewish Law.
 Prescript: The formal beginning of an epistle, normally including the names of the sender and addresses, a greeting, and
often a prayer or a wish for good health.

 Superapostles: In 2 Corinthians, a group of Paul’s opponents who were rhetorically proficient and able to do spectacular
deeds, who claimed that their remarkable abilities demonstrated that they, rather than Paul, were the true representatives of
Christ.

 Synagogue: Jewish place of worship and prayer. From a Greek word that literally means “being brought together”.

Reading 4: What is this idea of Salvation all about?

Definitions:

 Atonement: The doctrine that indicates how a person who is condemned by sin can be placed in a right standing before God
by means of a sacrifice. In traditional Christians teaching, it is Christ’s death that brings atonement.

 Baptism: From the Greek term baptize, which means “to immerse”. The earliest Christian practice of baptism in water
appears to have been an imitation rite and probably derived from the practice of John the Baptist, who baptized Jews,
including Jesus, in anticipation of the imminent arrival of the end of this age and the coming of the Kingdome of God. Later
Christians assigned other meanings to the rite: the apostle Paul, for example, saw it as the mystical act of dying with Christ
to sin.

 Clement (Rome): One of the early leaders of the church of Rom, around 95 C.E who is the traditional author of the
noncanonical book 1 Clement.

 Diatribe: A rhetorical device used by Greek and Latin authors, including the apostle Paul, in which an imaginary opponent
raises objections to one’s views only to be answered successfully, so as to move an argument forward.

 Judicial Model: One of the two principal ways Paul understood or conceptualized the relationship between Christ’s death
and salvation. According to this model, salvation is comparable to a legal decision, in which God, who is both lawmaker and
judge, treats humans as “not guilty” for committing sins against his Law even though they are guilty because Jesus’ death
has been accepted as payment.

 Justification by faith: The doctrine found in Paul’s letters that a person is “made right” with God by trusting in the effects
of Christ’s death, rather than by doing the works prescribed by the Jewish Law.

 Nero: Roman emperor from 54 to 68 C.E. It was under his reign that both Peter and Paul were allegedly martyred in Rome,
as part of his persecution of Christians for the fire that destroyed much of the city which Tacitus indicates that Nero himself
was responsible for the fire.

 Participationist Model: One of the two principal ways Paul understood or conceptualized the relationship between Christ’s
death and salvation. This model understood sin to be a cosmic force that enslaved people; salvation came by participating in
Christ’s death through baptism.

Important Concepts

1) What are the tools for doing history?

Textual criticism:

2) What are the criterias scholars use to assess the historicity of Jesus?

Scholars of early Christianity have devised methods to sift out what could be historic. There is a kind of tension since they
recognize these texts aren’t historical but more theological texts. Most scholars agree that Jesus the Nazareth existed as a man
lived, this earthy Jesus existed. However, the only access we have to him is through the New Testament which is considered
“fake documents”. Scholars have, as a result, devised way/criteria of assessing the historicity of Jesus which is specifically
designed for Christian document analysis. It is important to mention that this method of analysis is not considered historical
methodology.

The criteria of embarrassment which essentially is any saying or action of Jesus that would have been an embarrassment or
create problems with the early church is most likely historic. For example, Jesus’ baptism, his ignorance concerning the time of
the Parousia; his despair on the cross in which he states “I’m not supposed to be here”. Nonetheless, as the “chosen one”,
shouldn’t he know everything?

Another criteria used by scholars is the criteria of multiple attestation which is basically any saying or deed of Jesus attested in
one or more literary sources (Q, Mark, Paul, John) and/or in more than one literary genre (parable, miracle story, controversy
dialogue, etc.) If something Jesus says or does comes across the 3 synoptic gospels it’s probably true. For example, the story of
the last supper is not only found in the 1st Corinthian chapter 2 but also Paul is the one who brings the memory of that even to
the believers of the Corinthian, thus making this event it more archaic than the gospels.

Another criterion is the criteria of Rejection and Execution which is any saying or deed which led Jesus to be executed under the
accusation “King of the Jews” is probably true. For instance, words against the temple which would have brought the religious
authorities to turn against Jesus because he was challenging the holiest place is probably true.

Lastly, the criteria of discontinuity which is any saying or deed of Jesus which made him standout from the religious context of
his days is probably true. Of course Jesus is a Jew that followed Judaic principles, given that he was attached to his traditions. At
the same time, there are many things in the Gospel that don’t agree with Jewish tradition for example Jesus’ attitude towards
fasting which goes against Jewish grain and would have probably led to conflict with religious authorities and probably led him
to live the path he lived.

