Paul among the Postliberals illuminates Paul’s thought by creating links between contemporary Pauline scholarship and the writings of postliberals such as Karl Barth, Stanley Hauerwas, and John Howard Yoder. Douglas Harink argues that the quintessentially Pauline doctrine of "justification by faith" has been widely mistranslated and misunderstood; instead, he emphasizes that "human faithfulness is action patterned after Christ’s faithfulness" and the goal of the gospel is to free Christians-and the church-for faithful action. Reading Paul’s ecclesiology in dialogue with Yoder’s The Politics of Jesus, and his letter to the Galatians in dialogue with Hauerwas’s apocalyptic Christology, Harink fills in the political contours of Paul’s writings, identifying the church as a socio-political reality.

Finally, bringing attention to an issue too often neglected or misread, Harink reviews several recent proposals for a Christian theology of Israel and Judaism arguing that more weight should be given to the Pauline doctrine of God’s election of Israel.

Clergy, professors, seminarians, and theology students will take a keen interest in this important new presentation of Pauline thought. Paul among the Postliberals will also provide a fascinating, unique, and timely text for college courses on Paul, the church, and contemporary theology.

Can Paul the Apostle be placed in the company of such contemporary luminaries as John Howard Yoder and Stanley Hauerwas? Douglas Harink shows that such a conversation, in the form of an engagement between central Pauline themes and perspectives that lie at the heart of postliberal thought, is not only possible but also crucial. The result is an illuminating rendering of the significance of Pauline teaching for the church ‘beyond Christendom and modernity.’–Stanley J. Grenz, Baylor University

Seeking fresh insight, Doug Harink has linked up the new perspective on St. Paul with the work of certain postliberals and noted a very fruitful fit with some large implications for living faithfully as Jesus’ disciples. The book represents to my mind the kind of generous orthodoxy toward which we should all be tending.–Clark Pinnock, author of Most Moved Mover