Romans 7 commentary

So long as a man continues under the law as a covenant, and seeks justification by his own obedience, he continues the slave of sin in some form. Nothing but the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, can make any sinner free from the law of sin and death. Believers are delivered from that power of the law, which condemns for the sins committed by them. And they are delivered from that power of the law which stirs up and provokes the sin that dwells in them. Understand this not of the law as a rule, but as a covenant of works. In profession and privilege, we are under a covenant of grace, and not under a covenant of works; under the gospel of Christ, not under the law of Moses. The difference is spoken of under the similitude or figure of being married to a new husband. The second marriage is to Christ. By death we are freed from obligation to the law as a covenant, as the wife is from her vows to her husband. In our believing powerfully and effectually, we are dead to the law, and have no more to do with it than the dead servant, who is freed from his master, has to do with his master's yoke. The day of our believing, is the day of being united to the Lord Jesus. We enter upon a life of dependence on him, and duty to him. Good works are from union with Christ; as the fruitfulness of the vine is the product of its being united to its roots; there is no fruit to God, till we are united to Christ. The law, and the greatest efforts of one under the law, still in the flesh, under the power of corrupt principles, cannot set the heart right with regard to the love of God, overcome worldly lusts, or give truth and sincerity in the inward parts, or any thing that comes by the special sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit. Nothing more than a formal obedience to the outward letter of any precept, can be performed by us, without the renewing, new-creating grace of the new covenant.

There is no way of coming to that knowledge of sin, which is necessary to repentance, and therefore to peace and pardon, but by trying our hearts and lives by the law. In his own case the apostle would not have known the sinfulness of his thoughts, motives, and actions, but by the law. That perfect standard showed how wrong his heart and life were, proving his sins to be more numerous than he had before thought, but it did not contain any provision of mercy or grace for his relief. He is ignorant of human nature and the perverseness of his own heart, who does not perceive in himself a readiness to fancy there is something desirable in what is out of reach. We may perceive this in our children, though self-love makes us blind to it in ourselves. The more humble and spiritual any Christian is, the more clearly will he perceive that the apostle describes the true believer, from his first convictions of sin to his greatest progress in grace, during this present imperfect state. St. Paul was once a Pharisee, ignorant of the spirituality of the law, having some correctness of character, without knowing his inward depravity. When the commandment came to his conscience by the convictions of the Holy Spirit, and he saw what it demanded, he found his sinful mind rise against it. He felt at the same time the evil of sin, his own sinful state, that he was unable to fulfil the law, and was like a criminal when condemned. But though the evil principle in the human heart produces sinful motions, and the more by taking occasion of the commandment; yet the law is holy, and the commandment holy, just, and good. It is not favourable to sin, which it pursues into the heart, and discovers and reproves in the inward motions thereof. Nothing is so good but a corrupt and vicious nature will pervert it. The same heat that softens wax, hardens clay. Food or medicine when taken wrong, may cause death, though its nature is to nourish or to heal. The law may cause death through man's depravity, but sin is the poison that brings death. Not the law, but sin discovered by the law, was made death to the apostle. The ruinous nature of sin, and the sinfulness of the human heart, are here clearly shown.

Compared with the holy rule of conduct in the law of God, the apostle found himself so very far short of perfection, that he seemed to be carnal; like a man who is sold against his will to a hated master, from whom he cannot set himself at liberty. A real Christian unwillingly serves this hated master, yet cannot shake off the galling chain, till his powerful and gracious Friend above, rescues him. The remaining evil of his heart is a real and humbling hinderance to his serving God as angels do and the spirits of just made perfect. This strong language was the result of St. Paul's great advance in holiness, and the depth of his self-abasement and hatred of sin. If we do not understand this language, it is because we are so far beneath him in holiness, knowledge of the spirituality of God's law, and the evil of our own hearts, and hatred of moral evil. And many believers have adopted the apostle's language, showing that it is suitable to their deep feelings of abhorrence of sin, and self-abasement. The apostle enlarges on the conflict he daily maintained with the remainder of his original depravity. He was frequently led into tempers, words, or actions, which he did not approve or allow in his renewed judgement and affections. By distinguishing his real self, his spiritual part, from the self, or flesh, in which sin dwelt, and by observing that the evil actions were done, not by him, but by sin dwelling in him, the apostle did not mean that men are not accountable for their sins, but he teaches the evil of their sins, by showing that they are all done against reason and conscience. Sin dwelling in a man, does not prove its ruling, or having dominion over him. If a man dwells in a city, or in a country, still he may not rule there.

The more pure and holy the heart is, it will have the more quick feeling as to the sin that remains in it. The believer sees more of the beauty of holiness and the excellence of the law. His earnest desires to obey, increase as he grows in grace. But the whole good on which his will is fully bent, he does not do; sin ever springing up in him, through remaining corruption, he often does evil, though against the fixed determination of his will. The motions of sin within grieved the apostle. If by the striving of the flesh against the Spirit, was meant that he could not do or perform as the Spirit suggested, so also, by the effectual opposition of the Spirit, he could not do what the flesh prompted him to do. How different this case from that of those who make themselves easy with regard to the inward motions of the flesh prompting them to evil; who, against the light and warning of conscience, go on, even in outward practice, to do evil, and thus, with forethought, go on in the road to perdition! For as the believer is under grace, and his will is for the way of holiness, he sincerely delights in the law of God, and in the holiness which it demands, according to his inward man; that new man in him, which after God is created in true holiness.

This passage does not represent the apostle as one that walked after the flesh, but as one that had it greatly at heart, not to walk so. And if there are those who abuse this passage, as they also do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction, yet serious Christians find cause to bless God for having thus provided for their support and comfort. We are not, because of the abuse of such as are blinded by their own lusts, to find fault with the scripture, or any just and well warranted interpretation of it. And no man who is not engaged in this conflict, can clearly understand the meaning of these words, or rightly judge concerning this painful conflict, which led the apostle to bemoan himself as a wretched man, constrained to what he abhorred. He could not deliver himself; and this made him the more fervently thank God for the way of salvation revealed through Jesus Christ, which promised him, in the end, deliverance from this enemy. So then, says he, I myself, with my mind, my prevailing judgement, affections, and purposes, as a regenerate man, by Divine grace, serve and obey the law of God; but with the flesh, the carnal nature, the remains of depravity, I serve the law of sin, which wars against the law of my mind. Not serving it so as to live in it, or to allow it, but as unable to free himself from it, even in his very best state, and needing to look for help and deliverance out of himself. It is evident that he thanks God for Christ, as our deliverer, as our atonement and righteousness in himself, and not because of any holiness wrought in us. He knew of no such salvation, and disowned any such title to it. He was willing to act in all points agreeable to the law, in his mind and conscience, but was hindered by indwelling sin, and never attained the perfection the law requires. What can be deliverance for a man always sinful, but the free grace of God, as offered in Christ Jesus? The power of Divine grace, and of the Holy Spirit, could root out sin from our hearts even in this life, if Divine wisdom had not otherwise thought fit. But it is suffered, that Christians might constantly feel, and understand thoroughly, the wretched state from which Divine grace saves them; might be kept from trusting in themselves; and might ever hold all their consolation and hope, from the rich and free grace of God in Christ.

Though he had, in a brief manner, sufficiently explained the question respecting the abrogation of the law; yet as it was a difficult one, and might have given rise to many other questions, he now shows more at large how the law, with regard to us, is become abrogated; and then he sets forth what good is thereby done to us: for while it holds us separated from Christ and bound to itself, it can do nothing but condemn us. And lest any one should on this account blame the law itself, he takes up and confutes the objections of the flesh, and handles, in a striking manner, the great question respecting the use of the law. The connection of the beginning of this chapter with Romans 6:14 deserves to be noticed. He says there, that sin shall not rule over us, because we are not under law, but under grace. Then he asks, in Romans 6:15,

“Shall we sin, because we are not under law, but under grace?”

This last subject, according to his usual mode, he takes up first, and discusses it till the end of the chapter: and then in this chapter he reassumes the first subject — freedom from the law. This is a striking instance of the Apostle’s manner of writing, quite different from what is usual with us in the present day. He mentions two things; he proceeds with the last, and then goes back to the first. — Ed.

1. Know ye not, etc. Let the general proposition be that the law was given to men for no other end but to regulate the present life, and that it belongs not to those who are dead: to this he afterwards subjoins this truth — that we are dead to it through the body of Christ. Some understand, that the dominion of the law continues so long to bind us as it remains in force. But as this view is rather obscure, and does not harmonize so well with the proposition which immediately follows, I prefer to follow those who regard what is said as referring to the life of man, and not to the law. The question has indeed a peculiar force, as it affirms the certainty of what is spoken; for it shows that it was not a thing new or unknown to any of them, but acknowledged equally by them all.

(For to those who know the law I speak.) This parenthesis is to be taken in the same sense with the question, as though he had said — that he knew that they were not so unskilful in the law as to entertain any doubt on the subject. And though both sentences might be understood of all laws, it is yet better to take them as referring to the law of God, which is the subject that is discussed. There are some who think that he ascribes knowledge of the law to the Romans, because the largest part of the world was under their power and government; but this is puerile: for he addressed in part the Jews or other strangers, and in part common and obscure individuals; nay, he mainly regarded the Jews, with whom he had to do respecting the abrogation of the law: and lest they should think that he was dealing captiously with them, he declares that he took up a common principle, known to them all, of which they could by no means be ignorant, who had from their childhood been brought up in the teaching of the law.

2. For a woman subject to a man, etc. He brings a similitude, by which he proves, that we are so loosed from the law, that it does not any longer, properly and by its own right, retain over us any authority: and though he could have proved this by other reasons, yet as the example of marriage was very suitable to illustrate the subject, he introduced this comparison instead of evidence to prove his point. But that no one may be puzzled, because the different parts of the comparison do not altogether correspond, we are to be reminded, that the Apostle designedly intended, by a little change, to avoid the invidiousness of a stronger expression. He might have said, in order to make the comparison complete, “A woman after the death of her husband is loosed from the bond of marriage: the law, which is in the place of a husband to us, is to us dead; then we are freed from its power.” But that he might not offend the Jews by the asperity of his expressions, had he said that the law was dead, he adopted a digression, and said, that we are dead to the law This is a plausible reason, derived from Theodoret and Chrysostom; but hardly necessary. Commentators have felt much embarrassed in applying the illustration given here. The woman is freed by the death of the husband; but the believer is represented as freed by dying himself. This does not correspond: and if we attend to what the Apostle says, we shall see that he did not contemplate such a correspondence. Let us notice how he introduces the illustration; “the law,” he says in the first verse, “rules, or exercises authority, over a man while he lives;” and then let us observe the application in Romans 7:4, where he speaks of our dying to the law The main design of the illustration then was, to show that there is no freedom from a law but by death; so that there is no necessity of a correspondence in the other parts, As in the case of man and wife, death destroys the bond of marriage; so in the case of man and the law, that is, the law as the condition of life, there must be a death; else there is no freedom. But there is one thing more in the illustration, which the Apostle adopts, the liberty to marry another, when death has given a release: The bond of connection being broken, a union with another is legitimate. So far only is the example adduced to be applied — death puts an end to the right and authority of law; and then the party released may justly form another connection. It is the attempt to make all parts of the comparison to correspond that has occasioned all the difficulty. — Ed. To some indeed he appears to reason from the less to the greater: however, as I fear that this is too strained, I approve more of the first meaning, which is simpler. The whole argument then is formed in this manner “The woman is bound to her living husband by the law, so that she cannot be the wife of another; but after the death of her husband she is loosed from the bond of his law so, that she is free to marry whom she pleases.”

Then follows the application, — The law was, as it were our husband, under whose yoke we were kept until it became dead to us: After the death of the law Christ received us, that is, he joined us, when loosed from the law, to himself: Then being united to Christ risen from the dead, we ought to cleave to him alone: And as the life of Christ after the resurrection is eternal, so hereafter there shall be no divorce.

But further, the word law is not mentioned here in every part in the same sense: for in one place it means the bond of marriage; in another, the authority of a husband over his wife; and in another, the law of Moses: but we must remember, that Paul refers here only to that office of the law which was peculiar to the dispensation of Moses; for as far as God has in the ten commandments taught what is just and right, and given directions for guiding our life, no abrogation of the law is to be dreamt of; for the will of God must stand the same forever. We ought carefully to remember that this is not a release from the righteousness which is taught in the law, but from its rigid requirements, and from the curse which thence follows. The law, then, as a rule of life, is not abrogated; but what belongs to it as opposed to the liberty obtained through Christ, that is, as it requires absolute perfection: for as we render not this perfection, it binds us under the sentence of eternal death. But as it was not his purpose to decide here the character of the bond of marriage, he was not anxious to mention the causes which releases a woman from her husband. It is therefore unreasonable that anything decisive on this point should be sought here.

4. Through the body of Christ. Christ, by the glorious victory of the cross, first triumphed over sin; and that he might do this, it was necessary that the handwriting, by which we were held bound, should be cancelled. This handwriting was the law, which, while it continued in force, rendered us bound to serve “Obæratos“ — debtors bound to serve their creditors until payment is made. — Ed. sin; and hence it is called the power of sin. It was then by cancelling this handwriting that we were delivered through the body of Christ — through his body as fixed to the cross. That his crucified body is intended, is clear from what follows; for he is spoken of as having “been raised from the dead.” — Ed. But the Apostle goes farther, and says, that the bond of the law was destroyed; not that we may live according to our own will, like a widow, who lives as she pleases while single; but that we may be now bound to another husband; nay, that we may pass from hand to hand, as they say, that is, from the law to Christ. He at the same time softens the asperity of the expression, by saying that Christ, in order to join us to his own body, made us free from the yoke of the law. For though Christ subjected himself for a time of his own accord to the law, it is not yet right to say that the law ruled over him. Moreover, he conveys to his own members the liberty which he himself possesses. It is then no wonder that he exempts those from the yoke of the law, whom he unites by a sacred bond to himself, that they may be one body in him.

Even his who has been raised, etc. We have already said, that Christ is substituted for the law, lest any freedom should be pretended without him, or lest any, being not yet dead to the law, should dare to divorce himself from it. But he adopts here a periphrastic sentence to denote the eternity of that life which Christ attained by his resurrection, that Christians might know that this connection is to be perpetual. But of the spiritual marriage between Christ and his Church he speaks more fully in Ephesians 6

That we may bring forth fruit to God. He ever annexes the final cause, lest any should indulge the liberty of their flesh and their own lusts, under the pretense that Christ has delivered them from the bondage of the law; for he has offered us, together with himself, as a sacrifice to the Father, and he regenerates us for this end — that by newness of life we may bring forth fruit unto God: and we know that the fruits which our heavenly Father requires from us are those of holiness and righteousness. It is indeed no abatement to our liberty that we serve God; nay, if we desire to enjoy so great a benefit as there is in Christ, it will not henceforth be right in us to entertain any other thought but that of promoting the glory of God; for which purpose Christ has connected us with himself. We shall otherwise remain the bond-slaves, not only of the law, but also of sin and of death.

Romans 7:5-6

5. For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

5. Quum enim essemus in carne, affectus peccatorum qui sunt per Legem, in membris nostris operabantur ad fructificandum morti:

6. But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

6. Nunc vero soluti sumus a Lege, mortui ei in qua detinebamur; ut serviamus in novitate spiritus, et non in vetustate literæ.

5. For when we were, etc. He shows still more clearly by stating the contrary effect, how unreasonably the zealots of the law acted, who would still detain the faithful under its dominion; for as long as the literal teaching of the law, unconnected with the Spirit of Christ, rules and bears sway, the wantonness of the flesh is not restrained, but, on the contrary, breaks out and prevails. It hence follows, that the kingdom of righteousness is not established, except when Christ emancipates us from the law. Paul at the same time reminds us of the works which it becomes us to do, when set free from the law. As long, then, as man is kept under the yoke of the law, he can, as he is sinning continually, procure nothing for himself but death. Since bondage to the law produces sin only, then freedom, its opposite, must tend to righteousness; if the former leads to death, then the latter leads to life. But let us consider the very words of Paul.

In describing our condition during the time we were subject to the dominion of the law, he says, that we were in the flesh. We hence understand, that all those who are under the law attain nothing else but this — that their ears are struck by its external sound without any fruit or effect, while they are inwardly destitute of the Spirit of God. They must therefore necessarily remain altogether sinful and perverse, until a better remedy succeeds to heal their diseases. Observe also this usual phrase of Scripture, to be in the flesh; it means to be endued only with the gifts of nature, without that peculiar grace with which God favors his chosen people. But if this state of life is altogether sinful, it is evident that no part of our soul is naturally sound, and that the power of free will is no other than the power of casting evil emotions as darts into all the faculties of the soul. To be “in the flesh” has two meanings, — to be unrenewed, and in our natural corrupt state, as Calvin says, see Romans 8:8, — and to be subject to external rites and ceremonies as the Jews were, see Galatians 3:3; Philippians 3:4. Its meaning here, according to Beza and Pareus, is the first; according to Grotius and Hammond, the second; and according to Turrettin and Hodge, both are included, as the context, in their view, evidently shows. — Ed.

The emotions of sins, “Affectus peccatorum — affections of sins;” τα παθήματα, etc., — “cupiditates — desires,” or lusts, Grotius.. The word is commonly taken passively, as signifying afflictions, sufferings; Romans 8:18; 2 Corinthians 1:5; Colossians 1:24; but here, and in Galatians 5:24, it evidently means excitements, commotions, emotions, lusts or lustings. “Passion” in our language admits of two similar meanings — suffering, and an excited feeling, or an inward commotion.

These “emotions” are said to be through the law, — “made known by the law,” says Chrysostom; but “occasioned by the law,” is more correct, as it appears from Romans 7:8, or, “made to abound by the law,” as in Romans 5:20. The law, instead of making men holy, made them, through the perversity of human nature, to sin the more. “Emotions of sins” is an Hebraism for “sinful emotions” — “The members” are those of the “old man,” and not those of the material body, though it is commonly thought that they are the latter, and mentioned, because they are employed as the instruments of sin: but there are many sins, and those of the worst kind, which are confined to the mind and heart. It is therefore more consistent to regard them as the members of “the body of sin,” Romans 6:6. — Ed. which are through the law, etc.; that is, the law excited in us evil emotions, which exerted their influence through all our faculties; for there is no part which is not subject to these depraved passions. What the law does, in the absence of the inward teacher, the Spirit, is increasingly to inflame our hearts, so that they boil up with lusts. But observe here, that the law is connected with the vicious nature of man, the perversity of which, and its lusts, break forth with greater fury, the more they are checked by the restraints of righteousness. He further adds, that as long as the emotions of the flesh were under the dominion of the law they brought forth fruit to death; and he adds this to show that the law by itself is destructive. It hence follows, that they are infatuated, who so much desire this bondage which issues in death.

6. But now we have been loosed from the law, etc. He pursues the argument derived from the opposite effect of things, — “If the restraint of the law availed so little to bridle the flesh, that it became rather the exciter of sin; then, that we may cease from sin, we must necessarily be freed from the law.” Again, “If we are freed from the bondage of the law for this end, that we may serve God; then, perversely do they act who hence take the liberty to indulge in sin; and falsely do they speak who teach, that by this means loose reins are given to lusts.” Observe, then, that we are then freed from the law, when God emancipates us from its rigid exactions and curse, and endues us with his Spirit, through whom we walk in his ways. That the moral, and not the ceremonial law, is meant here, is incontestably evident from what the Apostle adds in the following verses. He quotes the moral law in the next verse; he calls this law, in Romans 7:10, the commandment, την ἐντολὴν, which was unto life, see Matthew 19:16; and he says, that “by it” sin “slew” him, which could not have been said of the ceremonial law. — Ed.

