[778] Rom. 1:17: dunamis theou eis soterian panti to pisteuonti , Ioudaio te [proton]kai Helleni. Other pregnant passages in which Paul summarizes his dogmatics and ethics, are Rom. 1:16, 17:3: 21-26; 4:25; 11:32; 1 Cor. 15:22; Gal. 3:22; Tit. 3:3-7.
[779] Rom. 1:18; 3:20. First the depravity of the heathen, then that of the Jews (2:1, comp. 2:17).
[780] Rom. 1:18-21; 2:14-16; comp. Acts 17:28.
[781] The Augustinian application of this conflict to the regenerate state, involves Rom. 7 in contradiction with Rom. 6 and 8, and obliterates the distinction between the regenerate and the unregenerate state. Augustine understood that chapter better in his earlier years, before the Pelagian controversy drove him to such an extreme view of total depravity as destroys all freedom and responsibility. We see here the difference between an inspired apostle and an enlightened theologian. The chief object of Rom. 7 is to show that the law cannot sanctify any more than it can justify (Rom. 3), and that the legal conflict with the sinful flesh ends in total failure. Paul always uses here nous for the higher principle in man (including reason and conscience); while in Rom. 8, where he speaks of the regenerate man, he uses pneuma, which is the nous sanctified and enlightened by the Holy Spirit. In 8:25 he indeed alludes to the regenerate state by way of anticipation and as an immediate answer to the preceding cry for redemption; but from this expression of thanks he once more points back with ara oun to the previous state of bondage before he enters more fully with ara nun into the state of freedom.
[782] 1 Tim. 1:15; 2:4, 6; Tit. 2:11. Particularistic restrictions of "all" in these passages are arbitrary. The same doctrine is taught 2 Pet. 3:9, and John 3:16; 1 John 2:2. The last passage is as clear as the sun: "Christ is the propitiation (hilasmos) for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world"(ou monon ... alla kai peri holou tou kosmou ).
[783] Rom. 5:12-21; 1 Cor. 15:1, 22. The pantes and the hoi polloi (which is equivalent to pantes and opposed, not to a few, but to the one) in the second clause referring to the second Adam, is as comprehensive and unlimited as in the first clause. The English Version weakens the force of hoi polloi, and limits the number by omitting the article. The pollo mallon (Rom. 5:15, 17) predicated of Christ's saving grace, is not a numerical, nor a logical, but a dynamic plus, indicating a higher degree of efficacy, insomuch as Christ brought far greater blessings than we lost in Adam.
[784] Rom. 11:32; Gal. 8:22. These contain the briefest statement of the sad mystery of the fall cleared up by the blessed mystery of redemption. In the first passage the masculine is used (tous pantas), in the second the neuter (ta panta), and the application is confined to believers (tois pisteuousin).
[785] Rom. 3 -7; Gal. 2 -4; especially Rom. 3:20; 5:20; Gal. 3:24
[786] Rom. 8:3, 32; Phil. 2:6-11; 2 Cor. 8:9. On the Christology of Paul, see the Notes at the end of this section.
[787] Gal. 5:11; 6:12. 1 Cor. 1:23.
[788] 1 Cor. 15:3: "I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures."
[789] Rom. 3:26: eis to einai auton dikaion kai dikaiounta ton ek Christou. Bengel calls this "summum paradoxon evangelicum."
[790] 2 Cor. 5:15: hoti eis uper panton apethanen, ara hoi pantes apethanon. Mark the aorist. The prepositions huper (used of persons) and peri (of things, but also of persons) express the idea of benefit, but often in close connection with the idea of vicariousness (anti). Comp. Gal. 1:4; 3:13; Rom. 4:25; 5:6, etc
[791] Rom. 3:21-26; 5:6-10; 8:32; 1 Cor. 1:17, 18; 2:2; 6:20; 7:23; 11:24; 15:3; 2 Cor. 5:15, 18, 19, 21; Gal. 1:4; 2:11 sqq.; 3:13; 6:14, etc. Comp. Weiss, p. 302; Pfleiderer, p. 7; Baur (N. T. Theol., p. 156). Holsten and Pfleiderer (in his able introduction) regard the atoning death of Christ as the kernel of Paul's theology, and Holsten promises to develop the whole system from thus idea in his new work, Das Evangelium des Paulus, of which the first part appeared in 1880. But they deny the objective character of the revelation at Damascus, and resolve it into a subjective moral struggle and a dialectical process of reflection and reasoning. Luther passed through a similar moral conflict and reached the same conclusion, but on the basis of the Scriptures and with the aid of the divine Spirit.
