Notes Along the Way TF6 -- A Dunn Deal

continued from the previous post
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1. I mentioned my college honor's project on holiness. I mentioned the independent study I did with Dr. Bauer on Hebrews. Since my fleece had turned toward teaching, my eyes were now set on where I might do my doctoral work.

My first year as Teaching Fellow, I presented an academic paper to a few people at Asbury. The title wasn't very clear: "Hebrews and the Rest of God." My friends were curious where the rest of God might be. Apparently it must be hiding in Hebrews.

That probably would have been a much more entertaining paper to listen to. I forget which friend it was who said they didn't understand a word I said. I would go on to present it at a regional SBL in Atlanta that spring, I think 1991. 

It felt like a cattle trough. I went up. I read. I came down. Quite underwhelming. I hadn't really left any time for questions -- partially by intent. I threw in a couple German and Hebrew sentences to show I was scholar material. You know, fake it till you make it.

2. Bauer and Dongell had gone to Union Seminary. I wasn't too interested, but I considered it. Paul Achtemeier would have been the person to study with, since he was Paul and the more epistolary part of the New Testament. But as it turned out, he was retiring anyway.

I looked at Notre Dame, but I pulled a classic Ken move. Since their materials said the degree was in theology, I concluded that they didn't have a doctoral program in New Testament. That was before the internet, but I didn't ask anyone either. Even more significant was the fact that Harold Attridge decided to go to Yale.

It seems like I sent a letter to Richard Hays at Duke, but I don't think he was interested in supervising any dissertations on Hebrews at that time. (or maybe it was me)

3. I sent a letter to James Dunn at Durham. If I couldn't go to the Durham in the US, what about the one in England? I think I have mentioned that his Baptism in the Holy Spirit had come to me by way of Bob Lyon, and it had influenced my understanding of Acts fairly significantly. 

So I sent a letter. I mentioned that Baptism had been formative for me. I might have also picked up a copy of his new Parting of the Ways at Joseph Beth. In it, he suggests that perhaps Hebrews combines a Platonic cosmology with a Jewish eschatology. It seemed a kind of extension of Barrett's thesis. That was the angle I suggested I might explore. [1]

He was receptive.

He was a great advocate to have. By the time it was all done, I received an Overseas Research Scholarship (ORS) that brought my tuition down to British cost. He connected me with St. John's College, where I served as Residential Tutor (and fire alarm runner). That gave me free room and board when the dining hall was open. I taught Greek to university students, which gave me a little spending money as well.

As it turns out, if I had not gotten the ORS, teaching Greek would have granted me free tuition. That's quite annoying. It took me 20 years to pay off my loan debt for something that would have been free. Funny how no one mentioned that to me.

4. Dunn was invited to speak at Asbury Seminary during my final year in Wilmore, and I was invited to the dinner. The Q & A after his presentation was probably fairly typical. I remember one fellow being clearly disturbed by it. I don't remember what it was on, but I can imagine a couple areas where he might have been less than orthodox. My guess is that he made more room for a non-Christian Jew to be right with God than would be orthodox.

Dunn inhabited a curious space. He was frequently sought out to speak at evangelical institutions, even ETS. And yet he wasn't fully orthodox in those circles. He told me he didn't look at what he was signing when he signed the inerrancy statement to speak at ETS. He had come from a fairly evangelical Scottish background, I would say. Then he had done his doctoral work at Cambridge under Charlie Moule, I believe.

What I liked about him is that he was really interested in what was true. That doesn't mean he was always right. Not at all. But I loved his method. He really tried to let the chips fall where they would. He rigorously wanted to come to the most likely conclusion given the evidence and sound reason.

At that dinner, Joe Dongell sat next to him. Being a bit mischievious, Joe asked, "So, are there any positions you've taken over the years that you regret? Like, maybe your interpretation of Romans 7?"

Leave it to Joe. In Dunn's two volume Word commentary on Romans, he took what was at the time a traditional view of Romans 7 -- that it is a believer struggling with Sin. Of course, that was about the time that a pivot took place. A strong majority of Romans scholars today -- the consensus in fact -- believe that Romans 7 is a dramatization of a person who wants to keep the Law but doesn't have the Spirit to be able to do so.

But Paul goes on in Romans 8 (as he anticipated in Romans 6 and the beginning of 7) to talk about victory over the power of Sin through the Holy Spirit. The consensus interpretation, by the way, fits very well with Wesleyan theology. In that regard, Dunn's commentary was almost out of date on Romans 7 when it came off the press.

But his response to Joe was unsurprising. "No, I feel very comfortable with my conclusions on Romans 7."

5. I remember also having a side conversation with Joe at that dinner. (He was the beloved disciple next to Dunn. I was Peter having to ask him to ask Dunn questions.) I asked Joe about Matthew 24:34: "Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all is fulfilled." The context clearly indicates that the conversation is about the second temple, the one destroyed in AD70.

But the second coming has not happened yet -- not if it is the literal return of Jesus. I have yet to hear a completely satisfying answer to this conundrum. The best I have had to offer is that the near and the far sometimes blur when you are looking at them in a line of sight.

Joe did offer an answer. He suggested that there is a clear break in referent at 24:29. The first half of the chapter is about AD70. The second half about the second coming. I didn't find it completely satisfying. Bill Patrick and I sometimes mused about Joe's confidence. Things were increasingly complicated to us.

[1] I can't remember if it was purely providential or great luck that he had taken a similar position in Partings to Barrett. Did I realize the overlap or was it completely unintentional?

Sermon Starters: What's up with Romans 7?

Context: This wasn't really a sermon but an evening presentation of sorts as part of the B. H. and Dorothy Phaup Holiness Emphasis Series at Southern Wesleyan University. In the morning I preached a sermon. This was the evening "lecture" in the new Nicholson-Mitchell Building, which used to be the College church.

What's up with Romans 7?
1. The infamous verses (Romans 7:14-25)
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"The Law is spiritual, but I am made of flesh, sold under Sin. I don’t know what I’m doing! I do things I don’t want to do, but what I hate I do! And if I’m doing what I don’t want to do, I [at least] agree that the Law is good. But now I am no longer doing [these things I don’t want to do] but Sin, which is living inside me.

"For I know that good does not live in me—that is in my flesh. For wanting [to do the good] exists in me but doing [the good] does not. For I don’t do the good I want to do but the bad I don’t want to do I do. And if I am doing what I don’t want to do, I am no longer the one doing it but Sin which lives in me.