Having died to that, etc. This part contains a reason, or rather, indicates the manner in which we are made free; for the law is so far abrogated with regard to us, that we are not pressed down by its intolerable burden, and that its inexorable rigor does not overwhelm us with a curse. Our common version is evidently incorrect as to this clause. The pronoun αὐτῷ or ἐκεινῷ, is to be supplied. There is an exactly similar ellipsis in Romans 6:21 Beza and several others, as well as our version, have followed a reading, αποθανοντὀ, which Griesbach disregards as of no authority; and it is inconsistent with the usual phraseology of the Apostle. See Romans 7:4, and Galatians 2:19. — Ed. — In newness of spirit; He sets the spirit in opposition to the letter; for before our will is formed according to the will of God by the Holy Spirit, we have in the law nothing but the outward letter, which indeed bridles our external actions, but does not in the least restrain the fury of our lusts. And he ascribes newness to the Spirit, because it succeeds the old man; as the letter is called old, because it perishes through the regeneration of the Spirit.

Romans 7:7-8

7. What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet Perhaps the sentence ought to have been rendered, For lust (concupiscentiam) I had not known, except the law had said, “Thou shalt not lust” (non concupisces.) Then the word “coveting” in the next verse should be “lust” (concupiscentiam.) But “Thou shalt not covet,” is the commandment; and to retain a similarity of idea, for the lack of a more suitable word, it seems necessary to have coveting, as covetousness has not the meaning here intended. There is the same correspondence in the words in Greek as in Calvin’s Latin. The noun is rendered first in our version “lust,” and then “concupiscence;” and the same is done by Doddridge; the “strong desire” of Macknight is by no means suitable; the “inordinate desire” of Stuart is better, though “Thou shalt not lust” cannot be approved. By ἐπιθυμία, desire, is meant the inward propensity that is sinful, It is called “sin” in the preceding clause; and, according to the usual stage of the Apostle, to show what sin was intended, it is called here desire: it is then sin in the wish, in the inclination or disposition within. And this very sinful desire the tenth commandment distinctly forbids. — Ed.

7. Quid ergo dicemus? Lex peccatum est? Absit: sed peccatum non cognovi nisi per Legem: concupiscentiam enim non noveram, nisi Lex diceret, Non concupisces

8. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. ...

8. Occasione autem sumpta, peccatum per mandatum effecit in me omnem concupiscentiam.

7. What then shall we say? Since it has been said that we must be freed from the law, in order that we may serve God in newness of spirit, it seemed as though this evil belonged to the law, — that it leads us to sin. But as this would be above measure inconsistent, the Apostle rightly undertook to disprove it. Now when he adds, Is the law sin? what he means is, “Does it so produce sin that its guilt ought to be imputed to the law?” — But sin I knew not, except through the law; sin then dwells in us, and not in the law; for the cause of it is the depraved lust of our flesh, and we come to know it by the knowledge of God’s righteousness, which is revealed to us in the law. It was the saying of Ambrose, “Lex index peccati est, non genitrix — the law is the discoverer, not the begetter of sin.” “The law,’ says Pareus, “prohibits sin; it is not then the cause of it: sin is made known by the law; it is not then by the law produced.” — Ed. You are not indeed to understand, that no difference whatever can be known between right and wrong without the law; but that without the law we are either too dull of apprehension to discern our depravity, or that we are made wholly insensible through self-flattery, according to what follows, —

For coveting I had not known, etc. This is then an explanation of the former sentence, by which he proves that ignorance of sin, of which he had spoken, consisted in this — that he perceived not his own coveting. And he designedly referred to this one kind of sin, in which hypocrisy especially prevails, which has ever connected with itself supine self-indulgence and false assurance. For men are never so destitute of judgment, but that they retain a distinction in external works; nay, they are constrained even to condemn wicked counsels and sinister purposes: and this they cannot do, without ascribing to a right object its own praise. But coveting is more hidden and lies deeper; hence no account is made of it, as long as men judge according to their perceptions of what is outward. He does not indeed boast that he was free from it; but he so flattered himself, that he did not think that this sin was lurking in his heart. For though for a time he was deceived, and believed not that righteousness would be violated by coveting, he yet, at length, understood that he was a sinner, when he saw that coveting, from which no one is free, was prohibited by the law.

Augustine says, that Paul included in this expression the whole law; which, when rightly understood, is true: for when Moses had stated the things from which we must abstain, that we may not wrong our neighbor, he subjoined this prohibition as to coveting, which must be referred to all the things previously forbidden. There is no doubt but that he had in the former precepts condemned all the evil desires which our hearts conceive; but there is much difference between a deliberate purpose, and the desires by which we are tempted. God then, in this last command, requires so much integrity from us, that no vicious lust is to move us to evil, even when no consent succeeds. Hence it was, that I have said, that Paul here ascends higher than where the understanding of men can carry them. But civil laws do indeed declare, that intentions and not issues are to be punished. Philosophers also, with greater refinement, place vices as well as virtues in the soul. But God, by this precept, goes deeper and notices coveting, which is more hidden than the will; and this is not deemed a vice. It was pardoned not only by philosophers, but at this day the Papists fiercely contend, that it is no sin in the regenerate. As an instance of the frivolous and puerile mode of reasoning adopted by the Papists, the following may be adduced: quoting James 1:15, “When lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin; and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death,” they reason thus: — “Lust is not simply a sin, for it brings it forth; and when it is sin, it is not mortal sin, for it afterwards brings forth death. “Taking advantage of a metaphor, they apply it strictly and literally, without considering that the Apostle is only exhibiting the rise, progress, and termination — of what? of sin no doubt. The like produces its like. If lust were not sinful, it could not generate what is sinful. Such childish and profane reasoning is an outrage both on common sense and on religion. — Ed. But Paul says, that he had found out his guilt from this hidden disease: it hence follows, that all those who labor under it, are by no means free from guilt, except God pardons their sin. We ought, at the same time, to remember the difference between evil lustings or covetings which gain consent, and the lusting which tempts and moves our hearts, but stops in the midst of its course.

8. But an occasion being taken, etc. From sin, then, and the corruption of the flesh, proceeds every evil; the law is only the occasion. And though he may seem to speak only of that excitement, by which our lusting is instigated through the law, so that it boils out with greater fury; yet I refer this chiefly to the knowledge the law conveys; as though he had said, “It has discovered to me every lust or coveting which, being hid, seemed somehow to have no existence.” I do not yet deny, but that the flesh is more sharply stimulated to lusting by the law, and also by this means more clearly shows itself; which may have been also the case with Paul: but what I have said of the knowledge it brings, seems to harmonize better with the context; Most commentators take the opposite view, — that the irritation of sin occasioned by the law is more especially meant here. The two ideas, the knowledge and the excitement, or the increase of sin by the law, are no doubt referred to by the Apostle in these verses. — Ed. for he immediately subjoins —

Romans 7:8-12

8. For without the law sin was dead. This clause is rightly separated from the former verse; for it clearly announces what is illustrated in the following verses. “Without the law,” means without the knowledge of the law. The law is known and not known still. — Ed.

8. Sine Lege enim peccatum est mortuum:

9. For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

9. Ego autem vivebam sine Lege aliquando “Aliquando;” ποτε — formerly, while he was a Pharisee, when be thought himself blameless. Critics often make difficulties when there are none. What is said here of being alive without the law, or when the law is not known, and of the commandment supposed to be for life being found to be unto death, is still exemplified in the character of men, and takes place in the experience of all who are brought out of darkness, as Paul was, unto marvellous light. Experience is often the best expositor.

To understand this passage, no more is necessary than to read what Paul says of himself in Philippians 3:9; and also in Galatians 2:19. — Ed. adveniente autem mandato, peccatum revixit,

10. And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.

10. Ego autem mortuus sum; et deprehensum est a me mandatum quod erat in vitam, cedere in mortem.

11. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me

11. Peccatum enim, occasione sumpta per mandatum, abduxit me a via et per illud occidit:

12. Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.

12. Itaque Lex quidem sancta, et mandatum sanctum, et justum et bonum.

8. For without the law, etc. He expresses most clearly the meaning of his former words; for it is the same as though he had said, that the knowledge of sin without the law is buried. It is a general truth, which he presently applies to his own case. I hence wonder what could have come into the minds of interpreters to render the passage in the preterimperfect tense, as though Paul was speaking of himself; for it is easy to see that his purpose was to begin with a general proposition, and then to explain the subject by his own example.

9. For I was alive, etc. He means to intimate that there had been a time when sin was dead to him or in him. But he is not to be understood as though he had been without law at any time, but this word I was alive has a peculiar import; for it was the absence of the law that was the reason why he was alive; that is, why he being inflated with a conceit as to his own righteousness, claimed life to himself while he was yet dead. That the sentence may be more clear, state it thus, “When I was formerly without the law, I was alive.” But I have said that this expression is emphatic; for by imagining himself great, he also laid claim to life. The meaning then is this, “When I sinned, having not the knowledge of the law, the sin, which I did not observe, was so laid to sleep, that it seemed to be dead; on the other hand, as I seemed not to myself to be a sinner, I was satisfied with myself, thinking that I had a life of mine own.” But the death of sin is the life of man, and again the life of sin is the death of man.

It may be here asked, what time was that when through his ignorance of the law, or as he himself says, through the absence of it, he confidently laid claim to life. It is indeed certain, that he had been taught the doctrine of the law from his childhood; but it was the theology of the letter, which does not humble its disciples, for as he says elsewhere, the veil interposed so that the Jews could not see the light of life in the law; so also he himself, while he had his eyes veiled, being destitute of the Spirit of Christ, was satisfied with the outward mask of righteousness. Hence he represents the law as absent, though before his eyes, while it did not really impress him with the consciousness of God’s judgment. Thus the eyes of hypocrites are covered with a veil, that they see not how much that command requires, in which we are forbidden to lust or covet.

But when the commandment came, etc. So now, on the other hand, he sets forth the law as coming when it began to be really understood. It then raised sin as it were from be dead; for it discovered to Paul how great depravity abounded in the recesses of his heart, and at the same time it slew him. We must ever remember that he speaks of that inebriating confidence in which hypocrites settle, while they flatter themselves, because they overlook their sins.

10. Was found by me, etc. Two things are stated here — that the commandment shows to us a way of life in the righteousness of God, and that it was given in order that we by keeping the law of the Lord might obtain eternal life, except our corruption stood in the way. But as none of us obey the law, but, on the contrary, are carried headlong on our feet and hands into that kind of life from which it recalls us, it can bring us nothing but death. We must thus distinguish between the character of the law and our own wickedness. It hence follows, that it is incidental that the law inflicts on us a deadly wound, as when an incurable disease is more exasperated by a healing remedy. I indeed allow that it is an inseparable incident, and hence the law, as compared with the gospel, is called in another place the ministration of death; but still this remains unaltered, that it is not in its own nature hurtful to us, but it is so because our corruption provokes and draws upon us its curse.

11. Led me out of the way, etc. It is indeed true, that while the will of God is hid from us, and no truth shines on us, the life of men goes wholly astray and is full of errors; nay, we do nothing but wander from the right course, until the law shows to us the way of living rightly: but as we begin then only to perceive our erroneous course, when the Lord loudly reproves us, Paul says rightly, that we are led out of the way, when sin is made evident by the law. Hence the verb, ἐξαπατᾷν, must be understood, not of the thing itself, but of our knowledge; that is, that it is made manifest by the law how much we have departed from the right course. It must then be necessarily rendered, led me out of the way; for hence sinners, who before went on heedlessly, loathe and abominate themselves, when they perceive, through the light which the law throws on the turpitude of sin, that they had been hastening to death. But he away introduces the word occasion, and for this purpose — that we may know that the law of itself does not bring death, but that this happens through something else, and that this is as it were adventitious. This verse will be better understood if we consider it as in a manner a repetition, in another form, of what the former verse contains, and this is perfectly consistent with the usual manner of the Apostle. His object seems to have been to prevent a misapprehension of what he had said, that the commandment which was for life proved to be unto death. He hence says, that sin availed itself of the commandment, and by it deceived him, that is, promised him life, and then by it killed him, that is, proved fatal to him. There is a correspondence in meaning between the commandment unto life and deceiving, and between death and killing. In Romans 7:8, sin, as a person, is said to take advantage of the commandment to work every kind of sinful desires: but it is said here to take this advantage to deceive by promising life, and then to destroy, to expose, and subject him to death and misery. — Ed.

12. So then the law is indeed holy, etc. Some think that the words law and commandment is a repetition of the same thing; with whom I agree; This is doubtless true, and it is an example of what the Apostle’s manner of writing is, it being that of the ancient prophets. How various are the words used in the 119th Psalm to designate the law or the revealed will of God? and two different words are often used in the same verse.

Having spoken of the law in connection with sin, the Apostle may be supposed to have had the character of sin in view in characterizing the law. Sin works depraved desires and lusts; the law is holy: sin deceives and acts the traitor, the law is plain-dealing and just: sin leads to death and misery; the law is good and leads to happiness. The last contrast is evident from what follows in the next verse, “Was that which is good made death unto me?” — Ed. and I consider that there is a peculiar force in the words, when he says, that the law itself and whatever is commanded in the law, is holy, and therefore to be regarded with the highest reverence, — that it is just, and cannot therefore be charged with anything wrong, — that it is good, and hence pure and free from everything that can do harm. He thus defends the law against every charge of blame, that no one should ascribe to it what is contrary to goodness, justice, and holiness.

Romans 7:13

13. Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.

13. Quod ergo bonum est, mihi in mortem cessit? Absit: imo peccatum, ut appareat peccatum, per bonum operatur mihi mortem: ut fiat super modum peccans peccatum Per mandatum.

13. Has then what is good, etc. He had hitherto defended the law from calumnies, but in such a manner, that it still remained doubtful whether it was the cause of death; nay, the minds of men were on this point perplexed, — how could it be that nothing but death was gained from so singular a gift of God. To this objection then he now gives an answer; and he denies, that death proceeds from the law, though death through its means is brought on us by sin. And though this answer seems to militate in appearance against what he had said before — that he had found the commandment, which was given for life, to be unto death, there is yet no contrariety. He had indeed said before, that it is through our wickedness that the law is turned to our destruction, and that contrary to its own character; but here he denies, that it is in such a sense the cause of death, that death is to be imputed to it. In 2 Corinthians 3 he treats more fully of the law. He there calls it the ministration of death; but he so calls it according to what is commonly done in a dispute, and represents, not the real character of the law, but the false opinion of his opponents. This can hardly be admitted. The Apostle in Corinthians evidently states a fact, as he often does, without going into an explanation; and the fact was, that the law proved to be the ministration of death: but it proved to be so through the sin and wickedness of man. — Ed.

But sin, etc. With no intention to offend others, I must state it as my opinion, that this passage ought to be read as I have rendered it, and the meaning is this, — “Sin is in a manner regarded as just before it is discovered by the law; but when it is by the law made known, then it really obtains its own name of sin; and hence it appears the more wicked, and, so to speak, the more sinful, because it turns the goodness of the law, by perverting it, to our destruction; for that must be very pestiferous, which makes what is in its own nature salutary to be hurtful to us.” The import of the whole is — that it was necessary for the atrocity of sin to be discovered by the law; for except sin had burst forth into outrageous, or, as they say, into enormous excess, it would not have been acknowledged as sin; and the more outrageous does its enormity appear, when it converts life into death; and thus every excuse is taken away from it. Erasmus, Beza, Pareus, Stuart, and others, make up the ellipsis by putting in, “was made death to me,” after “sin.” But there is no need of adding anything. The sentence throughout is thoroughly Hebraistic. What is partially announced in the words, “that it might appear sin,” or, to be sin, etc., is more fully stated in the last clause; and the participle, “working” — κατεργαζομένη, is used instead of a verb, the auxiliary verb being understood. See similar instances in Romans 14:9-13 Calvin’s version is no doubt the correct one. What follows the last ἵνα more fully explains what comes after the first. — Ed.

Romans 7:14-17

14. For me know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.

14. Scimus enim quod Lex spiritualis est: ego autem carnalis sum, venditus sub peccato.

15. For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.

15. Quod enim operor, non intelligo; siquidem non quod volo, hoc ago: sed quod odi, hoe facio.

16. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.

16. Si vero quod nolo, hoe facio, consentio Legi Dei quod sit bona.

17. Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

17. Nunc vero non jam illud operor ego, sed quod habitat in me peccatum.

14. For we know that the law, etc. He now begins more closely to compare the law with what man is, that it may be more clearly understood whence the evil of death proceeds. He then sets before us an example in a regenerate man, in whom the remnants of the flesh are wholly contrary to the law of the Lord, while the spirit would gladly obey it. But first, as we have said, he makes only a comparison between nature and the law. Since in human things there is no greater discord than between spirit and flesh, the law being spiritual and man carnal, what agreement can there be between the natural man and the law? Even the same as between darkness and light. But by calling the law spiritual, he not only means, as some expound the passage, that it requires the inward affections of the heart; but that, by way of contrast, it has a contrary import to the word carnal This is evidently the case here. As carnal means what is sinful and corrupt, so spiritual imports what is holy, just, and good. As the works of the flesh are evil and depraved works, so the fruits of the Spirit are good and holy fruits. See Galatians 5:19, 22, and particularly John 3:6. — Ed. These interpreters give this explanation, “The law is spiritual, that is, it binds not only the feet and hands as to external works, but regards the feelings of the heart, and requires the real fear of God.”

But here a contrast is evidently set forth between the flesh and the spirit. And further, it is sufficiently clear from the context, and it has been in fact already shown, that under the term flesh is included whatever men bring from the womb; and flesh is what men are called, as they are born, and as long as they retain their natural character; for as they are corrupt, so they neither taste nor desire anything but what is gross and earthly. Spirit, on the contrary, is renewed nature, which God forms anew after his own image. And this mode of speaking is adopted on this account — because the newness which is wrought in us is the gift of the Spirit.

The perfection then of the doctrine of the law is opposed here to the corrupt nature of man: hence the meaning is as follows, “The law requires a celestial and an angelic righteousness, in which no spot is to appear, to whose clearness nothing is to be wanting: but I am a carnal man, who can do nothing but oppose it.” “He is ‘carnal’ in exact proportion to the degree in which he falls short of perfect conformity to the law of God.” — Scott

It has been usual with a certain class of divines, such as Hammond and Bull, to hold that all the Fathers before Augustine viewed Paul here as not speaking of himself. But this is plainly contradicted by what Augustine declares himself in several parts of his writings. In his Retractations, B. 1, chapter 23, he refers to some authors of divine discourses (quibusdam divinorum tractatoribus eloquiorom) by whose authority he was induced to change his opinion, and to regard Paul here as speaking of himself. He alludes again in his work against Julian, an advocate of Pelagianism, B. 6, chapter 11, to this very change in his view, and ascribes it to the reading of the works of those who were better and more intelligent than himself, (melioribus et intelligentioribus cessi.) Then he refers to them by name, and says, “Hence it was that I came to understand these things, as Hilary, Gregory, Ambrose, and other holy and known doctors of the Church, understood them, who thought that the Apostle himself strenuously struggled against carnal lusts, which he was unwilling to have, and yet had, and that he bore witness as to this confiict in these words,” (referring to this very text,) — Hinc factum est. ut sic ista intelligerem, quemadmodum intellexit Hilarius, Gregorius, Ambroslus, et cœteri Ecclsiœ sancti notique doctores, qui et ipsum Apostolum adversus carnales concupiscentias, quas habere nolebat, et tamen habebat, strenue conflixisse, eundemque conflictum suum illis suis verbis contestatum fuisse senserunt — Ed. But the exposition of Origen, which indeed has been approved by many before our time, is not worthy of being refuted; he says, that the law is called spiritual by Paul, because the Scripture is not to be understood literally. What has this to do with the present subject?