[792] The passages in which the Holy Spirit is mentioned are very numerous, especially in the Thessalonians, Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, and Ephesians. Comp. Rom. 5:5; 7:6; 8:2, 5, 9, 11, 14, 15, 16, 26; 1 Cor. 2: 4 sqq.; 3:16; 6:11, 17, 19; 12:3-16; 2 Cor. 1:12; 2:7; Gal. 4:6; 5:16, 22, 25; Eph. 1:17; 2:2; 4:23, 30; 5:18; 1 Thess. 1:5, 6; 4:8; 5:19, 23; 2 Thess. 2:2, 8, 13; 2 Tim. 1:7, 14; Tit. 3: 5.
[793] The concluding verse in the second Epistle to the Corinthians; comp. Eph. 2:18, 22; 4:4-6, where God the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit are mentioned as distinct personalities, if we may use this unsatisfactory yet indispensable term.
[794] 1 Cor. 13:13.
[795] Rom. 8:29: "Whom he foreknew (ohus proegno), he also foreordained (proorisen), to be conformed to the image of his Son. "The verb proginosko occurs in the New Test. five times (Rom. 8:29; 11:1, 2; Acts 26:5; 1 Pet. 1:20), the noun prognosis twice (Acts 2:23; 1 Pet. 1:2), always, as in classical Greek, in the sense of previous knowledge (not election). The verb proorizooccurs six times, and means always to foreordain, to determine before. The words eklego and eklegomai, ekloge, eklektos occur much more frequently, mostly with reference to eternal choice or election. See note below.
[796] Eph. 1:4: "Even as he chose us in Christ (exelexato hemas en auto) before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blemish before him in love: having foreordained us unto adoption as sons (proorisas hemas eis huiothesian )through Jesus Christ unto himself, according to the good pleasure of his will."
[797] Phil. 2:12, 13. Comp. Romans 9 with 10.
[798] Rom. 8:30: "Whom he foreordained them he also called (ekalesen): and whom he called them he also justified (edikaiosen), which is also the beginning of sanctification), and whom he justified, them he also glorified (edoxasen)."The proleptic aorist is used for the future to indicate the absolute certainty that God will carry out his gracious design to the glorious consummation.
[799] Rom. 10:14, 15. A chain of abridged syllogisms (sorites) by which Paul reasons back from effect to cause till he reaches the first link in the chain. On the klesis(vocatio) see Rom. 11:29; 1 Cor. 1:26; 7:20; Gal. 1:6; Eph. 1:18; 4:14; Phil. 3:14, etc. The verb kaleo is of very frequent occurrence in the Gospels and Epistles.
[800] Rom. 2:4; 2 Cor 7:9, 10; 2 Tim. 2:25.
[801] Baur (p. 154) distinguished five conceptions of pistis (from peithein): 1st, conviction in general, a theoretical belief or assent. In this sense it does not occur in Paul, but in James 1:17. 2d, conviction of the invisible and supernatural; 2 Cor. 5:7, pistis as distinct from heidos. 3d, religious conviction, 1 Cor. 2:5; 2 Cor. 1:24, etc. 4th, trust in God, Rom. 4:17-21. 5th, trust in Christ, or the specific Christian faith, Rom. 3:22; 1 Cor. 15:14; Gal, 1:23, and always where justifying faith is meant. Weiss (p. 316) defines the Pauline idea of justifying faith as " the very opposite of all the works required by the law; it is no human performance, but, on the contrary, an abandonment of all work of our own, an unconditional reliance on God who justifies, or on Christ as the Mediator of salvation. "But this is only the receptive side of faith, it has an active side as well, pistis is energoumene di agapes. See below.
