Karl Barth, Theological Exegesis and the Apocalyptic Interpretation of Paul

by Martinus C. de Boer

Published in Zeitschrift für Dialektische Theologie 73 (2021) 11–37.

(The pagination of this PDF matches that of the published version, as do the page
breaks, and includes three minor corrections of the published text, in red letters)

In the preface to the English translation of his famous commentary on Romans in 1933, Karl
Barth expressed the hope that the publication of his book in English would “perhaps lead to a
fresh formulation of the problem, ‘What is exegesis?’.”1 The question arose because Barth’s
“theological” exegesis of Romans seemed to involve a rejection, or at least a significant
qualification, of “historical” exegesis.2 The question remains relevant in our own time,
especially among Protestants of the Reformed tradition.3 In Section A, I will turn to Barth’s
attempts in the prefaces to his commentary on Romans to explain and to justify his exegetical
method in response to the accusation that he was “an enemy of historical criticism”.4 In
Section B, I will turn to a specimen of his exegesis of Paul’s letter to the Galatians as
presented in a long excursus of CD IV/1.5 Does his evidently “theological” exegesis of
Galatians also involve historical exegesis in any meaningful sense of the term? I have chosen
to look at his treatment of Galatians because I have written a commentary on this Pauline
letter and can therefore compare his exegetical

1
Karl Barth, “The Author’s Preface to the English Edition”, in Karl Barth, The Epistle to the Romans. London:
Oxford University Press, 1933 (paperback edition 1968), ix. This was a translation of the sixth edition, which
was only marginally different from the definitive second edition of 1922.
2
In what follows, I will refer repeatedly to “historical exegesis” and “theological exegesis” but it should be
apparent that I always mean, respectively, historical-critical exegesis and theological-critical exegesis. This is
the case for Barth as well: see Barth, “The Preface to the Second Edition”, in Barth, Romans (note 1), 6–8.
3
See, for example, G.C. den Hertog and C. van der Kooi (eds.), Tussen leer en lezen: De spanning tussen
bijbelwetenschap en geloofsleer, Kampen: Kok, 2007.
4
Barth, “Preface Second Edition” (note 2), 6.
5
K. Barth, The Doctrine of Reconciliation. Church Dogmatics IV/1. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1956, 637–42.
This excursus contains the most extended exegesis of Galatians in the Church Dogmatics. The German text of
Barth’s works is conveniently available online in the Digital Karl Barth Library, along with an English
translation.

11
method with my own.6 In Section C, I will be looking at Barth’s “apocalyptic” interpretation
of both Romans and Galatians and I will do so primarily in dialogue with two Barth scholars
in particular, Bruce McCormack and Shannon Nicole Smythe,7 both of whom discern a
remarkable development in Barth’s thought from his commentary on Romans to his treatment
of the doctrine of justification in CD IV/1, the very volume in which the excursus containing
Barth’s extended exegesis of Galatians is found. I focus on the issue of the “apocalyptic”
interpretation of Paul for two reasons: (1) because Barth has been seen as a forerunner of the
apocalyptic interpretation of Paul that has gained some ground in recent years8 and (2)
because I myself have written on this subject, both in my commentary and in other
publications.9

A. Barth’s Exegetical Method and its Results in the Commentary on Romans

Before turning to an analysis of Barth’s exegetical method, a few words about historical exegesis and
theological exegesis, as I understand them, may be prove useful for understanding my comments on
Barth.10 (Following Barth’s example in the Church Dogmatics, I will do this in an excursus in smaller
type).
A German handbook on NT scholarship declares that the goal of exegesis, which is to
understand the text (das Verstehen des Textes), is achieved in two ways:

6
Martinus C. de Boer, Galatians: A Commentary (New Testament Library), Louisville, KY: Westminster John
Knox, 2011.
7
For their publications, see note 65 below.
8
On Barth as a forerunner of the apocalyptic interpretation of Paul, see Philip G. Ziegler, Militant Grace: The
Apocalyptic Turn and the Future of Christian Theology. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2018, 20–25. As
Ziegler indicates, the two most important scholars in this apocalyptic turn in Pauline scholarship are Ernst
Käsemann and J. Louis Martyn, both of whom were influenced by Barth. A fine summary of Käsemann’s views,
found in diverse essays from his hand, may be found in Ziegler, Militant Grace, 53–67. For Martyn, see in
particular the following: Galatians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (Anchor Bible 33A),
New York: Doubleday, 1997.
9
See Martinus C. de Boer, Paul, Theologian of God’s Apocalypse: Essays on Paul and Apocalyptic. Eugene,
OR: Cascade Books, 2020. For my commentary, see note 6 above.
10
For certain readers, the following discussion may well be superfluous, but since I am a New Testament scholar
writing in this journal for systematic and dogmatic theologians it may be helpful, and prevent misunderstanding
on all sides, for me to be transparent about my assumptions on these matters and what, in my opinion, they
signify. Some readers may, however, want to skip or skim this excursus and two others further on in this article.

12
 (1) “Die Exegese sucht einerseits zu erfassen, was der Autor einer neutestamentlichen Schrift
seinen direkt oder indirekt von ihm angesprochenen Lesern hatte sagen wollen und wie
diese ursprünglichen Leser den ihnen zugekommenen Text verstehen konnte.
(2) Die Exegese fragt andererseits natürlich auch danach, wie der Text heute verstanden
werden kann”.11

The first of these is normally understood to be historical exegesis, the second is commonly known as
theological exegesis. They are regarded as distinct but related tasks. I comment on each in turn.
Historical exegesis is a descriptive and explanatory exercise. It attempts, as the handbook just
quoted indicates, to determine what the author of a NT document wanted to say, directly or indirectly,
to the intended audience and how the original readers could have understood the received text. To
achieve this aim, historical exegesis requires certain knowledge and tools, e.g., of the language in which
these texts were written, and of the historical, political, social, and cultural realities of the time in which
these texts were composed and first read. Historical exegesis can be practised by anyone with the
requisite knowledge, skills, and tools.12 Historical exegesis leaves unanswered whether what is
described, including any theological claims made by the writer of a NT document, say Paul in his
letters, means anything at all for today, except perhaps by implication. You do not need to be a believer,
or a member of a particular church, to practise historical exegesis.
Theological exegesis, on the other hand, is a normative exercise. It focuses on theological
claims made or implied by the NT writer and it is driven by the conviction that what Paul said then
about God and Christ he also says today, as it were. His proclamation is as relevant now (aktuell) as it
was then. Since theological exegesis assumes normativity, or at least the claim to normativity, it is
normally practised by believers who are also preachers or (systematic or dogmatic) theologians. “To do
theology”, i.e., to practise theological exegesis, means (at least in English) to think through the
implications of the biblical text for faith today. It involves “applying” the text, i.e., the message
discerned in the text, to current issues or to current understanding. The emphasis shifts from what it
meant to what is it means.13
That seems clear enough, at least in theory. For a number of reasons, the matter is more
complicated in practice. First, an individual can go to work as a

11
H. Conzelmann und A. Lindemann, Arbeitsbuch zum Neuen Testament. 11th edition (Uni-Taschenbuch 52),
Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck] 1995, 1-2.
12
I hasten to add that no one person today possesses all the requisite skills or knowledge, for which reason
exegesis has more than ever become a communal enterprise.
13
For this well-known distinction, see the seminal essay by Krister Stendahl, ‘Biblical Theology,
Contemporary’, in The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1962, 1.418–32.