Sold under sin. By this clause he shows what flesh is in itself; for man by nature is no less the slave of sin, than those bondmen, bought with money, whom their masters ill treat at their pleasure, as they do their oxen and their asses. We are so entirely controlled by the power of sin, that the whole mind, the whole heart, and all our actions are under its influence. Compulsion I always except, for we sin spontaneously, as it would be no sin, were it not voluntary. But we are so given up to sin, that we can do willingly nothing but sin; for the corruption which bears rule within us thus drives us onward. Hence this comparison does not import, as they say, a forced service, but a voluntary obedience, which an inbred bondage inclines us to render.

15. For what I do I know not, etc. He now comes to a more particular case, that of a man already regenerated; It appears from this, that Calvin did not apply the foregoing words, “I am carnal, sold under sin,” in the same way: but they are evidently connected together. They are indeed strong words, and some explain them in such a way as to be wholly unsuitable to a renewed man; but we ought to take the explanation as given by the Apostle himself in what follows, for he handles the subject to the end of the chapter.

Various fictions have been resorted to by critics on this point. The Apostle has been supposed by some to speak of himself as under the law, or as Stuart terms it, “in a law state,” and such is the scheme of Hammond Others have imagined, that he personates a Jew living during the time between Abraham and the giving of the law; and this was Locke’s idea. A third party have entertained the notion, that the Apostle, speaking in his own person, represents, by a sort of fiction, as Vitringa and some others have imagined, the effects of the law in Jews and proselytes, as opposed to the effects of the gospel, as delineated in the next chapter. And a fourth party maintain, that the Apostle describes a man in a transition state, in whom God’s Spirit works for his conversion, but who is as yet doubtful which way to turn, to sin or to God.

All these conjectures have arisen, because the language is not taken in its obvious meaning, and according to the Apostle’s own explanation. As soon as we depart from the plain meaning of the text and the context, we open a door to endless conjectures and fictions. The Apostle says nothing here of himself, but what every real Christian finds to be true. Is not a Christian, yea, the best, in this world carnal, as well as spiritual? Is he not “sold under sin?” that is, subjected to a condition, in which he is continually annoyed, tempted, hindered, restrained, checked, and seduced by the depravity and corruption of his nature; and in which he is always kept far below what he aims at, seeks and longs for. It was the saying of a good man, lately gone to his rest, whose extended pilgrimage was ninety-three years, that he must have been often swallowed up by despair, had it not been for the seventh chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. The best interpreter of many things in Scripture is spiritual experience; without it no right judgment can be formed. Hence it is that the learned often stumble at what is quite plain and obvious to the illiterate when spiritually enlightened. Critics sometimes find great difficulties in what is fully understood by a simpler minded Christian, taught from above. “Wayfaring men” are far better divines than any of the learned, who possess nothing more than natural talents and natural acquirements. — Ed. in whom both the things which he had in view appear more clearly; and these were, — the great discord there is between the Law of God and the natural man, — and how the law does not of itself produce death. For since the carnal man rushes into sin with the whole propensity of his mind, he seems to sin with such a free choice, as though it were in his power to govern himself; so that a most pernicious opinion has prevailed almost among all men — that man, by his own natural strength, without the aid of Divine grace, can choose what he pleases. But though the will of a faithful man is led to good by the Spirit of God, yet in him the corruption of nature appears conspicuously; for it obstinately resists and leads to what is contrary. Hence the case of a regenerated man is the most suitable; for by this you may know how much is the contrariety between our nature and the righteousness of the law. From this case, also, a proof as to the other clause may more fitly be sought, than from the mere consideration of human nature; for the law, as it produces only death in a man wholly carnal, is in him more easily impeached, for it is doubtful whence the evil proceeds. In a regenerate man it brings forth salutary fruits; and hence it appears, that it is the flesh only that prevents it from giving life: so far it is from producing death of itself.

That the whole, then, of this reasoning may be more fully and more distinctly understood, we must observe, that this conflict, of which the Apostle speaks, does not exist in man before he is renewed by the Spirit of God: for man, left to his own nature, is wholly borne along by his lusts without any resistance; for though the ungodly are tormented by the stings of conscience, and cannot take such delight in their vices, but that they have some taste of bitterness; yet you cannot hence conclude, either that evil is hated, or that good is loved by them; only the Lord permits them to be thus tormented, in order to show to them in a measure his judgment; but not to imbue them either with the love of righteousness or with the hatred of sin.

There is then this difference between them and the faithful — that they are never so blinded and hardened, but that when they are reminded of their crimes, they condemn them in their own conscience; for knowledge is not so utterly extinguished in them, but that they still retain the difference between right and wrong; and sometimes they are shaken with such dread under a sense of their sin, that they bear a kind of condemnation even in this life: nevertheless they approve of sin with all their heart, and hence give themselves up to it without any feeling of genuine repugnance; for those stings of conscience, by which they are harassed, proceed from opposition in the judgment, rather than from any contrary inclination in the will. The godly, on the other hand, in whom the regeneration of God is begun, are so divided, that with the chief desire of the heart they aspire to God, seek celestial righteousness, hate sin, and yet they are drawn down to the earth by the relics of their flesh: and thus, while pulled in two ways, they fight against their own nature, and nature fights against them; and they condemn their sins, not only as being constrained by the judgment of reason, but because they really in their hearts abominate them, and on their account loathe themselves. This is the Christian conflict between the flesh and the spirit of which Paul speaks in Galatians 5:17.

It has therefore been justly said, that the carnal man runs headlong into sin with the approbation and consent of the whole soul; but that a division then immediately begins for the first time, when he is called by the Lord and renewed by the Spirit. For regeneration only begins in this life; the relics of the flesh which remain, always follow their own corrupt propensities, and thus carry on a contest against the Spirit.

The inexperienced, who consider not the subject which the Apostle handles, nor the plan which he pursues, imagine, that the character of man by nature is here described; and indeed there is a similar description of human nature given to us by the Philosophers: but Scripture philosophizes much deeper; for it finds that nothing has remained in the heart of man but corruption, since the time in which Adam lost the image of God. So when the Sophisters wish to define free-will, or to form an estimate of what the power of nature can do, they fix on this passage. But Paul, as I have said already, does not here set before us simply the natural man, but in his own person describes what is the weakness of the faithful, and how great it is. Augustine was for a time involved in the common error; but after having more clearly examined the passage, he not only retracted what he had falsely taught, but in his first book to Boniface, he proves, by many strong reasons, that what is said cannot be applied to any but to the regenerate. And we shall now endeavor to make our readers clearly to see that such is the case.

I know not. He means that he acknowledges not as his own the works which he did through the weakness of the flesh, for he hated them. And so Erasmus has not unsuitably given this rendering, “I approve not,” (non probo.) “Pii quod perpetrant non agnoscunt, non approbant, non excusant, non palliant;” — “What the godly do [amiss,] they know not, approve not, excuse not, palliate not.” — Pareus

The verb γινώσκω is used here in the sense of the Hebrew verb ידע which is often so rendered by the Septuagint. See Psalm 1:6; Hosea 8:4; and Matthew 7:23. — Ed. We hence conclude, that the doctrine of the law is so consentaneous to right judgment, that the faithful repudiate the transgression of it as a thing wholly unreasonable. But as Paul seems to allow that he teaches otherwise than what the law prescribes, many interpreters have been led astray, and have thought that he had assumed the person of another; hence has arisen the common error, that the character of an unregenerate man is described throughout this portion of the chapter. But Paul, under the idea of transgressing the law, includes all the defects of the godly, which are not inconsistent with the fear of God or with the endeavor of acting uprightly. And he denies that he did what the law demanded, for this reason, because he did not perfectly fulfil it, but somewhat failed in his effort.

For not what I desire, etc. You must not understand that it was always the case with him, that he could not do good; but what he complains of is only this — that he could not perform what he wished, so that he pursued not what was good with that alacrity which was meet, because he was held in a manner bound, and that he also failed in what he wished to do, because he halted through the weakness of the flesh. Hence the pious mind performs not the good it desires to do, because it proceeds not with due activity, and doeth the evil which it would not; for while it desires to stand, it falls, or at least it staggers. But the expressions to will and not to will must be applied to the Spirit, which ought to hold the first place in all the faithful. The flesh indeed has also its own will, but Paul calls that the will which is the chief desire of the heart; and that which militates with it he represents as being contrary to his will.

We may hence learn the truth of what we have stated — that Paul speaks here of the faithful, “As the Apostle was far more enlightened and humble than Christians in general are, doubtless this clog (indwelling sin) was more uneasy to him than it is to them, though most of us find our lives at times greatly embittered by it. So that this energetic language, which many imagine to describe an unestablished believer’s experience, or even that of an unconverted man, seems to have resulted from the extraordinary degree of St. Paul’s sanctification, and the depth of his self-abasement and hatred of sin; and the reason of our not readily understanding him seems to be, because we are far beneath him in holiness, humility, acquaintance with the spirituality of God’s law, and the evil of our own hearts, and in our degree of abhorrence of moral evil.” — Scott

“What some mistake as the evidence of a spiritual decline on the part of the Apostle, was in fact the evidence of his growth. It is the effusion of a more quick and cultured sensibility than fell to the lot of ordinary men.” — Chalmers in whom the grace of the Spirit exists, which brings an agreement between the mind and the righteousness of the law; for no hatred of sin is to be found in the flesh.

16. But if what I desire not, I do, I consent to the law, etc.; that is, “When my heart acquiesces in the law, and is delighted with its righteousness, (which certainly is the case when it hates the transgression of it,) it then perceives and acknowledges the goodness of the law, so that we are fully convinced, experience itself being our teacher, that no evil ought to be imputed to the law; nay, that it would be salutary to men, were it to meet with upright and pure hearts.” But this consent is not to be understood to be the same with what we have heard exists in the ungodly, who have expressed words of this kind, “I see better things and approve of them; I follow the worse.” Again, “What is hurtful I follow; I shun what I believe would be profitable.” For these act under a constraint when they subscribe to the righteousness of God, as their will is wholly alienated from it, but the godly man consents to the law with the real and most cheerful desire of his heart; for he wishes nothing more than to mount up to heaven. “I consent — consentio — συμφημι, I say with, assent to, agree with, confirm.” — Ed.

17. Now it is no more I who do it, etc. This is not the pleading of one excusing himself, as though he was blameless, as the case is with many triflers who think that they have a sufficient defense to cover all their wickedness, when they cast the blame on the flesh; but it is a declaration, by which he shows how very far he dissented from his own flesh in his spiritual feeling; for the faithful are carried along in their obedience to God with such fervour of spirit that they deny the flesh.

This passage also clearly shows, that Paul speaks here of none but of the godly, who have been already born again; for as long as man remains like himself, whatsoever he may be, he is justly deemed corrupt; but Paul here denies that he is wholly possessed by sin; nay, he declares himself to be exempt from its bondage, as though he had said, that sin only dwelt in some part of his soul, while with an earnest feeling of heart he strove for and aspired after the righteousness of God, and clearly proved that he had the law of God engraven within him. The last clause of this verse is worthy of notice, as the expression “indwelling sin” seems to have arisen from the words ἡ οἰκουσα ἐν ἐμοὶ — “which dwells in me.” Sin was in him as in a house or dwelling; it was an in-habiting sin, or that which is in-abiding or resident. — Ed.

Romans 7:18-20

18. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

18. Novi enim quod non habitat Non habitat bonum — οὐκ οἰκει ἀγαθόν. — Ed. in me (hoc est, in came mea) bonum: siquidem velle adest mihi, sed ut perficiam bonum non reperio.

19. For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

19. Non enim quod volo facio bonum; sed quod nolo malum, id ago.

20. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

20. Si vero quod nolo ego id facio, non jam ego operor illud, sed quod habitat in me peccatum.

18. For I know, etc. He says that no good by nature dwelt in him. Then in me, means the same as though he had said, “So far as it regards myself.” In the first part he indeed arraigns himself as being wholly depraved, for he confesses that no good dwelt in him; and then he subjoins a modification, lest he should slight the grace of God which also dwelt in him, but was no part of his flesh. And here again he confirms the fact, that he did not speak of men in general, but of the faithful, who are divided into two parts — the relics of the flesh, and grace. For why was the modification made, except some part was exempt from depravity, and therefore not flesh? Under the term flesh, he ever includes all that human nature is, everything in man, except the sanctification of the Spirit. In the same manner, by the term spirit, which is commonly opposed to the flesh, he means that part of the soul which the Spirit of God has so re-formed, and purified from corruption, that God’s image shines forth in it. Then both terms, flesh as well as spirit, belong to the soul; but the latter to that part which is renewed, and the former to that which still retains its natural character. The Apostle here is his own interpreter; he explains who the I is that does what the other I disapproved, and who the I is that hates what the other I does. He tells us here that it is not the same I, though announced at first as though it were the same. The one I, he informs us here, was his flesh, his innate sin or Corruption, and the other I, he tells us in Romans 7:22, was “the inner man,” his new nature. The “inner man,” as Calvin will tell us presently, is not the soul as distinguished from the body, but the renewed man as distinguished from the flesh. It is the same as the “new man” as distinguished from “the old man.” See Ephesians 4:22, 24; Romans 6:6; 2 Corinthians 5:17. But “the inward man,” and “the outward man,” in 2 Corinthians 4:16, are the soul and the body; and “the inner man,” in Ephesians 3:16, the same expression as in Romans 7:22, means the soul, as it is evident from the context. The same is meant by “the hidden man of the heart,” in 1 Peter 3:4. — Ed.

To will is present, etc. He does not mean that he had nothing but an ineffectual desire, but his meaning is, that the work really done did not correspond to his will; for the flesh hindered him from doing perfectly what he did. So also understand what follows, The evil I desire not, that I do: for the flesh not only impedes the faithful, so that they can not run swiftly, but it sets also before them many obstacles at which they stumble. Hence they do not, because they accomplish not, what they would, with the alacrity that is meet. This, to will, then, which he mentions, is the readiness of faith, when the Holy Spirit so prepares the godly that they are ready and strive to render obedience to God; but as their ability is not equal to what they wish, Paul says, that he found not what he desired, even the accomplishment of the good he aimed at.

19. The same view is to be taken of the expression which next follows, — that he did not the good which he desired, but, on the contrary, the evil which he desired not: for the faithful, however rightly they may be influenced, are yet so conscious of their own infirmity, that they can deem no work proceeding from them as blameless. For as Paul does not here treat of some of the faults of the godly, but delineates in general the whole course of their life, we conclude that their best works are always stained with some blots of sin, so that no reward can be hoped, unless God pardons them.

He at last repeats the sentiment, — that, as far as he was endued with celestial light, he was a true witness and subscriber to the righteousness of the law. It hence follows, that had the pure integrity of our nature remained, the law would not have brought death on us, and that it is not adverse to the man who is endued with a sound and right mind and abhors sin. But to restore health is the work of our heavenly Physician.

Romans 7:21-23

21. I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

21. Reperio igitur Legem volenti mihi facere bonum quod mihi malum insideat. “Insideat,” — παράκειταί; the same verb in Romans 7:18, is rendered adest — is present. It means, to lie near, to be at hand. — Ed.

22. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:

22. Consentio enim Legi Dei secundum interiorem hominem.

23. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

23. Video autem alterum Legem in membris meis, repugnantem “Repugnantem, — ἀντιστρατεύομενον, placing itself in battle array, fighting or warring against, taking the field or marching against an enemy. Then follows “taking” an enemy “captive,” αἰχμαλωτίζοντα. There are two sorts of captives, willing and unwilling. The latter is the case here; for the Apostle compares himself to captives of war, which are made so by force. The same is meant as by the expression, “sold under sin,” verse 14, — the constrained condition of being subject during life, to the annoyances, to the tempting, seducing, and deadening power of innate corruption. — Ed. legi mentis meæ, et captivum me reddentem legi peccati, quæ est in membris meis.

21. I find then, etc. Here Paul supposes a fourfold law. The first is the law of God, which alone is properly so called, which is the rule of righteousness, by which our life is rightly formed. To this he joins the law of the mind, and by this he means the prompt readiness of the faithful mind to render obedience to the divine law, it being a certain conformity on our part with the law of God. On the other hand, he sets in opposition to this the law of unrighteousness; and according to a certain kind of similarity, he gives this name to that dominion which iniquity exercises over a man not yet regenerated, as well as over the flesh of a regenerated man; for the laws even of tyrants, however iniquitous they may be, are called laws, though not properly. To correspond with this law of sin he makes the law of the members, that is, the lust which is in the members, on account of the concord it has with iniquity.

As to the first clause, many interpreters take the word law in its proper sense, and consider κατὰ or διὰ to be understood; and so Erasmus renders it, “by the law;” as though Paul had said, that he, by the law of God as his teacher and guide, had found out that his sin was innate. But without supplying anything, the sentence would run better thus, “While the faithful strive after what is good, they find in themselves a certain law which exercises a tyrannical power; for a vicious propensity, adverse to and resisting the law of God, is implanted in their very marrow and bones.”

22. For I consent “Consentio,” συνήδομαι: it is not the same verb as in Romans 7:16; this signifies more than consent, for it includes gratification and delight. See Psalm 1:2. The verb is found only here. Macknight’s version, “I am pleased with,” is very feeble and inexpressive; Stuart’s is better, “I take pleasure in;” but our common version is the best, “I delight in.”

The γὰρ here would be better rendered “indeed:” the Apostle makes declaration as to his higher principle; and then in the next verse he states more fully what he had said in Romans 7:21. This exactly corresponds with his usual mode in treating subjects. He first states a thing generally, and afterwards more particularly, in more specific terms, and with something additional. — Ed. to the law of God, etc. Here then you see what sort of division there is in pious souls, from which arises that contest between the spirit and the flesh, which Augustine in some place calls the Christian struggle (luctam Christianam.) The law calls man to the rule of righteousness; iniquity, which is, as it were, the tyrannical law of Satan, instigates him to wickedness: the Spirit leads him to render obedience to the divine law; the flesh draws him back to what is of an opposite character. Man, thus impelled by contrary desires, is now in a manner a twofold being; but as the Spirit ought to possess the sovereignty, he deems and judges himself to be especially on that side. Paul says, that he was bound a captive by his flesh for this reason, because as he was still tempted and incited by evil lusts; he deemed this a coercion with respect to the spiritual desire, which was wholly opposed to them. Some consider the conclusion of Romans 7:23, “to the law of sin which is in my members,” as a paraphrase for “to itself;” as the Apostle describes it at the beginning as the law in his members: and the reason which may be assigned for the repetition is twofold, — to preserve the distinction between it and “the law of the mind” in the preceding clause, — and to give it a more distinctive character, by denominating it “the law of sin.” We in fact find a gradation in the way in which it is set forth: in Romans 7:21, he calls it simply “a law;” in this verse he first calls it “another law in his members,” and then, “the law of sin in his members.”

The construction of Romans 7:21, is difficult. Pareus quotes Chrysostom as supposing σύμφηναι from Romans 7:16, to be understood after “law,” so as to give this rendering, “I find then that the law assents to me desiring to do good,” etc., that is, that the law of God was on his side, “though evil was present with him.” He then gives his own view, it being essentially that of Augustine: he supposes ὅτι καλὸς from Romans 7:16, to be understood after “law,” and that ὅτι, in the last clause, is to be construed “though:” the verse is then to be rendered thus, — “I find then the law, that it is good to me desiring to do good, though evil is present with me;” The verse taken by itself may thus present a good meaning, but not one that harmonizes with the context, or that forms a part of the Apostle’s argument. The only other construction that deserves notice is that of our own version, and of Calvin, and it is that alone which corresponds with the context. It has been adopted by Beza, Grotius, Venema, Turrettin, Doddridge, and others.

This verse, and the two which follow, conclude the subject, and also explain what he had been saying about willing and doing. He in fact accounts here for the paradoxical statements which he had made, by mentioning the operation and working of two laws, which were directly contrary to one another. It seems to be a mistake that he alludes to four laws; for the law of the mind and the law of God are the same, under different names; it is that of the mind, because it belongs to and resides in the mind: and it is the law of God, because it comes from him, and is implanted by his Spirit. To the other law he also gives two names, the “law in his members,” and the “law of sin.” This view is confirmed by the last verse in the chapter, which contains a summary of the whole.