"I find the rule then for me—the person who wants to do the good—that the bad is what’s present in me. For I delight in the Law in my inner person. But I see a different “law” in my body parts, a law that opposes the Law in my mind and enslaves me with the law of Sin that is in my body parts.

"I am a wretched man! Who will rescue me from this body of death? … Therefore, I myself with my mind serve the Law of God, but with my flesh the Law of Sin."
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Notice I intentionally left out a piece--it's the most important piece, IMO. We read these verses in isolation and their meaning seems obvious to us--we just can't help but be spiritual losers. This meaning resonates so much with American Christianity that it seems inconceivable that they would have any other meaning.

But I'm going to try to convince you tonight that this is exactly the opposite of what Paul was saying!

2. The situational context of Romans

• Romans was written at the end of Paul's third missionary journey from Corinth, right before he went to Jerusalem and was arrested. Here's a conversation he would have with James, Jesus' brother, right after that:

“You see, brother, how many thousands of believers there are among the Jews, and they are all zealous for the law. They have been told about you that you teach all the Jews living among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, and that you tell them not to circumcise their children or observe the customs” (Acts 21:20-21, NRSV)

• What we see here is that Paul had a bad reputation among the Christians in Jerusalem. His reputation was that he was teaching Jews to stop keeping the Law.
• In Romans 3, he addresses this reputation. He effectively denies that he is against the Law.

“If through my falsehood God’s truthfulness abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? And why not say (as some people slander us by saying that we say), ‘Let us do evil so that good may come’? Their condemnation is deserved!”

• Paul denies being "pro-sin." He doesn't teach, "Sin boldly that grace may come."
• I remember a Rugby lad in my time in England with juvenile diabetes. On Friday nights he would give himself a huge shot of insulin and then go drink himself into oblivion.
• Paul denies that he has this approach to sin--take a Jesus shot and then go sin all you want.
• In several of his letters (1 Corinthians, Galatians) Paul walks a fine line. On the one hand, we are free in the Lord (Augustine's, "Love God and do what you want"). But if we want to use our freedom to sin, we probably aren't quite in the Lord. Don't use your freedom as an opportunity to sin (Gal. 5:13).
• So Paul actually affirms that the Law is good:

“Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold law.” (Romans 3:31)

3. The literary context: Romans 6-7

• So let's look at how Paul is actually arguing that he is against sin in the life of believer in the broader context of Romans 6-8.

“What then are we to say? Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.” (6:1-4)

• Paul does not support sinning. Those in Christ should walk in newness of life.

“Therefore, do not let sin be the boss over your mortal bodies, to make you obey its passions. Stop presenting your body parts to sin as weapons of wickedness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and present your body parts to God as instruments of righteousness.” (6:12-13)

“What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?” (6:15-16)

“But thanks be to God that you, having once been slaves of sin, have become obedient from the heart to the form of teaching to which you were entrusted, 18 and that you, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.” (6:17-18)

That phrase, "thanks be to God" is in the part I omitted from Romans 7:

“Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God! Through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (7:24-25) It suggests that Paul sees a believer moving beyond being slaves to sin by the power of Jesus Christ.

4. A series of contrasts
This "used to be but now is not) pattern appears over and over in Romans 6-7:

• “Just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness for sanctification.” 6:19
• “When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness… But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life.” (6:20, 22)
• “While we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are discharged from the law, dead to that which held us captive, so that we are slaves not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit.” (7:5-6)

5. Returning to 7:14-25

• Paul is dramatizing the person who wants to keep the Law but cannot because they are in the flesh. They do not have the Spirit. This person repeatedly fails.
• The present tense is thus a vivid way of talking about this state, when one is a slave to Sin.
• The dramatic portrayal climaxes with, "I am a wretched man!" Who will rescue me from this flesh? The answer comes immediately, "Thanks be to God! Through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

6. The person with the Spirit then continues in Romans 8
“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do… so that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

What does this look like?

• Love your neighbor as yourself!
• “The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.” (Romans 13:9-10)
• Paul hinted at this person in 2:14-15: "When Gentiles, who do not possess the law by nature, do what the law requires, these, though not having the law, are a law in themselves. They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts."
• I believe Paul is referring to Gentile Christians who, by the power of the Spirit, love their neighbors as themselves.

8. Concentrated Romans (7:1-8:39)

The last in the series.

Romans 7:1-8:39
A. The function of the Jewish Law (7:1-25)

