Journal: Westminster Theological Journal
Volume: WTJ 30:2 (May 1968)
Article: Paul As Theologian A Review Article
Author: Richard B. Gaffin, Jr.

---

WTJ 30:2 (May 68) p. 204

Paul As Theologian
A Review Article

Richard B. Gaffin, Jr.

One has to be impressed by the response which this book [Herman Ridderbos: Paulus: Ontwerp van zijn theologie. Kampen: J. H. Kok. 1966. 653. Fl. 39, 50] has already found elsewhere. We may speak here of a consensus. To note just several examples: Professor Peter Y. De Jong of Calvin Seminary considers it a volume characterized by “unusual insight, amazing erudition and balanced argumentation”, which bears “the promise of a large degree of permanent worth”.1 He concludes that “As a study of Paul’s thought it stands today without a peer”.2 Professor Hendrikus Berkhof of Leiden prefaces his review with the title, “A Theological Event”. Although he acknowledges that it sounds somewhat “hoogdravend”, he still feels that such grandiloquence is in order to describe a book which is both “quantitatively and qualitatively a prodigious achievement”.3 Professor R. Schippers of the Free University knows of people who, with a not entirely bad conscience, have allowed themselves to fall behind in their daily work because thev found it so difficult to put the book down once they began reading! In an extended review which is not without a considerable amount of sharply directed criticism, he refers to it as “a remarkable phenomenon in our Reformed theologizing”.4

All these superlatives will not come as too great a surprise to readers of the Journal, who by this time are familiar with the high quality of the work of Professor Herman Ridderbos of Kampen. The appearance of his major writings in English during the past decade (Paul and Jesus, 1958;

WTJ 30:2 (May 68) p. 205

The Coming of the Kingdom, 1962; The Authority of the New Testament Scriptures, 1963) as well as his commentary on Galatians (1953) and the short but valuable collection of studies, When the Time Had Fully Come (1957) have already earned for him on this side of the Atlantic the reputation for penetrating, balanced, and clearly expressed scholarship which he has long enjoyed in his native Holland. There can be no question, however, that Paulus represents a new and unprecedented pinnacle of achievement, so much so that one has the feeling, especially in view of its potential for influencing the Reformed world, that it may well prove to be one of the most significant books of the decade, perhaps even of a generation. At any rate, it is fair to say that in both scope and insight it surpasses his monumental study on the kingdom, which many ha...

visitor : : uid: ()