13
 historical exegete or as a theological exegete; he or she can work at describing what it meant or
expounding what it means. In this view, a historical exegete is simply someone who practises historical
exegesis as a vocation (e.g., a New Testament scholar at a university),14 not someone who cannot,
should not, or could not do theological exegesis. And a theological exegete is simply someone who
practises theological exegesis as a vocation (e.g., a dogmatic theologian at a seminary for whom the
Bible is the primary source and conversation partner), not someone who cannot, should not, or could
not do historical exegesis. In other words, the method is one thing, the practitioner something else. An
individual can in principle devote him or herself to either or both historical exegesis and theological
exegesis.
Second, a historical exegete who is seeking to understand and to expound a particular text, say
a letter of Paul, confines her or his attention to that text. Appeals to other biblical passages, even other
letters of Paul, is done with some reserve and circumspection, especially if there is no indication that the
original readers knew about or had access to those other letters. A theological exegete, such as Barth, is
much less hesitant about bringing other letters of Paul, or even other passages from both the NT and the
OT, not to mention the tradition of the church, to bear in the task of interpreting a particular passage
from a Pauline letter. The results may actually be similar, or roughly similar, but they are the results of
different methods or approaches to the texts.
Third, historical exegesis can be practised without going on to theological exegesis,15 but it is
the question whether theological exegesis can be properly and responsibly done without historical
exegesis as the first and essential step, as the foundation and point of reference for theological
interpretation (as in the German handbook cited above).
Finally, it can probably be said that, in practice, the lines between the two forms of exegesis
often blur. There are good, even obvious reasons for this: Historical exegesis is practised by those who
live today and that reality can neither be denied or avoided by those practising historical exegesis. Since
historical exegesis of a biblical text, in particular a letter of Paul, cannot be done honestly or fully
without engaging the theological content of the text under scrutiny, the question of the text’s relevance
presses itself willy-nilly on the historical exegete. In fact, the relevance of the text, i.e., of its message or
its “theology”, is normally assumed by most historical exegetes, who are usually believers who accept
the authority of the Bible for faith and practice today, even if they choose not to do any (explicit)
theological exegesis (as defined above) in their academic publications. Their faith commitment is the
reason that they spend so much time

14
I here use the term “vocation” as the English counterpart to the German Beruf, which can also be translated as
“calling”, “occupation”, or “profession”.
15
Indeed, there are historical exegetes who would maintain that theological exegesis is not even exegesis but
something else (“application”).

14
 with these texts. Theological exegesis in turn is practised by those who interpret texts that undeniably
came into existence, were produced and first read, in the past, the relatively distant past. This fact
cannot finally or legitimately be denied, evaded, or ignored, at least not without increasing the risk of
distortion whereby theological exegesis easily turns into theological eisegesis, reading into the text what
you want or need it to say for people living today. The two forms of exegesis thus inevitably impinge on
each other, at least in practice. The difference between historical exegesis and theological exegesis may
in practice merely be a matter of emphasis or focus, i.e., either on what it meant or on what it means.

Barth famously sought to explain his exegetical method in the prefaces to the different
editions of his Romans commentary. I begin with Barth’s preface to the English translation
from 1933 from which I quoted at the beginning.
Barth writes here: “I ask my readers to judge my work, at any rate to begin with, on its
own merits. Only if this be done will it be possible to read the book as it was meant to be read
in 1921”,16 the year the second edition was written (it was published the next year). Barth
here asks his readers to do precisely what any good historical exegete attempts to do with a
biblical text: to read it on its own terms, to read it as it was meant to be read in the year it was
written. Barth continues: “My sole aim was to interpret Scripture”.17 He wants that aim to be
taken seriously. In other words, the author’s intention, Barth’s intention, must be taken into
account in interpreting his book, a principle that has long lain at the heart of exegesis as a
historical-critical discipline.
After expressing the hope that the publication of the book in English may lead to “a
fresh formulation of the problem” of what exegesis is, he goes on to define it as involving the
attempt to “bring out the meaning of a text (auslegen)”, but he admits (perhaps somewhat
defensively) that “no one can” do this “without at the same time adding something to it
(einlegen)”.18 He recognizes that there is no escaping this danger: “no interpreter is rid of the
danger of in fact adding more than he extracts. I neither was nor am free of this danger”.19
One can appreciate, especially in today’s climate of discourse, Barth’s realism about how
exegesis actually works in practice. But he adds: “I should be altogether misunderstood if my
readers refused to credit me

16
Barth, “Preface English Edition” (note 1), vii.
17
Barth, ibid., ix.
18
In “Preface Second Edition” (note 2), Barth responds to “the charge of imposing a meaning on the text rather
than extracting its meaning from it” (10).
19
Barth, ibid., ix.

15
with the honesty of, at any rate, intending to ex-plain the text”. He goes on to assure his
readers “that, in writing this book, I felt myself bound to the actual words of the text, and did
not propose to engage myself in free theologizing”.20 The task of exegesis, as well as its goal,
is to “ex-plain” a given text, to bring out its meaning. We cannot simply manipulate it or use
if for our own ends, use it as the pretext to engage in free theologizing whereby we in effect
make it mean what we want it to mean.
Barth goes on to claim that his book “deals with one issue, and one issue only. Did
Paul think and speak in general terms and in detail in the manner in which I have interpreted
him as thinking and speaking? Or did he think and speak altogether differently?”.21 Barth thus
invites his critics to assess his commentary as exegesis, as legitimate exegesis. Did Paul think
and speak in the way Barth has indicated? These are questions any historical-critical exegete
can affirm and appreciate.22
It is thus not surprising to find Barth in the preface to the second edition of his
commentary on Romans writing: “I have nothing whatever against historical criticism. … it
is both necessary and justified”. But he does of course complain about how historical exegesis
was actually being practised by his contemporaries: “My complaint is that recent
commentators confine themselves to an interpretation of the text which seems to me be no
commentary at all, but merely the first step towards a commentary”.23 He has in view those
commentaries that limit themselves to “a reconstruction of the text, a rendering of the Greek
words and phrases by their precise equivalents, a number of additional notes” with respect to
archaeology and philology.24 He wants to go “beyond this preliminary work to an
understanding of Paul” and that “involves more than a mere repetition in Greek or German of
what Paul says: it involves the reconsideration of what is set out in the Epistle, until the actual
meaning of it is disclosed”.25
So “historical criticism as a prolegomenon to the understanding of the Epistle” is fine,
but one must go beyond this. Many commentators fail at this

20
Barth, ibid., ix. Emphasis original.
21
Barth, ibid., ix–x.
22
The method can of course be applied to any piece of writing from any period of history.
23
Both quotations from Barth, “Preface Second Edition” (note 2), 6.
24
Orthodox interpreters are no better in Barth’s view. All they achieve is “the first draft of a paraphrase of the
text” that “provides no more than a point of departure for genuine exegesis.” (Barth, “Preface Second Edition”
[note 2], 8).
25
Barth, ‘Preface Second Edition” (note 2), 6–7.

16
point in Barth’s view. Adolf Jülicher becomes a special target. He takes Jülicher’s work as
“typical of much modern exegesis” and observes “how closely he keeps to the mere
deciphering of words as though they were runes. But, when all is said and done, they still
remain largely unintelligible”.26 There is little “understanding and interpretation” on display,
certainly when one compares his work with that of Calvin. About the latter, Barth famously
writes: “how energetically Calvin, having first established what stands in the text, sets himself
to wrestle with it, till the walls that separate the sixteenth century from the first become
transparent! Paul speaks, and the human being of the sixteenth century hears”. 27 Much of this
is already clearly discernible in the opening two sentences of the preface to the first edition of
his Romans commentary, where Barth writes: “Paul, as a child of his age, addressed his
contemporaries. It is, however, far more important that, as Prophet and Apostle of the
Kingdom of God, he veritably speaks to all people of every age”.28 The historical-critical
method has its rightful place: it is concerned with the preparation of the intelligence – and this
can never be superfluous”.29 Historical exegesis has its place and it is a preparatory one.
In some respects, however, Barth goes further when he challenges the “critical
historian … to be more critical”, by which he evidently means to say not only that
“interpretation of what is written requires more than a disjointed series of notes on words and
phrases”, but also that attention needs to be paid to the content, the abiding message, of a
biblical text. Barth challenges the historical critic to engage in what amounts to theological
criticism, as we have defined it above. “Criticism (κρίνειν) applied to historical documents”
means for Barth “the measuring of words and phrases by the standard of

26
Barth, ibid., 7.
27
Barth, ibid. 7.
28
Barth, “The Preface to the First Edition”, in Barth, Romans (note 1), 1. The preface was written in 1918. Barth
continues: “The differences between then and now, there and here, no doubt require careful investigation and
consideration. But the purpose of such investigation can only be to demonstrate that these differences are, in fact,
purely trivial”. Whether the differences are purely trivial, as Barth claims, cannot, however, be posited a priori.
Whether that is the case only be the result of exegesis, not its presupposition.
29
But Barth gives the preference to “the venerable doctrine of inspiration”, which is “concerned with the labour
of apprehending, without which no technical equipment, however complete, is of any use whatever”. He
believes, however, that he does not need to choose between the two.