• 7:1-25. Romans 6 has addressed the question of sin. If we are not deemed right with God initially on the basis of our own righteousness, "Should we continue in sin that grace may abound?" Paul gives a resounding "no" to this question. 
• Romans 7 then pursues the related question, "If we are not judged by the Jewish Law, what then was the purpose of the Law in the first place?"
• 7:1-6. The reasoning of Paul in relation to the Law is difficult for us. It is not the way we think. Paul is not merely saying that I am no longer judged by the Law's standards. He is suggesting that Sin had power over a Jew somehow through the Law. The Jewish Law was a catalyst of Sin's power for a Jew or a Gentile for that matter.
• He seems to be thinking about the core of the Jewish Law again here, as in Romans 2. This is the core that a Gentile or a Jew could keep in theory, which we find out in 13:8-10 is loving your neighbor as yourself.
• 7:1-3. A wife is married to her husband as long as he is alive. If he dies, she can remarry. If Paul had been married and she left him when he believed on Christ, there could be a personal flashback here. In Palestine, it may not have been possible for a wife to divorce her husband, only to leave him. If so, that would make this illustration more effective than a husband being bound to a wife, at least to "those who know the Law" (7:1).
• 7:4-6. So believers have died to the Law. Now we can marry Christ. We have died with Christ, as Paul said in 6:3-5 (cf. Gal. 2:20). We can rise with Christ to a new life that is not under the Law. Paul means that we can rise to bear fruit of righteousness in our life.
• 7:5-6. Here we get another version of the "used to"/"but now." We saw this claim in 6:17-18, 6:19, and 6:20, 22. Paul's meaning there seems clear. You used to be slaves to the power of Sin, but now you are not. Now you are slaves to righteousness.
• So here, when we were in the flesh, the passions of Sin, working through the Law, used to bear fruit associated with death. This is past tense for the believer. The power of Sin used the Law to make us sin even more.
• But now, we have been "cancelled" from the Law, "discharged." Now believers serve God in the newness of the Spirit, which empowers us to live under a different power.
• 7:7-12. In the next few verses, Paul clarifies that it is not the Law's fault. That is to say, the Law itself is not the problem. It served its purpose.
• 7:7. For example, the Law tells a person what sin is. The Law says, "Do not covet." Jews thus know that coveting is wrong. This is the first function of the Law in Paul's argument.
• E. P. Sanders in Paul pointed out that Paul intentionally picked the most internal of the commandments, the one that it is hardest to keep perfectly. Any other of the commandments could be kept perfectly, at least from an external point of view.
• 7:8. In some way, human flesh is putty in the hands of Sin through the Law. The power of Sin takes advantage of Jews and Gentiles through the Law. Perhaps it is a little like a child told not to do something. He or she wants to do it even more. So the Law, when I am in the flesh, aggravates my sinfulness. This is a second effect of the Law in Paul's argument.
• 7:9. Paul now seems to dramatize the life of a believer in relation to the Law in terms of the story of humanity and God's people. Some think he has Adam in mind here, but it is not at all clear.
• So there was a time when humanity did not have the Law (cf. 5:13-14). In a way, there is a time in a believer's pilgrimage when he or she does not have the Law because they are not yet old enough to know it.
• Then the Law was revealed to Moses. So in an individual Jew's life, there is a time when he or she learns the Law. The power of Sin comes alive and they die, as Adam did in the day that he sinned (cf. 5:12). However, Adam did not have the power of Sin over him when the commandment came, making it unlikely that Paul is thinking too much of Adam here.
• 7:12. The bottom line is that the Law itself is holy, righteous, and good. A human, Jew or Gentile, by contrast, is a slave to Sin when he or she is in the flesh. The power of Sin, working by way of the Law, produces sin in a person.
• 7:13-25. We now come to perhaps the most misunderstood verses in the whole Bible. Paul is still walking through the pilgrimage of an individual, especially a Jew but also a Gentile, in relation to Sin and the Law. He has covered the period of a person's life when they did not know the Law. Then he has spoken of the point where a person learns the Law and the power of Sin is accentuated.
• In these verses he expands upon this phase of a person's pilgrimage before they become a believer and are empowered by the Holy Spirit to be freed from Sin (chap. 8). The last sentence of the chapter sums up this phase: "With my mind I serve the law of God but with my flesh the Law of Sin" (7:25b). This is only a phase of the pilgrimage, before the Spirit.
• 7:13. Here we see the two functions of the Jewish Law. The Law tells me what sin is and it aggravates my sinfulness.
• 7:14. The default state of a human is to be "fleshly, sold under Sin." The Law again in itself is spiritual.
• 7:14-20. Here is the plight of the person who now knows the Law. This person has come to recognize that the Law is good, but without the Spirit he or she will find only failure. The good they now want to do, they will not be able to do.
• Again, these are probably the most misunderstood verses in the Bible. Paul's words here so resonate with Christian experience that all of Romans 6, the beginning of chapter 7, and chapter 8 are thrown out the window and these words are taken to be the never-ending plight of the believer. But if Paul is talking of his present experience, then he is painting himself as a non-Christian in the terms of Romans 6 and 8, as well as the beginning of Romans 7.
• In fact, Philippians 3 and the rest of Paul's letters do not give us the impression that Paul thought of himself as a moral failure even before he came to Christ. That is to say, it does not seem likely that Paul even felt this way before he believed on Christ. See Krister Stendahl, "Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West."
• So Paul is dramatizing in these verses the plight of the person who recognizes the goodness of the Law as a standard but, being in the flesh and under the Law, he or she is not able to attain to that standard. The present tense is very flexible and does not in any way in itself imply this is Paul's current experience. Again, that would negate the entire immediate context.
• 7:17-20. In stark contrast to Augustine, the "I" of the person in these verses actually wants to keep the Law. The problem is the flesh of the person. Augustine made the problem a matter of a corrupted will. This may be true theologically even if it is not what Paul was saying here.
• "Sinful nature" is a bad translation given the baggage of this phrase. The word Paul consistently uses here is flesh. Flesh is my skin under the power of Sin. My mortal body is not sinful in itself. It is just weak. Under the power of Sin, there is no hope for me to resist sin with my body, even if my mind wants to. There is thus a certain dualism to Paul's language here.
• 7:20. Sin is dwelling in me. That is, it has power over my body, my flesh.
• 7:21-25a. Here we reach the climax of the conundrum for the person at this stage of their pilgrimage. They know the Law. They know its standard is good. But they cannot keep it because of the power of Sin over their flesh.
• They delight in God's Law in their inner person, but there is another rule, another law in their physical members. It is warring against the law of God they understand with their mind.
• 7:24. "Who will free me from this body of death?" Paul dramatically exclaims. Who will enable me to fulfill the righteous expectation of the Law? Who will free me from the power of Sin over my flesh that only leads to death?
• 7:25a. "Thanks be to God! Through Jesus Christ our Lord!" Here is how we will be set free from the power of Sin and become slaves of righteousness, as in Romans 6. In fact, Paul made this same exclamation in 6:17. He has slowed down the sentiment of 6:16-18. You used to be slaves to sin, but thanks be to God, you are now slaves to righteousness.

