The Paradox of Salvation

Abstract

This study refutes the allegation that the author of Luke–Acts showed no systematic thought about the significance of Jesus's death, that is, he has no theologia crucis. Peter Doble focuses sharply on the Gospel's death scene and explores those features which appear in Luke alone, then extends the results into the longer account of Jesus's final days in Jerusalem. In the final section Doble demonstrates how specific words and patterns from Wisdom shape and fill Luke's retelling of the story of Jesus's entrapment, trials and death. Luke wanted his readers to understand that what had happened to Jesus was not a humiliating rejection but in accord with scripture's presentation of God's plan for salvation, and he modelled traditional material about Jesus's road to the crucifixion around an explanatory model which he drew from Wisdom.

Recent Trajectories and Themes in Lukan Soteriology

“…Thus, a translation of ‘innocent’ misses the point and obscures Luke’s soteriological agenda manifest in the crucifixion scene. Peter Doble follows the same trajectory, developing this scheme further in The Paradox of Salvation (1996). Doble, however, focuses on a Christology based exclusively on the suffering righteous one in Wisdom of Solomon and this one’s exaltation to the exclusion of the themes of Jesus as prophet or Isaianic Servant.…”

Difficult texts: the Christology of the Centurion’s words in Luke 23.47

“…He looks at the history of the debate, including Kilpatrick and Hanson's disagreement, 7 and also analyses the other uses of dikaios in Luke. 8 The force of Doble's argument is that it is not that Jesus is 'innocent' -this is a rather thin interpretation. Instead, 'Jesus was obviously .…”

“…a d ijaio1 [dikaios] in that his vindication was Luke's major theme'. 9 In other words, dikaios is a broad and far-reaching term, one that transcends the translation 'innocent'. Jesus was innocent, but that is really not the point.…”