17
that about which the documents are speaking”.30 That about which the documents are
speaking is Jesus Christ, who is “the subject matter” (die Sache) of Scripture.31 This “subject
matter” is not simply some idea found in Paul’s thought but the actual, living Jesus Christ,
who for that reason is as relevant today as he was then. Barth’s working assumption is “that in
the Epistle to the Romans Paul did speak of Jesus Christ, and not of something else”, even if
Barth cautiously (and rightly, in my view) adds that the “actual exegesis will alone decide
whether this assumption can be maintained”.32 The bridge that closes the gap between
yesterday and today is precisely this subject matter: “The conversation between the original
record and the reader moves around the subject matter (die Sache), until a distinction between
yesterday and to-day becomes impossible”.33 So for Barth historical exegesis must also
involve theological exegesis. The subject matter of the text to which the text bears witness
requires it, in fact makes it unavoidable.
It is perhaps obvious why the obliteration of the gap between yesterday and today is
attractive to someone whose vocation it is to be a dogmatic theologian. In the preface to the
second edition of his Romans commentary, Barth writes: “I do not want readers of this book
to be under any illusions. They must expect nothing but theology”.34 And that is fair enough.
Barth never pretended to be anything other than a (dogmatic) theologian.35

30
Barth, “Preface Second Edition” (note 2), 8. Barth calls this approach “the ‘dialectical’ method”.
31
Barth specifies the subject matter further when he claims that it (Christ) presupposes the “infinite qualitative
distinction” (a notion taken from Kierkegaard) between God and the human being (ibid., 10–11). For this reason,
it is not reasonable to “approach it [Romans] with any other assumption than that God is God” (ibid., 11). Barth
then notes that he has “found this assumption to be the best presupposition, even from the viewpoint of historical
criticism” (ibid., 11). On the importance of die Sache in Barth’s exegesis, both historical and theological, see
Gerhard Bergner, Um der Sache willen: Karl Barths Schriftauslesung der Kirkliche Dogmatik, FSÖTh 148.
Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015.
32
Barth, “Preface Second Edition” (note 2), 10.
33
Barth, ibid., 7. Barth goes on to write vividly that “Intelligent comment means that I am driven on till I stand
with nothing before me but the enigma of the matter; till the document seems hardly to exist as a document; till I
have almost forgotten that I am not its author; till I know the author so well that I allow him to speak in my name
and am even able to speak in his name myself” (ibid., 8).
34
Barth, “Preface Second Edition” (note 2), 4.
35
For Barth here a “theologian” is not simply someone who has been trained in one of the fields of theological
studies (biblical studies, church history, etc.) but someone who practises theological exegesis for the church. It is
possible, I think, that Barth would not have received the reaction he did from certain contemporary New
Testament scholars if he had not tried to write a commentary on Romans (or had given his book that title) but
simply a series of reflections on its ongoing theological relevance for the church after World War I (with another
suitable title). But its impact may then not have been as great as it was.

18
 While Barth was not an enemy of historical exegesis, it must nevertheless also be said
that his commentary on Romans indicates some ambivalence when it comes to historical
exegesis.36 The historical context and origin of Paul’s letter are largely present by virtue of
their absence. In his essay on the nature of “biblical theology”, Krister Stendahl points out
that Barth “implicitly loses his enthusiasm or his ultimate respect for the descriptive task”.37
The result, according to Stendahl, is that “what is intended as a commentary turns out to be a
theological tractate, expanding in contemporary terms what Paul should have said about the
subject matter as understood by the commentator”. Stendahl concludes with the observation
that where Barth’s method is applied “biblical theology” does not “designate anything
basically different from systematic theology, except that its systematic task is so defined as to
make the Bible central to its work”.38 The same can be said when the term “theological
exegesis” is used to describe Barth’s efforts, at least in his famous commentary on Romans,
which one admirer of his work has described, not unjustly, as “a huge, breathless, exciting
sermon”.39

B. Barth’s Exegesis of Galatians in CD IV/1

Barth never wrote a commentary on Galatians but he did devote a lengthy excursus to this
letter in CD IV/1.40 A look at Barth’s treatment of Galatians is interesting in view of the fact
that this letter has much in common with Romans, particularly with respect to the theme of
justification (cf. esp. Gal 2:15–16; Rom 3:21–26).41 I also focus on Galatians because I

36
See further on this ambivalence in the early Barth’s exegetical endeavours, Donald Wood, “Exegesis”, in Paul
Dafydd Jones and Paul T. Nimmo, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Karl Barth, Oxford: Oxford University, 2019,
263–76.
37
Stendahl, “Biblical Theology” (note 12), 421.
38
Stendahl, ibid., 420. According to Stendahl, biblical theology, properly understood, should in any case focus
on what it meant, not on what it means.
39
Daniel Jenkins, “Kart Barth”, in Martin E. Marty and Dean G. Peerman, eds., A Handbook of Christian
Theologians. Nashville: Abingdon, 1984, 398.
40
See note 4 above.
41
It is noteworthy that there is no extended exegesis of Rom 3:21–26 in the Church Dogmatics while Barth’s
treatment of this particular passage in his commentary on Romans seems to provide a window on his treatment
of Romans as a whole.

19
wrote a commentary on this Pauline letter some years ago,42 which puts me in a position to
compare Barth’s approach to the exegetical task with my own.

A few words (again, in an excursus in smaller type) about this commentary may be in order, particularly
in light of what has been said about Barth’s commentary on Romans above. In my commentary on
Galatians, I sought “to understand and to expound what the apostle was attempting to communicate to
the very first users and interpreters of the letter, a group of believers in Christ living in Galatia in the
middle of the first century C.E.”43 In other words, this is a matter of historical exegesis. There were two
working assumptions behind this quintessentially historical approach to my task.
First, we have a moral obligation44 to try to understand and to expound the letter to the
Galatians on Paul’s own terms and not to attribute meanings to those terms that he (probably) did not
intend. Of course, many factors make this quest difficult and fraught, such as the historical distance
between now and then, the linguistic and cultural barriers, the fact that every interpreter is not without
presuppositions and expectations, and so forth. That is not a reason for despair, but for humility with
respect to one’s own attempt to give an account of Paul’s thought in this letter.
Second, an understanding of what Paul was seeking to communicate to his first, intended
readers has some relevance for the manner in which the letter may be used and interpreted in current
theological discussion and preaching. It is of course true that all texts, and perhaps especially
theological texts, have a surplus of meaning, and are susceptible to a range of interpretations,45 but it
would still be difficult, and in my view morally dubious, to justify an appeal to Galatians that cannot be
supported exegetically. Historical exegesis thereby provides a measure of control on theological
appropriations and applications. In other words, Paul’s original intention in writing the letter and the
original reception of his words in Galatia must be allowed to play a critical role in its later use,
interpretation, and application. If we want to deviate from the text, and perhaps we do and even should
at some historical junctures, then we46 should know what exactly what we are deviating from. A similar
comment applies to the desire to be loyal to the

42
See note 6 above.
43
De Boer, Galatians (note 6), 1. The following remarks have been adapted from pp. 1–2 of this work.
44
In other words, it involves more than just a preparation of the intelligence as Barth suggested.
45
This is the case both in terms of the referential meanings of particular words, expressions, and formulations, as
well as their possible “significance” for theological reflection and application.
46
With “we” I here mean “the church”.

20
 text, as Barth certainly sought to be: We need to know what exactly we are being loyal to.
Historical-critical exegesis requires engagement with the message or content of the text.47 It
cannot be confined to text-critical, literary, lexicographical, and grammatical analysis.48 The text
encodes the thoughts of what was once a living a human being, writing to other living human beings.
We owe them all something: to be true to what the one wanted to communicate to the other, and how
the other will, or may, have understood what was being communicated.49 For this reason, the primary
aim of my commentary was to understand and to expound Paul’s “theology” as it unfolds in the letter
and as the Galatians will probably have understood it when they received it. By “Paul’s theology in this
letter” I meant not some thoroughly-worked-out system of thought, but merely his thinking about what
he calls “the gospel of Christ” (1:7) as it comes to expression in this particular letter, which was written
to a particular group of people living in a particular time and place. Paul’s “theology” here is a matter of
historical description.50 The commentary thus asked (and asks) its readers to imagine themselves as
silent witnesses to Paul’s dictation of the letter and to imagine how the letter will probably have been
received and understood by the churches of Galatia, and not how it is or should be received by readers
today.
With its focus on “what it meant”, a historical-critical exegesis of Galatians does create a gap,
a distance, between our world and the world of Paul’s letter. But this approach, or rather this exercise in
understanding and interpreting, carries within it the working assumption, or hope, that concentrated and
honest attention on what the letter meant for the writer and the original readers will provide essential
guidelines to what it may be allowed to mean for us today. When writing my commentary, I secretly
hoped, and still hope, that these guidelines would for the most part be self-evident to a discerning
reader, say a pastor or preacher (the target audience). After all my historical-critical investigation of
Galatians led to the conclusion, also shared by others, that Paul understands the death and resurrection
of Christ as an apocalyptic, and thus cosmic, event that

47
One could, I suppose, call this “the subject matter” so dear to Barth. For Barth this subject matter (the living
Jesus Christ) was a working assumption, as we saw above, one that is to be expected of an occupational
dogmatic theologian. For an occupational historical exegete, however, such an assumption must be derived from
the exegesis of the text at hand. In other words, it must not be an assumption but a conclusion. And that
conclusion must be subject to repeated critical testing by other exegetes, both historical and theological.
48
Barth’s complaint about critical commentaries that confine themselves to such matters is one I share.
49
I think Barth would have appreciated that, even if he, as an occupational dogmatic theologian, may have gone
about it differently.
50
The description can only be done in language that is currently in use, e.g., modern English or German. For this
reason, a restatement of Paul’s words inevitably occurs, one which is more than a repetition, or a paraphrase, of
what Paul had wanted to say in Greek.