The latter part of Romans 7:23 is in character with the Hebraistic style, when the noun is stated instead of the pronoun; see Genesis 9:16; Psalm 50:23; and it is also agreeable to the same style to add the same sentiment with something more specific appended to it. This part then might be rendered thus, — “and making me captive to itself, even to the law of sin, which is he my members.” — Ed.

But we ought to notice carefully the meaning of the inner man and of the members; which many have not rightly understood, and have therefore stumbled at this stone. The inner man then is not simply the soul, but that spiritual part which has been regenerated by God; and the members signify the other remaining part; for as the soul is the superior, and the body the inferior part of man, so the spirit is superior to the flesh. Then as the spirit takes the place of the soul in man, and the flesh, which is the corrupt and polluted soul, that of the body, the former has the name of the inner man, and the latter has the name of members. The inner man has indeed a different meaning in 2 Corinthians 4:16; but the circumstances of this passage require the interpretation which I have given: and it is called the inner by way of excellency; for it possesses the heart and the secret feelings, while the desires of the flesh are vagrant, and are, as it were, on the outside of man. Doubtless it is the same thing as though one compared heaven to earth; for Paul by way of contempt designates whatever appears to be in man by the term members, that he might clearly show that the hidden renovation is concealed from and escapes our observation, except it be apprehended by faith.

Now since the law of the mind undoubtedly means a principle rightly formed, it is evident that this passage is very absurdly applied to men not yet regenerated; for such, as Paul teaches us, are destitute of mind, inasmuch as their soul has become degenerated from reason.

Romans 7:24-25

24. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

24. Miser ego homo! quis me eripiet a corpore mortis hoc?

25. I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

25. Gratias ago Deo per Iesum Christum Dominum nostrum: itaque idem ego mente servio Legi Dei,carne autem legi peccati.

24. Miserable, etc. He closes his argument with a vehement exclamation, by which he teaches us that we are not only to struggle with our flesh, but also with continual groaning to bewail within ourselves and before God our unhappy condition. But he asks not by whom he was to be delivered, as one in doubt, like unbelievers, who understand not that there is but one real deliverer: but it is the voice of one panting and almost fainting, because he does not find immediate help, Ταλαίπωρος, miser, ærumnosus; “it denotes,” says Schleusner, “one who is broken down and wearied with the most grievous toils.” It is used by the Septuagint for the word שדוד, wasted, spoiled, desolated. See Psalm 137:8; Isaiah 33:1. — Ed. as he longs for. And he mentions the word rescue, “Eripere“ — pluck out, rescue, take away by force; ῥύσεται — shall draw, rescue or extricate; it means a forcible act, effected by power. — Ed. in order that he might show, that for his liberation no ordinary exercise of divine power was necessary.

By the body of death he means the whole mass of sin, or those ingredients of which the whole man is composed; except that in him there remained only relics, by the captive bonds of which he was held. The pronoun τούτου this, which I apply, as Erasmus does, to the body, may also be fitly referred to death, and almost in the same sense; for Paul meant to teach us, that the eyes of God’s children are opened, so that through the law of God they wisely discern the corruption of their nature and the death which from it proceeds. But the word body means the same as the external man and members; for Paul points out this as the origin of evil, that man has departed from the law of his creation, and has become thus carnal and earthly. For though he still excels brute beasts, yet his true excellency has departed from him, and what remains in him is full of numberless corruptions so that his soul, being degenerated, may be justly said to have passed into a body. So God says by Moses,

“No more shall my Spirit contend with man, for he is even flesh,” (Genesis 6:3:)

thus stripping man of his spiritual excellency, he compares him, by way of reproach, to the brute creation. “This body of death” is an evident Hebraism, meaning “this deadly or mortiferous body;” which is not the material body, but the body of “the old man,” Romans 7:6; called the “body of sin,” when its character is described, and the “body of death,” when the issue to which it leads is intended: it conducts to death, condemnation, and misery. — Ed.

This passage is indeed remarkably fitted for the purpose of beating down all the glory of the flesh; for Paul teaches us, that the most perfect, as long as they dwell in the flesh, are exposed to misery, for they are subject to death; nay, when they thoroughly examine themselves, they find in their own nature nothing but misery. And further, lest they should indulge their torpor, Paul, by his own example, stimulates them to anxious groanings, and bids them, as long as they sojourn on earth, to desire death, as the only true remedy to their evils; and this is the right object in desiring death. Despair does indeed drive the profane often to such a wish; but they strangely desire death, because they are weary of the present life, and not because they loathe their iniquity. But it must be added, that though the faithful level at the true mark, they are not yet carried away by an unbridled desire in wishing for death, but submit themselves to the will of God, to whom it behoves us both to live and to die: hence they clamor not with displeasure against God, but humbly deposit their anxieties in his bosom; for they do not so dwell on the thoughts of their misery, but that being mindful of grace received, they blend their grief with joy, as we find in what follows.

25. I thank God; etc. He then immediately subjoined this thanksgiving, lest any should think that in his complaint he perversely murmured against God; for we know how easy even in legitimate grief is the transition to discontent and impatience. Though Paul then bewailed his lot, and sighed for his departure, he yet confesses that he acquiesced in the good pleasure of God; for it does not become the saints, while examining their own defects, to forget what they have already received from God. There is a different reading for the first clause of this verse, χάρις τῳ Θέω, “thanks to God,” which, Griesbach says, is nearly equal to the received text; and there are a few copies which have ἡ χάρις κυρίου, “the grace of our Lord,” etc.; which presents a direct answer to the foregoing question: but a considerable number more have ἡ χάρις του θέου, “the grace of God,” etc.; which also gives an answer to the preceding question. But the safest way, when there is no strong reason from the context, is to follow what is mostly sanctioned by MSS. Taking then the received text, we shall find a suitable answer to the foregoing question, if we consider the verb used in the question to be here understood, a thing not unusual; then the version would be, “I thank God, who will deliver me through Jesus Christ our Lord;” not as Macknight renders the verb, “who delivers me;” for the answer must be in the same tense with the question. — Ed.

But what is sufficient to bridle impatience and to cherish resignation, is the thought, that they have been received under the protection of God, that they may never perish, and that they have already been favored with the first-fruits of the Spirit, which make certain their hope of the eternal inheritance. Though they enjoy not as yet the promised glory of heaven, at the same time, being content with the measure which they have obtained, they are never without reasons for joy.

So I myself, etc. A short epilogue, in which he teaches us, that the faithful never reach the goal of righteousness as long as they dwell in the flesh, but that they are running their course, until they put off the body. He again gives the name of mind, not to the rational part of the soul which philosophers extol, but to that which is illuminated by the Spirit of God, so that it understands and wills aright: for there is a mention made not of the understanding alone, but connected with it is the earnest desire of the heart. However, by the exception he makes, he confesses, that he was devoted to God in such a manner, that while creeping on the earth he was defiled with many corruptions. This is a suitable passage to disprove the most pernicious dogma of the Purists, (Catharorum,) which some turbulent spirits attempt to revive at the present day. “Idem ego — the same I,” or, “I the same;” αὐτὸς ἐγὼ Beza renders it the same — “idem ego,” and makes this remark, “This was suitable to what follows, by which one man seems to have been divided into two.” Others render it, “ipse ego — I myself,” and say that Paul used this dictlon emphatically, that none might suspect that he spoke in the person of another. See Romans 9:3; 2 Corinthians 10:1, 12, 13. The phrase imports this, “It is myself, and none else.”

He terms his innate sin “the flesh.” By the flesh, says Pareus, “is not meant physically the muscular substance, but theologically the depravity of nature, — not sensuality alone, but the unregenerated reason, will, and affections.” — Ed.

CHAPTER 8

Romans 8:1-4

1. There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. This clause, “who walk not,” etc., is regarded as spurious by Griesbach: a vast preponderance of authority as to MSS. is against it; and its proper place seems to be at the end of the fourth verse. It being placed here does not, however, interfere with the meaning. — Ed.

1. Nulla igitur condemnatio est iis qui sunt in Christo Iesu, qui non secumdum carnem ambulant, sed secundum Spiritum.

2. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.

2. Lex enim Spiritus vitæ in Christo Iesu, liberum me reddidit a lege peccati et mortis.

3. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:

3. Quod enim impossibile erat Legi,eo quod infirmabatur per carnem,misso Deus Filio suo in similitudine carnis peccati, etiam de peccato damnavit peccatum in carne;

4. That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

4. Ut justificatio Legis impleretur in nobis qui non secumdum carnem ambulamus, sed secundum Spiritum.

CHAPTER 7

Ro 7:1-25. Same Subject Continued.

Relation of Believers to the Law and to Christ (Ro 7:1-6).

Recurring to the statement of Ro 6:14, that believers are "not under the law but under grace," the apostle here shows how this change is brought about, and what holy consequences follow from it.

1. I speak to them that know the law--of Moses to whom, though not themselves Jews (see on Ro 1:13), the Old Testament was familiar.

2-3. if her husband be dead--"die." So Ro 7:3.

4. Wherefore ... ye also are become dead--rather, "were slain."

to the law by the body of Christ--through His slain body. The apostle here departs from his usual word "died," using the more expressive phrase "were slain," to make it clear that he meant their being "crucified with Christ" (as expressed in Ro 6:3-6, and Ga 2:20).

that ye should be married to another, even to him that is--"was."

raised from the dead--to the intent.

that we should bring forth fruit unto God--It has been thought that the apostle should here have said that "the law died to us," not "we to the law," but that purposely inverted the figure, to avoid the harshness to Jewish ears of the death of the law [Chrysostom, Calvin, Hodge, Philippi, &c.]. But this is to mistake the apostle's design in employing this figure, which was merely to illustrate the general principle that "death dissolves legal obligation." It was essential to his argument that we, not the law, should be the dying party, since it is we that are "crucified with Christ," and not the law. This death dissolves our marriage obligation to the law, leaving us at liberty to contract a new relation--to be joined to the Risen One, in order to spiritual fruitfulness, to the glory of God [Beza, Olshausen, Meyer, Alford, &c.]. The confusion, then, is in the expositors, not the text; and it has arisen from not observing that, like Jesus Himself, believers are here viewed as having a double life--the old sin-condemned life, which they lay down with Christ, and the new life of acceptance and holiness to which they rise with their Surety and Head; and all the issues of this new life, in Christian obedience, are regarded as the "fruit" of this blessed union to the Risen One. How such holy fruitfulness was impossible before our union to Christ, is next declared.

5. For when we were in the flesh--in our unregenerate state, as we came into the world. See on Joh 3:6 and Ro 8:5-9.

the motions--"passions" (Margin), "affections" (as in Ga 5:24), or "stirrings."

of sins--that is, "prompting to the commission of sins."

which were by the law--by occasion of the law, which fretted, irritated our inward corruption by its prohibitions. See on Ro 7:7-9.

did work in our members--the members of the body, as the instruments by which these inward stirrings find vent in action, and become facts of the life. See on Ro 6:6.

to bring forth fruit unto death--death in the sense of Ro 6:21. Thus hopeless is all holy fruit before union to Christ.

6. But now--On the same expression, see on Ro 6:22, and compare Jas 1:15.

we are delivered from the law--The word is the same which, in Ro 6:6 and elsewhere, is rendered "destroyed," and is but another way of saying (as in Ro 7:4) that "we were slain to the law by the body of Christ"; language which, though harsh to the ear, is designed and fitted to impress upon the reader the violence of that death of the Cross, by which, as by a deadly wrench, we are "delivered from the law."

that being dead wherein we were held--It is now universally agreed that the true reading here is, "being dead to that wherein we were held." The received reading has no authority whatever, and is inconsistent with the strain of the argument; for the death spoken of, as we have seen, is not the law's, but ours, through union with the crucified Saviour.

that we should--"so as to" or "so that we."

serve in newness of spirit--"in the newness of the spirit."

and not in the oldness of the letter--not in our old way of literal, mechanical obedience to the divine law, as a set of external rules of conduct, and without any reference to the state of our hearts; but in that new way of spiritual obedience which, through union to the risen Saviour, we have learned to render (compare Ro 2:29; 2Co 3:6).

False Inferences regarding the Law Repelled (Ro 7:7-25).

And first, Ro 7:7-13, in the case of the UNREGENERATE.

7-8. What ... then? Is the law sin? God forbid!--"I have said that when we were in the flesh the law stirred our inward corruption, and was thus the occasion of deadly fruit: Is then the law to blame for this? Far from us be such a thought."

Nay--"On the contrary" (as in Ro 8:37; 1Co 12:22; Greek).

I had not known sin but by the law--It is important to fix what is meant by "sin" here. It certainly is not "the general nature of sin" [Alford, &c.], though it be true that this is learned from the law; for such a sense will not suit what is said of it in the following verses, where the meaning is the same as here. The only meaning which suits all that is said of it in this place is "the principle of sin in the heart of fallen man." The sense, then, is this: "It was by means of the law that I came to know what a virulence and strength of sinful propensity I had within me." The existence of this it did not need the law to reveal to him; for even the heathens recognized and wrote of it. But the dreadful nature and desperate power of it the law alone discovered--in the way now to be described.

for I had not known lust, except, &c.--Here the same Greek word is unfortunately rendered by three different English ones--"lust"; "covet"; "concupiscence" (Ro 7:8)--which obscures the meaning. By using the word "lust" only, in the wide sense of all "irregular desire," or every outgoing of the heart towards anything forbidden, the sense will best be brought out; thus, "For I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not lust; But sin, taking ('having taken') occasion by the commandment (that one which forbids it), wrought in me all manner of lusting." This gives a deeper view of the tenth commandment than the mere words suggest. The apostle saw in it the prohibition not only of desire after certain things there specified, \ but of "desire after everything divinely forbidden"; in other words, all "lusting" or "irregular desire." It was this which "he had not known but by the law." The law forbidding all such desire so stirred his corruption that it wrought in him "all manner of lusting"--desire of every sort after what was forbidden.

9. For I was alive without the law once--"In the days of my ignorance, when, in this sense, a stranger to the law, I deemed myself a righteous man, and, as such, entitled to life at the hand of God."

but when the commandment came--forbidding all irregular desire; for the apostle sees in this the spirit of the whole law.

sin revived--"came to life"; in its malignity and strength it unexpectedly revealed itself, as if sprung from the dead.

and I died--"saw myself, in the eye of a law never kept and not to be kept, a dead man."

10-11. And--thus.

the commandment, which was, &c.--designed

to--give

life--through the keeping of it.

I found to be unto death--through breaking it.

For sin--my sinful nature.

taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me--or "seduced me"--drew me aside into the very thing which the commandment forbade.

and by it slew me--"discovered me to myself to be a condemned and gone man" (compare Ro 7:9, "I died").

12-13. Wherefore--"So that."

the law is--"is indeed"

good, and the commandment--that one so often referred to, which forbids all lusting.

holy, and just, and good.

14. For we know that the law is spiritual--in its demands.

but I am carnal--fleshly (see on Ro 7:5), and as such, incapable of yielding spiritual obedience.

sold under sin--enslaved to it. The "I" here, though of course not the regenerate, is neither the unregenerate, but the sinful principle of the renewed man, as is expressly stated in Ro 7:18.

15-16. For, &c.--better, "For that which I do I know not"; that is, "In obeying the impulses of my carnal nature I act the slave of another will than my own as a renewed man?"

for, &c.--rather, "for not what I would (wish, desire) that do I, but what I hate that I do."

17. Now then it is no more I--my renewed self.

that do it--"that work it."

but sin which dwelleth in me--that principle of sin that still has its abode in me. To explain this and the following statements, as many do (even Bengel and Tholuck), of the sins of unrenewed men against their better convictions, is to do painful violence to the apostle's language, and to affirm of the unregenerate what is untrue. That coexistence and mutual hostility of "flesh" and "spirit" in the same renewed man, which is so clearly taught in Ro 8:4, &c., and in Ga 5:16, &c., is the true and only key to the language of this and the following verses. (It is hardly necessary to say that the apostle means not to disown the blame of yielding to his corruptions, by saying, "it is not he that does it, but sin that dwelleth in him." Early heretics thus abused his language; but the whole strain of the passage shows that his sole object in thus expressing himself was to bring more vividly before his readers the conflict of two opposite principles, and how entirely, as a new man--honoring from his inmost soul the law of God--he condemned and renounced his corrupt nature, with its affections and lusts, its stirrings and its outgoings, root and branch).

18. For, &c.--better, "For I know that there dwelleth not in me, that is in my flesh, any good."

for to will--"desire."

is present with me; but how to perform that which is good--the supplement "how," in our version, weakens the statement.

I find not--Here, again, we have the double self of the renewed man; "In me dwelleth no good; but this corrupt self is not my true self; it is but sin dwelling in my real self, as a renewed man."

19-21. For, &c.--The conflict here graphically described between a self that "desires" to do good and a self that in spite of this does evil, cannot be the struggles between conscience and passion in the unregenerate, because the description given of this "desire to do good" in Ro 7:22 is such as cannot be ascribed, with the least show of truth, to any but the renewed.

22. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man--"from the bottom of my heart." The word here rendered "delight" is indeed stronger than "consent" in Ro 7:16; but both express a state of mind and heart to which the unregenerate man is a stranger.

23. But I see another--it should be "a different"

law in my members--(See on Ro 7:5).

warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members--In this important verse, observe, first, that the word "law" means an inward principle of action, good or evil, operating with the fixedness and regularity of a law. The apostle found two such laws within him; the one "the law of sin in his members," called (in Ga 5:17, 24) "the flesh which lusteth against the spirit," "the flesh with the affections and lusts," that is, the sinful principle in the regenerate; the other, "the law of the mind," or the holy principle of the renewed nature. Second, when the apostle says he "sees" the one of these principles "warring against" the other, and "bringing him into captivity" to itself, he is not referring to any actual rebellion going on within him while he was writing, or to any captivity to his own lusts then existing. He is simply describing the two conflicting principles, and pointing out what it was the inherent property of each to aim at bringing about. Third, when the apostle describes himself as "brought into captivity" by the triumph of the sinful principle of his nature, he clearly speaks in the person of a renewed man. Men do not feel themselves to be in captivity in the territories of their own sovereign and associated with their own friends, breathing a congenial atmosphere, and acting quite spontaneously. But here the apostle describes himself, when drawn under the power of his sinful nature, as forcibly seized and reluctantly dragged to his enemy's camp, from which he would gladly make his escape. This ought to settle the question, whether he is here speaking as a regenerate man or the reverse.

24. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?--The apostle speaks of the "body" here with reference to "the law of sin" which he had said was "in his members," but merely as the instrument by which the sin of the heart finds vent in action, and as itself the seat of the lower appetites (see on Ro 6:6, and Ro 7:5); and he calls it "the body of this death," as feeling, at the moment when he wrote, the horrors of that death (Ro 6:21, and Ro 7:5) into which it dragged him down. But the language is not that of a sinner newly awakened to the sight of his lost state; it is the cry of a living but agonized believer, weighed down under a burden which is not himself, but which he longs to shake off from his renewed self. Nor does the question imply ignorance of the way of relief at the time referred to. It was designed only to prepare the way for that outburst of thankfulness for the divinely provided remedy which immediately follows.

25. I thank God--the Source.

through Jesus Christ--the Channel of deliverance.

So then--to sum up the whole matter.

with the mind--the mind indeed.

I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin--"Such then is the unchanging character of these two principles within me. God's holy law is dear to my renewed mind, and has the willing service of my new man; although that corrupt nature which still remains in me listens to the dictates of sin."

