Ver. 7. 6 yap ἀποθανὼν κ.τ.λ. Here we have the general principle on which the foregoing argument rests: death annuls all obligations, breaks all ties, cancels all old scores. The difficulty is that by the words ἀπὸ τῆς ἁμαρτίας Paul introduces one particular application of the principle—the one he is concerned with here—as if it were identical with the principle itself. ‘‘ Death clears men of all claims, especially (to come to the case before us) it clears us, who have died with Christ, of the claim of sin, our old master, to rule over us still.””’ Weiss would reject the introduction into this clause of the idea of dying with Christ, on the ground that the words σὺν Χριστῷ bring it in as a new idea in the following verse. But it is no new idea; it is the idea of the whole passage; and unless we bring it in here, the quittance from sin (and not from any obligation in general) remains inexplicable. Weiss, in fact, gives it up.
Ver. 8. The Apostle now resumes his main thought. ovv{ycopev: see note on ἀνάστασις ver. 5: there is no conscious separation ot ethical and transcendent life with Christ—to Paul it is one life.
Ψετ.ο. εἰδότες. .. οὐκέτι ἀποθνήσκει: The new life with Christ will be the same which Christ Himself lives, a life in- accessible to death. The post-resurrec- tion life of Jesus was not His old life over
634
τος αὐτοῦ οὐκ έτι κυριεύει.
ἐφάπαξ -