My fascination with Paul began about forty years ago. Even as a schoolboy
I could not help being impressed by Paul's missionary achievements, particularly his extensive travels and his success in establishing Christianity in Europe. In my student days the fascination deepened as I began to appreciate something of Paul the theologian.
The combination of profound theological reflection and sensitive grappling with all too real human problems, of out spoken argument and pastoral insight, "found me" at many points.
As a University teacher I have lectured on Paul and his theology for more than twenty-five years, constantly drawn back to him as I tackled a series of different subjects, the lectures, I hope, becoming steadily richer as I probed more and more aspects of Paul's theology.
The dialogue with Paul's theology became increasingly serious in the mid-70s and early 80s. My work on Jesus and the Spirit (1975), Unity and Diversity in the New Testament (1977), and Christology in the Making (1980) all forced me to encounter Paul's thought at ever deeper levels.
"The new perspective on Paul". introduced by E. P. Sanders in his Paul and Palestinian Judaism (1971) I made a complete rethink necessary and led me through a close study of the Antioch incident (Gal. 2.11-14) in 1980 into a sustained reassessment of Paul's attitude to and relationship with his fellow Jewish Christians and his ancestral religion, which is ongoing.
Preparation for my first major commentary, on Romans (1988), made it necessary to engage fully with Galatians, reflected in my Jesus, Paul and the Law (1990) and the subsequent commentary on Galatians (1993).
And working on my commentary on Colossians and Philemon (1996) likewise increased my detailed familiarity with later Pauline thought.
Briefer treatments of I Corinthians and Ephesians have helped ensure a breadth of detailed knowledge of the Pauline corpus.
All this was repeatedly stimulated by classroom exchanges, postgraduates working on Paul, and sustained in-evolvement with annual seminars at the annual meetings of the Society of have ignored some important aspects or contributions.
Hopefully reviews will highlight any important omissions which can subsequently be remedied.