3) Describe who Paul was according to the Book of Acts and his genuine letters.

Although the Book of Act’s and Paul’s genuine letters enables give a picture into Paul’s life and his religious experience, one can
argue that each source depicts Paul in its own way. As a matter of fact, the letters provide an insight into his own understanding
into his spiritual lie while Acts provides details about Paul not mentioned in his letters (more event based).

Sketch of Paul’s life (according to his genuine letters)

In his letters, Paul talks about his past and flaunts it like the people who flaunt their Jewishness who believe that the covenant
they made with God the most authentic. Not only does he mention having accomplished what those Jews did, he also believe
he has done more, for instance persecute the church. However, he states that this prevented hi from seeing the glory of God. In
his letters, he also talks about how he persecuted the Jesus movement prior to his conversion. He felt because of this, he was
the least of the apostles. Paul’s religious experience as mentioned in Galatian 1:11-2:20 is one of those rare autobiographical
sketches speaking to what happened to Paul when he turns to Jesus. He says to his preachers that the gospel he heard was
supernatural since he received this gospel through the revelation of Jesus Christ. In other words, Paul is a mystic. In a sense, Paul
is the founder of Christianity of what we know today This Christian message (Jesus died on the cross for the sins of the people)
came through a mystical experience. This experience will produce him to change, or in other words a conversion. Paul sees
himself as a prophet adopting Jesus’s messiah but it’s also his reinterpretation of his Jewish traditions. In Corinthian 9:1-2, Paul
states that he saw Jesus mystically which one of the reasons why he calls himself an apostle. It is important to note that he only
has experiences with the resurrected Christ. In his letters, there is also mention of Paul’s marital status. He says to the
unmarried and widowed to remain that way since “we” are in our last days. He also talks about his trials, how he was being
persecuted by Jews. Lastly, in his letters, he talks about the fact that he has a job, although not specified, and he also
encourages people to take into consideration the fact the not only does he preach the gospel of God, but also works.

Sketch of Paul’s life (according to the Book of Acts)

According to the book of Acts, [Quote 1 of PowerPoint] Paul’s is first referred to as Soul however it changes into Paul later in the
literary document. Paul was born in a city called Tarsus, a small city much north of present day Palestine. He is nevertheless a
Jew but was born in a gentile country. The book of Acts, [Quote 2 of PowerPoint], also gives information about his educational
upbringing and other family details including the fact that he was educated strictly in Jewish Law, thus one can assume that he
knew the Torah and he also knew Hebrew Tradition. In 23:16 of the Book of Acts, there is mention of Paul’s sister who hears a
plot to kill him. The book also emphasizes that he was a Roman citizen. In other words, Paul is a Jew but also a Roman citizen
which gives him certain privileges. To the Tribune, Paul says “But I was born a citizen”. Paul is also responsible, according to Acts,
of the death of what is considered to be the 1 st Christian martyr Steven. People who heard his discourse became enrage and
began throwing stones and Soul (Paul) approved of his killing. Paul also persecuted other Christians given that he considered
them as part of a sect. However, after the killing of Steven, Paul went through some king of change and at one point is charged
by Jerusalem to go to Damascus and bring the Christians back to be tried. His journey can be found in Acts chapter 9, 22 and 26.
On this journey, something happens to him. As a matter of fact, there is some sort of conversion (surrounded by bright lights
and a voice speaking to him – Jesus), a realization that Jesus is in fact the messiah. It is important to note that he doesn’t
renounce his Jewishness but reinterprets his understanding of Jesus. The book of Acts also talks about his profession as a
tentmaker. Essentially, Paul works for money. For him, having a job is so important because he doesn’t want to burden Christians
to give him money. If Paul ever asks for money, it’s for the poor Jerusalem Christians going through a financial crisis.

In conclusion, despite relaying some common information about Paul and his religious experience, the letters tend to focus
more on the mystical experiences of Paul (his inward experience as a revelation of the gospel, how to preach it, and who Jesus
was), while Acts has more of the form of a tale, and provides details about Paul not mentioned in his letters.

Explain Paul and the crisis in the early Church?

Whenever Paul arrived to a certain city, he would go to a synagogue to explain his understanding of Jesus. Sometimes, he was
able to convince local religious leaders but most of the time he wasn’t able to and thrown out. As a result, Paul decided to turn
to the Gentiles who responded well to his preaching and joined the Jesus movement. What you have in the New Testament are
writing and letters he wrote to the various groups he was able to convince. In these letters, Paul addresses various issues that
are found in the early church.