21
 by definition affects everyone, thus also those living today, and not only Christians.51 The gap between
then and now is thus bridged by the gospel of Christ itself, or as Barth would undoubtedly put it, by the
subject matter, Jesus Christ, who is not merely an idea found in Paul but, if Paul’s testimony be true, the
living Lord, as relevant (aktuell) today as he was then. But I am not sure whether my reserve about
making this explicit in the commentary itself would have satisfied Barth. But then, in contrast to Barth,
I am not a (dogmatic) theologian but a New Testament scholar whose chosen vocation is historical-
critical exegesis of the New Testament texts. If a reader of Barth’s commentary on Romans “must
expect nothing but theology”, a reader of my commentary on Galatians must in turn expect nothing but
history, i.e., historical-critical exegesis of the text. I regard historical-critical exercises as a form of
service to the church and to theology today.

I now turn to Barth’s excursus on Galatians in CD IV/1.52 The question I will seek to answer
here is the following: Does his theological exegesis of Galatians also involve historical-
critical exegesis? Put otherwise: Does he honour the necessity of this step or does it play only
a tangential role?
Let me say at the outset that I am here more interested in Barth’s method, his way of
working, than in his results per se. It would be a cheap shot to say that where Barth comes to
different exegetical conclusions than I did in my commentary, he was not being exegetical
enough but reading his dogmatic presuppositions into the text. For example, Barth cites the
phrase πίστις χριστοῦ from Galatians several times. He understands it to mean “faith in
Christ”, whereas I, like many other interpreters in recent years, have argued for that it should
be translated as “the faith(fulness) of Christ”. Barth’s translation and understanding of the
phrase is the traditional one and still has many fierce defenders, also among historical
exegetes. So it will not do to say that Barth’s interpretation of the phrase is due to his
dogmatic assumptions, just because it disagrees with my own exegesis or that of others. The
question here is whether Barth acknowledges the propriety of historical exegesis and how he
makes use of it in his “theological” exegesis of Galatians.
Barth’s extended excursus on Galatians is to be found in subsection 4 of Section 61 of
the Church Dogmatics. This section is about 100 pages long and carries the title “The
Justification of the Human Being”. Subsection 4 itself carries the title “Justification by Faith
Alone” and the excursus on Galatians is found at the very end of this subsection. It is not
surprising that the excursus begins with some Christological statements, in a manner
characteristic of

51
See further on this issue in Section C below.
52
See note 4 above.

22
Barth.53 Before Barth actually turns to the text of Galatians he writes: “Christology in the
sense of a reference to Jesus Christ as the object and content and therefore the formative norm
of justifying faith may very well be described as the climax of the doctrine of justification”.
Further, “in this matter Jesus is not the last word but the first, not the climax but the
foundation”. He is “the reality and the truth of both justification and faith”.54
Given the many pages already devoted to establishing this thesis, it may seem that
Barth is here imposing his own views on Galatians, telling us what Paul should have thought,
but he goes on to appeal to “the witness” of Galatians “as a source and a criterion” for these
Christological claims. He clearly regards it as of some importance that his Christological
presuppositions be exegetically supported. The importance of Galatians, according to Barth,
“its whole secret, lies in the strictness with which Paul thought and spoke of justification and
faith not only with reference to Jesus Christ but in the light of Jesus Christ”. There is an
interesting interplay between doctrinal claims and the exegetical foundation for them, which
Barth thinks is there, though from my perspective as a NT scholar (and historical exegete) he
puts the cart before the horse. The exegetical justification occurs afterwards, and that leaves
him open at least to the suspicion that he has imposed his own presuppositions on the text. As
far as the presentation goes, he seems to work from a dogmatic assumption back to the text
instead of the other way around. What follows the introductory comments, however, is an
insightful treatment of the letter, which impresses with its close attention to the text of the
letter, yet in such a way as also to penetrate to the issues at stake in Paul’s words.
The first question Barth addresses, surprisingly, is: “Who is Paul himself, that he dares
to represent himself and obviously has to represent himself as the preacher of the only Gospel
beside which there is no other?”, here alluding to Gal 1:6–7. “At the very outset” of the letter,
Barth writes, “we are confronted by the abrupt contrast: He is an apostle, the human doer of
this human work, the human preacher of this human word … ‘by Jesus Christ, and God the
Father who raised him from the dead’”.55 Barth closes this treat-

53
After all, Section 61 is part of Chapter 14 of the CD, which encompasses Sections 59–63 and carries the
overall title “Jesus Christ, the Lord as Servant”.
54
CD IV/1 (n 4), 637. The quotations in the following paragraph are also from this page.
55
Ibid., 637. Barth then makes a giant leap: “Because Jesus Christ lives, because he is sent by him, he can only
preach the justification which has taken place in him and therefore justification by faith alone” (ibid.). That is
quite a conclusion to come to on the basis of the opening verse in which Paul has not yet said anything about
justification. A bit later he quotes portions from the central justification text in Gal 2:16, emphasizing the
contrast between justification on the basis of πίστις χριστοῦ and justification ἐξ ἔργων νόμου (CD IV/1, 637–38).
Barth pays no attention here to the flow of Paul’s argument or to the circumstances that may have called it forth.
He goes right to what for him is the heart of the matter, which is to say the matter that is the focus of his concern
in Section 61 of the CD, justification by faith (alone). While I, as a historical exegete, can agree with much of
what Barth writes here, in the third paragraph of his excursus on Galatians, the exegetical basis for his claims are
not transparent or explained. For example, he interprets justification ἐξ ἔργων νόμου as involving “self-
justification” (638), when that is arguably a tendentious way of characterizing justification on the basis of works
of the Law.

23
ment of Paul as an apostle with the following words: “This is Paul according to his own
picture of himself. This is the necessity in which as an apostle he has to say what he has to say
in this Epistle. He does not say it because it suits him, or because the logic of his theology
demands it, but because he finds himself in the power of Jesus Christ”.56 Barth is seeking to
be purely descriptive here.
The second issue to which Barth then turns is the fact that Paul is being confronted by
the Galatian churches.57 Barth gives a helpful survey of the information found in the letter
itself about the circumstances, including the faith, of the Galatians churches. He concludes
that despite the seriousness of the situation Paul does not treat the Galatians churches as
“renegades”, even if he believes that something like “a regeneration” is necessary. Barth pays
close attention to the text of Galatians, what Paul actually says, in his discussion. He rightly
claims that “there is no passage in the whole letter from which it may be deduced that he has
given them up, that he has ceased to see and address them in the light of Christ”. Barth sees
this as a consequence of Paul’s apostolic calling. His faithfulness to the Galatians mirrors the
faithfulness of God. He may call them foolish (3:1) but he addresses them repeatedly as
ἀδελφοί.
It is when Barth has clarified who Paul is and what the Galatians are for Paul that
Barth turns, third, to the central text on justification in Galatians, 2:16, even though he has
alluded to it in his treatment of Paul as an apostle at the beginning.58 Barth notes that three
times in this verse there is a reference to the πίστις χριστοῦ and he interprets it as “the faith in
which the human being knows and apprehends his or her justification, the justification which