Note, (1) This whole chapter was of essential service to the Reformers in their contendings with the Church of Rome. When the divines of that corrupt church, in a Pelagian spirit, denied that the sinful principle in our fallen nature, which they called "Concupiscence," and which is commonly called "Original Sin," had the nature of sin at all, they were triumphantly answered from this chapter, where--both in the first section of it, which speaks of it in the unregenerate, and in the second, which treats of its presence and actings in believers--it is explicitly, emphatically, and repeatedly called "sin." As such, they held it to be damnable. (See the Confessions both of the Lutheran and Reformed churches). In the following century, the orthodox in Holland had the same controversy to wage with "the Remonstrants" (the followers of Arminius), and they waged it on the field of this chapter. (2) Here we see that Inability is consistent with Accountability. (See Ro 7:18; Ga 5:17). "As the Scriptures constantly recognize the truth of these two things, so are they constantly united in Christian experience. Everyone feels that he cannot do the things that he would, yet is sensible that he is guilty for not doing them. Let any man test his power by the requisition to love God perfectly at all times. Alas! how entire our inability! Yet how deep our self-loathing and self-condemnation!" [Hodge]. (3) If the first sight of the Cross by the eye of faith kindles feelings never to be forgotten, and in one sense never to be repeated--like the first view of an enchanting landscape--the experimental discovery, in the latter stages of the Christian life, of its power to beat down and mortify inveterate corruption, to cleanse and heal from long-continued backslidings and frightful inconsistencies, and so to triumph over all that threatens to destroy those for whom Christ died, as to bring them safe over the tempestuous seas of this life into the haven of eternal rest--is attended with yet more heart--affecting wonder draws forth deeper thankfulness, and issues in more exalted adoration of Him whose work Salvation is from first to last (Ro 7:24, 25). (4) It is sad when such topics as these are handled as mere questions of biblical interpretation or systematic theology. Our great apostle could not treat of them apart from personal experience, of which the facts of his own life and the feelings of his own soul furnished him with illustrations as lively as they were apposite. When one is unable to go far into the investigation of indwelling sin, without breaking out into an, "O wretched man that I am!" and cannot enter on the way of relief without exclaiming "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord," he will find his meditations rich in fruit to his own soul, and may expect, through Him who presides in all such matters, to kindle in his readers or hearers the like blessed emotions (Ro 7:24, 25). So be it even now, O Lord!

For I speak to them that know the law - This is a proof that the apostle directs this part of his discourse to the Jews.

As long as he liveth? - Or, as long as It liveth; law does not extend its influence to the dead, nor do abrogated laws bind. It is all the same whether we understand these words as speaking of a law abrogated, so that it cannot command; or of its objects being dead, so that it has none to bind. In either case the law has no force.

For the woman which hath a husband - The apostle illustrates his meaning by a familiar instance. A married woman is bound to her husband while he lives; but when her husband is dead she is discharged from the law by which she was bound to him alone.

So then, if, while her husband liveth - The object of the apostle's similitude is to show that each party is equally bound to the other; but that the death of either dissolves the engagement.

So - she is no adulteress, though she be married to another - And do not imagine that this change would argue any disloyalty in you to your Maker; for, as he has determined that this law of ordinances shall cease, you are no more bound to it than a woman is to a deceased husband, and are as free to receive the Gospel of Christ as a woman in such circumstances would be to remarry.

Wherefore, my brethren - This is a parallel case. You were once under the law of Moses, and were bound by its injunctions; but now ye are become dead to that law - a modest, inoffensive mode of speech, for, The law, which was once your husband, is dead; God has determined that it shall be no longer in force; so that now, as a woman whose husband is dead is freed from the law of that husband, or from her conjugal vow, and may legally be married to another, so God, who gave the law under which ye have hitherto lived, designed that it should be in force only till the advent of the Messiah; that advent has taken place, the law has consequently ceased, and now ye are called to take on you the yoke of the Gospel, and lay down the yoke of the law; and it is the design of God that you should do so.

That ye should be married to another - who is raised from the dead - As Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth, the object of God in giving the law was to unite you to Christ; and, as he has died, he has not only abolished that law which condemns every transgressor to death, without any hope of a revival, but he has also made that atonement for sin, by his own death, which is represented in the sacrifices prescribed by the law. And as Jesus Christ is risen again from the dead, he has thereby given the fullest proof that by his death he has procured the resurrection of mankind, and made that atonement required by the law. That we should bring forth fruit unto God - we, Jews, who believe in Christ, have, in consequence of our union with him, received the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit; so that we bring forth that fruit of holiness unto God which, without this union, it would be impossible for us to produce. Here is a delicate allusion to the case of a promising and numerous progeny from a legitimate and happy marriage.

For, when we were in the flesh - When we were without the Gospel, in our carnal and unregenerated state, though believing in the law of Moses, and performing the rites and offices of our religion.

The motions of sins, which were by the law - Τα παθηματα των ἁμαρτιων, the passions of sins, the evil propensities to sins; to every particular sin there is a propensity: one propensity does not excite to all kinds of sinful acts; hence the apostle uses the plural number, the Passions or propensities of Sins; sins being not more various than their propensities in the unregenerate heart, which excite to them. These παθηματα, propensities, constitute the fallen nature; they are the disease of the heart, the pollution and corruption of the soul.

Did work in our members - The evil propensity acts εν τοις μελεσιν, in the whole nervous and muscular system, applying that stimulus to every part which is necessary to excite them to action.

To bring forth fruit unto death - To produce those acts of transgression which subject the sinner to death, temporal and eternal. When the apostle says, the motion of sin which were by the law, he points out a most striking and invariable characteristic of sin, viz. its rebellious nature; it ever acts against law, and the most powerfully against known law. Because the law requires obedience, therefore it will transgress. The law is equally against evil passions and evil actions, and both these exert themselves against it. So, these motions which were by the law, became roused into the most powerful activity by the prohibitions of the law. They were comparatively dormant till the law said, thou shalt Not do this, thou shalt Do that; then the rebellious principle in the evil propensity became roused, and acts of transgression and omissions of duty were the immediate consequences.

But now we are delivered from the law - We, who have believed in Christ Jesus, are delivered from that yoke by which we were bound, which sentenced every transgressor to perdition, but provided no pardon even for the penitent, and no sanctification for those who are weary of their inbred corruptions.

That being dead wherein we were held - To us believers in Christ this commandment is abrogated; we are transferred to another constitution; that law which kills ceases to bind us; it is dead to us who have believed in Christ Jesus, who is the end of the law for justification and salvation to every one that believes.

That we should serve in newness of spirit - We are now brought under a more spiritual dispensation; now we know the spiritual import of all the Mosaic precepts. We see that the law referred to the Gospel, and can only be fulfilled by the Gospel.

The oldness of the letter - The merely literal rites, ceremonies, and sacrifices are now done away; and the newness of the spirit, the true intent and meaning of all are now fully disclosed; so that we are got from an imperfect state into a state of perfection and excellence. We sought justification and sanctification, pardon and holiness, by the law, and have found that the law could not give them: we have sought these in the Gospel scheme, and we have found them. We serve God now, not according to the old literal sense, but in the true spiritual meaning.

Is the law sin? - The apostle had said, Rom 7:6 : The motions of sins, which were by the law, did bring forth fruit unto death; and now he anticipates an objection, "Is therefore the law sin?" To which he answers, as usual, μη γενοιτο, by no means. Law is only the means of disclosing; this sinful propensity, not of producing it; as a bright beam of the sun introduced into a room shows; millions of motes which appear to be dancing in it in all directions; but these were not introduced by the light: they were there before, only there was not light enough to make them manifest; so the evil propensity was there before, but there was not light sufficient to discover it.

I had not known sin, but by the law - Mr. Locke and Dr. Taylor have properly remarked the skill used by St. Paul in dexterously avoiding, as much as possible, the giving offense to the Jews: and this is particularly evident in his use of the word I in this place. In the beginning of the chapter, where he mentions their knowledge of the law, he says Ye; in the 4th verse he joins himself with them, and says we; but here, and so to the end of the chapter, where he represents the power of sin and the inability of the law to subdue it, he appears to leave them out, and speaks altogether in the first person, though it is plain he means all those who are under the law. So, Rom 3:7, he uses the singular pronoun, why am I judged a sinner? when he evidently means the whole body of unbelieving Jews.

There is another circumstance in which his address is peculiarly evident; his demonstrating the insufficiency of the law under color of vindicating it. He knew that the Jew would take fire at the least reflection on the law, which he held in the highest veneration; and therefore he very naturally introduces him catching at that expression, Rom 7:5, the motions of sins, which were by the law, or, notwithstanding the law. "What!" says this Jew, "do you vilify the law, by charging it with favoring sin?" By no means, says the apostle; I am very far from charging the law with favoring sin. The law is holy, and the commandment is holy, just, and good, Rom 7:12. Thus he writes in vindication of the law; and yet at the same time shows:

1. That the law requires the most extensive obedience, discovering and condemning sin in all its most secret and remote branches, Rom 7:7.

2. That it gives sin a deadly force, subjecting every transgression to the penalty of death, Rom 7:8-14. And yet,

3. supplies neither help nor hope to the sinner, but leaves him under the power of sin, and the sentence of death, Rom 7:14, etc. This, says Dr. Taylor, is the most ingenious turn of writing I ever met with. We have another instance of the same sort, Rom 13:1-7.

It is not likely that a dark, corrupt human heart can discern the will of God. His law is his will. It recommends what is just, and right, and good and forbids what is improper, unjust, and injurious. If God had not revealed himself by this law, we should have done precisely what many nations of the earth have done, who have not had this revelation - put darkness for light, and sin for acts of holiness. While the human heart is its own measure it will rate its workings according to its own propensities; for itself is its highest rule. But when God gives a true insight of his own perfections, to be applied as a rule both of passion and practice, then sin is discovered, and discovered too, to be exceedingly sinful. So strong propensities, because they appear to be inherent in our nature, would have passed for natural and necessary operations; and their sinfulness would not have been discovered, if the law had not said, Thou shalt not covet; and thus determined that the propensity itself, as well as its outward operations, is sinful. The law is the straight edge which determines the quantum of obliquity in the crooked line to which it is applied.

It is natural for man to do what is unlawful, and to desire especially to do that which is forbidden. The heathens have remarked this propensity in man.

Thus Livy, xxxiv. 4: -

Luxuria - ipsis vinculis, sicut fera bestia, irtitata. "Luxury, like a wild beast, is irritated by its very bonds."

Audax omnia perpeti

Gens humana ruit per vetitun; nefas. "The presumptuous human race obstinately rush into prohibited acts of wickedness."

Hor. Carm. lib. i. Od. iii. ver. 25.

And Ovid, Amor. lib. ii. Eleg. xix. ver. 3: -

Quod licet, ingratum est; quod non licet, acrius urit. "What is lawful is insipid; the strongest propensity is excited towards that which is prohibited."

And again, Ib. lib. iii. E. iv. ver. 17: -

Nitimur in vetitum semper, cupimusque negata. "Vice is provoked by every strong restraint,

Sick men long most to drink, who know they mayn't."

The same poet delivers the same sentiment it another place: -

Acrior admonitu est, irritaturque retenta

Et crescit rabies: remoraminaque ipsa nocebant.

Metam. lib. iii. ver. 566. "Being admonished, he becomes the more obstinate; and his fierceness is irritated by restraints. Prohibitions become incentives to greater acts of vice."

But it is needless to multiply examples; this most wicked principle of a sinful, fallen nature, has been felt and acknowledged by All mankind.

Sin, taking occasion by the commandment - I think the pointing, both in this and in the 11th verse, to be wrong: the comma should be after occasion, and not after commandment. But sin taking occasion, wrought in me by this commandment all manner of concupiscence. There are different opinions concerning the meaning of the word αφορμη, which we here translate occasion. Dr. Waterland translates the clause, Sin, taking Advantage. Dr. Taylor contends that all commentators have mistaken the meaning of it, and that it should be rendered having received Force. For this acceptation of the word I can find no adequate authority except in its etymology - απο, from, and ὁρμη, impetus. The word appears to signify, in general, whatsoever is necessary for the completion or accomplishment of any particular purpose. Xenophon uses αφορμαι εις τον βιον to signify whatever is necessary for the support of life. There is a personification in the text: sin is, represented as a murderer watching for life, and snatching at every means and embracing every opportunity to carry his fell purpose into effect. The miserable sinner has a murderer, sin, within him; this murderer can only destroy life in certain circumstances; finding that the law condemns the object of his cruelty to death, he takes occasion from this to work in the soul all manner of concupiscence, evil and irregular desires and appetites of every kind, and, by thus increasing the evil, exposes the soul to more condemnation; and thus it is represented as being slain, Rom 7:11. That is, the law, on the evidence of those sinful dispositions, and their corresponding practices, condemns the sinner to death: so that he is dead in law. Thus the very prohibition, as we have already seen in the preceding verse, becomes the instrument of exciting the evil propensity; for, although a sinner has the general propensity to do what is evil, yet he seems to feel most delight in transgressing known law: stat pro ratione voluntas; "I will do it, because I will."

For without the law, sin was dead - Where there is no law there is no transgression; for sin is the transgression of the law; and no fault can be imputed unto death, where there is no statute by which such a fault is made a capital offense.

Dr. Taylor thinks that χωρις νομου, without the law, means the time before the giving of the law from Mount Sinai, which took in the space of 430 years, during which time the people were under the Abrahamic covenant of grace; and without the law that was given on Mount Sinai, the sting of death, which is sin, had not power to slay the sinner; for, from the time that Adam sinned, the law was not re-enacted till it was given by Moses, Rom 5:13. The Jew was then alive, because he was not under the law subjecting him to death for his transgressions; but when the commandment came, with the penalty of death annexed, sin revived, and the Jew died. Then the sting of death acquired life; and the Jew, upon the first transgression, was dead in law. Thus sin, the sting of death, received force or advantage to destroy by the commandment, Rom 7:8, Rom 7:11.

All manner of concupiscence - It showed what was evil and forbade it; and then the principle of rebellion, which seems essential to the very nature of sins rose up against the prohibition; and he was the more strongly incited to disobey in proportion as obedience was enjoined. Thus the apostle shows that the law had authority to prohibit, condemn, and destroy; but no power to pardon sin, root out enmity, or save the soul.

The word επιθυμια, which we render concupiscence, signifies simply strong desire of any kind; but in the New Testament, it is generally taken to signify irregular and unholy desires. Sin in the mind is the desire to do, or to be, what is contrary to the holiness and authority of God.

For without the law, sin was dead - This means, according to Dr. Taylor's hypothesis, the time previous to the giving of the law. See before. But it seems also consistent with the apostle's meaning, to interpret the place as implying the time in which Paul, in his unconverted Jewish state, had not the proper knowledge of the law - while he was unacquainted with its spirituality. He felt evil desire, but he did not know the evil of it; he did not consider that the law tried the heart and its workings, as well as outward actions. This is farther explained in the next verse.

I was alive without the law once - Dr. Whitby paraphrases the verse thus: - "For the seed of Abraham was alive without the law once, before the law was given, I being not obnoxious to death for that to which the law had not threatened death; but when the commandment came, forbidding it under that penalty, sin revived, and I died; i.e. it got strength to draw me to sin, and to condemn me to death. Sin is, in Scripture, represented as an enemy that seeks our ruin and destruction; and takes all occasions to effect it. It is here said to war against the mind, Rom 7:23; elsewhere, to war against the soul, 1Pet 2:11; to surround and beset us, Heb 12:1; to bring us into bondage and subjection, and get the dominion over us, Rom 6:12; to entice us, and so to work our death, Jam 1:14-16; and to do all that Satan, the grand enemy of mankind, doth, by tempting us to the commission of it. Whence Chrysostom, upon those words, Heb 12:4 : Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, προς την ἁμαρτιαν ανταγωνιζομενοι, striving against sin; represents sin as an armed and flagrant adversary. When, therefore, it finds a law which threatens death to the violator of it, it takes occasion thence more earnestly to tempt and allure to the violation of it, that so it may more effectually subject us to death and condemnation on that account; for the sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law, condemning us to death for transgressing it. Thus, when God had forbidden, on pain of death, the eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge, Satan thence took occasion to tempt our first parents to transgress, and so slew them, or made them subject to death; εξηπατησε, he deceived them, Gen 3:13; 1Tim 2:14; which is the word used Rom 7:11. The phrase, without the law, sin was dead, means, that sin was then (before the law was given) comparatively dead, as to its power of condemning to death; and this sense the antithesis requires; without the law, ἁμαρτια νεκρα, εγω δε εζων, sin was dead, but I was living; but when the commandment came, (i.e. the law), sin revived, and I died. How were men living before the law, but because then no law condemned them? Sin, therefore, must be then dead, as to its condemning power. How did they die when the law came but by the law condemning them to death? Sin therefore revived, then, as to its power of condemning, which it received first from the sin of Adam, which brought death into the world; and next, from the law of Moses, which entered that the offense might abound, and reign more unto death, Rom 5:20, Rom 5:21. For though sin was in the world from Adam to Moses, or until the law was given, yet it was not imputed unto death, when there was no law that did threaten death; so that death reigned from that interval by virtue of Adam's sin alone; even over them who had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, i.e. against a positive law, forbidding it under the penalty of death; which law being delivered by Moses, sin revived; i.e. it had again its force to condemn men as before to death, by virtue of a law which threatened death. And in this sense the apostle seems to say, Gal 3:19, the law was added because of transgressions, to convince us of the wrath and punishment due to them; and that the law, therefore, worketh wrath, because where no law is there is no transgression, Rom 4:15, subjecting us to wrath; or no such sense of the Divine wrath as where a plain Divine law, threatening death and condemnation, is violated." See Whitby, in loco.

And the commandment - Meaning the law in general, which was ordained to life; the rule of righteousness teaching those statutes which if a man do he shall live in them, Lev 18:5, I found, by transgressing it, to be unto death; for it only presented the duty and laid down the penalty, without affording any strength to resist sin or subdue evil propensities.

Sin, taking occasion - Sin, deriving strength from the law, threatening death to the transgressor, (see Clarke's note on Rom 7:8), deceived me, drew me aside to disobedience, promising me gratification honor, independence, etc., as it promised to Eve; for to her history the apostle evidently alludes, and uses the very same expression, deceived me, εξηπατησε με· See the preceding note; and see the Septuagint, Genesis 3:13.

And by it slew me - Subjected me to that death which the law denounced against transgressors; and rendered me miserable during the course of life itself. It is well known to scholars that the verb αποκτεινειν signifies not only to slay or kill, but also to make wretched. Every sinner is not only exposed to death because he has sinned, and must, sooner or later, die; but he is miserable in both body and mind by the influence and the effects of sin. He lives a dying life, or a living death.

Wherefore the law is holy - As if he had said, to soothe his countrymen, to whom he had been showing the absolute insufficiency of the law either to justify or save from sin: I do not intimate that there is any thing improper or imperfect in the law as a rule of life: it prescribes what is holy, just, and good; for it comes from a holy, just, and good God. The Law, which is to regulate the whole of the outward conduct, is holy; and the Commandment, Thou shalt not covet, which is to regulate the heart, is not less so. All is excellent and pure; but it neither pardons sin nor purifies the heart; and it is because it is holy, just, and good, that it condemns transgressors to death.

Was then that which is good made death unto me? - This is the question of the Jew, with whom the apostle appears to be disputing. "Do you allow the law to be good, and yet say it is the cause of our death?" The apostle answers: - God forbid! μη γενοιτο, by no means: it is not the law that is the cause of your death, but sin; it was sin which subjected us to death by the law, justly threatening sin with death: which law was given that sin might appear - might be set forth in its own colors; when we saw it subjected us to death by a law perfectly holy, just, and good; that sin, by the law, might be represented what it really is: - καθ' ὑπερβολην ἁμαρτωλος, an Exceeding Great and deadly evil.

