Justification debate continues

The “justification” theology debate appears to be coming out of academia and into wider conversation, according to this CT article. I have read a few of the the books (Piper and Wright in particular) and come out mainly on Tom Wright’s side, seeing his argument as more coherent. But I still see a place for Piper’s “glory of God” emphasis.

Andrew

Andrew Jones launched his first internet space in 1997 and has been teaching on related issues for the past 20 years. He travels all the time but lives between Wellington, San Francisco and a hobbit home in Prague.

1 Comment

  • The “glory of God” is the ultimate end of justification, so I’m not sure it’d be fair to characterize that as the distinctive orientation of Piper’s position. The real distinction between the New Perspective and the traditional Reformed/Protestant perspective revolves around the concept of the righteousness of God. Mark Seifrid in Christ, Our Righteousness articulates this better (or at least more thoroughly and coherently) than anyone else I’ve read.
    I don’t think the New Perspective will stand the test of time, as leading evangelical scholarship (of which Piper is only a popular-level expositor) has pretty well shown its foundation to be untenable. (In addition to Seifrid, see the two-volume work by Carson and Moo, Justification and Variegated Nomism.) I’d encourage you to dig into some of the meatier, recent material from the more scholarly side of the debate (though you’ll be sacrificing the eloquence of the likes of Piper and Wright).

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