IS ONCE SAVED FOREVER SAVED? — An academic perspective
By Adesoji Fasanya
Image from illbehonest.com
A catchy title, isn’t it? In Christian circles, the above has been a subject of debate emerging from many bible students, however, this debate goes far back to the birth of the Reformation in about the 16th century.
Martin Luther reading through the epistles of Paul, concluded that salvation/justification is only by faith and this formed the basis for the Reformation movement. This “sola fide” grew and became more solidified in the minds of Protestants as the foundation for justification. As it grew, it was contrasted with the “perception of work/effort” as the channel for justification in the old covenant/Judaism.
John Calvin would come along to write the 5 pillars of Calvinism and “eternal preservation” would become a thing; which posits that once a believer is saved, he is forever preserved and cannot lose his salvation. But the question is what if justification in Judaism was not based on works? What if the Torah teaches salvation based on grace and does not work as the 16th-century polemics taught?
I must be clear that I do not think of myself as a better Bible Scholar than the likes of Martin Luther, John Calvin, and so on. But there are loads of Bible Scholars who posit that nature and evidence of grace in Judaism. People like Nicholas Thomas Wright believed that Abraham was called and chosen by grace through faith and it was not because of works. That much is clear from Genesis 12, Deuteronomy 32:8–10. For N.T. Wright, “Faith is the indication of covenant membership”, this means faith is a response to belonging to the covenant. So, Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him as righteousness (Genesis 15:6) because he was first elected by grace.
Since this premise is firmly established and Paul is a scholar of the Torah, it follows that he couldn’t have been re-inventing a strange perception of Judaism and the Torah. At the core of the Reformation’s theology is Paul’s theology on grace versus work.
EP Sanders in his work ‘Paul and Palestinian Judaism’ (1977)introduced a New Perspective on Paul which began to amplify a new view of Paul’s theology and mindset. One important point credited to EP Sanders’s work is that at the birth of Christianity, Judaism was not a legalistic religion of self-salvation by works. (Gieniusz, 2001). The belief that Paul’s theology on positing grace against Judaism, because he thought Judaism was a religion of merit, is simply anachronistic. Some pseudepigraphical writings in the second Temple Jewish period attest to this. Below are two portions taken from the Martinez, The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated.
“As for me, if I stumble, the mercies of God shall be my salvation always; and if I fall in the sin of the flesh…, he will judge me in the justice of his truth, and in his plentiful goodness always atone for all my sins; in his justice, he will cleanse me from the uncleanness of the human being and from the sin of the sons of man.” (1QS 11:12,14)
“I give you thanks, Lord because you have taught me your truth, you have made me know your wonderful mysteries, your kindness with sinful men, your bountiful compassion with the depraved of heart”. (1QH 15:26–27).
The above writings show that Judaism of the first century was not a legalistic religion and if the Judaism in Paul’s day was founded on grace, what then was Paul addressing in his epistles? James Dunn asked and answered that it was the Pharisaic believers in Christ who taught that Gentile believers must become proselytes, obeying the Jewish customs of circumcision, kosher diet, and Sabbath day observance (Dunn, 2008). Dunn’s Paul taught that justification was by grace through faith alone and not by works of circumcision and so on. Dunn explains that these tripartite customs of the Jews were more of an identity marker amongst other Gentile nations and were what made the Jews part of the people of God. He then cast Paul as a polemic who exalted faith in Jesus Christ as the only prerequisite for identifying the people of God. In Dunn’s mind, Paul was not reducing Judaism to a legalistic religion, he was making a case for God’s people as people of faith and not limited to those of Jewish stalk.
Scholars like Gabriele Boccaccini, Mark Nanos, Eli Lizorkin-Eyzenberg, and others have posited that Paul should be called a Jew or a Jewish thinker since he didn’t renounce the religion of his ancestors. Paul remained a Jew and participated in several Jewish feasts. The theology of the early apostles which is also the soteriological perspective of the Torah is better described as “Covenantal Nomism”.