B. Life in the Spirit (8:1-30)

• 8:1-4. Now we cross the threshold. We believe. We are justified. We have peace with God (5:1). We receive the Holy Spirit. In 8:9 we will learn that a person is not in Christ if he or she does not have the Holy Spirit. In Romans 8, we have finally become Christians.
• 8:1-2. There is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus because the rule of the Spirit has set you free from the rule of Sin and death.
• 8:3. The Law had no power to actually enable a person to keep it. So God did it through his Son. Jesus condemned sin in the flesh. 
• Jesus came "in the likeness of the flesh of Sin." There is a hint here that Jesus himself did not have the power of Sin over his flesh.
• 8:4. "That the righteous requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit." This is not merely legal because it has to do with "walking," which is a matter of life and ethics. Paul is saying that the Spirit actually enables a person to keep the core of the Law, which again 13:8-10 suggests is loving one's neighbor. This is the Law that we do not nullify because of faith (3:31).
• 8:5-8. Paul reviews the two ways of being he has been discussing for the last two chapters: the slave to Sin and the slave to righteousness.
• 8:5-7. Those who are "according to the flesh" think in a fleshly way. Those who are "according to the Spirit" think in a spiritual way. The first leads to death. The second leads to life and peace. The mind of the flesh is an enemy of God. This person cannot submit to the Law of God.
• 8:8. The bottom line and a classic holiness preaching text: "Those who are in the flesh cannot please God." Paul has moved beyond flesh as body or flesh as weak to flesh as "the body under the power of Sin," probably also including those who do not even serve God with their minds.
• In Romans, Paul sets up a two state metaphor. You are either a slave to God or a slave to Sin. You are either fleshly or you are spiritual. 1 Corinthians complexifies this situation, for the Corinthians are initially sanctified (1 Cor. 1:2) and thus must have the Holy Spirit (Rom. 8:9). But they are still fleshly and carnal (1 Cor. 3:1). In real life, therefore, we find people who are justified but not fully sanctified. They are in the flesh. They are at least at times like the person of Romans 7:14-24, suggesting that they need to "go on to perfection" or maturity (Heb. 6:1).
• 8:9-11. But believers are not in the flesh or at least should not be. Sin should not be reigning in their mortal bodies (6:12).
• 8:9. In this verse we have an important truth that has often been lost in the holiness movement's emphasis on entire sanctification. The Spirit is the indicator par excellence that a person is in Christ. The correct understanding of the Spirit-fillings of Acts is as an initial experience that indicates a person is "in." You can repent, be baptized, have faith, but until you have received the Holy Spirit, in Paul's words, "this person is not Christ's." This is the consistent teaching of Paul, Acts, and Hebrews (cf. 2 Cor. 1:22; 5:5; Eph. 1:14; Acts 2:35; Heb. 6:4).
• 8:10-11. Paul walks through the logic of the Spirit. We die with Christ. We are in Christ. But Christ is also in us when the Spirit is in us. The body is dead. The body of Sin is dead. We die to the Law. But our spirits are alive. Paul then reaches the final conclusion. God, who raised Jesus from the dead, will also give life to our mortal bodies through the indwelling Spirit.
• That is to say, we are now able to live out the Law in our bodies. We now "walk in newness of life" (6:4).
• 8:12-13. We reach the life conclusion. Believers do not live according to the flesh. Those who live according to the flesh will die. Galatians 5:19-20 indicate that those who live according to the flesh will not inherit the kingdom of God. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 says the same. Those who live by the Spirit will live and have put to death the practices of the body.
• 8:14-17. Those who have the Spirit are children of God, and they are led by the Spirit of God. This is not a Spirit that makes us fear judgment.
• 8:16. There is a witness of the Spirit, a key theological idea of John Wesley. "The Spirit himself witnesses together with our spirit that we are children of God."
• 8:15. Adoption is a key soteriological concept (along with the chorus of theological words associated with salvation: atonement, redemption, forgiveness, reconciliation, justification, adoption, regeneration, sanctification, glorification).
• Adoption in the ancient world was perhaps, for lack of a better word, more "ontological" than it is today in our world where we are conscious of DNA and genetics. An adopted child in the ancient world was at times more important, perhaps a more substantial child than a biological one, because an adopted child was a child by choice. So Julius Caesar had biological children, but none of them were as significant as his adopted son Octavian, who would become Caesar Augustus.
• The mention of the Aramaic word Abba substantiates the claim that Jesus used this word in reference to God the Father. It presumably was the practice of the Jerusalem church also to refer to God as Abba.
• 8:17. Believers are thus heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, especially if we suffer with him, a common theme in Paul's writings (cf. Phil. 3:10).
• 8:18-30. Paul now takes an eschatological perspective on the situation. He began this sub-section with consideration of how Adam brought Sin and death into the world (5:12-21). Now he ends with a consideration of how the creation eagerly awaits its redemption.
• 8:18-25. Paul and the Romans were undergoing suffering in their bodies. Here he surely refers to external pressures on the church. 
• 8:20. Paul pictures the creation subject to decay and corruption, perhaps in the same way that Adam brought sin and death into the world. This includes our mortal bodies, which as we have seen are subject to the power of Sin if we do not have the Spirit. 
• 8:19. The creation is thus waiting with us for the transformation of our current bodies to be like Christ's glorious body (cf. 1 Cor. 15:49-50; Phil. 3:21). This is the revelation of the children of God. This is the "glory about to be revealed" (Rom. 8:18). This is part of glorification. The creation awaits its liberation (8:21).
• 8:22-25. Paul has spoken of our current adoption because of the Spirit (8:15). Now he speaks of the second phase of adoption in the future tense. "The redemption of our bodies" (8:23), the transformation of our bodies to be like Christ's resurrected body, will take place at the second coming when we either are alive and transformed or are dead and raised incorruptible (1 Cor. 15:52).
• 8:24. "In hope we have been saved." That is, we trust that we will be saved from God's coming wrath. In hope, we have already been saved. The Spirit is the firstfruits of our coming inheritance (8:23; cf. 2 Cor. 1:22; 5:5).
• 8:26-27. In the meantime, the Spirit intercedes for us. We do not know exactly what we should pray. Should we pray for deliverance? Should we pray for endurance in suffering? The Holy Spirit knows.
• 8:26. Some have suggested that "unspeakable groanings" refers to Paul speaking in tongues (cf. 1 Cor. 14:18). It seems impossible to know.
• 8:28-30. Everything though is headed for redemption. We know that all things will end up at a good destination for those who love God. 
• 8:28. Although certainly God is in control and does nothing that conflicts with his love, 8:28 probably isn't about individual circumstance but about the final goal of the story, which is in salvation. We still die of cancer. War still kills thousands of believers. You might still be murdered. That is in the point here. The point is that history works out for good and that the collective destiny of the people of God is salvation.
• The election language of these verses is corporate. It is about the collective body of believers rather than the individual believer. 
• 8:29. God has predestined the plan of salvation. Those in Christ will be transformed. Their bodies will be redeemed from the bondage of decay. They will be conformed to the resurrection image of the Son (cf. 1 Cor. 15:49). Paul is not thinking here of sanctification in this life but about the resurrected/transformed bodies that will take place at the second coming/resurrection.
• The church is predestined to be saved. Those in the church he planned to justify. Those in the church will be glorified at the point of Christ's return.

