Gore Redux

A recent comment on an older post reminds me to recommend heartily Charles Gore's two volume commentary on Paul's Letter to the Romans. For those who (like me) have struggled with Paul's more, er, Calvinist overtones, Gore does an exceedingly useful job of putting him in his historical context, and elucidating this rich, sometimes contradictory, and occasionally daunting text. He is particularly good with Romans 8, one of my favorite Biblical texts, but one which springs from the paean to hope, to the introduction into Christian thought of predestination. Gore:

There is, I think, no point on which St. Paul has been more misrepresented than on his teaching about predestination. He teaches plainly that it is God's purpose to ' have mercy upon all': that He 'willeth that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth....The election of this catholic body to be the heirs of salvation and to bear the name of God in the world was, it would have been held, a selfevident fact. St. Paul reasons not up to this fact but from it. He uses the admitted fact to strengthen its individual members under stress of trial. They must bear earthly troubles because they form the appointed discipline for the individuals who form the select body. Let men but love God, and then all outward things whatsoever work together for good for them. The fact that they love God is the sufficient evidence of their election. Those who love God are also those who are ' called according to His purpose.' But, we ask, Have none received the call and rejected it? were none called, who do not love God? is it not true, that ' Many are called and few chosen' ? St. Paul says not a word to the contrary. But that is not the question he is considering. The members of the Christian Church, devoted to God, to whom he is writing have been called. This call of which they have become the subject is, St. Paul assures them, no afterthought, no momentary act of God, which as it came into being in a moment so may pass away. It is not a being taken up by God and then perhaps dropped again. His gifts and calling are without repentance on His side, because they represent an eternal will.

In other words, Paul is urging boldness and confidence upon the Christian community--be sure that you are loved, and will always be loved--and not claiming that others are excluded from that same love. This brings Paul into consistency with Jesus's declaration, judge not, that ye be not judged.

A first rate work of exposition by one of he finest minds in Anglicanism. Well worth your time.