Paul’s usage of this term is not based, like that of sperit and jiesh, on the Septuagint, though the word occurs six times as the rendering of lebh heart, and once of ruach spirit.
He uses it to throw into sharper relief the function of rejlect- ive intelligence and moral judgment which is expressed gener- ally by xapdia heart.
The key to its Pauline usage is furnished by the contrast in 1 Cor. xiv. 14-19, between speaking with a tongue and with the understanding (r@ voi), and between the spirit and the un- derstanding (ver. 14). There it is the faculty of reflective in- telligence which receives and is wrought upon by the Spirit. It
* So those who refer the section to the regenerate.
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is associated with yvaun opinion, resulting from its exercise, in 1 Cor. i. 10; and with xpiver judgeth in Rom. xiv. 5.
Paul uses it mainly with an ethical reference—moral judg- ment as related to action. See Rom. xii. 2, where the renewing of the vods mind is urged as a necessary preliminary to a right moral judgment (“that ye may prove,” ete.). The vods which does not exercise this judgment is addxeuos not approved, repro- bate. See note on reprobate, i. 28, and compare on 2 Tim. iii. 8; Tit. i. 15, where the vods is associated with the conscience. See also on Eph. iv. 28.
It stands related to rvedya spirit, as the faculty to the efficient power. It is “the faculty of moral judgment which perceives and approves what is good, but has not the power of practically controlling the life in conformity with its theoretical require- ments.” In the portrayal of the struggle in this chapter there is no reference to the mvedyua spirit, which, on the other hand, distinctively characterizes the christian state in ch. viii. In this chapter Paul employs only terms pertaining to the natural, faculties of the human mind, and of these vods mind is in the foreground.
Bringing into captivity (aiyyadwritovra). Only here, 2 Cor. x. 5, and Luke xxi. 24. See on captives, Luke iv.18. The warlike figure is maintained. Lit., making me prisoner of war.
Law of sin. The régime of the sin-principle. Sin is repre- sented in the New Testament as an organized economy. See Eph. vi.
The conflict between the worse and the better principle in human nature appears in numerous passages in the classics. Godet remarks that this is the passage in all Paul’s epistles which presents the most points of contact with profane litera- ture. Thus Ovid: “ Desire counsels me in one direction, rea- son in another.” “JT see and approve the better, but I foliow the worse.” Epictetus: “He who sins does not what he would, and does what he would not.” Seneca: “What, then, is it that, when we would go in one direction, drags us in the other?” See also the passage in Plato (‘‘ Phaedrus,” 246), in which the
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human soul is represented as a chariot drawn by two horses, one drawing up and the other down.
24. Wretched (radaimwpos). Originally, wretched through the exhaustion of hard labor.
Who (ris). Referring to a personal deliverer.
Body of this death (10d capatos Tod Savdérou Tovrov). The body serving as the seat of the death into which the soul is sunk through the power of sin. The body is the literal body, regarded as the principal instrument which sin uses to enslave and destroy the soul. In explaining this much-disputed phrase, it must be noted: 1. That Paul associates the dominion and energy of sin prominently with the body, though not as if sin were inherent in and inseparable from the body. 2. That he represents the service of sin through the body as associated with, identified with, tending to, resulting in, death. And therefore, 3. That he may properly speak of the literal body as a body of death—this death, which is the certain issue of the abject captivity to sin. 4. That Paul is not expressing a desire to escape from the body, and therefore for death. Meyer para- phrases correctly: “ Who shall deliver me out of bondage un- der the law of sin into moral freedom, in which my body shall no longer serve as the seat of this shameful death ?” Ignatius, in his letter to the Smyrnaeans, speaks of one who denies Christ’s humanity, as vexpodépos one who carries a Corpse.