The Ghost of Marcion in Solberg’s God’s Divorce Review - 5 Scholars Respond

Dr. Rob Solberg recently reviewed my book, God’s Divorce: The Bible’s Hidden Love Story. In this panel discussion, Scott Harwell, Jim Pierce, Nathaniel Alexander, and I examine not only his criticisms, but the deeper theological assumptions driving them. One question rises above the rest: Is Solberg reading the Bible through a framework inherited from Marcion—the second-century teacher who separated grace from God’s law, the Church from Israel, and Jesus from the God of the Old Testament? We are not claiming that Solberg consciously follows Marcion. But when God’s commandments are treated as a burden from which believers must be liberated, when Torah is placed in opposition to grace, and when the New Covenant is detached from Israel and Judah, Marcion’s shadow is difficult to ignore. In this discussion, we examine: Whether Sinai was a genuine marriage covenant God’s divorce of the House of Israel in Jeremiah 3 The New Covenant with Israel and Judah Romans 7 and the death of the husband Whether grace abolishes God’s legal standards The artificial division between the “Old Testament God” and Jesus Whether Solberg actually answered the central argument of God’s Divorce This is bigger than one book review. It is about whether modern Christianity has inherited a theology that divorced God’s commands from His grace—and then called that division the gospel. Watch the panel and decide: Did Solberg refute the thesis of God’s Divorce, or did the ghost of Marcion shape his conclusions before the review even began? #GodsDivorce #RobSolberg #Marcion #Torah #NewCovenant #DouglasHamp #Romans7 #Jeremiah31 #HauntedTheology