C. The love of God! (8:31-39)

• This paragraph climaxes this section (6:1-39) and indeed chapters 1-8 as a whole. No matter who might oppose the church. No matter what suffering the church might undergo, God is on the side of the Roman believers.
• God loved us so much he did not spare his Son. Certainly he will not let anyone else get in the way of the salvation of those with faith, especially the Gentiles.
• 8:31. God is for us--he is for the Gentiles and Jews who believe. 
• 8:33-34. He is the judge. He is the one who justifies. Who cares if some other believers or some non-believing Jews say they are not "in." The church are the elect, the ones God has chosen.
• 8:34. Jesus' blood intercedes against our condemnation. The Spirit thus is intercessor for our needs and desires. Christ is more our intercessor for atonement (cf. Heb. 7:25).
• 8:35-39. Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ or the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Death cannot. Various evil spiritual powers cannot. The future cannot. Nothing in the creation can.
• We do have to read these thoughts within the scope Paul intended. Paul is assuming throughout that we want the love of Christ, that we have faith in God. Nothing outside us can separate us from Christ. But if we walk away from faith, we have walked away from God. God does not force us to stay. 

_______________________
I. Introduction
1. Romans 1:1-15

II.1 Who is Justified?
II.1.1 Humanity's Problem
2. Romans 1:16-17
3. Romans 1:18-32
4. Romans 2:1-3:20

II.1.2 God's Solution
5. Romans 3:21-31
6. Romans 4:1-5:11

II.2 What about Sin?
7. Romans 5:12-6:23

Romans 7:25b

I wrote this footnote today:

"From a standpoint of clarity, it is unfortunate that Paul took the time in 7:25b to summarize the situation he has been describing in 7:7-24—the person wanting to keep the Law but not having the Spirit to be able to do so: 'I myself then with my mind serve the Law of God but with the flesh the law of sin.' Again, Paul makes it abundantly clear in both the lead up and follow up to this section that slavery to sin should not be the current situation of a person in Christ. Romans 8:8 further indicates that those who are in the flesh are not able to please God. It is unfortunate that readers of Paul, not least Luther, have so identified with the situation he presents in 7:7-24 that they often cannot see that it is exactly this state that Paul believes is untenable for a person in Christ."

Paul the Jew 2

Continued from yesterday...

... Nor is it likely that Paul viewed himself as a moral failure before he "discovered" justification by faith.  This was also one version of the older story.  Paul, plagued by his moral failures as revealed in Romans 7, finally realizes that he must depend entirely on Christ for his righteousness.  Now that he believes, he still cannot do the good he wants to do (7:19), but God now looks at Christ's righteousness rather than his.  Paul is both sinner and righteous, as long as he keeps repenting.

Again, this scenario is a fair description of Martin Luther's pilgrimage, but it is not Paul's. [1] In Philippians 3:6, Paul says that before he believed on Christ, he was faultless, "as for righteousness based on the law."  Indeed, Paul regularly tells his churches confidently to imitate his way of living (e.g., 1 Cor. 4:16-17; Phil. 4:9), and the word repentance rarely leaps from his subconscious in his writings--in fact never in relation to himself.  Paul was not a bad Pharisee.  He simply had an encounter with Christ that led him in another direction!

The vast majority of experts on Romans now agree that Paul never meant Romans 7 to depict a never-ending struggle for believers to do the right thing.  Indeed, we are reading this chapter exactly the opposite of how Paul meant it if we do not read it in the flow of Romans 6-8.  In these chapters, Paul contrasts what it is like to be a slave to sin with what it is like to have the Spirit within.  The end of the argument is Romans 8, where he talks about the Spirit setting a person free from the law of sin and death (8:2).

On the way there, Paul vividly dramatizes in Romans 7 the plight of the person, especially the Jew, who does not have the Spirit but wants to keep the essence of the Law, such as the command not to covet.  At the dramatic climax, he pictures this poor person crying out, "Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?" (7:24) The answer quickly follows, "through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (7:25).  Now by the power of the Spirit, we can fulfill the "just requirement of the law" (8:4, NRSV), which Paul later tells us is to love our neighbor (13:8-10).

Paul does say some things in his writings that paved the way for later Christians like Tertullian to consider Christians a "third race," neither Jew nor Gentile. [2]  In 1 Corinthians 9:20-21, Paul says that "to the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews... to those not having the law I became like one not having the law."  But this statement is really about keeping the Jewish Law--especially the parts like circumcision that distinguished Jew from Gentile--rather than about him abandoning his identity as an Israelite.  Romans 11 gives us the bigger picture.

For a time, the hearts of many Jews are hardened not to believe.  Certainly there remains a remnant of "true Israel" at present (e.g., Rom. 9:6), but most of ethnic Israel does not currently believe.  God is instead at this time grafting into the tree of Abraham the "full number of the Gentiles" (11:25).  Israel's lack of faith, in God's plan, has created an opportunity for the Gentiles to hear and believe the good news as well (e.g., 11:11).  But once that full number of the Gentiles comes in, then Israel itself will believe too: "all Israel will be saved" (11:26).  The "part" that is hardened (11:25) will become the "all" that believes (11:26).

For Paul, Israel thus remained the people of God.  Jews who believed remained part of true Israel.  Gentiles who believed could become a part of true Israel as well.

[1] We have Krister Stendahl, more than any other expert on Paul, to thank for these observations.  See "Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West," now in Paul Among Jews and Gentiles (***).  I dedicated the second volume of this series to him and N. T. Wright.

[2] To the Gentiles 1.8.

Original Meaning Translation: Romans 7:13-8:2

For previous parts of Romans.

13 Therefore, has the good become death?  May it not be!  But Sin, so that it might appear as sin, was working death in me through the good, so that Sin might become incredibly sinful through the commandment.  14 For I know that the Law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, having been enslaved under Sin. 15 For I do not know what I am doing. 16 But if I am doing what I do not want [to do], I agree with the Law, that [it is] good. 17 But now I am no longer doing it, but the Sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that good does not dwell in me--that is, in my flesh.  For the will is present in me, but to do the good is not. 19 For I am not doing the good that I want [to do], but I am practicing that bad that I do not want [to do]. 20 But if I am not doing that which I want [to do], it is no longer I doing it but the Sin that dwells in me.