Thus it appears that man cannot have a true notion of sin but by means of the law of God. For this I have already given sufficient reasons in the preceding notes. And it was one design of the law to show the abominable and destructive nature of sin, as well as to be a rule of life. It would be almost impossible for a man to have that just notion of the demerit of sin so as to produce repentance, or to see the nature and necessity of the death of Christ, if the law were not applied to his conscience by the light of the Holy Spirit; it is then alone that he sees himself to be carnal, and sold under sin; and that the law and the commandment are holy, just, and good. And let it be observed, that the law did not answer this end merely among the Jews in the days of the apostle; it is just as necessary to the Gentiles to the present hour. Nor do we find that true repentance takes place where the moral law is not preached and enforced. Those who preach only the Gospel to sinners, at best only heal the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly. The law, therefore, is the grand instrument in the hands of a faithful minister, to alarm and awaken sinners; and he may safely show that every sinner is under the law, and consequently under the curse, who has not fled for refuge to the hope held out by the Gospel: for, in this sense also, Jesus Christ is the End of the Law for justification to them that believe.

For, we know that the law is spiritual - This is a general proposition, and probably, in the apostle's autograph, concluded the above sentence. The law is not to be considered as a system of external rites and ceremonies; nor even as a rule of moral action: it is a spiritual system; it reaches to the most hidden purposes, thoughts, dispositions, and desires of the heart and soul; and it reproves and condemns every thing, without hope of reprieve or pardon, that is contrary to eternal truth and rectitude.

But I am carnal, sold under sin - This was probably, in the apostle's letter, the beginning of a new paragraph. I believe it is agreed, on all hands, that the apostle is here demonstrating the insufficiency of the law in opposition to the Gospel. That by the former is the knowledge, by the latter the cure, of sin. Therefore by I here he cannot mean himself, nor any Christian believer: if the contrary could be proved, the argument of the apostle would go to demonstrate the insufficiency of the Gospel as well as the law.

It is difficult to conceive how the opinion could have crept into the Church, or prevailed there, that "the apostle speaks here of his regenerate state; and that what was, in such a state, true of himself, must be true of all others in the same state." This opinion has, most pitifully and most shamefully, not only lowered the standard of Christianity, but destroyed its influence and disgraced its character. It requires but little knowledge of the spirit of the Gospel, and of the scope of this epistle, to see that the apostle is, here, either personating a Jew under the law and without the Gospel, or showing what his own state was when he was deeply convinced that by the deeds of the law no man could be justified, and had not as yet heard those blessed words: Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way, hath sent me that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost, Act 9:17.

In this and the following verses he states the contrariety between himself, or any Jew while without Christ, and the law of God. Of the latter he says, it is spiritual; of the former, l am carnal, sold under sin. Of the carnal man, in opposition to the spiritual, never was a more complete or accurate description given. The expressions, in the flesh, and after the flesh, in Rom 7:5, and in Rom 8:5, Rom 8:8, Rom 8:9, etc., are of the same import with the word carnal in this verse. To be in the flesh, or to be carnally minded, solely respects the unregenerate. While unregenerate, a man is in a state of death and enmity against God, Rom 8:6-9. This is St. Paul's own account of a carnal man. The soul of such a man has no authority over the appetites of the body and the lusts of the flesh: reason has not the government of passion. The work of such a person is to make provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof, Rom 13:14. He minds the things of the flesh, Rom 8:5; he is at enmity with God. In all these things the spiritual man is the reverse; he lives in a state of friendship with God in Christ, and the Spirit of God dwells in him; his soul has dominion over the appetites of the body and the lusts of the flesh; his passions submit to the government of reason, and he, by the Spirit, mortifies the deeds of the flesh; he mindeth the things of the Spirit, Rom 8:5. The Scriptures, therefore, place these two characters in direct opposition to each other. Now the apostle begins this passage by informing us that it is his carnal state that he is about to describe, in opposition to the spirituality of God's holy law, saying, But I am carnal.

Those who are of another opinion maintain that by the word carnal here the apostle meant that corruption which dwelt in him after his conversion; but this opinion is founded on a very great mistake; for, although there may be, after justification, the remains of the carnal mind, which will be less or more felt till the soul is completely sanctified, yet the man is never denominated from the inferior principle, which is under control, but from the superior principle which habitually prevails. Whatever epithets are given to corruption or sin in Scripture, opposite epithets are given to grace or holiness. By these different epithets are the unregenerate and regenerate denominated. From all this it follows that the epithet carnal, which is the characteristic designation of an unregenerate man, cannot be applied to St. Paul after his conversion; nor, indeed, to any Christian in that state.

But the word carnal, though used by the apostle to signify a state of death and enmity against God, is not sufficient to denote all the evil of the state which he is describing; hence he adds, sold under sin. This is one of the strongest expressions which the Spirit of God uses in Scripture, to describe the full depravity of fallen man. It implies a willing slavery: Ahab had sold himself to work evil, 1Kgs 21:20. And of the Jews it is said, in their utmost depravity, Behold, for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, Isa 50:1. They forsook the holy covenant, and joined themselves to the heathen, and Were Sold to do mischief, 1 Maccabees 1:15. Now, if the word carnal, in its strongest sense, had been sufficiently significant of all he meant, why add to this charge another expression still stronger? We must therefore understand the phrase, sold under sin, as implying that the soul was employed in the drudgery of sin; that it was sold over to this service, and had no power to disobey this tyrant, until it was redeemed by another. And if a man be actually sold to another, and he acquiesce in the deed, then he becomes the legal property of that other person. This state of bondage was well known to the Romans. The sale of slaves they saw daily, and could not misunderstand the emphatical sense of this expression. Sin is here represented as a person; and the apostle compares the dominion which sin has over the man in question to that of a master over his legal slave. Universally through the Scriptures man is said to be in a state of bondage to sin until the Son of God make him free: but in no part of the sacred writings is it ever said that the children of God are sold under sin. Christ came to deliver the lawful captive, and take away the prey from the mighty. Whom the Son maketh free, they are free indeed. Then, they yield not up their members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin; for sin shall not have the dominion over them, because the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made them free from the law of sin and death, Rom 6:13, Rom 6:14; Rom 8:2. Anciently, when regular cartels were not known, the captives became the slaves of their victors, and by them were sold to any purchaser; their slavery was as complete and perpetual as if the slave had resigned his own liberty, and sold himself: the laws of the land secured him to his master; he could not redeem himself, because he had nothing that was his own, and nothing could rescue him from that state but a stipulated redemption. The apostle speaks here, not of the manner in which the person in question became a slave; he only asserts the fact, that sin had a full and permanent dominion over him. - Smith, on the carnal man's character.

I am carnal, sold under sin - I have been the more particular in ascertaining the genuine sense of this verse, because it determines the general scope of the whole passage.

For, that which I do, I allow not, etc. - The first clause of this verse is a general assertion concerning the employment of the person in question in the state which the apostle calls carnal, and sold under sin. The Greek word κατεργαξομαι which is here translated I do, means a work which the agent continues to perform till it is finished, and is used by the apostle, Phi 2:12, to denote the continued employment of God's saints in his service to the end of their lives. Work Out your own salvation; the word here denotes an employment of a different kind; and therefore the man who now feels the galling dominion of sin says, What I am continually labouring at I allow not, ου γινωσκω, I do not acknowledge to be right, just, holy, or profitable.

But what I hate, that do I - I am a slave, and under the absolute control of my tyrannical master: I hate his service, but am obliged to work his will. Who, without blaspheming, can assert that the apostle is speaking this of a man in whom the Spirit of the Lord dwells? From Rom 7:7 to this one the apostle, says Dr. Taylor, denotes the Jew in the flesh by a single I; here, he divides that I into two I's, or figurative persons; representing two different and opposite principles which were in him. The one I, or principle, assents to the law that it is good, and wills and chooses what the other does not practice, Rom 7:16. This principle he expressly tells us, Rom 7:22, is the inward man; the law of the mind, Rom 7:23; the mind, or rational faculty, Rom 7:25; for he could find no other inward man, or law of the mind, but the rational faculty, in a person who was carnal and sold under sin. The other I, or principle, transgresses the law, Rom 7:23, and does those things which the former principle allows not. This principle he expressly tells us, Rom 7:18, is the flesh, the law in the members, or sensual appetite, Rom 7:23; and he concludes in the last verse, that these two principles were opposite to each other; therefore it is evident that those two principles, residing and counteracting each other in the same person; are reason and lust, or sin that dwells in us. And it is very easy to distinguish these two I's, or principles, in every part of this elegant description of iniquity, domineering over the light and remonstrances of reason. For instance, Rom 7:17 : Now then, it is no more I that do it, but Sin that dwelleth in me. The I he speaks of here is opposed to indwelling or governing sin; and therefore plainly denotes the principle of reason, the inward man, or law of the mind; in which, I add, a measure of the light of the Spirit of God shines, in order to show the sinfulness of sin. These two different principles he calls, one flesh, and the other spirit, Gal 5:17; where he speaks of their contrariety in the same manner that he does here.

And we may give a probable reason why the apostle dwells so long upon the struggle and opposition between these two principles; it appears intended to answer a tacit but very obvious objection. The Jew might allege: "But the law is holy and spiritual; and I assent to it as good, as a right rule of action, which ought to be observed; yea, I esteem it highly, I glory and rest in it, convinced of its truth and excellency. And is not this enough to constitute the law a sufficient principle of sanctification?" The apostle answers, "No; wickedness is consistent with a sense of truth. A man may assent to the best rule of action, and yet still be under the dominion of lust and sin; from which nothing can deliver him but a principle and power proceeding from the fountain of life." The sentiment in this verse may be illustrated by quotations from the ancient heathens; many of whom felt themselves in precisely the same state, (and expressed it in nearly the same language), which some most monstrously tell us was the state of this heavenly apostle, when vindicating the claims of the Gospel against those of the Jewish ritual! Thus Ovid describes the conduct of a depraved man: -

Sed trahit invitam nova vis; aliudque cupido,

Mens aliud suadet. Video meliora, proboque;

Deteriora sequor.

Ovid, Met. lib. vii. ver. 19.

My reason this, my passion that persuades;

I see the right, and I approve it too;

Condemn the wrong, and yet the wrong pursue. - indignum facinus! nunc ego et

Illam scelestam esse, et me miserum sentio:

Et taedet: et amore ardeo: et prudens, sciens,

Vivus, vidensque pereo: nec quid agam scio. - Terent. Eun. ver. 70.

An unworthy act! Now I perceive that she is wicked, and I am wretched. I burn with love, and am vexed at it. Although prudent, and intelligent, and active, and seeing, I perish; neither do I know what to do.

Sed quia mente minus validus, quam corpore toto,

Quae nocuere, sequar; fugiam, quae profore credam.

Hor. Ep. lib. i. E. 8, ver. 7.

More in my mind than body lie my pains:

Whate'er may hurt me, I with joy pursue;

Whate'er may do me good, with horror view.

Francis. Επει γαρ ὁ ἁμαρτανων ου θελει ἁμαρτανειν, αλλα κατορθωσαι δηλον ὁτι, ὁ μεν θελει, ου ποιει, και ὁμη θελει, ποιει.

Arrian. Epist. ii. 26.

For, truly, he who sins does not will sin, but wishes to walk uprightly: yet it is manifest that what he wills he doth not; and what he wills not he doth. - αλλα νικωμαι κακοις, Και μανθανω μεν, οἱα τολμησω κακα Θυμος δε κρεισσῳν των εμων βουλευματων, Ὁσπερ μεγιστων αιτος κακων βροτοις. - Eurip. Med. v. 1077. - But I am overcome by sin,

And I well understand the evil which I presume to commit.

Passion, however, is more powerful than my reason;

Which is the cause of the greatest evils to mortal men.

Thus we find that enlightened heathens, both among the Greeks and Romans, had that same kind of religious experience which some suppose to be, not only the experience of St. Paul in his best state, but to be even the standard of Christian attainments! See more examples in Wetstein.

The whole spirit of the sentiment is well summed up and expressed by St. Chrysostom: ὁταν τινος επιθυμωμεν, ειτε κωλυωμεθα, αιρεται μαλλον της επιθυμιας ἡ φλοξ. If we lust after any thing which is afterwards prohibited, the flame of this desire burns the more fiercely.

If then I do that which I would not, etc. - Knowing that the law condemns it, and that therefore it must be evil. I consent unto the law; I show by this circumstance that I acknowledge the law to be good.

Now then it is no more I - It is not that I which constitutes reason and conscience, but sin-corrupt and sensual inclinations, that dwelleth in me - that has the entire domination over my reason, darkening my understanding, and perverting my judgment; for which there is condemnation in the law, but no cure. So we find here that there is a principle in the unregenerate man stronger than reason itself; a principle which is, properly speaking, not of the essence of the soul, but acts in it, as its lord, or as a tyrant. This is inbred and indwelling sin - the seed of the serpent; by which the whole soul is darkened, confused, perverted, and excited to rebellion against God.

For I know that in me, etc. - I have learned by experience that in an unregenerate man there is no good. There is no principle by which the soul can be brought into the light; no principle by which it can be restored to purity: fleshly appetites alone prevail; and the brute runs away with the man.

For to will is present with me - Though the whole soul has suffered indescribably by the Fall, yet there are some faculties that appear to have suffered less than others; or rather have received larger measures of the supernatural light, because their concurrence with the Divine principle is so necessary to the salvation of the soul. Even the most unconcerned about spiritual things have understanding, judgment, reason, and will. And by means of these we have seen even scoffers at Divine revelation become very eminent in arts and sciences; some of our best metaphysicians, physicians, mathematicians, astronomers, chemists, etc., have been known - to their reproach be it spoken and published - to be without religion; nay, some of them have blasphemed it, by leaving God out of his own work, and ascribing to an idol of their own, whom they call nature, the operations of the wisdom, power, and goodness of the Most High. It is true that many of the most eminent in all the above branches of knowledge have been conscientious believers in Divine revelation; but the case of the others proves that, fallen as man is, he yet possesses extra-ordinary powers, which are capable of very high cultivation and improvement. In short, the soul seems capable of any thing but knowing, fearing, loving, and serving God. And it is not only incapable, of itself, for any truly religious acts; but what shows its fall in the most indisputable manner is its enmity to sacred things. Let an unregenerate man pretend what he pleases, his conscience knows that he hates religion; his soul revolts against it; his carnal mind is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be. There is no reducing this fell principle to subjection; it is Sin, and sin is rebellion against God; therefore sin must be destroyed, not subjected; if subjected, it would cease to be sin, because sin is in opposition to God: hence the apostle says, most conclusively, it cannot be subjected, i.e. it must be destroyed, or it will destroy the soul for ever. When the apostle says, to will is present with me, he shows that the will is on the side of God and truth, so far that it consents to the propriety and necessity of obedience. There has been a strange clamor raised up against this faculty of the soul, as if the very essence of evil dwelt in it; whereas the apostle shows, throughout this chapter, that the will was regularly on God's side, while every other faculty appears to have been in hostility to him. The truth is, men have confounded the will with the passions, and laid to the charge of the former what properly belongs to the latter. The will is right, but the passions are wrong. It discerns and approves, but is without ability to perform: it has no power over sensual appetites; in these the principle of rebellion dwells: it nills evil, it wills good, but can only command through the power of Divine grace: but this the person in question, the unregenerate man, has not received.

For the good that I would I do not - Here again is the most decisive proof that the will is on the side of God and truth.

But the evil which I would not - And here is equally decisive proof that the will is against, or opposed to evil. There is not a man in ten millions, who will carefully watch the operations of this faculty, that will find it opposed to good and obstinately attached to evil, as is generally supposed. Nay, it is found almost uniformly on God's side, while the whole sensual system is against him. - It is not the Will that leads men astray; but the corrupt Passions which oppose and oppress the will. It is truly astonishing into what endless mistakes men have fallen on this point, and what systems of divinity have been built on these mistakes. The will, this almost only friend to God in the human soul, has been slandered as God's worst enemy, and even by those who had the seventh chapter to the Romans before their eyes! Nay, it has been considered so fell a foe to God and goodness that it is bound in the adamantine chains of a dire necessity to do evil only; and the doctrine of will (absurdly called free will, as if will did not essentially imply what is free) has been considered one of the most destructive heresies. Let such persons put themselves to school to their Bibles and to common sense.

The plain state of the case is this: the soul is so completely fallen, that it has no power to do good till it receive that power from on high. But it has power to see good, to distinguish between that and evil; to acknowledge the excellence of this good, and to will it, from a conviction of that excellence; but farther it cannot go. Yet, in various cases, it is solicited and consents to sin; and because it is will, that is, because it is a free principle, it must necessarily possess this power; and although it can do no good unless it receive grace from God, yet it is impossible to force it to sin. Even Satan himself cannot do this; and before he can get it to sin, he must gain its consent. Thus God in his endless mercy has endued this faculty with a power in which, humanly speaking, resides the salvability of the soul; and without this the soul must have eternally continued under the power of sin, or been saved as an inert, absolutely passive machine; which supposition would go as nearly to prove that it was as incapable of vice as it were of virtue. "But does not this arguing destroy the doctrine of free grace?" No! it establishes that doctrine.

1. It is through the grace, the unmerited kindness, of God, that the soul has such a faculty, and that it has not been extinguished by sin.

2. This will, though a free principle, as it respects its nilling of evil and choosing good, yet, properly speaking, has no power by which it can subjugate the evil or perform the good.

We know that the eye has a power to discern objects, but without light this power is perfectly useless, and no object can be discerned by it. So, of the person represented here by the apostle, it is said, To will is present with me, το γαρ θελειν παρακειται μοι. To will is ever in readiness, it is ever at hand, it lies constantly before me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not; that is, the man is unregenerate, and he is seeking justification and holiness from the law. The law was never designed to give these - it gives the knowledge, not the cure of sin; therefore, though he nills evil and wills good, yet he can neither conquer the one nor perform the other till he receives the grace of Christ, till he seeks and finds redemption in his blood.

Here, then, the free agency of man is preserved, without which he could not be in a salvable state; and the honor of the grace of Christ is maintained, without which there can be no actual salvation. There is a good sentiment on this subject in the following words of an eminent poet: -

Thou great first Cause, least understood;

Who all my sense confined

To know but this, that thou art good;

And that myself am blind.

Yet gave me in this dark estate

To see the good from ill;

And binding nature fast in fate,

Left free the human will.

Pope's Universal Prayer.

It is no more I - My will is against it; my reason and conscience condemn it. But sin that dwelleth in me - the principle of sin, which has possessed itself of all my carnal appetites and passions, and thus subjects my reason and domineers over my soul. Thus I am in perpetual contradiction to myself. Two principles are continually contending in me for the mastery: my reason, on which the light of God shines, to show what is evil; and my passions, in which the principle of sin works, to bring forth fruit unto death.

This strange self-contradictory propensity led some of the ancient philosophers to imagine that man has two souls, a good and a bad one; and it is on this principle that Xenophon, in his life of Cyrus, causes Araspes, a Persian nobleman, to account for some misconduct of his relative to Panthea, a beautiful female captive, whom Cyrus had entrusted to his care: - "O Cyrus, I am convinced that I have two souls; if I had but one soul, it could not at the same time pant after vice and virtue; wish and abhor the same thing. It is certain, therefore, that we have two souls; when the good soul rules, I undertake noble and virtuous actions; but when the bad soul predominates, I am constrained to do evil. All I can say at present is that I find my good soul, encouraged by thy presence, has got the better of my bad soul." See Spectator, vol. viii. No. 564. Thus, not only the ancients, but also many moderns, have trifled, and all will continue to do so who do not acknowledge the Scriptural account of the fall of man, and the lively comment upon that doctrine contained in the seventh chapter of the Epistle to the Romans.

I find then a law - I am in such a condition and state of soul, under the power of such habits and sinful propensities, that when I would do good - when my will and reason are strongly bent on obedience to the law of God and opposition to the principle of sin, evil is present with me, κακον παρακειται, evil is at hand, it lies constantly before me. That, as the will to do good is constantly at hand, Rom 7:18, so the principle of rebellion exciting me to sin is equally present; but, as the one is only will, wish, and desire, without power to do what is willed, to obtain what is wished, or to perform what is desired, sin continually prevails.