56
CD IV/1 (note 4), 638.
57
Ibid., 638–39.
58
See note 55 above.

24
can be known and apprehended and realised only in this work – this again is maintained three
times in 2:16 – and not in doing the works of the Law” (639).59
Barth recognizes the polemical import of 2:16. He acknowledges that the Galatians are
being subject to an alternate view. For example, he writes: “Concretely we learn two things:
circumcision (5:2, 6, 11, 6:13, 15) and the observance of Jewish feasts (4:10) are to be made
obligatory. In other words, they are to be made to give to Christian faith and life the form of
variation of the Jewish religion of the Law”. In Galatia, “the point at issue” was the
“necessary completion, consolidation and rounding off” of faith with the observance of the
Law, “within which it was still possible to speak about grace quite comfortably and seriously
and profoundly”.60 In making these historical-exegetical observations, Barth makes a jump
from the religion of the Law to religion as such: “There is no question of setting aside faith or
the Gospel, but rather of domesticating it, on integrating it into the well-known and natural
view of a human being that his relationship with God is something which he can and must
create and assure to himself by definite observances”.61 We here find Barth’s understanding
of religion as such. Barth goes in one movement from the historical situation, which he
recognizes and characterizes with insight, to generalizations about human religion, thereby
mingling “exposition and application”62 in a way that I when working as a historical exegete
would not so quickly do.
He makes a similar move when he gives an account of what Paul tells the Galatians.
According to Barth, Paul “sets against the supposed reformation in Galatia Jesus Christ
himself. … The only thing which counts is the ‘new creation’,” the new creation that “is real
in Christ and nowhere else”.63 Here Christ is set over against not simply the religion of the
Law and the religion of the στοιχεῖα τοῦ κοσμοῦ, but over against religion as a common
human activity that transcends the specific time and culture of Paul and the Galatians.
In conclusion, it can be said that at least in this excursus Barth does honour the
necessity of historical exegesis even if it must also be said that relative to the great number of
words he devotes to the doctrine of justification in the foregoing pages of CD IV/1 it also
plays a tangential role. The placement of the excursus at the end of Section 61 strengthens
that impression, as does

59
CD IV/1 (note 4), 639.
60
Ibid., 640.
61
Ibid., 640.
62
Ibid., 622.
63
Ibid., 641.

25
his decisive appeal to the Reformers on the last page of the excursus. According to Barth, the
Reformation rightly saw that “the living Jesus Christ – and his righteousness and the
righteousness of the human being - is the scarlet thread” that runs through Galatians “and
therefore through the rest of Holy Scripture”.64 Barth concludes the excursus by quoting at
length and “without comment” from the Heidelberg Catechism (Questions 60, 61, and 64) as
representative of the Reformation understanding of justification, one that he clearly embraces.
The Reformation understanding of justification, not Galatians itself, seems to play the
controlling role in his articulation of this doctrine.

C. Barth’s Apocalyptic Interpretation of Paul

Barth’s acknowledged indebtedness to the Reformation understanding of justification in CD

IV/1 has led some Barth scholars to discern a significant change in his thinking in the years
following his commentary on Romans. This change has been characterized in the work of
Bruce McCormack and Shannon Nicole Smythe as a shift from “cosmological apocalyptic
eschatology” in the commentary on Romans to “forensic apocalyptic eschatology” in CD
IV/1.65 These labels have been derived from my own investigation of Paul’s apocalyptic
eschatology against the background of ancient Jewish apocalyptic eschatology. I have argued
that the latter has two discernible patterns, or “tracks”, one cosmological and the other
forensic. Elements of both, christologically modified and adapted, are to be found in Paul’s
letters, Romans and Galatians in particular.66

64
Ibid., 642.
65
See Bruce McCormack, “Can We Still Speak of ‘Justification by Faith’? An In-House Debate with
Apocalyptic Readings of Paul”, in Mark W. Elliott et al., eds., Galatians and Christian Theology: Justification,
the Gospel, and Ethics in Paul’s Letter (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2014, 159–86 (on Barth, see pp. 177–
84); McCormack, “Longing for a New World: On Socialism, Eschatology and Apocalyptic in Barth’s Early
Dialectical Theology”, in Theologie im Umbruch der Moderne: Karl Barth’s fruehe Dialektische Theologie, ed.
by G. Pfleiderer and H. Matern. Zurich: Theologischer Verlag, 2014, 135–49 (esp. 146–48); Shannon Nicole
Smythe, Forensic Apocalyptic Theology: Karl Barth and the Doctrine of Justification, Minneapolis, MN:
Fortress, 2016; Shannon Nicole Smythe, “Kath Barth in Conversation with Pauline Apocalypticism”, in Karl
Barth in Conversation, ed. by W.T. McMaken and D. Congdon. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2014, 195–210.
The article summarizes the central thrust of her book.
66
Martinus C. de Boer, “Paul and Jewish Apocalyptic Eschatology”, in J. Marcus and M.L. Soards, eds.,
Apocalyptic and the New Testament. Journal for the Study of the New Testament, Supplement Series, Vol. 24.
Sheffield, 1989, 169-190. Much from this article was incorporated into another article, “Paul and Apocalyptic
Eschatology”, in J.J. Collins, ed., The Encyclopedia of Apocalypticism, Vol. I. New York: Continuum, 1998,
345-383 (reprinted in Bernard McGinn, John J. Collins, and Stephen J. Stein, eds., The Continuum History of
Apocalypticism. New York: Continuum, 2003, 166-194). The first article mentioned is now available along with
other, related articles in de Boer, Paul (note 9 above). A convenient summary of the two patterns may be found
in de Boer, Galatians, 33–35 (note 6 above). The foundational research of the primary sources is available in
Martinus C. de Boer, The Defeat of Death: Apocalyptic Eschatology in 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5. Library
of New Testament Studies 22. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1988; London: Bloomsbury, 2015.

26
 A brief word (again in the form of an excursus) about ancient Jewish apocalyptic eschatology and these
two patterns as I understand them may be useful at this juncture, as also some comments on the
presence of these two patterns in Galatians and Romans.
Ancient Jewish apocalyptic eschatology – whether cosmological or forensic – is fundamentally
concerned with God’s active and visible revelation (ἀποκάλυψις) whereby God finally and irrevocably
rectifies (puts right) the created world (the cosmos) which has somehow gone astray and become
alienated from God. The expectation of God’s eschatological rectifying intervention – again, whether
that be cosmological or forensic – creates a dualism between “this age” and “the age to come” and this
dualism is the defining characteristic of apocalyptic eschatology, as opposed to other forms of
eschatology. It is important to recognize that both patterns of ancient Jewish apocalyptic eschatology
assume that only God can – and will – establish the new age in which what has gone wrong with the
world is put right. Both patterns are equally cosmic in scope and implication.67 The word “apocalyptic”
thus evokes the expectation of God’s own eschatological (i.e., final, definitive and irrevocable) action of
putting an end to this world-age and replacing it with the new world-age (the kingdom of God).68
Ancient Jewish apocalyptic eschatology exhibits two distinct patterns, however, and these two
patterns conceive of the human plight and the solution to it in significantly different ways.69 In the first
or cosmological pattern,70 the world has come under the dominion of evil, angelic powers. God’s
sovereign rights

67
Smythe unfortunately labels the cosmological pattern repeatedly as “cosmic apocalyptic eschatology” (e.g.,
Forensic Apocalyptic Theology [note 65], 16; emphasis added), thereby implying that the forensic variety is not
also cosmic in scope and implication (they both pertain to all humanity and the whole created order). I have
consistently maintained that both patterns are equally cosmic. See de Boer, “Paul and Jewish Apocalyptic
Eschatology” (note 66), 181 (= de Boer, Paul [note 9] 29).
68
With its focus on God’s sovereign or free intervention, apocalyptic eschatology can also be referred to as
apocalyptic theology. The term “apocalyptic”, used absolutely as a noun, can be used as shorthand for either or
both.
69
The following two paragraphs are taken almost verbatim from de Boer, “Paul and Jewish Apocalyptic
Eschatology” (note 66), 180–81 (= de Boer, Paul [note 9], 28–29).
70
I borrowed the term “cosmological” for this pattern from Käsemann’s study of apocalyptic.

