Just as Abraham ‘believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness’, so, you see, those who believe are the descendants of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, declared the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, ‘All the Gentiles shall be blessed in you.’ For this reason, those who believe are blessed with Abraham who believed. (Galatians 3: 7-9)

Belief preceded the law. The gospel of Jesus is the same gospel given to Abraham. The spiritual foundation of the law is this same gospel. Spiritual insight is available to all. Spiritual insight is superior to legalistic discipline.

This is, it seems to me, a reasonable argument. Further, I am predisposed to accept the primacy of spiritual insight and to be suspicious of religious legalism. Whether this is spiritual insight or the legacy of being raised in churches descended from Paul's teaching is less clear.

But the way Paul constructs his argument is off-putting to me. It seems to me legalistic in its insistence on one angle and dismissal of another. In the Gospel according to Matthew Jesus says, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished." (Matthew 5: 17-18).

Fulfilling the law may well be different than ritual observance - or circumcision - but I do not hear or see in Jesus a dismissal of the law.

The greatest challenge of this study is a sense that Paul is so preoccupied by what we might call the "Sermon at Golgotha" that he ignores - or is unaware - of the Sermon on the Mount or most of what Jesus taught.

The passion, crucifixion, and resurrection of Jesus is the crucial climax of redemption. But I sometimes feel Paul has come into the play at the end of the second act. He is transfixed by the climax, but - because he missed what led up to the climax - he has a rather limited take on the meaning of the climax.

It is difficult for me - and I need to exercise considerable discipline - to hear the spiritual insight of Paul that can be obscured by his rhetorical approach.

Above is the Conversion of St. Paul by Caravaggio.