According to Sanders, Covenantal nomism is the view that one’s place in God’s plan is established based on the covenant and that the covenant requires as the proper response of man, his obedience to its commandments while providing means of atonement for transgression. The divine covenant is stressed as primary. God’s election of grace is required for getting into the covenant while obedience on man’s part is needed to stay in the covenant (Kent Yinger). Obedience to the Law was therefore a prerequisite for staying in the covenant (Deuteronomy 28:63–64). Sanders summarized covenantal nomism as follows;
- God has chosen Israel
- And God has given the law
- The law implies both God’s promise to maintain the election and
- The requirement of obedience
- God rewards obedience and punishes transgression
- The law provides means for atonement and atonement results in
- Maintenance or re-establishment of the covenantal relationship.
The above therefore casts the law as “not burdensome” (1 John 5:3) as opposed to the law as a burden- one that can’t be kept in its entirety. The Law is therefore a keeper. Obedience to the law becomes a response to the gift of the covenant and not a means to receive the covenant. The circumcision then becomes a sign of the covenant (Genesis 17:11).
One theological implication of this perspective on Paul is that it establishes the role of grace and faith as the means to salvation in both testaments, thereby unifying them both as opposed to the dichotomy of faith and work. It also begins to show the efficacy of the sacrifice of Christ. While the atonement in the old covenant is limited (as expounded by the writer of Hebrews), it elevates the atonement provided by Christ since Christ is the image of God. We also have an example of perfect obedience in Christ to whom we can pattern our obedience and remain in covenant.
However, it begins to reorient the position of Calvinism on “eternal preservation”. While this New Perspective on Paul elevates grace and faith, it also points to the role of obedience in remaining in the covenant. It goes to say that disobedience to the covenant terms would mean to be removed from the covenant.
Michael Heiser in his “Notes on Leviticus” underscored the presence of atonement for ritual impurity but the absence thereof for moral impurity. People like Achan who defiled the people of God were ‘killed’ as such a defiant act had no atonement plan. On the other hand, we had people like Caleb (Numbers 32:12, Genesis 15:18–21), Rehab, Naomi, and others who were not part of the ‘commonwealth of Israel’ but were drafted in by faith and remained in by obedience to the covenant. This is why Paul could say that the matter of being a Jew (drafted into the People of God) was not by bearing a social marker (circumcision) on your body but by truly believing in Jesus Christ (Romans 2:28–29).
To therefore answer the question of ‘is once saved forever saved’, we must read the writings of the New Testament authors against the backdrop of covenantal nomism. This is why Hebrews could teach that although the children of Israel entered the promised land, there remains a rest to be entered. It is the rest of faith. God’s people can only enter into this rest by faith (Hebrews 4:8–11).
I will drop by pen by saying; “Once saved should be forever saved”, this is because with the requirement of obedience comes the grace for obedience (John 1:16, Romans 1:5) but “once saved is not forever saved” because the one to whom grace has been given can choose to despise it (Galatians 2:21, 1 Peter 5:12).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Theological Implications of the New Perspective on Paul by Marcin Walczak (2023)
Identity Markers by Gieniusz Andrzej (2001)
Paul the Jew: Rereading the Apostle as a Figure of Second Temple Judaism by Boccaccini Gabriele (2016)
The Theology of the Apostle Paul by Dunn G James (1998)
The New Perspective on Paul by Dunn G James (2008)
The New Perspective on Paul — An Introduction by Kent L Yinger (2011).
Paul and Palestinian Judaism by EP Sanders (1977)
The climax of the covenant: Christ and the Law in Pauline Theology by NT Wright (1993).
Martinez The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated (1996)
What does St. Paul have to do with the Shema by Eli Lizorkin-Eyzenberg (2021)
Notes on Leviticus by Michael Heiser (2017).