[802] Rom. 5:1; 8:15-17; Gal. 4:5-7. If we read in Rom. 5:1 (with the oldest authorities) the hortative subjunctive echomen "let us have" (instead of the indicative echomen "we have "), peace is represented as a blessing which we should grasp and fully enjoy--an exhortation well suited for Judaizing and gloomy Christians who groan under legal bondage. On justification see the notes below.
[803] Matt. 5:20; 6:33; 9:22, 29; 17:20; Mark 11:22; 16:16; Luke 5:50; 18:10-14; John 3:16, 17; 6:47, etc.
[804] Comp. Rom. 6:19, 22; 1 Cor. 1:30; 1 Thess. 4:3, 4, 7; 2 Thess. 2:13.
[805] 1 Cor. 18:1, 2. Luther's famous description of faith (in his Preface to Romans), as "a lively, busy, mighty thing that waits not for work, but is ever working, and is as inseparable from love as light is from heat," is in the very spirit of Paul, and a sufficient reply to the slander brought against the doctrine of justification by faith as being antinomian in its tendency.
[806] 1 Thess. 5:23: "The God of peace sanctify you wholly; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved entire, without blame at the coming (parousia)of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he that calleth you, who will also do it." Comp. Romans 6 -8, which treat most fully of sanctification, also Rom. 12 -15, and all the ethical or hortatory portions of his other epistles.
[807] Phil. 2:12, 13. The apostle emphatically uses the same verb, energon and enerphein, while the E. V., with its usual love for variation, renders "worketh" and "to do." Augustin (De dono persev. 33): "Nos ergo volumus, sed Deus in nobis operatur et velle nos ergo operamur, sed Deus in nobis operatur at operari." Phil. 2:13 "supplies at once the stimulus to, and the corrective of the precept in the preceding verse: 'Work, for God works with you;'and 'The good is not yours but God's.'" Lightfoot, in loc. Comp. also Calvin, Alford, and Braune, in loc.
[808] Gal. 2:20. This passage is obscured in the E V. by the omission of ouketi, "no longer," and the insertion of "nevertheless."
[809] Gal. 3:27; Eph. 5:30; 1 Cor. 1:9; 2 Cor. 1:3, 5; 5:17; 13:4; Col. 3:4; Phil. 1:21; Rom. 6:4-8; 14:8; 1 Thess. 5:10. Comp. those numerous passages where Paul uses the significant phrase en Christo, living and moving and acting in Him, as the element of our spiritual existence.
[810] Hence the Heidelberg Catechism, following the order of the Ep. to the Romans, represents Christian life, in the third and last part, under the head: "Thankfulness."
[811] Erasmus justly regarded the conclusion of Rom. 8:31-39 as unsurpassed for genuine eloquence: "Quid unquam Cicero dixit grandiloquentius It is only equalled by the ode on love in 1".
[812] This is the subject of Rom. 9-11. These three chapters contain a theodicy and an outline of the philosophy of church history. They are neither the chief part of Romans (Baur), nor a mere episode or appendix (De Wette), but an essential part of the Epistle in exposition of the concluding clause of the theme, Rom. 1:17 ... "to the Jew first, and also to the Greek" (or Gentile). Romans 9 treats of divine sovereignty; Rom. 10 (which should begin at Rom. 9:30) treats of human responsibility; Rom. 11 of the future solution of this great problem. They must be taken together as a unit. Romans 9 alone may be and has been made to prove Calvinism and even extreme supralapsarianism; Rom. 10 Arminianism; and Rom. 11 Universalism. But Paul is neither a Calvinist nor an Arminian nor a Universalist in the dogmatic sense. See the doctrinal expositions in Lange on Romans, much enlarged in the translation, pp. 327-334.
[813] Rom. 11:32, 33, 86.
[814] 2 Thess. 2:3-12; 1 Cor. 15:28.