Nijay (NKG): When you signed on to write this commentary, what got you excited about studying Romans in this kind of depth?
Gaventa (BRG): I actually became fascinated with Romans in one of my earliest seminary classes. It was my ‘gateway drug’ to NT study. And I had taught it with some regularity before I started work on the commentary. At the time I began work on the commentary, I was carrying with me questions from my students about Paul’s varying comments about sin/Sin and about the way the letter works as a whole (how the pieces “fit” or don’t). Of course, those questions are also major scholarly preoccupations but my students’s voices were ringing in my ears as well.
NKG: What are a few things you better understand now about Romans than before you worked on this commentary?
BRG: First, I understand better the primary role of worship throughout the letter. By that I refer not simply to organized services of worship but to human reverence for God. I think Paul sees it as a presenting problem—revealed by the advent of Jesus Christ. It’s not accidental that the letter body concludes by anticipating the eschatological worship of God shared by Jew and gentile alike.
Second, I see how Paul is moving—or attempting to move—the Romans gatherings, the intricate way in which he introduces ideas, even entices his auditors to agree to them, only to undermine them later on. The most obviousl example comes at the turn from chapter 1 to chapter 2, when the audience is confronted with its own refusal to honor God, but there are numerous others, as when chapter 9–10 invite auditors to conclude that God has rejected Israel only to turn in 11 to challenge gentile hubris.
NKG: What are a few texts in Romans that still perplex you? And what was the hardest section to write about?
BRG: I suppose Romans 13:1–7 is still the hardest. I suspect I spent a year reading, thinking, drafting, redrafting that section. But every section was hard. Each time I “finished” something, I would imagine the next passage would be easier. It never was.
NKG: Who have been the most influential scholars for your understanding of Romans?
BRG: It’s hard to keep this list short. If I look back to my intellectual formation, the names would be W. D. Davies, Ernst Käsemann, J. Louis Martyn, and Paul W. Meyer. In recent decades, I turn most often to John Barclay, Susan Eastman, Peter Lampe, Jonathan Linebaugh, and Ross Wagner.
NKG: Other than commentaries, what are a few books/monographs or key articles on Romans do you think grad/seminary students should read?
BRG: Two essays by Käsemann would top the list, although neither is specifically on Romans. Those are his “On Paul’s Anthropology” and “The Saving Significance of Jesus’ Death in Paul.”
Paul Meyer’s essay on Romans 7, “The Worm at the Core of the Apple.”
Susan Eastman, “Israel and the Mercy of God: A Re-reading of Galatians 6.16 and Romans 9–11.”
Wayne Meeks, “On Trusting an Unpredictable God: A Hermeneutical Meditation on Romans 9–11.”
Jonathan Linebaugh, God, Grace, and Righteousness in Wisdom of Solomon and Paul’s Letter to the Romans.
NKG: What would you say is an urgent message in Romans to help us think about life today in 2024? How can we "hear" this ancient text anew as a word from God for our moment?
BRG: It would be hard to improve on the ending of Romans 8, with its reassurance that nothing in all creation can get between God’s love and God’s creation.
NKG: Check out Gaventa’s work on Romans. FYI: Currently I am doing a review series working through her Romans commentary. If you enjoyed this interview and are interested, follow along!
Gaventa has also written a shorter work called When in Romans.