21 Then, I am finding the "law" in me--the one wanting to do the good--that the bad is present in me.  For I delight in the law of God in my inner person, 23 but I am seeing a different "law" in my [body] parts, warring against the "law" of my mind and subjugating me with the "law" of Sin which is in my [body] parts. 24 A wretched person [am] I!  Who will rescue me from the body of this death?  25 But thanks [be] to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!  


Therefore then, [to summarize the default state of the good-desiring Jew], I myself am serving the law of God with the mind, but the "law" of Sin with the flesh.

8:1 Then now [there is] no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus, 2 for the "law" of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has freed you from the "law" of Sin and death...

Sin and the Law 4

The key to understanding Romans 6-8 is to understand the clear "before and after" Paul presents repeatedly throughout the section. The first is in 6:17-18:

"But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness."

Notice the clear timing here. The Romans used to be slaves to sin before they believed. Now they are free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. Paul gives no middle ground. A person is either a slave to righteousness or a slave to sin. You are not both at the same time. The timing for Paul is not ambiguous. Before you commit to Christ you are a slave to sin. After you believe, you are not to "let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires" (6:12).

Paul gives the same contrast in 6:19-22 and then again in 7:5-6. His statement in Romans 7:5-6 is worth quoting because this statement is in the lead up to what he will say later in that chapter:

"For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death. But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit" (NASB).

Again, the timing is clear. Being "in the flesh" is a matter of a believer's past. And the "fruit for death" that Paul has in mind is also clear from the previous chapter. 6:19 puts it clearly: "you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness." And when Paul says we have "been released from the Law," is not talking about some legal hocus pocus where God treats us like we have become righteous even though we continue sinning as before. You would have to ignore everything he has said in the previous chapter to read him this way.

No, there is not the slightest ambiguity here. Paul is saying that we were slaves to sin. We used to act in ways that lead to death. Paul is saying believers no longer let their sinful passions control their actions. Believers are set free from the law of sin.

Romans 8 confirms this same train of thought yet one more time: "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death" ... "so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit" (8:1, 4). "Walking" is the Jewish word for how one lives (halakah), confirming that Paul is not talking about something only figuratively fulfilled in us. He is talking about believers actually keeping the essence of the Law, like the Gentiles he mentioned in Romans 2:15 who demonstrate the Law written on their hearts. [1]

Paul's overall train of thought in Romans 6-8 is thus quite clear. One is either a slave to sin or a slave to righteousness. Before the Spirit, a person is a slave to sin with the result that they act sinfully and follow the lead of the sinful passions inside them. However, after the Spirit, a person is set free from the law of sin, a person is freed from sin and becomes a slave to righteousness, with the result that they act righteously and actually fulfill the righteous requirement of the Jewish Law.

It is only when we have this context firmly in mind that we should approach Romans 7:14-25. The popular interpretation of these verses is so deeply engrained in the contemporary Christian's mind that it will take every effort to keep most readers even at this point from chucking Paul's clear train of thought out the window. Paul cannot be saying that he is still a slave to sin or that he continues to be unable to keep the heart of the Jewish Law unless he is saying he is not a believer.

"We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin" (7:14). Paul cannot be talking about himself at that very moment because he has said clearly, repeatedly, and emphatically that believers used to be slaves to sin but are now free (6:17-18; 19; 20-22; 7:5-6; 8:1-4). If Paul is talking about the default state of the Christian or of himself, then his train of thought here is fundamentally incoherent. The only way to read Romans 7 this way is to rip it completely from the rest of Romans!

The only way to read Romans 7:14-25 coherently is to see Paul putting himself into the shoes of the default Jew who has not yet believed, not yet been baptized into Christ, and has not yet received the Spirit. [2] It is a person who "wants to do good" (7:21, NASB) but is incapable because s/he is a slave to sin. In short, Paul is not talking about his current experience but he is explaining what the purpose of the Law was even though unbelieving Jews are unable to keep it even in its essence. [3]

Paul's theology would have starkly raised the question of the Law among Jews. Paul is saying that keeping the Jewish Law does not make a Jew right with God. Only the death of Christ and faith in what God has done through it can make a person right with God. Well then what was the purpose of the Law, then, Paul? He states clearly in Romans and Galatians that its purpose was to show me my need for Christ (e.g., Gal. 3:24). Romans 7:14-25 presents this need dramatically.

I am a Jew. I want to keep the Jewish Law. The Jewish Law tells me what God desires of me (meaning those core parts that apply universally). But I find in my default state that I am unable to keep it. I discover that I am a slave to sin, that I am "utterly sinful" (7:13). Who will free me from this body that makes me do things that lead to death?

"Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Rom. 7:25). That is to say, when I am incorporated into Christ, I am set free from this horrible default state in which humanity finds itself, including Jews. We have seen this exuberant exclamation before, "Thanks be to God." It was back in Romans 6:17, and it is worth quoting those verses all over again to show that Paul's train of thought here is exactly the same as it was there: "thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness." [4]

Romans 8 thus continues with the believer, returning to much the same point Paul reached at the beginning of Romans 5. Paul had reached the point of talking about peace with God in Romans 5:1 after his lengthly discussion of the need and basis for justification in the first four chapters. Romans 8:1 returns to this point of "no condemnation" after over two chapters talking about the problem and overcoming of Sin in a person's life. The rest of Romans 8 will celebrate the real benefits of the Spirit's power in the believer, both now and in the redemption that is to come.

[1] It thus seems very likely that Paul had Gentile believers in mind in Romans 2:15. Therefore, in Romans 8:4, Paul is not thinking that the righteous requirement is literally fulfilled in Christ and only figuratively then fulfilled in believers. Paul is saying that the law of the Spirit literally empowers believers to keep the heart of the Jewish Law, what he calls "Christ's law" in 1 Corinthians 9:21).

[2] The suggestion that Paul has Adam in mind in 7:9 seems to overread the passage. Paul is presenting a logical, not an autobiographical or chronological sequence.

[3] Paul's claim here is difficult because Jews in general did believe they could keep the Law appropriately to God's expectations. Some have accused Paul of misrepresenting the Law or even of misunderstanding it. Nevertheless, we do find this same sentiment elsewhere in the New Testament (e.g., Acts 15:10) and Paul implies the same in Galatians 6:13.

[4] From the standpoint of our understanding, it is unfortunate that Paul went on in the rest of Romans 7:25 to summarize the state of his hypothetical unbelieving Jew wanting to keep the Law--"I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin." Just this restatement is enough for many to ignore the victory his train of thought has just pronounced through Christ.