27
 have been usurped and the world, including God’s own people, have been led astray into idolatry. But
there is a righteous remnant, chosen by God, which by its submission to the Creator, the God of Israel,
bears witness to the fact that these evil cosmological powers are doomed to pass away. This remnant,
the elect of God, awaits God’s deliverance. God will invade the world under the dominion of the evil
powers and defeat them in a cosmic war. Only God has the power to defeat and to overthrow the
demonic powers that have subjugated and perverted the earth. God will establish his sovereignty very
soon, delivering the righteous and bringing about a new age in which God will reign unopposed. The
textbook example of this pattern is 1 Enoch 1–36.
The second or forensic pattern is a modified, weakened version of the cosmological pattern.
The notion of evil cosmological forces is absent, recedes into the background or is even explicitly
rejected. Instead, the emphasis falls on free will and decision. Thus we find a kind of legal piety in
which personal responsibility and accountability are dominant. Sin is the wilful rejection of the Creator
God (a violation of the First Commandment) and death is the punishment for this fundamental sin. God
has, however, provided the Law as a remedy for this situation and a person’s posture toward this Law
determines one’s ultimate destiny. At the Last Judgment, God will reward those who have
acknowledged God’s claim and chosen the Law, whereas God will punish those who have not. The
textbook example of this pattern is 2 Baruch.71
As noted above, elements belonging to both patterns can be found in both Romans and
Galatians, christologically modified and adapted of course, but it is also the case, so I have argued, that
Paul’s own Christ-centred apocalyptic eschatology has more affinities with the cosmological pattern
than with the forensic pattern. The presence of motifs that are derived from the forensic pattern can to
some extent be explained by the fact that in both letters Paul is in conversation and debate with
representatives or adherents of the forensic pattern. In Galatians, his conversation partners are Jewish-
Christian missionaries who vehemently oppose his mission and adhere to a christologically adapted
form of forensic Jewish apocalyptic eschatology. For them, the forgiveness granted in Christ’s atoning
death for sins provides another chance to get it right, with the eschatological Spirit of Christ enabling a
more rigorous observance of the Law than was possible before. The observance of the Law as enabled
by the Spirit

71
This a summary of a complex set of data. For more detail and nuances, see de Boer, Defeat of Death (note 66)
and de Boer, Paul (note 9). Cosmological apocalyptic eschatology can incorporate forensic elements, whereas
forensic apocalyptic eschatology can do without cosmological elements (so not only 2 Baruch but also 4 Ezra
and rabbinic literature). The two tracks as I have outlined them do not pretend to account for all that may be
important in Jewish apocalyptic eschatology of either pattern, e.g. messianism, national disaster and restoration,
the Temple, repentance, atonement, covenant. They are meant to be heuristic models enabling a better
understanding of certain phenomena discernible in the ancient sources, including the letters of Paul.

28
 will provide the necessary righteousness to ensure justification at Christ’s Parousia, when the Last
Judgment will take place.72 In Romans, Paul’s conversation partners are probably non-Christian Jews
who adhere to the forensic pattern of Jewish apocalyptic eschatology (involving justification in the
future on the basis of works of the Law), though it is possible, I think, that Paul also has in view Jewish-
Christians who have adopted a similar, but christologically adapted, form of the same pattern, as is the
case in Galatians. Paul’s strategy in both letters is not to reject this forensic pattern of apocalyptic
eschatology but to circumscribe and to recontextualize it with a christologically focussed cosmological
apocalyptic eschatology of his own.73 In contrast to his conversation partners in both Romans and
Galatians, “Paul has interpreted (a) Christ’s atoning death to signify eschatological justification now
and (b) this justification cosmologically as God’s rectifying and life-giving power”.74 Paul’s
cosmological apocalyptic eschatology is thus focussed on Christ (i.e., his death and resurrection) as
God’s sovereign and eschatologically redemptive act of liberation from the twin supra-human powers of
Sin and Death in particular. The coming of Christ represents for Paul God’s apocalyptic-eschatological
invasion of the human world, whereby God has begun to wage a war of cosmic proportions against evil
cosmological forces that have oppressed and victimized all human beings and brought about their
separation from God and from life. This war will end in God’s sure and final triumph at Christ’s
Parousia.75

Both McCormack and Smythe maintain that Barth’s account of Paul’s thought in his
commentary on Romans is completely compatible with the cosmological-apocalyptic reading
of Paul.76 And they both go on to note how Barth’s theology, more specifically, his
eschatology,77 in CD IV/1 has (rightly, in their view) taken a decidedly forensic turn under the
influence of the Reformers.78 In one important respect, however, Barth’s forensic-apocalyptic

72
In his exegesis of Galatians, Martyn makes use of my distinction, as I do in my own commentary on Galatians,
between cosmological and forensic apocalyptic eschatology (Martyn, Galatians [note 5]), as initially outlined in
my 1989 essay, “Paul and Jewish Apocalyptic Eschatology” (note 66; also found in de Boer, Paul [note 9]).
73
Cf. de Boer, “Paul’s Mythologizing Program in Romans”, in de Boer, Paul (note 9), 55–72.
74
De Boer, Defeat of Death (note 66), 175. See de Boer, Galatians (note 6), 151–65.
75
See de Boer, Defeat of Death (note 66), 93–188.
76
See note 65 above.
77
In Romans (note 1), Barth writes: “If Christianity be not altogether thoroughgoing eschatology, there remains
no relationship whatever with Christ” (314; also quoted by Ziegler, Militant Grace [note 5], 20).
78
As Ziegler puts it, while McCormack concedes that “a pattern of ‘cosmological apocalyptic eschatology’ …
captures and characterizes Barth’s early reading of Paul very well, … he also argues that Barth’s later and
decidedly forensic account of salvation, as rendered in the fourth volume of the Church Dogmatics, corrects this
early reading and amounts to a better understanding of Paul” (Ziegler, Militant Grace [note 8], 22). For a very
helpful introduction to Romans along the lines of the early Barth, see Beverly Roberts Gaventa, When in
Romans: An Invitation to Linger with the Gospel according to Paul. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2016. See
also idem Our Mother Sant Paul. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2007, 113–60.

29
interpretation of Paul in CD IV/I goes beyond the Reformers and is consistent with his
cosmological-apocalyptic interpretation in Romans, and that is to be found in the emphasis
Barth places on Christ’s initial coming as “the turn of the ages, the passing of the present age
and the coming of the ‘new creation’”.79 Whereas in Romans Barth interprets this turn of the
ages in cosmological terms, in CD IV/I he interprets it in forensic terms. McCormack calls
this emphasis on Christ’s advent as the turn of the ages in CD IV/1 “an apocalyptic
supplement” to the theology of the Reformers, whose forensic character, according to
McCormack and Smythe, is more true to Paul than the cosmological variety discerned by
Barth in Romans or championed by J. Louis Martyn and myself.80
If McCormack and Smythe are correct in their analyses, Barth in CD IV/1 effectively
reverses the direction – the vector – of Paul’s own argumentation81 which, so I have argued,
moves consistently in both letters from the predominantly forensic categories dear to his
conversation partners to the predominantly cosmological ones that shape his own theology.82
In my judgment, the modification of Paul’s apocalyptic eschatology in a forensic direction as
occurs in CD IV/1 turns Paul’s thinking on its head. The following comments will indicate
further why I find this modification unconvincing and contrary to Paul’s intent.

79
McCormack, “Can We Still Speak” (note 65), 174. McCormack notes here that this emphasis is also
characteristic of Martyn’s and my account of Paul thought, and is “something that was not grasped in the
sixteenth century”. See also Smythe, Forensic Apocalyptic Theology [note 65], 201.
80
See the main title of Smythe’s study of Barth: Forensic Apocalyptic Theology (note 65).
81
Rightly noted with respect to Smythe by Andrew R. Guffey, “Apocalypse Ellipsis: A Response to Shannon
Smythe”, in Karl Barth in Conversation, ed. by W.T. McMaken and D. Congdon. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock,
2014, 211–15.
82
I have also argued that Paul’s cosmological views are more prominently on display in Romans than in
Galatians, which was written before Romans. See de Boer, “Justification in Paul: From Romans to Galatians”, in
de Boer, Paul (note 9), 131–141. It bears repeating that Paul does not reject the forensic categories of his
conversation partners, though he does circumscribe and recontextualize their independent significance by
incorporating them into his own cosmological-apocalyptic understanding of Christ’s coming.

