The will of God/or mffl»'« cemrf«c< enters into man's experience in the form of Law. In the generic sense, the term is applicable to any authoritative principle of action normally issuing in human obedience (8^, cf. 3^, 1 Co 92>). Such obedience may, however, be the response either to an en- abhng principle working from within (see passages just quoted, and S'*"-)! or to a summons confront- ing man from without. In this, the characteristic sense of »6//os in our Epistle, law is a factor in the moral life fitted to acquaint the intellect with the Divine standard of conduct (7*° and previous context), but incapable (dSwaroi', 8') of bringing the life of man into harmony with its precepts. This result, due to the conaitions of human nature (below, 2) is the more apparent the mon' fixed and definite the form in which law is promulgated. This appears to be the meaning of ' the letter ' [ypiiifui.), in which the full moral rifect of law is seen (7^ cf. 2 Co 3«, 1 Co 15", Ro S" 4" S=» 7', Gal
3""). This was above all true of the one law which had conveyed to man in inexorable fixity and dellniteness the Divine standard of action, the Jewish law, o vbixo^. The denotative force of the definite art. depends upon its context. In most cases, 'the law' in question is the Jewish law ; on the other hand, the anarthrous viiio^ may well be used of the Jewish law, either as a law or as representing the principle of law, or as a quasi- proper name (probably 7', possibly 3^' etc.). See, further, art. Law (in NT). The Christian is ideally free from 'law' as an external principle (6^*), but to be imb x^P^^ ^^ to be ^vvofios Xptorou { 1 Co 9-', cf. Ro 8^, see below, 2 ; on the whole sub- ject, cf. Gittbrd, p. 41 ft.).
In connexion with the doctrine of God, we must, lastlj', note the bearing of the Epistle on the theo- logy of t/>^ Person and Work of Christ. Neither are treated of ex profcsso. But in 1*- ' and 9° we have the contrast between what Christ was, kotA ffdpKa, and His higher nature as Son of God (P) and as actuaUy God (9'). The diliiculty of the former passage is in the exact interpretation of Kara irv^vfia ayi<tjff6injs (see Gifiord and Sanday- Headlam, in loe.). In the latter there is a still more difficult question of punctuation (see the Commentaries, also Ezra Abbot, Critical Essays, and Hort's critical note, in loc). On the whole, the punctuation assumed just above appears distinctly the more probable. The principle, moreover, of T^Xos vd/iov Xpio-ris (10^), and Christ as an object of Faith (1' SoCXos 'Ii/o-. Xp., contrast 1 Co 7^), and 10" which identifies Christ (by the context) with mn', make decisively in the same doctrinal direction. (On 8^ see below, 2).
On the Atonement, 3^- ''* is a classical passage, but it leaves open most of the ditticult questions which attend the theology of that mysterious subject. The reader must consult the admirable excursus of Sanday - Headlam on the subject, Lightfoot's notes, and the discussion of the passage in R. W. Dale, The Atonement. The key to the meaning is to be found in the words IXoffriJpiov . . . iv t<} atfian avTov, rather than in the (vdetin t^s SiitaiocrwTjs aiVoO, which, taken by itself, would hardly compel us to go beyond the thought of punishment as a vindication of God's moral government, which by no means exhausts the significance of the Atone- ment. The doctrine is emphasized, but not ex- plained, in 5^"'".
2. St. Paul's doctrine of man is formulated in OT categories, but enlarged and deepened by his out- look upon life and history, and by his personal experience as a Jew and as a ' slave of Christ ' (Ro 1'). His comprehensive formula for human nature is 'flesh' — 'all flesh' (cf. 1 Co 3' df0puTroi = (ripKivoi). From the time of Theodore of Mopsues- tia to our own day the moral colour of St. Paul's conception of adp^ bas been matter of keen debate. The close relation between flesh and sin in his theology is obvious. But to make the connexion essential, is to mistake the entire meaning of the apostle. In Ro 8' we have the crucial passage. What the law could not do — namely, liberate man from the law of sin — God did by sending His iwn Son, and in Him condemning sin ' in the flesh.' That is, sin was, by the mere fact (ir^/i^as) of the coming of Christ, shown to be a usurper in human nature. This was ellected by the Son of God coming ' in the likeness of sinful flesh ' — iv iiioiw/Mn ffapKit aimprlat. ' Sinful flesh ' is the universal condition in which our common humanity drawt its first breath (5'*). Christ did not enter into this condition, but into its ' likeness.' The «n- likeness certainly did not consist in 'the fle.sh' (1» 9») which Christ took in reality, not in mere likeness. St. Paul could not have written iv ifwiii- liari aapK&s. But neither did he write iv <rapd
ROMANS, EPISTLE TO THE
ROMAN'S, EPISTLE TO THE 303
itrnprias, which he should have done had sin been to him part of the very meaning of ' flesh ' (see Gill'ord's admirable discussion, Iiitrud. p. 52, and in loc). His language expresses with consum- mate accuracy the thought that Christ ' by taking our flesh ma<le it sinless' (TertuU.), and so broke the empire over human natvire usurped by sin. Flesh, in fact, has with St. Paul a phj'sical (adpKiyo^) and a moral {<rapKiK6i) sense. In the former sense, as long as this life lasts we are iy aapKl (Gal 2**), in the ' mortal body ' (Ro 6'= 8"). But ideally the Christian has left the flesh a.s the sphere of his moral life behind (Ro 7' 8"). But in the pre-Chris- tian, and even in the imperfectly Christian life, the ffdpKtvot is inevitably cro/)/«ic6s (Ko 7'*, 1 Co 3'"-). This is carried back by him to a historic beginning in the one sin of one man (5"- "■"), which left human nature under the reign of death and sin. Unque.stionably, actual disobedience is to St. Paul far graver than passive or congenital sin. Before sin becomes a fact of experience, the individual is, comparatively speaking, 'alive' (7*). But guilt in some sense is there already (5"), and rebellion is there, thougli latent and ' dead ' (7*''), and it needs hut the first shock of prohibition to 'revive' (v.'). Under the most favourable conditions of enlighten- ment, with the law of God to guide it, and with complete mental assent to and enthusiasm for (7**, cf. 2") that law, human nature experiences helpless failure and disaster. But, where the higher guidance is absent or lost, man becomes more and more lost to self-respect and moral con- viction (I"-'-). In a sense the heathen is, like the Jew, under law : apart from the ideal sense in which 'the Jewish law was a law for aU men' ;Hort, liomans and Ephexians, p. 25), his reason •ind conscience (2'*), if normal and healthy, tell him what is right. The ' natural virtue ' of Aris- totle is fully recognized by St. Paul, and it is, in fact, this inward moral law that is restored in Christ. But, in fact, the law of conscience con- demned the Gentile as completely as the written law condemned the Jew (3*), and not less so when its voice had ceased to be heard (l*^-'').