Sin and the Law 3

... In the first volume of this series, we argued that when Galatians uses the phrase "works of Law," Paul primarily had in mind those parts of the Jewish Law that distinguished Jew from Gentile. [1] In Galatians, circumcision in particular was the key issue under discussion when he said, "no one will be justified by the works of the law" (2:16, NRSV). The argument of Romans is more general, and certainly Paul did not think anyone could earn God's favor, but the key subject was still whether a Jew had any advantage over a non-Jew in being right with God. The underlying issue is not "Can you be good enough for God to accept you?" It is "Is there something about being a Jew that automatically makes you right with God?"

So when Paul says he is not under Law (e.g., 1 Cor. 9:20) and that right standing with God does not come by "works of Law" (e.g., Rom. 3:28), he primarily has things like circumcision, Jewish food and purity laws, and Sabbath laws in mind. Yes, as part of that argument he makes general statements about the impossibility of earning a right standing with God (e.g., Rom. 4:4-5; 9:32). But it is a supporting point, not the main one. When Paul distances believers from the Law, he primarily has the Jew-specific aspects of the Jewish Law in view, the boundary type laws that most distinguished Jew from Gentile.

What is confusing is that Paul also talks about the Law with a very different content in view. Sometimes he has a certain "core law" in view that is universal and timeless. When Romans 2:14 talks about Gentiles who "do by nature things required by the law," it cannot refer to Jew-specific elements. Gentiles by definition do not do such things. Paul can only have a certain universal, "moral" core in mind, if you would. It is this part of the Jewish Law that Paul has in mind in Romans 6-8.

The key to understanding Romans 6-8 is to understand the clear "before and after" he presents repeatedly throughout the section...

[1] Paul: Messenger of Grace

Sin and the Law 2

I am convinced that a great deal of our confusion comes from the fact that Paul glides seemlessly between a number of different meanings for the word "law" in these passages in Romans and Galatians. Perhaps a good place to start is to remember that the "Law" in general was the Torah, the Pentateuch, the first five books of our Old Testament. When Paul says that the "Law and the Prophets" witness to recent developments (Rom. 3:21), he is referring to the first five books of Scripture, a body of literature.

When we ask what sin was for Paul, we must very quickly get to this Jewish Law. Paul says in Romans 5:13 that sin is not reckoned where there is no law, even though it is present. This comment makes it very clear that one purpose of the Jewish Law was to identify exactly what sin was. Paul confirms this purpose a little later in Romans 7:7 when he says, "I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, 'Do not covet."

A key observation here is that Paul nowhere has some absolute definition of sin. Sin is not for Paul "missing the mark," as if anything short of absolute perfection is sin, any imperfection whatsoever. [1] Sin is, in one respect, to violate the Law, the Jewish Law, where the Law is a record of the actions that are wrong. As we might expect of the Old Testament, such violations were far more concrete than abstract. They were not some introspective flub where a less than perfect thought flew through your head. We suspect that even when Jesus spoke of looking at another woman with lust (Matt. 5:28), there was a level of intent to act that went well beyond what we would call a lustful thought. [2]

A great starter definition of the verb, "to sin," is thus "to do wrong," where wrongdoing is defined in the Jewish Law. Closely related is to wrong another person. Thus you can sin against someone (e.g., Matt. 18:21; 1 Cor. 8:12). Such definitions know nothing of the standard "sin every day in word, thought, and deed." This conventional Christian definition of sin does not come from the Bible but from later Christian theology. The Bible consistently treats acts of sin or wrongdoing as something that is avoidable and bad.

To be sure, Paul does not use the word sin in relation to every part of the Jewish Law. Paul never speaks of someone who touches a dead body as sinning nor does he say that someone who works on the Sabbath sins. Indeed, he very likely did not consider such actions to be sins for a believer, especially a Gentile believer. [3] We thus encounter the key ambiguity in Paul's rhetoric about the Jewish Law: sometimes he used the word "law" in relation to parts of the Law he did not apply to Gentile believers; sometimes he uses the word "law" in relation to parts of the Law that still applied to believers. But he does not clearly distinguish in his language between the two...

[1] Thus the quite incorrect translation of Romans 3:23 in the New Living Translation where sin is to fall short "of God's glorious standard."

[2] We have the Romanticism of the 1700s and 1800s to thank for our overly introspective orientations.

[3] Whether he might have considered them sins for an unbelieving Jew is a question we probably cannot answer given the evidence he has left us.

Calvin Goof of the Day 3-26-09

In Romans 7, "he is discussing the Christian struggle (more briefly touched in Galatians [ch. 5:17]), which believers constantly feel in themselves in the conflict between flesh and spirit. But the Spirit comes, not from nature, but from regeneration. Moreover, it is clear that the apostle is speaking of these regenerated, because when he had said that no good dwelt in him, he adds the explanation that he is referring to his flesh [Rom. 7:18].

"Accordingly, he declares that it is not he who does evil, but sin dwelling in him. [Rom. 7:20.] What does he mean by this correction: "In me, that is, in my flesh" [Rom. 7:18]? It is as if he were speaking in this way: "Good does not dwell in me of myself, for nothing good is to be found in my flesh." Hence follows that form of an excuse: "I myself do not do evil, but sin that dwells in me" [Rom. 7:20]. This excuse applies only to the regenerate who tend toward good with the chief part of their soul.

"Now the conclusion appended clearly explains this whole matter: "For I delight in the law . . . according to the inner man, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind" [Rom. 7:22-23]. Who would have such strife in himself but a man who, regenerated by the Spirit of God, bears the remains of his flesh about with him?"

Oops. I guess Calvin isn't inspired. No wonder so many fundamentalist Calvinists are up in arms about the "new" perspective. It's hard to kick against the pricks.

Romans 7 and Slavery to Sin

I was putting a pulse through an online class and the old subject of Romans 7 came up. The popular view of this chapter is that "If Paul couldn't help but sin, what hope is there for me?"

I've beat this dead horse before, but thought I might rehearse the evidence of Romans 6-7 again this morning. I am not unusual in this interpretation--it is the majority interpretation and, in my opinion, painfully obvious if you approach Romans with an open mind.

The train of thought in Romans 6-8 makes it very difficult to read Romans 7 as a statement of Paul's current experience.

6:1--Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? Certainly not!

6:12--"Do not let sin reign in your mortal body to obey its evil desires."