30
 (1) According to McCormack, Barth’s “apocalyptic supplement” to the Reformation
doctrine of justification entails “his belief that what takes place in the cross is nothing
less than the destruction of the sinner as such”. McCormack here adds: “Such a view
stands in close proximity to what de Boer describes as ‘forensic apocalypticism’”.83 I
would demur and maintain that the destruction of the sinner, expressed by Paul in
terms of co-crucifixion with Christ (Rom 6:6; Gal 2:19–20; 5:24; 6:14), is a
cosmological motif,84 which moves beyond the understanding of the death of Jesus as
an atoning sacrifice for sins and thus beyond forgiveness or acquittal.85 It involves
liberation from the twin dominions of Sin and Death.86 The destruction of the sinner
marks the end of Sin’s hegemony over a human being and thus of Death’s hegemony
as well (cf. Rom 6:6 in context; 2 Cor 5:21).87 Paul’s own theological formulations
here undermine the forensic interpretation of his thought by Barth in CD IV/1, and
embraced by McCormack and Smythe.

(2) Like Martyn, I render the expression πίστις χριστοῦ (Gal 2:16c) as “the faith(fulness)
of Christ” (construing χριστοῦ as a subjective genitive)88 instead of as ‘faith in Christ
(which construes χριστοῦ as

83
McCormack, “Can We Still Speak” (note 65), 180. He cites Barth, CD II/1, 253–54 in this connection.
84
Cf. de Boer, Galatians (note 6), 172; idem, “Apocalyptic as God’s Eschatological Activity in Paul’s
Theology”, in de Boer, Paul (note 9), 212–13.
85
A point similar to McCormack’s is made by Smythe: “as regards the remission of sins, Barth speaks
apocalyptically of the destruction of the sinner—the necessity of the in-breaking of a catastrophe in which we
are freed by being imprisoned, saved by our destruction” (“Karl Barth in Conversation” [note 65], 209–10).
Again, this to my mind is a cosmological-apocalyptic statement, as Smythe’s use of the terms “catastrophe” and
“freed” implies.
86
It is not, in my opinion, to be equated with “the penalty for sin”, as McCormack maintains, attributing this
view to Barth as well (McCormack, “Can We Still Speak” [note 65], 182). Cf. de Boer, Defeat of Death [note
66], 141–50, on the death of Adam and his descendants as the penalty for the sin of repudiating God. Dying with
Christ, or being crucified with him, is something else again; that signifies participation in Christ’s death to Sin as
a power (Rom 6:1–10), whereby the power of Sin (along with the power of Death) is defeated and destroyed (de
Boer, Defeat of Death [note 66], 176–77). One form of dying is part of the problem (plight), the other form is the
solution (salvation). They should not be collapsed, because Paul himself does not collapse them.
87
See de Boer, “Sin and Soteriology in Romans”, in de Boer, Paul (note 9), 73–89.
88
The Greek term πίστις can have a range of overlapping meanings, some active (faith in the sense of trust, or
faithfulness in the sense of fidelity or loyalty), others passive (trustworthiness, reliability). An active meaning
would seem to be particularly appropriate here. Christ’s πίστις would be his trust in God and his fidelity or
conformity to God’s will and purpose. Christ’s πίστις is also the revelation of God’s πίστις (cf. Rom 3:3).

31
 an objective genitive). The latter is the traditional rendering, which Barth adopts in his
excursus on Galatians, as noted previously. A fuller version of this expression, πίστις
Ἰησοῦ χριστοῦ, with no difference in meaning, occurs not only in Gal 2:16a and Gal
3:22, but also in Rom 3:22.89 In his commentary on Romans, Barth rendered the
instance in Rom 3:22, with some daring, as “his [God’s] faithfulness in Jesus Christ”
(seine Treue in Jesus Christ).90 This paraphrastic rendering seems to serve Barth’s
cosmological-apocalyptic interpretation of Christ’s advent in Romans very well,91 and
it is one he abandoned in CD IV/1 when exegeting Galatians. It thus seems on the face
of it as if the construal of πίστις χριστοῦ as “the faith(fulness) of Christ” is more
congenial to a cosmological-apocalyptic reading of Paul than the traditional construal
of the term as “faith in Christ”. It is for this reason, evidently, that McCormack makes
the exaggerated claim that “the whole of de Boer’s reading of Paul depends for its
success on his construal of pistis Christou as a subjective genitive in 2:16 and 3:22. It
is the cornerstone of his arch; without it, the arch crumbles”.92 Mixing his metaphors,
McCormack goes on to maintain that my construal of πίστις χριστοῦ as a subjective
genitive is a “slender reed”93 which does “a lot of heavy lifting”94 in support of a
cosmological-apocalyptic reading of Galatians.

89
See also Gal 2:20 (“the faith of the Son of God”), Rom 3:26 (“the faith of Jesus”), and Phil 3:9 (“the faith of
Christ”).
90
Barth, Romans (note 1), 91. This was helpfully called to my attention by G.C. den Hertog.
91
McCormack evidently disagrees with Barth’s reading: “there is no irruption of the cosmological in Paul’s
forensic account of the saving significance of Christ’s death in Romans 3:21–26” (“Can We Speak” [note 65],
174).
92
McCormack, “Can We Still Speak” [note 65], 171. With respect to Romans, McCormack (170) claims that I
make my cosmological-apocalyptic reading of Romans depend not only on the reference to Sin as a power in
Rom 3:9 but also on my interpretation of πίστις χριστοῦ in Rom 3:22 and 3:26 as a subjective genitive. The
problem with this claim is that I make no mention of Rom 3:22 or 3:26 in my treatment of Romans. I do appeal,
however, to δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ in Rom 1:17, which I construe as a subjective genitive, understanding it as God’s
eschatological saving action and power, following Käsemann. See de Boer, “Paul and Apocalyptic Eschatology”
(note 66), 365.
93
McCormack, “Can We Still Speak” (note 65), 173.
94
Ibid., 170; emphasis original.

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 But that is not the case. While Martyn and I both interpret “the faith(fulness) of
(Jesus) Christ” to refer specifically to Christ’s faithful death “on our behalf”,95 I also
argue that the expression was not coined by Paul himself (as Martyn thinks) but rather
Paul borrowed it was borrowed by him from his conversation partners in Galatia.96
These Jewish-Christian missionaries also understood πίστις χριστοῦ to refer to
Christ’s own faith(fulness) as evident in his death “for us” and they gave it a place in
their own eschatological expectations, which were forensic-apocalyptic in nature.97
I also argue that Paul’s cosmological-apocalyptic interpretation of πίστις
χριστοῦ becomes evident only from the argumentative context in which he places it
and cannot be derived from the formulation itself. For both Paul and his conversation
partners in Galatia, the faithfulness of Jesus Christ in his death is also the revelation of
the

95
Martyn, Galatians (note 8), 252; de Boer, Galatians (note 6), 150; following Richard B. Hays, “Pistis and
Pauline Christology: What is at Stake?”, in Richard B. Hays, The Faith of Jesus Christ: The Narrative
Substructure of Galatians 3:1–4:11. 2nd edition. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002, 272–97 (287).
96
This is another way of saying that the expression πίστις χριστοῦ was a fixed formula with a distinctive
meaning, referring to Christ’s own πίστις. That does not mean that faith (believing, trusting) in Christ has no
place in Paul’s thought since Gal 2:16 clearly indicates that it does: “we came to believe in Christ Jesus”, ἡμεῖς
εἰς χριστὸν Ἰσοῦς ἐπιστεύσαμεν (cf. 3:22: “those who believe”, οἱ πιστεύοντες). McCormack misconstrues my
plea for the subjective genitive construal of πίστις χριστοῦ when he suggests that my “central argument” for this
construal is the claim that in the objective genitive construal faith is being regarded as a human work analogous
to works of the Law, which is not how Luther (or by implication, Paul) interpreted the objective genitive at all
(ibid., 172). I was simply pointing out, however, that some exegetes plead for the objective genitive reading on
the grounds that just as works of the Law involve human activity, πίστις χριστοῦ probably does so as well. There
remains the question of how such “faith in Christ” is then to be interpreted. In my view, Luther’s understanding
of justification by faith as articulated by McCormack trenchantly and accurately sums up what such faith in
Christ involves for Paul: “In Luther’s case, justification ‘by faith’ means, in fuller expression, by the grace of
God in Jesus Christ made effective in the human individual by the Spirit through the faith that the Spirit creates”
(“Can We Still Speak” [note 65], 172). Cf. de Boer, Galatians [note 6], 176–77, 191–92, 319. Having granted
that, I would still maintain that πίστις χριστοῦ is a fixed formula that is to be understood as “the faith(fulness) of
Christ”. For Paul, faith in Christ is then to be understood as participation in the faith of Christ.
97
De Boer, Galatians (note 6), 153: Paul’s Jewish-Christian conversation partners in Galatia “understand
Christ’s faithful death not as a justifying act, an act of vindication and approval, but as an atonement for the past
sins of the nation against God and his law”; for them, “justification is something that will occur for the law-
observant believer in the future” (emphasis added).

