No Flesh Justified

No Flesh Justified September 19, 2014

No one is justified by the works of law, Paul says, and supports the claim with what appears to be a paraphrase of Psalm 143:2. The Psalm says “for not righteous before your face are all the living.” Paul writes, “by the works of the law no flesh is justified” (Galatians 2:16).

The Psalm has traditionally been taken to imply total inability: We know that no one living can be justified by law because no one can keep the whole law. Perfect obedience is required; no one can fulfill that; therefore no one is justified. More recent interpreters have suggested alternative explanations. 

To unravel this, we have to probe three issues: What does Paul mean by “justify”? What are the “works of the law”? And how does the Psalm support Paul’s argument?

Start with the Psalm. As in many Psalms, David is under assault from enemies, and he cries out to God to intervene to rescue and revive him (vv. 1, 3, 7-9, 11). He wants Yahweh to destroy those who afflict him (v. 12). His appeal is based on the fact that David is Yahweh’s servant (v. 12b), and is supported by memories of the Lord’s earlier acts on his behalf (vv. 5-6). If Yahweh answers favorably, it will be a demonstration of His faithfulness and righteousness (v. 1). Yahweh will prove Himself faithful and just by delivering His distressed servant. 

Equally, though, the Lord proves himself faith and just by refusing to enter into judgment with David: “Answer me in Your faithfulness, in Your righteousness. And do not enter into judgment with Your servant” (vv. 1b-2a). It is righteous for God to destroy David’s enemies; it is equally righteous for Yahweh to deliver David. Yahweh’s righteousness is, it seems, interested; His truthfulness involves playing favorites.

David supports his plea not to be judged with the fragment that Paul alludes to: “in Your sight no man living is righteous” (v. 2b). The logic seems to be: David is Yahweh’s servant; Yahweh has obligations to deliver David his servant, and in delivering David He demonstrates His reliability; if Yahweh were to enter into judgment with David, David would be destroyed, since no one is righteous before God; so in order to prove Himself righteous, Yahweh has to refrain from judging David. Overlooking or forgiving David’s sin won’t be an act of mercy that cancels Yahweh’s righteous justice; it is an expression of Yahweh’s justice. But the reason why David doesn’t want Yahweh to enter into judgment supports the traditional “Old Perspective” view: David knows that he will not stand if God enters into judgment with him, because he has sinned.

Now, from this we can answer one of the questions from Galatians 2: What does Paul mean by “justify”? If we take our cues from Psalm 143, to “justify” means to a) deliver David from enemies by b) destroying those enemies and c) simultaneously overlooking/forgiving David’s sins. Forgiveness of sins is embedded in God’s favorable judgment, but it is not the whole of that judgment. God’s favorable judgment must be a delivering judgment, or it is no answer to David’s prayer.

The Psalm gives us some help in understanding what Paul means by “works of the law.” If we take our cues from Psalm 143, the phrase cannot be taken merely as “boundary markers” or identity symbols. The Psalm doesn’t mention the law directly, but David’s fear that Yahweh will enter into judgment with him has moral overtones: David hopes Yahweh will refrain from judgment because David has sinned.

Paul’s deliberate introduction of the term “flesh” into the Psalm paraphrase is important. “Flesh” describes the state of man in Adam. What Paul denies is that flesh can be justified by the works of the law. That is a fair summary of what Paul says more elaborately in Romans 7: The law comes to a man of flesh and kills him. To be delivered in the way that David hopes for in Psalm 143, he needs something other than the law. What He needs is Yahweh’s own delivering act, an act that both rescues Him and destroys His enemies. That’s something the law cannot accomplish.

Tim Gallant puts it well (Paul’s Travail, 20-21): “Circumcision cuts away flesh, but it is in flesh and presupposes the continuing existence of flesh. Wherever there is circumcision, flesh retains its hegemony; life is dictated by its terms. . . . Those who belong to Messiah rather than Torah have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires (5:24) – that is not possible for anyone defined by Torah. Torah is limited, circumscribed by flesh, and cannot go beyond it.”


Browse Our Archives