Challenging, inspiring commentary on Romans

Romans Believers Church Bible Commentary. John E. Toews. Herald Press, 2004. 463 pages.

With almost 20 commentaries on Romans on my shelf, why would I read another? The answer is that when I study a certain book of Scripture, I like to take the three or four commentaries I find the most enlightening and read them simultaneously as if the different commentators are interacting with one another (which they often are). I then draw my own conclusions from this imaginary “debate.” I read new commentaries, therefore, asking the question: does it warrant inclusion into the “debating chamber”?

The claims on the back cover suggest that this commentary does warrant such consideration. “[Romans] gives new eyes for readers to see what the central message of Romans really is . . . a provocative reinterpretation of Paul’s letter” (italics mine). Does reading it vindicate such a claim?

John E. Toews is a renowned Mennonite Brethren scholar who states in the foreword of this commentary that work on it began 20 years ago and that it has gone through numerous drafts. It is, then, the culmination of a “life-long pilgrimage of reading and re-reading Romans and about Romans.”

The layout is clear and consistent. The passage being addressed is considered under the categories of Preview, Outline, Explanatory notes, Text in Biblical Context and Text in the Life of the Church.

While a certain amount of technical language is unavoidable on a subject as complex as Romans, Toews has done his readers a great service by both defining technical terms in the text (in brackets) as well as providing a very good selection of short relevant essays at the end (covering 25 topics such as faith, righteousness and sin). This is a real strength. It makes this commentary accessible and comprehensible to a wide range of readers without compromising academic depth.

According to Toews, “Romans is a pastoral letter intended to reconcile differing groups of believers in the house churches of mid-first century Rome. . . . The theological center of Romans is the gospel of God’s salvation for all people.”

Toews approaches this study from an Anabaptist perspective and therefore addresses and challenges many of the traditional interpretations of some of the central passages of Romans (e.g. 1:16–18, 3:21–26, chapters 7, 9–11). In doing so, he presents the various arguments in Romans in a manner that shows the consistency and development of Paul’s thought throughout the entire book, something many commentators have failed to do. In addition, Toews is conversant with such important subjects as shame and honour, and recently influential discussions on Greek rhetoric.

This in turn lays the foundation for discussion of some of the most pressing issues facing the church today. Toews courageously addresses such contemporary issues as homosexuality and alternative marriage arrangements, and asks the provocative question: “Are some patterns of relationship so pervasive in a culture that the church must learn to live with them for a time even if they fall short of the normative pattern?”

This is not an easy commentary to read in the sense that readers are forced to wrestle with questions that affect the very foundation of their belief system – statements like (in a discussion on Romans 6), “This narrative spirituality says that the modern gospel that ‘God accepts us the way we are’ is nothing less than heresy.” Or the comment on Romans 9 that, “Modern theodicy focuses primarily on the unjust suffering of innocent people. Paul believes that all human beings are sinners who deserve judgment.” Or, “In a variety of different ways theologians since the second century have argued that the church is the New Israel that has replaced history’s Israel as the people of God because Israel rejected God’s Messiah, and, in fact, crucified him. A teaching could hardly be further from Paul’s intent than super-sessionism.”

My only criticism is that I would have liked more specific references to other contemporary commentaries.

The best compliment I can pay Toews, however, is not that this commentary has been given access to my “debating chamber” (as it has), but that I have grown closer to God through reading it. This has been as challenging a commentary as I have read of late, and the journey of learning and application has not been a comfortable one! I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Lance Christie is pastor of the Sema Community Church, a new church plant in Calgary. He has a BA and MA in Social Anthropology, with a particular interest in the study of shame and honour.