Interesting that you critique others when we make the inference that Paul is talking about works of the Law of Moses, yet you apparently give yourself a pass on this kind of thing when you read Romans 4:2 as having any connection to "good works" - Paul never uses the phrase "good works".
You of all people should know better than making this accusation as I have repeatedly defined the law of God to be expressed in conscience or oral laws or in Mosaic legislation as the expression of God's righteousness and the instructor between "good" and "bad" works. What I have denied is that Paul is arguing against Judiac law in specific as necessary to be justified before God
As per the discussion in other thread, you are making a circular argument,
presuming that the issue here is "good works" vs "bad works" and then finding errors in the views of others based on your unsubstantiated presumption.
It is not a circuluar argument when the very text furnishes you black and white evidence of what kind of works that are being discussed - the kind you can BRAG about IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD. Romans 4:1 explicitly defines this KIND of works to be those "PERTAINING TO THE FLESH" not pertaining to the Judai Law. Romans 4:4 provides a general principle that cannot be restricted to Judaic law. Only a fool would argue that such are "bad" works for boasting in the presence of God. There are only two kinds of works known in scripture - "good" verus "bad." If you have another classification then please give scripture text for it.
Your exposition of Romans 3:27-4:6 is false completely false. You ignore so many contextual truths in order to advance your false doctrine. First, Romans 4:1-2 reverts back to Romans 3:27 and the question "Where is boasting then" as Romans 4:1-2 is given to show that Abraham has no basis for "glorying" before God "PERTAINING TO THE THINGS OF THE FLESH."
Secondly, you completely ignore the contrast in Romans 3:27 that is between TWO opposing contrasting laws. You want to make "the law of works" to be restricted to the Judaic Mosaic law. However, that will not work because Paul has already talked about the Gentiles being condemned under the law of conscience. Hence, "the law of works" must be inclusive of all laws that dictate "good" and "bad" whether by CONSCIENCE or by Tradition or written in stone by God or written on other materials by man and thus anything and everything including "THINGS PERTAINING TO THE FLESH" (Rom. 4:1).
Hence, what Paul excludes in Romans 3:27 are ALL LAWS which dictate what is RIGHT versus what is WRONG as means for justification before God.
In so doing it naturally applies to the Judai Mosaic law that distinguished Gentiles from Jews (Rom. 3:29-30) as well as "THAT WHICH PERTAINETH TO THE FLESH" as grounds for boasting before God - all works without exception but not without distinction.
So now we come to the workman. I trust we all understand that this is a metaphor. As such, it cannot be taken literally in all its details – it is a comparison, like all metaphors. Paul has just finished arguing that Abraham, like any other Jew, cannot claim that God “owes” justification to the Jew, and only the Jew, in virtue of the cultural marker of the Law of Moses. The issue to this point is not “does someone who does good works have a claim on God”, it is “does the Jew – the one who is under the Law of Moses – have a claim on God”.
The workman expects to be paid because he has done something. Fine. What is the parallel to Abraham? The parallel is that Abraham might think he has claim on justification because of ethnic membership in the nation of Israel, marked out by the Law of Moses, not because he has done “good works”. Paul is no doubt spinning in his grave, wondering how people have ignored the flow of the argument and instead impose their own “Paul must be denying justification by good works” scheme onto his text.
The above interpretation is so bizzare and absurd it is really difficult for me to address it seriously. First of all Abraham is not a Jew or an Israelite but a CHALDEAN (Gen. 11:28,31) and so any attempt to reason that Abraham was not justified under Mosaic legislation is stupid as no Jew would argue that Abraham was an ethnic Jew - HE WAS A GENTILE.
Second, you apparently have not looked up the meaning and/or usage of "metaphor." Metaphors use linking verbs ("are, is, was") and make a direct application saying one thing IS another thing. This is no metaphor so your whole basis for your argument vanishes with your eisgesis.
Your whole exposition is flawed with errors, misinterpretations, failure to observe contextual factors and is wrong!
