The Story of Romans: A Narrative Defense of God's Righteousness

by A. Katherine Grieb

A. Katherine Grieb insightfully traces the argument of Paul's letter to the Romans and shows how it is grounded in the story of God's faithfulness to Israel. She draws together a number of crucial insights: the narrative character of Paul's thought, the apocalyptic message of his gospel, the depth of his engagement with Israel's Scripture, and the practical and political impact of his theology. She demonstrates the letter's relevance today and invites contemporary readers to locate their own stories within Paul's account of God's righteousness. Informed by recent Pauline scholarship, this book will be useful to scholars, students, and pastors.

Genres: Theology, New Testament

176 pages, Paperback

First published September 30, 2002

Reviews

[Whitney Dziurawiec · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ooh. I really liked this commentary. Felt very accessible and plain but theologically rich. I appreciated her constant pushback against the "theological treatise" approach to Romans. I also respected that she just did the work and didn't take much time to "bash" other conclusions or traditions that she would disagree with. A lot of times after I would read sections I would say to myself "I kind of already knew this, but the way she worded it just revitalizes this to me." Highly recommend for anyone studying Romans.

[Gael Browne · Rating 5 out of 5]

A core text in my biblical studies class, this has been well worth a read. Grieb brings some wonderful insight to the text as she works her way through Romans, particularly looking at narrative structure. The addition of the questions at the end of each chapter is brilliant - they’re not ‘throwaway’, but help to weave the text deeply into our own contexts and would make for brilliant Bible study material. However, I would say that it is perhaps more academic than the average church congregation would desire.

[Bill Hooten · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really good book! It breaks down the book of Romans, into sections that are readable and understandable. The approach is that Paul is telling the Romans about the righteousness of God, and does it by telling them in a story/stories that they are familiar with. I believe that this book will be helpful to anyone that plans on teaching, or preaching, Romans.

[Kayla Fletcher · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love that this book is written by an established, female scholar! It was a refreshing read!

[Kat Armstrong · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book! It is short but packed with insight.

[Henry Sturcke · Rating 4 out of 5]

I co-led continuing education courses for ministers in worship and preaching for several years. I was surprised to learn how many colleagues shied away from preaching on the epistles of Paul. Partly this was because even pastors aren’t immune to the generally bad rap Paul has these days, but this only affected a few. The more widespread reason was that narrative preaching had become the fashion. Everyone likes to hear a story, and creating such sermons from gospel accounts or even from the Old Testament seemed easier. Somehow, it seemed hard to do that with epistle texts.
A. Katharine Grieb’s book makes its approach clear in both the title (“Story”) and subtitle (“narrative”). In less than two hundred pages, she interprets Paul’s longest and most complex letter and demonstrates that it is, at heart, a story, “the gospel.” For Paul, the narrative of God reconciling humanity to himself through the man, Jesus, was the story. It became his own story through his experience on the road to Damascus, and he’s convinced it’s also the story of his readers. To recount it involves many sub-stories, including those of Adam, Abraham, and Moses with Israel in the wilderness.
I like how Grieb directs attention away from the usual view of Romans as a theological treatise about justification or faith versus works. Instead, by focusing on the long narrative arc, she can integrate the three chapters Paul devotes to the continuing election of Israel (chapters 9–11), a challenge for many other commentators.
There have been many commentators of Romans: Luther, Calvin, and Barth. One recent standard commentary runs 1250 pages. The vast amount of secondary literature can seem as intimidating as the epistle. Grieb’s book is not meant to displace these, but it would be an excellent place to start. I recommend it particularly to any minister who, week after week, when consulting the texts suggested in the lectionary, avoids the epistle for their sermon text.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author, A. Katherine Grieb, believes that Romans is seen by most readers as both the most important and the most intimidating of the NT letters. This sounds right to me. In an effort to assist readers of Romans in understanding Paul's argument for the righteousness of God and the believer's appropriate response, Grieb has written a book which presents the narrative substructure of Romans by examining the biblical narrative(s) that Paul makes use of in the presentation of his argument. I like this book a lot; a whole lot. For the thoughtful reader of Romans that might otherwise turn to a commentary for help in navigating Paul's argument, I think that this book will prove a ready and helpful alternative. It's brief without cutting corners and to-the-point presentation is clear and compelling and without the often unneeded minutiae of the normal commentary.