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 faithfulness of God, understood by both Paul and his conversations partners as the turn
of the ages. For both, the resurrection of Christ functions as the eschatological
confirmation of this faithfulness. But whereas the resurrection caused Paul’s
conversation partners to understand Christ’s faithful death within the framework of
forensic apocalyptic eschatology, it caused Paul himself to understand Christ’s faithful
death within the framework of cosmological apocalyptic eschatology. 98

The question remains whether Barth’s exegesis of Galatians in the excursus found at
the end of section 61 of CD IV/1 could provide a foundation for a cosmological-apocalyptic
reading of Galatians. Martyn’s commentary on Galatians suggests a positive answer. Martyn,
who often expressed his admiration for Barth,99 exhibits familiarity with Barth’s exegesis of
Galatians in CD IV/1, particularly in what he says about “religion”.100 We saw above how
Barth moves easily from analysing the religious views of the Galatians in their historical
setting to a generalization about religion as such (“the well-known and natural view of a
human being that his relationship with God is something which he can and must create and
assure to himself by definite observances”).101 Martyn makes a similar move, defining
religion as “the various communal, cultic means … by which human beings seek to know and
to be happily related to the gods or God”.102 For Martyn, as for Barth, re-

98
As Martyn puts it (Galatians [note 6], 101): Paul “is concerned to offer an interpretation of Jesus’ death that is
oriented not toward personal guilt and forgiveness but rather toward corporate enslavement and liberation. Jesus’
death was the powerful deed in God’s war, the deed by which God has already freed us from the malevolent
grasp of the present age”. This is a comment on Gal 1:4 where πίστις χριστοῦ does not occur. See similarly de
Boer, Galatians (note 6), 30. It is because of Gal 1:4 (among other passages in Galatians) that we both interpret
πίστις χριστοῦ in Gal 2:16 cosmologically, but that has nothing intrinsically to do with its being a subjective
genitive.
99
For example, in a private letter dated July 7, 1994 Martyn wrote to me of those who had gone, as he had,
“through the Barthian waters”. I myself went “through the Barthian waters” while at university in the late 1960s.
100
Martyn rarely mentions Barth in the commentary itself, however, and then primarily with respect to Barth’s
insistence that the human plight can only be properly understood from the vantage point of Christ (Galatians
[note 8], 95 n. 43; 266 n. 163; cf. also 387 n. 5 on the distinction between the anologia entis and the anologia
fidei).
101
CD IV/1 (note 4), 640.
102
Martyn, Galatians [note 8], 588.

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ligion is “thus a human enterprise that Paul sharply distinguishes from God’s apocalyptic act
in Christ”.103
Christ thus stands over against religion as such in Galatians, for Martyn as for Barth.
According to Martyn, Paul wants to let the Galatians know that “the advent of Christ is the
end of religion”,104 and that in turn means that the “church of God is not a religious option
among others”.105 In fact, for Martyn, “the ruling polarity” in Galatians is not “Christianity
versus Judaism” (as two religious options) but “the cosmic antinomy of God’s apocalyptic act
in Christ versus religion”, human religion in whatever form it occurs.106 Martyn takes this line
of apocalyptic interpretation in an unmistakably cosmological direction. He writes that there
are “numerous junctures at which Paul indicates that a move into the realm of religion is a
move away from the realm of Christ, a retrogression to the enslaving state of affairs before
Christ’s coming (cf. 5:4; 4:9;… )”.107 Barth writes in a similar vein of the Galatians’ “relapse
into heathenism, into bondage to natural forces, the στοιχεῖα τοῦ κοσμοῦ, from the service of
which they been snatched by the preaching of the Gospel when they believed, in betrayal of
the καινὴ κτίσις which had been promised to Abraham … and in the light of which there
could be no question of circumcision or uncircumcision or any other ordinances (6:15)”.108
Martyn calls God’s act in Christ an “apocalyptic invasion”, consistent with a
cosmological-apocalyptic understanding of Christ’s advent.109 “With the advent of Christ,
then,” according to Martyn, “God has elected to invade the realm of the wrong – ‘the present
evil age’ (1:4) – by sending his Son and the Spirit of his Son into it from outside it”.110 Paul
wants to speak of “God’s apocalyptic and new-creative act in Christ”.111 Again, in a similar
vein Barth

103
Ibid., 588. As indicated above, I would hesitate to make such explicit generalizations in a historical-critical
commentary, even if they are a defensible application of what Paul says about the religion of the Galatians and
the religion of the Law (see de Boer, Galatians [note 6], 402; de Boer, “Cross and Cosmos in Galatians”, Paul
[note 9], 102–3). Moreover, the making of such generalizations is different from regarding Christ as the letter’s
subject matter (die Sache) that is as relevant now as it was then.
104
Martyn, Galatians (note 8), 164.
105
Ibid., 116. Also 423 n. 25.
106
Ibid., 37.
107
Ibid., 116.
108
CD IV/1 (note 4), 641. Emphasis added.
109
Martyn, Galatians (note 8), 39.
110
Ibid.
111
Ibid. 164.

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writes that Paul “sets against the supposed [religious] reformation in Galatia Jesus Christ
himself, … The only thing which counts is the ‘new creation’”, which is “real in Christ and
nowhere else”.112
The cosmological-apocalyptic understanding of Christ’s advent means for Martyn that
Paul’s language of justification (δικαιοσύνη, δικαιόω) can best be understood (and translated)
as “rectification”, as God’s action of putting right what has gone wrong.113 Paul’s language of
justification is to be understood not forensically but cosmologically, i.e., not as justification in
the forensic sense but as rectification in the cosmological sense.114 At the end of his excursus
on Galatians, as we have seen, Barth reverts to the Reformers’ understanding of the doctrine
of justification and ends with an extended quotation from the Heidelberg Catechism. Martyn
does what Barth himself evidently hesitated to do, extend his cosmological-apocalyptic
reading of Romans to Galatians.

Conclusion

Barth is right about historical-critical exegesis, at least at it concerns Galatians. It must go

beyond making grammatical, philological, and text-critical comments to address the specific
occasion of the letter, as well as the content, the message being conveyed to the first readers.
Barth does so in his exegesis of Galatians in CD IV/1. Barth also recognizes that historical
exegesis provides a control on theological appropriations and applications. Dogmatic
theology cannot simply repeat what the Bible says but it must ground its claims and
formulations exegetically in the biblical witness if it is be characterized as Christian theology.
The biblical text is not to be used as a pretext for “free theologizing”. Barth sees his task as
bringing out the message, the witness, of the Bible for today, to give an account of the Word
in

112
CD IV/1 (note 4), 641.
113
Martyn, Galatians (note 8), 250. As McCormack points out (“Can We Speak” [note 65], 165), rectification
can be used to describe forensic justification, but it does not do so in Martyn’s usage. For Martyn, it means
redemption, liberation, or deliverance (cf. Gal 1:4; 3:13; 4:5; 5:1).
114
I argue in more nuanced fashion that “Paul’s striking redefinition of justification as involving God’s
powerful, apocalyptic rectifying action in the present remains inchoate” in Galatians even if he takes “the first
steps toward this ‘cosmological’ redefinition of the forensic-eschatological understanding of justification” (de
Boer, Galatians [note 6], 155). Paul is clearer on this score in Romans than in Galatians; see de Boer,
“Justification in Paul: From Galatians to Romans”, in de Boer, Paul (note 9), 131–41.

36
the words, as he puts it. As a dogmatic theologian, Barth not only practises theological
exegesis but also historical exegesis and sees the latter as essential for the former.
With respect to Galatians, Barth has let the legacy of the Reformation (as he
understood it) influence his exegesis of the letter to such an extent that in CD IV/1 he
modified and undermined the major thrust of his commentary on Romans, God’s catastrophic,
earth-shaking invasion in and through Jesus Christ of the human cosmos under the subjection
of alien powers in order to liberate the creation from those powers. He reverses the direction –
the vector – of Paul’s own argumentation. His treatment of Galatians in CD IV/1 can
nevertheless be read as providing the exegetical groundwork for a “cosmological-apocalyptic”
interpretation of Galatians, as attested by the work of Martyn in particular.

37