One of the issues highlighted in Paul’s letter to the church of Corinth is the division within the church itself (Corinthian 1:10-13).
As a matter of fact, there was competition as to who would lead the church. Essentially, this is a new church. There are people
who prefer Paul, some Apollos, some identify more with Cephas (could be Peter or actually Cephas), and others were drawn to
the Christ himself. The competition as to who would lead the church was probably due to the emphasis of these various leaders,
which caused friction. This idea that everyone preaches/teaches the same thing is an illusion in the early church. The proof of
this was that there were many different gospels read in the early church, including the gospel of Thomas and the protogospel of
James. When Paul opens his letters, he calls the Corinthian believers “Saints”. Essentially, for Paul, people who adhere to the
Jesus movement were Saints; someone who is set apart not because of good work but because of Jesus’ death on the cross. In
other words, “Saint” is a status gained through faith and not through good work. Although there are divisions within the early
Church, Paul is exhorting the Corinthians by calling them Saints.

Paul also addresses the questionable ethics in the early church, as seen in Corinthian 5:1-5. For saints, there is a certain moral
standard expected. Unfortunately, the immorality displayed by the people of Corinth is, in Paul’s eyes, worst than in Pagan and
Gentile societies, which shouldn’t be the case. This where the “mystical Paul, comes in and casts judgment on the by stating
“hand this man over to Satan”. For Paul, Satan is a true entity. Thus to deliver a man to Satan is to excommunicate an individual,
put him outside the community. When Christians are together, they are under God’s protection, but when thrown out, they are
thrown into the realm of Satan, so that this entity could cast judgment on the ex-communicated person. Paul believed that if
you ex-communicated someone because of his sinful behavior, it was because their dangers were so great that this individual
will die so that his spirit may be saved. This way of reasoning was because Paul believed that as a saint, the ex-communicated
individual initially believed in the faith of Christ. Since he brought shame to the Christian message, he was to be punished by
being ex-communicated in order to bring shame and hopefully repentance so that he could be reinstated in the community.
Furthermore, in Corinthian 6:1, Paul tells his readers not to go to the normal courts but to deal with the issue amongst
themselves by talking it out.

Paul also highlights the issues about marriage. Nonetheless, Paul believed that men should not marry. However, if one couldn’t
control his desire, it’s better to marry than burn. Furthermore, he also stated that women shouldn’t remarry if their husband
died because of the urgency of the days. As a matter of fact, Paul emphasized that idea that it wasn’t worth getting because
God’s kingdom was imminent. It was a practical belief.

Paul also criticizes the way Christians celebrated the Lord’s Supper (Corinthian 11:18-34). As a matter of fact, Christians use to
meet, share food, talk, etc. In his letters, Paul also highlights that some forgetting that this ceremony was intended to remember
the tragic death of Jesus and the provision of the fact the he will return, which was disrespectful to the Christian ritual. By taking
for granted/not understanding that it represents the death of Christ as a means of salvation, Paul warns that there are going to
be consequences. He attributes all the hardships, such as sickness, weakness, and death, of the Corinthian people as their lack
of understanding. This is the way the lord is punishing and chastising them in hope that this group will repent. In his letter, Paul
gives specific instructions on how to celebrate in order to return into the good graces of the Christian faith.

Paul also dedicates a significant part of his letter the topic of spiritual gifts that God. The Corinthians thought that they were
very spiritual and one of the ways they demonstrated this is through their speaking in tongues, a celestial language that is not
learned but that people who have it can use to communicate with God. In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul essentially says that
if you speak in tongues; make sure that their is also the ability to interpret as well or else it would be useless. He also states that
“I rather you prophesize instead” since it is more edifying. In the New Testament, the speaking of tongue first occurs in
Pentecost (Book of Acts). The writer of the book of Acts uses this to explain the propagation of the Christian message
throughout the world by an uneducated group of individuals. In other words, the writer of Acts is essentially constituting a
narrative where the disciples are at the center, and in which the holy spirit gave them the audacity to go preach the gospel
throughout the world.

On last thing Paul discusses in his letter is the bodily resurrection of Christ (Corinthians 15:1-8) by appealing to the Credo
method. As a matter of fact, Paul is convinced that Christ was the first to rise from the dead given his mystical experience with
Jesus and also in his belief of a creed which mentions how Jesus died for our sins, was buried, and then raised from the dead on
the third day. This idea that Christ died for our sins comes from a retrospective reading of the Hebrew Scriptures. Christians
come to this conclusion through their interpretation of the Hebrew Bible, more specifically to the story of Jonas who was
swallowed by a fish and was inside its belly for 3 days and 3 nights. In other words, Paul’s creed and his experience enables his
readers to understand who he is as a believer and what the resurrection of the Christ actually means.

