615 - But as For Me: The Question of Election for God's People Today

But as For Me: The Question of Election for God's People Today
Andre Lacocque
Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1979. 191 pp. $13.00.

This is essentially a book about Jewish-Christian relations written primarily from a biblical perspective by an Old Testament scholar who has spent many years in dialogue with the Jewish community. Using a selfconsciously phenomenological approach, Lacocque defines Israel as "the name of the human commitment to God." He bases much of his thought on an exposition of Exodus 19:4-6, insisting that Israel's mission has always been distinctively priestly and universalistic. Another peculiar mark of Israel (both Jewish and Christian) is that it "reveals victory in defeat, triumph in failure," which is what it means to be a "Messianic people." Turning to the New Testament, Lacocque suggests the Paul's negative evaluation of the "law" was directed against its misinterpretation in his own day, and that the New Testament in no way tries to replace an "old Israel" with a "new Israel." Much of the rest of the book argues that the Jewish-Christian relationship should be much like that between man and woman in marriage: a "communion between 'I and Thou' " in which the differences are catalytic rather than opposing or synthesized.

One can only praise the irenic intentions of this book, combined with an often passionate but honest wrestling with the issues. However, the arguments are often flawed by questionable exegesis; the phenomenological approach is not wholly adequate (convenant is ubiquitously construed in terms of love, marriage, and sexuality); and the frequent juxtaposition of Auschwitz as "meaningful and creative" death alongside that of the death of Christ raises a host of very difficult theological problems.

Thomas W. Mann
Princeton Theological Seminary
Princeton, N.J.