6:14--"For sin shall not be your master."

6:17-18--"Thanks be to God! Though you used to be slaves to sin, you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness."

Are we really to think that Paul is still a slave to sin while the Roman church is not?

6:20, 22--"When you were slaves to sin... but now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God."

7:5-6--"For when we were controlled by the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our members... now we have been set free from the law..."

Romans 7:14-25 is an explication of "when we were controlled by the flesh" yet wanted to keep the Jewish Law.

7:24-25 "Who will free me from this body of death? Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!

7:25b then summarizes the condition of the person "controlled by the flesh."

8:1 "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the Spirit has set you free from the law of sin and death."

I personally do not even think the hypothetical person of Romans 7:14-25 is a good reflection of Paul's feelings before he accepted Christ, especially in the light of Philippians 3:6. Krister Stendahl's "Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West" is still the definitive statement here, I believe.

Interpretations of Romans 7

Here are several interpretations of Romans 7 and particularly of statements like "the good I want to do I don't do; but the bad I do not want to do, that I do." Some people mix and match these views a bit.

1. James D. G. Dunn: "In this 'I' Paul includes himself as a believer ..., not just in his pre-Christian days... The split Paul is about to expound is one between the epochs of Adam and Christ: the 'I' is split and the law is split ... because each belongs to two epochs at the same time in this period of overlap between the epoch of Adam and the epoch of Christ, between the era of the flesh and the era of the Spirit" (Word, 388).

This somewhat traditional interpretation sees the struggle of Romans 7 as the current struggle of all believers, who live in two worlds at the same time. The one is the world of the Spirit that we serve with our minds. The other is the world of the flesh in which we struggle with sin. This view has fallen on hard times.

2. Douglas Moo: "ego [Greek for "I"] denotes Paul himself but ... the events depicted in these verses were not all experiences personally and consciously by the Apostle... a combination of the autobiographical view with the view that identifies ego with Israel." (NICNT, 431)

"vv. 14-25 describe the situation of an unregenerate person. Specifically, I think that Paul is looking back, from his Christian understanding, to the situation of himself, and other Jews like him, living under the law of Moses." (447-48).

This is a respectable position I think. Moo believes that these verses refer to Paul's past experiences as a Jew and, indeed, to the common experiences of Israel as it has tried to keep the Mosaic Law.

3. Krister Stendahl: "We look in vain for a statement in which Paul would speak about himself as an actual sinner" ("Paul and the Introspective Conscience," Paul Among Jews and Gentiles, 91). "Paul here is involved in an argument about the Law; he is not primarily concerned about man's or his own cloven ego or predicament" (92). "'Now if I do what I do not want, then it is not I who do it, but the sin which dwells in me.' The argument is one of acquittal of the ego, not one of utter contrition. Such a line of thought would be impossible if Paul's intention were to describe man's (sic) predicament."

Stendahl, following the classic study of W. G. Kümmel (Römer 7 und die Bekehrung des Paulus), sees the "I" and present tense of Romans 7 as a rhetorical device to make the situation of the person under the Jewish Law vivid. Such a person may want to keep the Law, but because of the power of sin over their flesh they are unable to keep the Law. But Paul is not necessarily giving some deeply autobiographical snippet of his past (in fact what he says throughout his letters leads us in a different direction, one in which he was very confident of himself in the past, cf. Phil. 3:6) and he is certainly not speaking of his present, given the timing of verses like Romans 6:17-18; 7:5-6; and 8:1-4 in relation to the summary in 7:25b.

4. Adam: A side issue is whether or not Paul has Adam in mind in 7:7-13. Perhaps most scholars think Paul did (e.g., Dunn above), although I myself remain unconvinced.

Ben Witherington would be somewhat typical. Here are some selections:

"Rom. 7:8 refers to a 'commandment' (singular) ... Only Adam, in all biblical history, was under only one commandment, and it was one about coveting..." (Romans, 189).

"v. 9 says, 'I was living once without/apart from the Law' The only person said in the Bible to be living before or without any law was Adam" (189).

"Sin is personified in this text, especially in v. 11, as if were like the snake in the garden" (189).

"Paul, then, is retelling the story of Adam from the past in vv. 7-13 and telling the story of all those in Adam in the present in vv. 14-25" (190).

I have a few questions about this line of interpretation. The first is of course why Paul never says anything explicitly about this. But even then, why does he use the word anazao in 7:9, "sin revived." Sin didn't revive in Adam's case, for he did not have sin before. In general, Paul's argument seems to be about someone whose flesh is under the power of sin, and it is unclear to me how this would apply to Adam before his sin.

5. Israel: Another side issue is the degree to which the "I" in this passage represents Israel. Moo has already given us a reasonable suggestion that Paul is speaking somewhat of the typical experience of a Jew and, thus, of Israel.

Tom Wright would be the one we would most expect to pursue this line of thought. Here are some selections:

"'The law' here, to repeat, is the Mosaic law, the Torah, and this is one of Paul's fullest discussions of it And those who are 'under the law' are, basically, Jews, and, by extension, those who attach themselves to Israel, i.e., God-fearers and proselytes" (New Interpreter's Bible, "Romans," 552).

"The change of tense [in verse 14] has to do ... with the change from the description of what happened when Torah first arrived in Israel, the time when Israel recapitulated the sin of Adam ... to the description of the ongoing state of those who live under the law" (553).

Wright thus seems to see the "I" of Romans 7 as a recapitulation of the story of Israel. Very clever indeed. But I wonder if once again Paul would have made this allusion clearer if it is in fact what he had meant. Nevertheless, the similarity of verses like 7:9 to 5:14 is tantalizing.

Conclusion: Paul's own autobiographical statements elsewhere make it unlikely that Romans 7 was ever a very good description of how Paul actually felt either as a Christian or in his pre-Christian days. In that sense I most agree with Krister Stendahl's analysis. It is possible that there are echoes of Adam in 7:7-12, but I believe these must be secondary if they exist. Paul is giving a theological run down of a Jew trying to keep the Mosaic law (and as Sanders points out, he picks a commandment whose keeping is less concrete than others and particularly susceptible to inner ambiguity). Perhaps the scenario is modeled on Adam, but it is not Adam. Similarly, Moo is surely correct to see the "I" as the typical Jew and thus see a connection with Israel. But Wright may go a little too far in virtually equating the "I" with Israel.