This excellent book is a development of what David Capes presented in his Old Testament Yahweh Texts in Paul's Christology (1992). He extends his conclusions about Paul's early high christology in the context of a thorough and vigorous engagement with contemporary scholarship. Capes writes with both clarity and a light touch which, on careful reading, disclose depth of scholarship, judicious insight and common sense. This book is readable as well as erudite. Capes’ approach is that ‘if we are to grasp why and what early Christians such as Paul meant when they called Jesus “Lord”, we must engage in a close, contextual reading of Paul's Letters vis-à-vis the Septuagint’ (p. 45). This Capes does admirably.
Chapter 1 is a consideration of the words ‘lord’, ‘Lord’ and ‘LORD’ in English translations of the Bible and the way that the divine name would have appeared in the texts Paul encountered. He concludes that Paul was ‘likely aware that kyrios was the accepted vocalization and/or translation of YHWH in Greek-speaking contexts’ and that ‘he cannot be ignorant of the theological implications of applying the name to the Messiah’ (p. 19).
The next chapter explores kyrios/Lord as a christological title. He traces how Bousset's 1913 work, Kyrios Christos, has been critiqued in the century since its publication. He particularly explores the work of W. D. Davies, Martin Hengel and Larry Hurtado.
Chapter 3 is a careful exploration of Jesus as kyrios in Paul's letters. He observes that, though on a few occasions Paul employs kyrios for human authority figures, pagan gods and the God of Israel, ‘in the vast majority of cases [Paul] employs kyrios in reference to Jesus’ (p. 48) and that ‘the Lord Jesus's relation to the church stands in direct continuity to YHWH's relation to Israel’ (p. 81). He also points out that Paul was not the first to acclaim Jesus as kyrios, and cites pre-Pauline confessions such as Rom 10:9, 1 Cor 12:3 and Phil 2:10–11. For Paul, the resurrection is the basis of Jesus’ lordship, though Paul also speaks of the earthly Jesus as kyrios (as in 1 Cor 11:23–24, for example). This use of kyrios is set in three main, and sometimes overlapping, contexts: ethical, eschatological and liturgical.
The longest chapter is the fourth (65 pages, about one-third of the book) and explores in the undisputed Pauline letters the YHWH texts with God as referent. By ‘YHWH texts’ Capes includes allusions to Old Testament texts as well as direct quotations. Here, Capes follows Richard Hays' method of categorising intertextual references. Capes finds that Paul quotes such texts thirteen times, and about half refer to Christ. Capes analyses Paul's exegetical practice and concludes that when Paul discusses justification, divine wisdom, the fatherhood of God and the relationship of Jews and Gentiles, he customarily uses YHWH texts with God as its referent. In contrast, Paul applies YHWH texts to Christ in passages with a christological focus that refer to the scope of the gospel, eschatological judgment and the Parousia, Jesus’ resurrection, Christian ethics, divine wisdom as ‘Christ crucified’, the Lord's Supper, the role of the Spirit in the life of a believer and Paul's own apostolic authority. Capes concludes (p. 150): ‘Paul is able to identify Jesus with God … through scriptural exegesis, yet he is able to keep him distinct and subordinate to the Father.’
The final substantive chapter of the book explores some of the implications of what it meant for Paul to call Jesus ‘Lord’ and thereby to associate him with the name YHWH. Capes addresses those who think too much is made of Paul's application of the divine name to Jesus, since there are some Jewish texts where OT texts associated with the divine name are applied to another figure. He also criticises the scholarly construct that views Christianity as moving from a ‘low’ christology, such as some see in Paul's letters, to the ‘high’ christology of John's Gospel. In dialogue with Larry Hurtado, James Dunn, Richard Bauckham, N. T. Wright, A. R. Johnson and Richard Hays, he explores how Paul can remain a ‘monotheist’ even though he applies YHWH texts to Jesus as the subject of religious devotion. Capes also looks at the catalysts for Paul's christological uses of YHWH texts and the way that the impact that Jesus made on his followers was a source of conviction that Jesus was the embodiment of Israel's God.
This is a thorough, careful and cogently argued book, well worth reading – and rereading.