4) What is Paul’s idea of salvation?

Corinth Gnostics believe that Jesus is cursed because he is tied to the material realm, then he must be cursed. What counts is
the Christ. As for Paul, he believes that there is no distinction between the notion that Christ is a material being (fleshly being)
and a spiritual entity. In other words, Paul has to content with people who are saying Jesus be cursed in a church that he himself
started whose members have a different perspective from him. To him, salvation is not based on knowledge or some elitist
understanding of God’s will but has to do with the righteousness of God which is available to everyone through faith, which
happens to be the essence of his letters to the Roman church, as observed in passages such as Romans 1:16 and Romans 3:20.

In regards to Romans 1:16, Paul says that the power to save and enlighten people to salvation is found in the gospel. He actually
tells this to the Jews first given that they already have a scripture, and then to the Greeks. For in the gospel lies righteousness of
God, his own justice, which lives within the believers through faith.

In regards to Romans 3:20, Paul tells his readers that doing God’s deeds will not justify you before God. It’s insufficient to
actually make you righteous before him. He pushes it further by conveying that knowledge (Law) is actually a sin given that it
sheds light on sinful behavior. He sees that Law as many different things: a principle that pushes someone to the bad, as the
Pentateuch, as the Old Testament as a whole, as the Law of God. The purpose of the Law was to be a revelation of God and his
will, given for the health and preservation of humankind, and to provide guidance for the believer’s life, and to bring sin to light
and lead sinners to cast themselves on pardoning grace of God.

In Romans chapters 12 and 13, Paul also quotes many of the 10 commandments. When you read Paul, he isn’t really concerned
with ceremonial law such as circumcision, not eating certain foods, etc. The Law is a covenant between God and his chosen
people. Paul is actually telling his readers that you are not justified by a law that associates you to a specific ethnicity or race
(distinguishing you from other people) that will provide you with salvation.

The difficulty with Paul is that he has various modes, primarily judicial and participationist concepts, of understanding what it
means to say that God brought salvation through Jesus’ death and ressurection. Furthermore, he doesn’t see these models as
mutually exclusive to one another given that he often combines different conceptualities in one statement. Both models
understand that human beings are somehow alienated from God and that Christ’s death and resurrection somehow work to
resolve that problem. The nature of this problem and the way Christ has solved it are expressed differently in both salvation
models.

The judicial model which states that god is a lawmaker and humankind has broken God’s law (everyone has sinned). The penalty
for breaking God’s law is death. Jesus paid the penalty through his death which God accepts the payment by raising Jesus from
the dead and those who trust in this act are made right with God. Humans can avail themselves of Christ’s payment of their
debt by simply trusting that God will find it acceptable. It is not payment that they have either earned or deserved, it is a
beneficent act done on their behalf by someone else. Those who accept it are treated as if they are “not guilty” and the
opposite for those who don’t accept it. In other words, a person who has faith is restored in the right standing with God
(justification of faith). In this model, the Jewish law plays no role in salvation, thus merely obeying the 10 commandments won’t
restore your grace with God. It is only through your faith in the death of Jesus.

The participationist model states that sin is a cosmic power forcing humankind to live in alienation from God. Under this power,
humankind is incapable of being free. Sin is also related to the power of death. As a matter of fact, Christ’s death defeated the
powers of sin and death. Believers have to appropriate this reality by identifying with Jesus in his death and resurrection.
Basically, believers of this model believe that they participate through Christ with the Baptism. When people were baptized,
they actually experienced a union with Christ and participated in a victory brought at his death. Nonetheless, Paul knew that a
person who had been baptized had not yet been raised because people continued to die (weren’t completely free from the
power of death). As a matter of fact, he believed that they would be raised only when the Christ returns and bring about the
resurrection at the end of time.

In both models, the problem is sin. Nonetheless, in one model, sin is an act of disobedience that a person commits, whereas in
the other it is a cosmic force that works to enslave people. In both models, the solution is provided by Christ’s death and
resurrection, but in one, his death pays the penalty for human disobedience and in the other it breaks the cosmic power of sin.
Furthermore, appropriation of the benefits derived from Christ’s death is done through faith in one of them while the other
relies on a ritual participation in the victory. Nonetheless, Paul regularly combines both models in his address to the Roman
church and he probably never thought that someone could be baptized without also having faith (trusting Christ’s payment of
for sin).