on account of the righteousness we are justified. The expression " the sentence was by one offence" teaches as clearly the mode of condemna- tion, as the mode of justification is taught by saying " it is not by works," but " by the righteousness of Christ." 2. This interpretation is not only the simple and natural meaning of the words, but is rendered ne- cessary by the context. We have in this verse the idea of pardon on the one hand, and condemnation on the other. If the lattei clause means, as is admitted, that we are pardoned for many offences, the former must mean we are condemned for one. 3. The whole force of the con- trast lies in this very idea. The antithesis in this verse is between the one offence and the many offences. To make Paul say that the offence of Adam was the means of involving us in a multitude of crimes, from all of which Christ saves us, is to make the evil and tne benefit exactly equal. ' Adam leads us into offences from which Christ delivers us.' Here is no contrast and no superiority. Paul, howevei, evidently means to assert that the evil, from which Christ saves us, is far greater than that which Adam has brought upon us. According to the natural inter- pretation of the verse this idea is retained ; ' Adam brought upon us the condemnation of one offence ; Christ saves us from that of many.'' 4. Add to these considerations the obvious meaning of the corresponding clauses in the other verses, especially in v. 19, and the design of the apostle so often referred to, and it seems scarcely possible to resist the evidence in favour of this view of the passage.*
The free gift is of many offences unto justification, that is, the free gift is justification. The construction of this clause is the same as that of the preceding one, and is to be explained in the same way. As, how- ever, the logical relation of a sentence to an offence is not the same as that of pardon to transgressions, the preposition {Ik) cannot express pre- cisely the same idea here as in the foregoing clause. Though it is pro- per to say we are condemned on account of our offences, we cannot say we are pardoned or justified on account of them in precisely the same sense. Our translators render the word, therefore, in the first instance hy, and in the second of. The sentiment of the verse then is, ' While, on account of Adam, we suffer the sentence of condemnation pronounced on one sin, we are freed through Christ from the condemnation of many.'
(17) For if by one man's offence death reigned by one,- much more, &c. It is doubtful whether this verse is a mere amplification of the idea of v. 15, which, in import and structure, it so much resembles; or whether the stress is to be laid on the last clause, reigning in life,- so that the point of the difference between Adam and Christ, as here indicated, is, Christ not only delivers from death, but bestows eternal life ; or, finally, whether the emphasis is to be laid on the word receive. The
* This interpretation is given not only by the older and stricter Calvinistics, but by Arminians, Pelagians, Rationalists, and the great body of philological com- mentators.