The Pulpit Commentary — Romans — Section 159

or glorious hope, of joy in God. 'l'he apostle in the present section expounds the relation in which mankind stands to the two grel\t representatives, A.dBm and Christ. We CRI1not do better than com1ider these two roprcsontl\tives in the order named, and bow they are related to the race. I. Tm:_ Fms! ADAM AS REPRESEl>'"TATIVE OJ.I'_ 'l'1IE RAOE. Now, the Bpostle distinctly declares m this p&..-.sage that death entered into our world through one man's sin. The one man in his sin must, therefore, have been acting for the race; and it is for us to get a clear view of his representative position. Now, the usual mistake made in this subjeot is in supposing that representatives· must be voluntarily selected by those they represent. This is not always the case. A representative may occupy his position of wecessity. This was t-he ca.."8 with our first pa.rent. The human race is not made up of a number of independent un.its, but of a series of dependent generations. Conse- quently, as first parent, Adam was in the very nature of the case representative of the race. "The unrea.«oning :flippancy," says an able writer, "with which some object to their responsibility for the act of Adam, because they had no part in choosing him as their representative, shows singular want of thought and of discriminating observation of the settled order of God's providence. It is evident that when God himself directly institutes a social organization, he always appoints, either by special act or by an invariable natural order, the ruling and representative head . . . . The unity of the human race is his own immediate institution, and be appointed Adam its ancestor to be its representative and federal head. And in this case also he rendered an elective appointment by man impossible, by the constitution which brought man into being in successive generations. Not having from the beginning contemporaneous existence, consenta.neous action was impossible. Their unity, therefore, was made to depend upon a common head and upon his representative action. . . . The constitution of nature and the course of providence render it a matter of social justice that one generation sh.a.l.1 bind the succeeding, however remote, for good or evil. All legislation and all government proceeds upon this principle, and cannot avoid it. The evil entailed upon the race has come upon us by the selfsame principle, and its repudiation is impossible without the violation of the moral order upon which the stability of society depends. Our responsible relation to the first sin of Adam in no way depends upon our consent to his appointment-as our covenant bead, any more than our responsible relation to the D&tional debt of Great Britain is affected by the fact that it was contracted without our personal consent, and before we were born." 1 It will be found also that Adam's parental authority carries with it the idea of kingship; he was in a regal as well as representative position; be had dominion not only over the creatures, but also over his own post.erity. His acts were consequently of a regal and representative character, Carrying these necesrary principles with us, we can see how his sin in eating the for- bidden fni,it W(]Jl II representative act. In this the race was represented, by it the race was bound; he was actini: in his representative capacity, and there is no good gained by repudiating it. But, further, we can understand in some measure how a sin like Adam's affected his constitution, so that he became with his wife tainted, and so trans- mitkd the sin to succeeding generations. The death of infants is the positive proof that the race has been treated as a.n organic unity, and that the taint of ein has been transmitt.t:d by ordinary generation. The whole subject of "heredity," as now scier,tifically treated., bears upon this relation of Adam to his posterity. It is evident that the generations have been linked ea.eh to each. Representative responsibility has been in operation from the first. Instead of quarrelling with the arrangement, our duty ia to recognize it, and to see how out of the same principle we may receive bl-ing u a glorious set-off to the curse which has been transmitted to us. IL THE sWOND A.DAM .A8 REPBESENTATIVJ~ OF THE JUSTIFIED. We have seon how the first Adam was COWltituted the representative of the race, and by his sin involved tbe whole race in tre,pase and condemnation. Death passed unto all men, for that all i11 him have eim-.ed. But now the apoBtle showa ue the glorious set-off to this inheritance of guilt and death. God has given a new Representative to the raoe, even .TesW! Chriat his Son. By bis obedience the representative principle ie transmuted into an organ of 6,ra.ce ir,st<:ad of an organ of condemnation. But let us carefully note tltu i.ature of t1e relati,,n S<,t up between us and Christ. And here let u1 observe: 1. ' C!. Wallace'•• Ilepreaentative Re1ponlibility,' pp. 40-42. clt. \It, 1-23.] 'fHE EPISTLE O:F PAUL TO TRE ROMANS.