The New Perspective on Paul

Can someone please explain this ""New Perspective on Paul""? Where did it come from and will it help or hinder Christian interpreters to grasp the apostle's writings more clearly? In The New Perspective on Paul: An Introduction, Kent Yinger provides concise, readable, and authoritative answers to these and other questions currently exercising students of Paul.

""The New Perspective on Paul has, sadly, been more controversial than illuminative of a neglected dimension of Paul's teaching on justification by faith. Professor Yinger most helpfully explains both aspects. . . . [T]his is as good an Introduction to the New Perspective and the related Pauline teaching as you will find.""
--James D. G. Dunn
author of The New Perspective on Paul: Collected Essays

""Kent Yinger has made a complex and often emotive debate about Paul and Justification accessible to a wider audience. This book isn't beating any drum, it's not an apology for the 'New Perspective' thing, nor is it a declaration of war on any party. Rather, this is a map of the key terrain, a list of who is who in the zoo of debate, and a flashlight on several dark alleys of contested interpretations. At the same time, Yinger gives us some good and sensible commentary along the way. If you're lost in the maelstrom of theological polemics and Pauline interpretation, this book is one of the ways to help you get your bearings.""
--Michael F. Bird
Lecturer in Theology and Bible
Crossway College, Brisbane, Australia


""For those who want to know what all the fuss is about and whether and how it matters, this is just the book. Kent Yinger, while thoroughly conversant with the huge amount of discussion generated by the New Perspective on Paul, has the gift of making the key issues accessible to others. Here is a readable, succinct, clear, accurate, and fair-minded introduction to the ongoing debate. For both the academy and the church Yinger provides a much needed perspective on the New Perspective.
--Andrew Lincoln
Portland Professor of New Testament
University of Gloucestershire

""Kent Yinger set out to write a book that offers a fair-minded, easy-to-read explanation of the so-called New Perspective on Paul (NPP), which neither critiques nor defends it. His aim was to navigate between the faddish innovations of some biblical scholars and the deeper insights that come from a better understanding of Scripture. He sought to answer four basic questions regarding NPP: (1) What is it? (2) Where did it come from? (3) What are the potential dangers? and (4) What good is it? After reading this book, I have only one thing to say to Dr. Yinger: Bull's eye!""
--Charles J. Conniry Jr.
Vice President and Dean
George Fox Seminary/George Fox University


Kent L. Yinger is Professor of New Testament at George Fox Evangelical Seminary (George Fox University) in Portland Oregon. He is the author of Paul, Judaism, and Judgment According to Deeds (1999).