but they will not encroach on the isolation of the “real” Paul, with his highly individual theology and vocation. Like his own experience on the Damascus Road, this Paul appears on the scene without preparation or precedent. Like the Melchizedek of the Epistle to the Hebrews, he has no father or mother or genealogy. He is, as it were, sovereign over his own discourse. Everything in it—his “view of the law”, his “doctrine of justification”, his “use of scripture”—is, precisely, his. The interpreter