The word νομος, law, in this verse, must be taken as implying any strong or confirmed habit, συνηθεια, as Hesychius renders it, under the influence of which the man generally acts; and in this sense the apostle most evidently uses it in Rom 7:23.

I delight in the law of God after the inward man - Every Jew, and every unregenerate man, who receives the Old Testament as a revelation from God, must acknowledge the great purity, excellence and utility of its maxims, etc., though he will ever find that without the grace of our Lord Jesus he can never act according to those heavenly maxims; and without the mercy of God, can never be redeemed from the curse entailed upon him for his past transgressions. To say that the inward man means the regenerate part of the soul, is supportable by no argument. Ὁ εσω ανθρωπος, and ὁ εντος ανθρωπος, especially the latter, are expressions frequently in use among the purest Greek ethic writers, to signify the soul or rational part of man, in opposition to the body of flesh. See the quotations in Wetstein from Plato and Plotinus. The Jews have the same form of expression; so in Yalcut Rubeni, fol. 10, 3, it is said: The flesh is the inward garment of the man; but the Spirit is the Inward man, the garment of which is the body; and St. Paul uses the phrase in precisely the same sense in 2Cor 4:16, and Eph 3:16. If it be said that it is impossible for an unregenerate man to delight in the law of God, the experience of millions contradicts the assertion. Every true penitent admires the moral law, longs most earnestly for a conformity to it, and feels that he can never be satisfied till he awakes up after this Divine likeness; and he hates himself, because he feels that he has broken it, and that his evil passions are still in a state of hostility to it.

The following observations of a pious and sensible writer on this subject cannot be unacceptable: "The inward man always signifies the mind; which either may, or may not, be the subject of grace. That which is asserted of either the inward or outward man is often performed by one member or power, and not with the whole. If any member of the body perform an action, we are said to do it with the body, although the other members be not employed. In like manner, if any power or faculty of the mind be employed about any action, the soul is said to act. This expression, therefore, I delight in the law of God after the inward man, can mean no more than this, that there are some inward faculties in the soul which delight in the law of God. This expression is particularly adapted to the principles of the Pharisees, of whom St. Paul was one before his conversion. They received the law as the oracles of God, and confessed that it deserved the most serious regard. Their veneration was inspired by a sense of its original, and a full conviction that it was true. To some parts of it they paid the most superstitious regard. They had it written upon their phylacteries, which they carried about with them at all times. It was often read and expounded in their synagogues: and they took delight in studying its precepts. On that account, both the prophets and our Lord agree in saying that they delighted in the law of God, though they regarded not its chief and most essential precepts." See farther observations on this point at the end of the chapter, (Rom 7:22-25 (note)).

So far, then, is it from being true that none but a Regenerate man can delight in the law of God, we find that even a proud, unhumbled Pharisee can do it; and much more a poor sinner, who is humbled under a sense of his sin, and sees, in the light of God, not only the spirituality, but the excellence of the Divine law.

But I see another law in my members - Though the person in question is less or more under the continual influence of reason and conscience, which offer constant testimony against sin, yet as long as help is sought only from the law, and the grace of Christ in the Gospel is not received, the remonstrances of reason and conscience are rendered of no effect by the prevalence of sinful passions; which, from repeated gratifications, have acquired all the force of habit, and now give law to the whole carnal man.

Warring against the law of my mind - There is an allusion here to the case of a city besieged, at last taken by storm, and the inhabitants carried away into captivity; αντιστρατευομενον, carrying on a system of warfare; laying continual siege to the soul; repeating incessantly its attacks; harassing, battering, and storming the spirit; and, by all these assaults, reducing the man to extreme misery. Never was a picture more impressively drawn and more effectually finished; for the next sentence shows that this spiritual city was at last taken by storm, and the inhabitants who survived the sackage led into the most shameful, painful, and oppressive captivity.

Bringing me into captivity to the law of sin - He does not here speak of an occasional advantage gained by sin, it was a complete and final victory gained by corruption; which, having stormed and reduced the city, carried away the inhabitants with irresistible force, into captivity. This is the consequence of being overcome; he was now in the hands of the foe as the victor's lawful captive; and this is the import of the original word, αιχμαλωτιζοντα, and is the very term used by our Lord when speaking of the final ruin, dispersion, and captivity of the Jews. He says, αιχμαλωτισθησονται, they shall be led away captives into all the nations, Luk 21:24. When all this is considered, who, in his right mind, can apply it to the holy soul of the apostle of the Gentiles? Is there any thing in it that can belong to his gracious state? Surely nothing. The basest slave of sin, who has any remaining checks of conscience, cannot be brought into a worse state than that described here by the apostle. Sin and corruption have a final triumph; and conscience and reason are taken prisoners, laid in fetters, and sold for slaves. Can this ever be said of a man in whom the Spirit of God dwells, and whom the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made free from the law of sin and death? See Rom 8:2.

O wretched man that I am, etc. - This affecting account is finished more impressively by the groans of the wounded captive. Having long maintained a useless conflict against innumerable hosts and irresistible might, he is at last wounded and taken prisoner; and to render his state more miserable, is not only encompassed by the slaughtered, but chained to a dead body; for there seems to be here an allusion to an ancient custom of certain tyrants, who bound a dead body to a living man, and obliged him to carry it about, till the contagion from the putrid mass took away his life! Virgil paints this in all its horrors, in the account he gives of the tyrant Mezentius. Aeneid, lib. viii. ver. 485.

Quid memorem infandas caedes? quid facta tyranni?

Mortua quin etiam jungebat corpora Vivis,

Componens manibusque manus, atque oribus ora;

Tormenti genus! et sanie taboque fluentes

Complexu in misero, longa sic morte necabat.

What tongue can such barbarities record,

Or count the slaughters of his ruthless sword? 'Twas not enough the good, the guiltless bled,

Still worse, he bound the living to the dead:

These, limb to limb, and face to face, he joined;

O! monstrous crime, of unexampled kind!

Till choked with stench, the lingering wretches lay,

And, in the loathed embraces, died away!

Pitt.

Servius remarks, in his comment on this passage, that sanies, mortui est; tabo, viventis scilicet sanguis: "the sanies, or putrid ichor, from the dead body, produced the tabes in the blood of the living." Roasting, burning, racking, crucifying, etc., were nothing when compared to this diabolically invented punishment.

We may naturally suppose that the cry of such a person would be, Wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this dead body? And how well does this apply to the case of the person to whom the apostle refers! A body - a whole mass of sin and corruption, was bound to his soul with chains which he could not break; and the mortal contagion, transfused through his whole nature, was pressing him down to the bitter pains of an eternal death. He now finds that the law can afford him no deliverance; and he despairs of help from any human being; but while he is emitting his last, or almost expiring groan, the redemption by Christ Jesus is proclaimed to him; and, if the apostle refers to his own case, Ananias unexpectedly accosts him with - Brother Saul! the Lord Jesus, who appeared unto thee in the way, hath sent me unto thee, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost. He sees then an open door of hope, and he immediately, though but in the prospect of this deliverance, returns God thanks for the well-grounded hope which he has of salvation, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

I thank God through Jesus Christ - Instead of ευχαριστω τῳ Θεῳ, I thank God, several excellent MSS., with the Vulgate, some copies of the Itala, and several of the fathers, read ἡ χαρις του Θεου, or του Κυριου, the grace of God, or the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ; this is an answer to the almost despairing question in the preceding verse. The whole, therefore, may be read thus: O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Answer - The grace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Thus we find that a case of the kind described by the apostle in the preceding verses, whether it were his own, before he was brought to the knowledge of Christ, particularly during the three days that he was at Damascus, without being able to eat or drink, in deep penitential sorrow; or whether he personates a pharisaic yet conscientious Jew, deeply concerned for his salvation: I say, we find that such a case can be relieved by the Gospel of Christ only; or, in other words, that no scheme of redemption can be effectual to the salvation of any soul, whether Jew or Gentile, but that laid down in the Gospel of Christ.

Let any or all means be used which human wisdom can devise, guilt will still continue uncancelled; and inbred sin will laugh them all to scorn, prevail over them, and finally triumph. And this is the very conclusion to which the apostle brings his argument in the following clause; which, like the rest of the chapter, has been most awfully abused, to favor anti-evangelical purposes.

So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God - That this clause contains the inference from the preceding train of argumentation appears evident, from the αρα ουν, therefore, with which the apostle introduces it. As if he had said: "To conclude, the sum of what I have advanced, concerning the power of sin in the carnal man, and the utter insufficiency of all human means and legal observances to pardon sin and expel the corruption of the heart, is this: that the very same person, the αυτος εγω, the same I, while without the Gospel, under the killing power of the law, will find in himself two opposite principles, the one subscribing to and approving the law of God; and the other, notwithstanding, bringing him into captivity to sin: his inward man - his rational powers and conscience, will assent to the justice and propriety of the requisitions of the law; and yet, notwithstanding this, his fleshly appetites - the law in his members, will war against the law of his mind, and continue, till he receives the Gospel of Christ, to keep him in the galling captivity of sin and death."

1. The strong expressions in this clause have led many to conclude that the apostle himself, in his regenerated state, is indisputably the person intended. That all that is said in this chapter of the carnal man, sold under sin, did apply to Saul of Tarsus, no man can doubt: that what is here said can ever be with propriety applied to Paul the Apostle, who can believe? Of the former, all is natural; of the latter, all here said would be monstrous and absurd, if not blasphemous.

2. But it is supposed that the words must be understood as implying a regenerate man, because the apostle says, Rom 7:22, I delight in the law of God; and in this verse, I myself with the mind serve the law of God. These things, say the objectors, cannot be spoken of a wicked Jew, but of a regenerate man such as the apostle then was. But when we find that the former verse speaks of a man who is brought into captivity to the law of sin and death, surely there is no part of the regenerate state of the apostle to which the words can possibly apply. Had he been in captivity to the law of sin and death, after his conversion to Christianity, what did he gain by that conversion? Nothing for his personal holiness. He had found no salvation under an inefficient law; and he was left in thraldom under an equally inefficient Gospel. The very genius of Christianity demonstrates that nothing like this can, with any propriety, be spoken of a genuine Christian.

3. But it is farther supposed that these things cannot be spoken of a proud or wicked Jew; yet we learn the contrary from the infallible testimony of the word of God. Of this people in their fallen and iniquitous state, God says, by his prophet, They Seek me Daily, and Delight to know my ways, as a nation that did Righteousness, and Forsook not the Ordinances of their God: they ask of me the ordinances of Justice, and Take Delight in approaching to God, Isa 58:2. Can any thing be stronger than this? And yet, at that time, they were most dreadfully carnal, and sold under sin, as the rest of that chapter proves. It is a most notorious fact, that how little soever the life of a Jew was conformed to the law of his God, he notwithstanding professed the highest esteem for it, and gloried in it: and the apostle says nothing stronger of them in this chapter than their conduct and profession verify to the present day. They are still delighting in the law of God, after the inward man; with their mind serving the law of God; asking for the ordinances of justice, seeking God daily, and taking delight in approaching to God; they even glory, and greatly exult and glory, in the Divine original and excellency of their Law; and all this while they are most abominably carnal, sold under sin, and brought into the most degrading captivity to the law of sin and death. If then all that the apostle states of the person in question be true of the Jews, through the whole period of their history, even to the present time; if they do in all their professions and their religious services, which they zealously maintain, confess, and conscientiously too, that the law is holy, and the commandment holy, just, and good; and yet, with their flesh, serve the law of sin; the same certainly may be said with equal propriety of a Jewish penitent, deeply convinced of his lost estate, and the total insufficiency of his legal observances to deliver him from his body of sin and death. And consequently, all this may be said of Paul the Jew, while going about to establish his own righteousness - his own plan of justification; he had not as yet submitted to the righteousness of God - the Divine plan of redemption by Jesus Christ.

4. It must be allowed that, whatever was the experience of so eminent a man, Christian, and apostle, as St. Paul, it must be a very proper standard of Christianity. And if we are to take what is here said as his experience as a Christian, it would be presumption in us to expect to go higher; for he certainly had pushed the principles of his religion to their utmost consequences. But his whole life, and the account which he immediately gives of himself in the succeeding chapter, prove that he, as a Christian and an apostle, had a widely different experience; an experience which amply justifies that superiority which he attributes to the Christian religion over the Jewish; and demonstrates that it not only is well calculated to perfect all preceding dispensations, but that it affords salvation to the uttermost to all those who flee for refuge to the hope that it sets before them. Besides, there is nothing spoken here of the state of a conscientious Jew, or of St. Paul in his Jewish state, that is not true of every genuine penitent; even before, and it may be, long before, he has believed in Christ to the saving of his soul. The assertion that "every Christian, howsoever advanced in the Divine life, will and must feel all this inward conflict," etc., is as untrue as it is dangerous. That many, called Christians, and probably sincere, do feel all this, may be readily granted; and such we must consider to be in the same state with Saul of Tarsus, previously to his conversion; but that they must continue thus is no where intimated in the Gospel of Christ. We must take heed how we make our experience, which is the result of our unbelief and unfaithfulness, the standard for the people of God, and lower down Christianity to our most reprehensible and dwarfish state: at the same time, we should not be discouraged at what we thus feel, but apply to God, through Christ, as Paul did; and then we shall soon be able, with him, to declare, to the eternal glory of God's grace, that the law of the Spirit of life, in Christ Jesus, has made us free from the law of sin and death. This is the inheritance of God's children; and their salvation is of me, saith the Lord.

I cannot conclude these observations without recommending to the notice of my readers a learned and excellent discourse on the latter part of this chapter, preached by the Rev. James Smith, minister of the Gospel in Dumfermline, Scotland; a work to which I am indebted for some useful observations, and from which I should have been glad to have copied much, had my limits permitted. Reader, do not plead for Baal; try, fully try, the efficiency of the blood of the covenant; and be not content with less salvation than God has provided for thee. Thou art not straitened in God, be not straitened in thy own bowels.

The apostle continues the comparison between the former and the present state of a believer, and at the same time endeavours to wean the Jewish believers from their fondness for the Mosaic law. I speak to them that know the law - To the Jews chiefly here. As long - So long, and no longer. As it liveth - The law is here spoken of, by a common figure, as a person, to which, as to an husband, life and death are ascribed. But he speaks indifferently of the law being dead to us, or we to it, the sense being the same.

She is freed from the law of her husband - From that law which gave him a peculiar property in her.

Thus ye also - Are now as free from the Mosaic law as an husband is, when his wife is dead. By the body of Christ - Offered up; that is, by the merits of his death, that law expiring with him.

When ye were in the flesh - Carnally minded, in a state of nature; before we believed in Christ. Our sins which were by the law - Accidentally occasioned, or irritated thereby. Wrought in our members - Spread themselves all over the whole man.

Being dead to that whereby we were held - To our old husband, the law. That we might serve in newness of spirit - In a new, spiritual manner. And not in the oldness of the letter - Not in a bare literal, external way, as we did before.

What shall we say then - This is a kind of a digression, to the beginning of the next chapter, wherein the apostle, in order to show in the most lively manner the weakness and inefficacy of the law, changes the person and speaks as of himself, concerning the misery of one under the law. This St. Paul frequently does, when he is not speaking of his own person, but only assuming another character, Rom 3:5, 1Cor 10:30, 1Cor 4:6. The character here assumed is that of a man, first ignorant of the law, then under it and sincerely, but ineffectually, striving to serve God. To have spoken this of himself, or any true believer, would have been foreign to the whole scope of his discourse; nay, utterly contrary thereto, as well as to what is expressly asserted, Rom 8:2. Is the law sin - Sinful in itself, or a promoter of sin. I had not known lust - That is, evil desire. I had not known it to be a sin; nay, perhaps I should not have known that any such desire was in me: it did not appear, till it was stirred up by the prohibition.

But sin - My inbred corruption. Taking occasion by the commandment - Forbidding, but not subduing it, was only fretted, and wrought in me so much the more all manner of evil desire. For while I was without the knowledge of the law, sin was dead - Neither so apparent, nor so active; nor was I under the least apprehensions of any danger from it.

And I was once alive without the law - Without the close application of it. I had much life, wisdom, virtue, strength: so I thought. But when the commandment - That is, the law, a part put for the whole; but this expression particularly intimates its compulsive force, which restrains, enjoins, urges, forbids, threatens. Came - In its spiritual meaning, to my heart, with the power of God. Sin revived, and I died - My inbred sin took fire, and all my virtue and strength died away; and I then saw myself to be dead in sin, and liable to death eternal.

The commandment which was intended for life - Doubtless it was originally intended by God as a grand means of preserving and increasing spiritual life, and leading to life everlasting.

Deceived me - While I expected life by the law, sin came upon me unawares and slew all my hopes.

The commandment - That is, every branch of the law. Is holy, and just, and good - It springs from, and partakes of, the holy nature of God; it is every way just and right in itself; it is designed wholly for the good of man.

Was then that which is good made the cause of evil to me; yea, of death, which is the greatest of evil? Not so. But it was sin, which was made death to me, inasmuch as it wrought death in me even by that which is good - By the good law. So that sin by the commandment became exceeding sinful - The consequence of which was, that inbred sin, thus driving furiously in spite of the commandment, became exceeding sinful; the guilt thereof being greatly aggravated.

I am carnal - St. Paul, having compared together the past and present state of believers, that "in the flesh," Rom 7:5, and that "in the spirit," Rom 7:6, in answering two objections, (Is then the law sin? Rom 7:7, and, Is the law death? Rom 7:13,) interweaves the whole process of a man reasoning, groaning, striving, and escaping from the legal to the evangelical state. This he does from Rom 7:7, to the end of this chapter. Sold under sin - Totally enslaved; slaves bought with money were absolutely at their master's disposal.

It is good - This single word implies all the three that were used before, Rom 7:12, "holy, just, and good."

It is no more I that can properly be said to do it, but rather sin that dwelleth in me - That makes, as it were, another person, and tyrannizes over me.

In my flesh - The flesh here signifies the whole man as he is by nature.

I find then a law - An inward constraining power, flowing from the dictate of corrupt nature.

For I delight in the law of God - This is more than "I consent to," Rom 7:16. The day of liberty draws near. The inward man - Called the mind, Rom 7:23,25.

But I see another law in my members - Another inward constraining power of evil inclinations and bodily appetites. Warring against the law of my mind - The dictate of my mind, which delights in the law of God. And captivating me - In spite of all my resistance

Wretched man that I am - The struggle is now come to the height; and the man, finding there is no help in himself, begins almost unawares to pray, Who shall deliver me? He then seeks and looks for deliverance, till God in Christ appears to answer his question. The word which we translate deliver, implies force. And indeed without this there can be no deliverance. The body of this death - That is, this body of death; this mass of sin, leading to death eternal, and cleaving as close to me as my body to my soul. We may observe, the deliverance is not wrought yet.

I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord - That is, God will deliver me through Christ. But the apostle, as his frequent manner is, beautifully interweaves his assertion with thanksgiving;' the hymn of praise answering in a manner to the voice of sorrow, "Wretched man that I am!" So then - He here sums up the whole, and concludes what he began, Rom 7:7. I myself - Or rather that I, the person whom I am personating, till this deliverance is wrought. Serve the law of God with my mind - My reason and conscience declare for God. But with my flesh the law of sin - But my corrupt passions and appetites still rebel. The man is now utterly weary of his bondage, and upon the brink of liberty.

1 KNow ye not brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law) how that the law hath dominion over a man , as long as he liveth?

By the Law here he means the Law of Wedlock, or the Law of Moses about that matter, as appears by the instance given in the next verse.

The word Man here is common to both Sexes, and may be applyed to either, for both are subject to the aforementioned Law.

