476 TRANSLATION, NOTES, AND COMMENTScovenant. In his allegory in Gal 4:21-31, Paul sees the Abrahamic covenant
(fulfilled through Sarah) leading to freedom, sonship, and the Jerusalem
above; the covenant made at Sinai (called Hagar) leads to present Jerusalem-
i.e., the Jews and Judaizers, and thus slavery.
As ?. Christian, Paul has a major problem knowing what to do with the law
(Torah). The law is supposed to belong to the new covenant, but the coming of
Christ has eclipsed the law. Paul resolves this problem to some extent by seeing
a development in the covenants. Among the former covenants, the Abrahamic
covenant is primary and is not annulled by the Mosaic covenant coming later
(Gal 3:17). Paul exploits the dual meaning of diatheke as "covenant" and "will"
(or "testament") in Gal 3: 15-18 in order to make this point. The Mosaic cove-
nant when originally given was accompanied with great splendor, though it
was a splendor that faded (cf. Exod 34:29-35); now there is no splendor at all
associated with the Mosaic covenant because of the surpassing splendor of
Christ, whose new covenant is eternal (2 Cor 3:7-11). Paul also sees a develop-
ment in the covenants when he views the Mosaic law as a schoolmaster that
must discipline a people not yet mature (Gal 3:23-24). With the coming of
Christ, however, those having faith are no longer subject to their former
schoolmaster (vv 25-26). Irr Romans, Paul says that Christians are discharged
from the law (Rom 7:6), that Christ is the end of the law (10:4). Yet Paul does
not want to dispense with the law; in fact, he calls it holy (7:12) and claims to
uphold it (3:31). His other statements, however, distance him irrevocably from
Judaism, for whom the law is central and eternally binding. For Paul, Christ is
central, and the new covenant written by his life-giving Spirit surpasses all
other covenants and is eternal.
Paul's law and grace dichotomy (Rom 6:14) stems from the lack of a typol-
ogy in his thinking between the new covenant in Christ and the Mosaic cove-
nant. Were such a typology made, Paul would have to concede that the
Mosaic covenant/law had its own accompanying act of divine grace, which
was the Exodus from Egypt.
Paul's views on sin and reconciliation in Romans lack covenant language
per se; nevertheless, they rest almost certainly on broad-based assumptions
about the new covenant existing in the early Church. According to Paul's gos-
pel, both Jew and Gentile are under the power of sin, both stand in need of for-
giveness, and both are reconciled to God by Jesus' death on the cross. In
Ephesians too (whether or not it is Pauline), the blood of Christ is said to bring
Gentiles near to God, even though formerly they were strangers to the cove-
nants of promise (Eph 2:12-13).
In Rom 2:14-15, Paul seeks parity between Jew and Gentile by stating that
upright Gentiles not possessing the Jewish law show, nevertheless, "that what
the law requires is written on their hearts." Such people also possess a "con-
science" (syneidesis). The first remark about a law-equivalent "written on the
heart" appears to be a borrowing from Jer 31: 3 3 (cf. St.-B. 3: 89-90); the follow-
ing remark about a "conscience that bears witness" derives most likely from
Stoic or Jewish-Hellenistic philosophy. Paul's precise understanding of how