New Perspective on Paul
Flagged as a concern
A school of New Testament study that reads Paul's teaching on justification mainly as about who belongs to God's people, often denying that Christ's righteousness is imputed to believers.
Also called: New Perspective, NPP, imputation denied
What it means
The New Perspective arose in New Testament scholarship in the late twentieth century. It argues that first-century Judaism was not a religion of earning salvation by works, and that when Paul opposes "works of the law," he means chiefly the badges that marked Jews off from Gentiles, such as circumcision, food laws, and the Sabbath. On this reading, justification is mainly God's declaration of who belongs to His covenant people, Jew and Gentile together, rather than how a guilty sinner is accepted.
There is variety among its writers. Many affirm that salvation is by grace and through faith, and the movement has rightly drawn attention to Paul's concern for the unity of Jew and Gentile in one church. But many of its leading voices deny that Christ's righteousness is imputed to believers, and some describe final justification as according to the whole life lived.
The historic Protestant confessions read Paul as teaching that justification is God's pardon of the guilty and His acceptance of them as righteous for Christ's sake alone. This site flags denial of imputation as a concern.
What Scripture says
Paul contrasts wages earned by work with righteousness credited to the one who trusts God.
Paul sets a righteousness of his own against a righteousness from God through faith.
No one will be justified by works of the law, for through the law comes knowledge of sin.
Israel sought to establish their own righteousness rather than submit to God's.
Holders rightly stress that Christ made Jew and Gentile one new man.
What is wrong with it
Paul does care about Jew and Gentile together, but he grounds that unity in something deeper: all alike are sinners, and all are justified the same way. In Romans 4 he contrasts working for wages with trusting God who justifies the ungodly, which is about earning, not ethnic badges. In Philippians 3 he renounces "a righteousness of my own" and wants "the righteousness from God." When the New Perspective denies imputation, it removes the very righteousness Paul says believers stand in.
How it undermines the truth
It undermines imputation, and with it the believer's assurance. If justification is chiefly about membership rather than acceptance before God's judgment, the question "How can a guilty sinner be right with a holy God?" is left without a clear answer. Where final justification is tied to the whole life lived, works begin to creep back in as part of the ground of acceptance.
How it can harm a church
Members may be left unsure whether they will be accepted at the last day, since their standing seems to depend on how well they have lived. Preaching can drift from the comfort of Christ's finished work to an emphasis on covenant faithfulness. Where a church is influenced by this view, it is worth asking how its leaders answer the question of imputation directly.
This page describes a teaching, not the faith of any person who holds it.
Where it comes up
Confessions: WCF 11.1; LBCF 1689 11.1
On this site: Gospel & justification
Related terms
ImputationHistoric orthodoxy
God counts, or credits, one person's standing to another, so that our sin was counted to Christ and His righteousness is counted to those who believe.
Justification by faith aloneHistoric orthodoxy
God declares sinners righteous in His sight not because of anything they do, but only because of Christ's righteousness, received through faith alone.
Federal VisionFlagged as a concern
A movement within Reformed churches that ties a person's standing with God closely to baptism and ongoing covenant faithfulness, blurring justification by faith alone.