Review of: Scot McKnight. Reading Romans Backwards: A Gospel in Search of Peace in the Midst of the Empire. London: SCM Press, 2019. 236 pp. ISBN 9780334058342

Abstract

The work of the well-known Anglican biblical scholar Scot McKnight, "Reading the Epistle to the Romans Backwards: The Gospel in Search of Peace in the Midst of Empire," is dedicated, as the title suggests, to one of the most extensive and important epistles of St. Paul, which has been the subject of perhaps the most controversial debate among the apostle's letters to the Gentiles over the centuries. McKnight addresses these realities by demonstrating that the Epistle to the Romans is also a church letter. In other words, it was written for specific individuals with the intention of addressing specific issues. Since it is the last chapters of the Epistle to the Romans that tell us the most about its context, McKnight analyzes this letter in reverse order to show the context of St. Paul's statements. In other Epistles of the Apostle to the Gentiles, such as the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, the Epistle to the Galatians, or the Epistle to the Philippians, the most explicit contextual instructions are provided only after a broader theological foundation has been established and the listeners/readers have become familiar with it.