The Apostle having shewed in the former Chapter how Believers are freed from the Dominion of Sin. He proceeds in this Chapter, to declare, that they are free also from the Yoak of the Mosaical Law, because that was dead to them, and they to it. This he illustrates, and proceeds by the familiar Allegory of a Husband and his Wife: Look as a Wife is free from her Husband when he is dead, and may then marry another, and be no Adultress; So Believers are dead to the Law, and are free to be Married to another, even to Christ, that is raised from the dead, that upon their happy Marriage, they may bring forth fruit unto God.

2. For the woman which hath an husband, is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth: but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the Law of her husband .

He here exemplifyes and illustrates the foregoing assertion.

See a parallel place, 1 Cor. 7.39. This is the general rule, yet there is an exception in the case of Fornication or Desertion. vid, Mat. 5.32. 1 Cor. 7.15.

From the obligation of the Law of marriage.

4 Wherefore my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ ; that ye should be married to another, even to him that is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God .

i. e. Ye are taken off from all hopes of Justification by it, and from your confidence in obedience to it. Gal. 2.19. The Opposition seems to require that he should have said The Law is dead to us. But these two Phrases are much the same. Q. What Law doth he mean? A. Not only the Ceremonial, but the Moral Law, for in that he instanceth, v. 7. the moral Law is in force still, Christ came to confirm, and not to destroy it: But Believers are freed from the malediction, from the rigid exaction, and from the irritation thereof. Of this last he speaks, v. 8, 9. and from it we are freed but in part.

i. e. By the Sacrifice of Christs Body upon the Cross; thereby he delivered us from the Law, in the sence before mentioned.

i. e. Fruits of Holiness and good Works to the Glory and Praise of God.

Marginal references: Chap. 8. [illegible: 1 letter] Gal. 5.18.; Or, th[illegible: 2 letters] y[illegible: 1 letter] may be to [illegible: 3 letters] ther.; Gal. 5.2[illegible: 1 letter]

5. For when we were in the flesh , the motions of sins which were by the law , did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death .

q. d. For bringing forth of which Fruit unto God, we have now better helps than formerly we had; or we are in much better Circumstances than formerly we were: And so he proceeds to shew how our present State doth differ from the former.

i. e. In our Carnal Fleshly State, before we were Regenerated, or under the Carnal Paedagogy of the Law; for in the next Verse he speaks of our being now delivered from the Law.

i. e. The corrupt Inclinations to Sin, which are drawn forth by the Law, as ill Vapours are raised out of a Dunghil by the Sun, or which are irritated by the Law; of which by and by.

vid. c. 6. 13.16.

i. e. Such ill Fruit as ends in Death, c. 6.21.

Marginal references: Gr. [illegible: 1 word]

6. But now we are delivered from the law , that being dead, wherein we were held ; that we should serve in * newness of spirit , and not in the oldness of the letter .

i. e. Being brought out of our Fleshly State.

See the Notes on ver. 4.

The Relative is not in the Greek Text, but it is well supplyed to fill up the Sence. The Antecedent must be either Sin or the Law; by both of these we were held or detained whilst Unregenerate: But now neither of these have any Power to hold us with. Some read it, He being dead, the Old Man of which he spake in the foregoing Chapter.

i. e. That we should serve God or Jesus Christ our New Husband in true Holiness, which is wrought in us by the renewing of the Spirit; or serve him in a new Spiritual manner.

i. e. Not in an outward and ceremonial manner, according to the Letter of the Law; which Service or way of Worship, is now Antiquated, and grown out of date. The word Oldness insinuates the abolishing thereof, because of insufficiency, Heb. 8.13.

Marginal references: Or, [illegible: 1 word] d[illegible: 2 letters]d to [illegible: 1 word] Chap. [illegible: 1 letter]

7. What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid . Nay, I had not known sin, but by the Law : for I had not known lust , except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet .

Here is another Anticipation of an Objection, which might arise from what the Apostle had said; ver. 5. That Sin was powerful in us by the Law. Some might Object and say, That the Law then was Sin, i. e. That it was the cause of it, and a factor for it. To this he Answers, by his usual Note of Detestation, God forbid.

i. e. I had not known it so clearly and effectually; so as to humble and drive me to Christ. For otherwise, Nature it self teacheth a difference of good and evil in many things. He adds this as a Reason why the Law cannot be the cause of Sin, because it discovers and reproves Sin; it detects and damns it; and that it so doth, he proves from his own Experience.

i. e. I had not known it to be Sin. By Lust here some understand, that concupiscence, which the Schoolmen call unform'd concupiscence, which hath not the consent of the Will: For the concupiscence to which we Consent, the Heathens themselves know to be Sinful; but that which hath not the Consent of the Will, or the first motions to Sin, they held to be no Sin; as neither did the Pharisees, amongst whom Paul lived; nor do the Papists to this very day. Some by Lust do understand original Sin, which is the Fountain from whence all particular Lusts do flow; the [illegible: 1 word] Furnace from which all sinful Motions, as so many Sparks do continually Arise: This is called Lust likewise, in Iam. 1.14. and this is forbidden in every Commandment; for where any of Sin is prohibited, there the Root also is prohibited; but more particularly it is forbidden in the Tenth Commandment.

Some understand the Law in general; but the Article us'd in the Greek seems to restrain it to a particular Precept. Besides, they are the very words of the Tenth Commandment. But, Why doth he not mention the Objects that are specified in that Commandment; as Thy Neighbours House, Wife, &c? The Answer is, That that was not Material; for the Apostle speaking of inward Concupiscence; which without the Law is latent and undiscovered; it was enough to name the sin it self, seeing the Objects about which it is Conversant, are of all sorts, and can hardly be numbred.

Marginal references: Chap. 3.20.; [illegible: 1 paragraph]; [illegible: 1 word]. 20. [illegible: 1 span]. 5. [illegible: 1 span]. 20.[illegible: 1 letter]

8. But sin taking occasion by the commandment , wrought in me all manner of concupiscence , for without the law sin was dead .

i. e. The Corruption of our Nature, the depraved Bent and Byas of the Soul, called before Lust.

i. e. Being stirr'd up or drawn forth by the Prohibition of the Law. The Law did not properly give occasion, but sin took it. The Law (as before) is not the cause of sin, tho' by accident it is the occasion of it. In a Dropsy, it is not the Drink that is to be blamed for increasing the Disease, but the ill habit of Body. Such is the depravedness of Man's Nature, that the things which are Forbidden, are the more desired: The more the Law would damn up the Torrent of sinful Lusts, the higher do they swell. The Law was given to restrain sin, but through our Corruption it falls out contrarily. The Law inhibiting Sin, and not giving Power to avoid it: Our impetuous Lusts take occasion or advantage from thence, the more eagerly to pursue it.

i. e. Inordinate Affections, and Inclinations of all sorts.

i. e. Without the knowledge of the Law.

i. e. Comparatively dead. Sin hath not so much Power, either to Terrify the Conscience, or to stir up inordinate Affections; it is like a sleepy Lyon that stirs not.

Marginal references: C[illegible: 2 letters]p. 4.15. [illegible: 1 word] 5.20.; Or, receiving [illegible: 1 word].; 1 Cor. 15.[illegible: 1 letter]

9. For I was alive without the law once ; but when the commandment came , sin reviv'd , and I di[illegible: 2 letters] .

q. d. Take me if you please for an Instance. Before I knew the Law aright, and understood the divine and spiritual Meaning of it; or whilst the Law stood afar off, and was not brought home to my Conscience. I was alive, that is▪ in my own Conceit. I thought my self in as good condition as any Man living. My Conscience never gave me any Trouble. So it was with me once, or heretofore, when I was a Pharisee, or in an unregenerate State.

i. e. When it came nearer to my Conscience; when I came to know and understand the Spiritual meaning and extent of it, that it condemned sinful Lusts, Affections, and Inclinations.

i. e. Its Sinfulness & Guilt appear'd; & I had a lively Sense thereof imprinted upon my Soul: Or my Corruptions began to gather▪ Head, and seem'd, as it were, to receive new Vigor and Life.

i. e. In my own Opinion and Feeling. I felt my Conscience deadly wounded. I was convinced I was in a State of Death and Damnation. I lost the Confidence I formerly had of my Good Estate.

10. And the commandment which was ordained to life I found to be unto death .

q. d. So it came to pass, that the Commandment which was ordain'd to be a Rule of Life; and if I could [illegible: 1 letter]ave kept it, a Means of Life also, chap. 10.5. Gal. 3.12. [illegible: 1 letter] found it to be to me (through my Corruption and Transgression) an occasion of Death; it bound me over to Punishment, and so by Accident it tendeth to Death. Some by Life and Death, here do understand Peace and Perturbation of Spirit.

Marginal references: Lev. 18.5. Ezek. 20.11, 13, 21.

11. For sin taking occasion by the commandment deceived me , and by it slew me .

See the Notes on ver. 8.

i. e. Seduced and drew me aside, Heb. 3.13. Iames 1.14.

i. e. It drove me into Despair, or delivered me over to Death and Damnation, and made me Obnoxious thereunto.

12. Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good .

And so the Objection ver. 7. was a groundless Objection; for though the Law were the occasion of Sin, or were made advantage of by Sin, as ver. 8. yet it was not the Cause of it, that on all hands is acknowledg'd to be Holy, &c.

The Law in all the Branches of it.

Particularly the Preceptive part of the Law, and every particular Precept.

The three Epithets here given the Law of God, may be thus distinguished: 'Tis Holy in respect of the Ceremonial Part; 'tis Iust in respect of the Judicial Part; and Good in respect of the Moral Part of it. Or else the Law is Holy, as it teacheth us our Duty unto God: Iust, as it sheweth us our Duty to our Neighbour. Good, in regard of the Effect and End; as it works Goodness in the Observer thereof, and is Conducive to his temporal and eternal Good,

Marginal references: 1 Tim. 1.8.

13. Was then that which is good, made death unto me? God forbid . But sin that it might appear sin, working death in me, by that which is good ; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful .

Another Anticipation. The Apostle denyes, that the Holy Law was in its own nature deadly, or the cause of Death to him; the Fault was not in the Law, but in his own depraved Nature: But the plain Case is this that follows.

That Sin, that so it might appear every way like it self, wrought Death in him▪ by occasion of that Law, which, yet its self is Holy, Iust, and Good.

So as hereupon Sin, which in the time of his Ignorance an Unregeneracy, seem'd not worthy of any Notice, appear'd to be exceeding Foul and Sinful. Sin is so Evil, that he can't call it by a worse Name than its own. Hierome thinketh, That the Apostle here commits a Solecisme, by joyning an Adjective of the Masculine Gender, with a Substantive of the Feminine: But Beza and Erasmus have observed, That this is usual in the Attick Dialect. See the like, chap. 1.20. Some read Sinner for Sinful, and make the Apostle to speak of Sin, as of a certain Person; & therefore all along, the Context, Sin, is said to Work, to be Dead, to Revive, to Deceive, to Kill, &c. which is properly attributed to Persons, and not to things.

14. For we know that the law is spiritual : but I am carnal , sold under sin .

He goes on to clear the Law, and excuse it, giving it another Commendation, that it is Spiritual. i. e. It requires such Obedience as is not only outward, but Inward and Spiritual: It forbids Spiritual as well as Fleshly Sins. Read Christ's Exposition of it▪ in the fifth of St. Matthew.

i. e. In Part, because of the Remainders of Sin, and of the Flesh, that are still in me; in respect of which, those who are Regenerated, are said to be Carnal. Compare 1 Cor. 1.2. with 1 Cor. 3.1.

He did not Actively sell himself to sin, or to commit sin, which is said of A[illegible: 1 letter]ab. 1 King. 21.20, 25. and of the Idolatrous Israelites, 2 King. 17.17. He was not Sins Servant or Slave▪ but many times he was Sins Captive against his Will, vid. ver. 23. Against his Will and Consent, he was still subject to the violent Lusts and Assaults of Sin, and not able wholly to free himself▪ Though he alwayes made stout Resistance, yet many times he was overcome. Hitherto the Apostle hath spoken of the Power of the Law and Sin, in unregenerate Persons; even as he himself had Experienc'd, whilst he was yet in such a State. But now he cometh to speak of himself, as he then was; and to declare what Power the Remainders of Sinful Flesh had still in him, though Regenerated; and in part Renewed. That the following part of this Chapter is to be Apply'd to a Regenerate Person, is evident, Because the Apostle (speaking of himself in the former Verses) useth the Praeter perfect Tense, or speaketh of that which was Past; but here he changeth the Tense, and speaketh of the Present Time. From the seventh verse to the fourteenth, he tells us how it had been with him formerly; and then from the fourteenth verse to the End, he relates how it was with him now; I was so and so, I am thus and thus. The changing of the Tense and Time doth plainly argue a Change in the Person. They that list to be farther satisfied in this Point, may find it fully Discussed in our own Language, by Mr. Anthony Burgess, in his Excellent Discourse of Original Sin, Part 4. c. 3. and by Dr. Willet, in his Hexalta in Locum; and they that understand the Latine Tongue, may find it Argued pro and con, in Synops[illegible: 1 letter]. Critic. &c. and by Aug. lib. 1. Retractat. c. 23. lib. 5. contra Iulian. c. 11.

15. For that which I do , I allow not : for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I .

i. e. What I do contrary to the Command of God.

In the Greek 'tis, I know not. q. d. Many times I am surpriz'd and overtaken, not knowing or considering what I do: Or when he sayes I know not, his meaning is (as our Translation renders it) I allow or approve not. So the word is used, Mat. 7.23. & alibi. q. d. Even now in my Converted and Regenerate State, I am many times greatly Divided, and feel a Strife or Combate in my self; so that the good I would do upon the Motions of God's Spirit in me, I do not; and the Evil that I hate, and am utterly averse to; so far as I am Regenerated, that I do. See a parallel Place, Gal. 5.17.

He doth not speak here so much of outward Actions, as of inward Motions and Affections: He doth not speak of gross Sins, as Drunkenness, Vncleanness, &c. but of such Infirmities, as flow from the polluted Nature; and from which we can never be throughly Cleansed in this Life.

Marginal references: Gr. knew not

16. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good .

This very thing is an Argument, that the Law is such as I have before Asserted, ver. 12, 14. This shews my Consent to the Holiness and Goodness of the Law: I Vote with it, and for it, as the only Rule of Right, or Righteousness.

17. Now then, it is no more I that do it , but sin that dwelleth in me .

i. e. It is not I as Spiritual or Renewed, 'tis not my whole self, but 'tis Sin that dwelleth in me.

That inhabits in me as a troublesome Inmate, that I can't get rid of; that will not out, so long as the House stands; as the fretting Leprosy in the Walls of a House, would not out, till the House it self were Demolished. It is such an Inhabitant, as is never from Home; it is not in us as a Stranger for a Season, but it makes its constant Abode with us.

Marginal references: Or, no longer I.

18. For I know, that in me that is, in my flesh dwelleth no good thing : for to will is present with me , but how to perform that which is good, I find not .

i. e. In my Fleshly Part, or my Nature in and of its self.

No Goodness at all, or no spiritual Good.

i. e. I can, so long and so far as I follow the Motions of God's Spirit, Will that which is good; but how to perform the good, that I would, I find no Power or Might at least to perform it, in that manner that I desire.

The meaning is, not that he never did the Good he desired; but it often so fell out, he began many good things, but he could not go thorough stitch with them.

Marginal references: Gen. 6.5. and 8.21.; Or, good dwelleth not.; Or, lyeth by me.

20. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me .

These two Verses are a Repetition of what he had said, ver. 15, 17. Every New Man is two Men; There is in him an I, and an I. The Apostle in his unregenerate State, could make no such Distinction was now he doth.

21. I find then a law , that when I would do good, evil is present with me .

This Verse hath greatly vexed Interpreters. The Apostle speaking simply and abstractedly of a Law; The Question is, What Law he mean[illegible: 1 letter]? Some take the word improperly, for a Decree or Condition, which was imposed upon him, and to which he was necessarily subject; that when he would do good, evil should be present with him. Others by Law, here do understand the Law of Sin; of which he speaks afterwards, ver. 23, 25. Sin is like a Law, and so Powerful and Imperious, in its Commands and Dictates; that we have much ado, the best of us, to resist it, and shake off its Yoke. q. d. I find by sad Expeence, such a forcible Power in Sin, That when I would do good, I am hindered, and can't do it so freely and fully as I desire. Others by Law, here do understand the Law of God: And those that so understand it, have given no less, than Eight Interpretations, to make the Grammatical Connexion; the best is of those that say the Preposition [non-Latin text not transcribed] is understood, a frequent Ellipsis in the Greek Tongue (vid. Iames 1.25.) and then the Sence is this; I find that when according to the Law or Command of God, I would do good, evil is present with me.

Another Periphrasis of Original Sin, of which there are many in this Chapter. Just now it was the Sin that dwelleth in us, and here it is the Evil that is present with us: It inheres and adheres, or hangs upon us continually. It is Adjacent, so the Greek Word signifies, and alwayes at hand; we carry it about with us at all times, and into all Places; whither soever we go, it follows us; or as it is here in our doing of Good, it is a very great Impediment to us.

22. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man .

This shews yet more expresly that the Apostle speaketh in the Person of a Regenerate Man, or of himself as Regenerate. Certainly to delight in the Law of God is an inseparable property of such a one, vid[illegible: 1 letter] Psal 1.2. and 119.77.111.

i. e. The New Man or Regenerate Part within me: This is called the Hidden Man of the Heart, vid. Chap. 2.29. 2 Cor. 4.16. 1 Pet. 3.4.

Marginal references: Or, I delight with.; Eph. 3.16. Col. 3.9, 10.

23. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members .

i. e. A Law quite different from the Law of God mentioned in the foregoing Verse. By the Law in the Members understand natural Corruption, which like a Law Commandeth and Inclineth by sensual rewards and punishments; and by the Law in the mind understand a principle of Grace, which as a Law, as well as the other commanding and inclining to that which is good. The Law in the members, and the Law in the mind, is the same that is called Flesh and Spirit, Gal. 5.17. These two Laws and Principles, are in all regenerate persons, and are directly contrary to one another: hence there is continual warring and combating betwixt them, as is exprest in both these places, as also in Iames 4.1. 1 Pet. 2.11.

i. e. Drawing and hurrying me to the commission of Sin, against my will and consent. He pursues the metaphor, the Flesh doth not only War in the regenerate, but many times it overcomes and hath success. vid. v. 15.

i. e. to its self. The antecedent is put in the room of the relative, see Gen. 9.16. and alibi. the Law in the members, and the Law of Sin, in the members, is the same.

24. O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death !

The word signifies one wearied out with continual combates.

It is not the voice of one desponding or doubting, but of one breathing and panting after deliverance; the like pathetical exclamations are frequent. vid. Psal. 55.6. One calls this verse, Gemi[illegible: 1 letter]us Sanctorum, the Groan of the Godly.

Or from this Body of Death, or by an Hebraisme from this dead Body. This carcass of Sin to which I am inseparably fastned, as noysom every whit to my Soul, as a dead carcass to my Senses. This is another circumlocution, or denomination of Original Sin. chap. 6▪6. 'tis called the Body of Sin, and here the Body of death: It tends and binds over to death.

Marginal references: Or, this bo[illegible: 2 letters] of death.

25. I thank God , through Jesus Christ our Lord: So then , with the mind I my self serve the Law of God; but with the flesh, the law of sin .

Who hath already delivered me from the slavery and dominion of Sin. So that though it war against me, I still resist it, and by the strength of Christ, do frequently overcome it. 1 Cor. 15.57.

This is the conclusion the Apostle maketh of this experimental discourse.

q. d. So far as I am renewed, I yeild Obedience to the Law of God; and so far as I am unregenerate, I obey the dictates and Suggestions of the Law of Sin. Object. No man can serve two contrary Masters. A. The Apostle did not serve these two in the same part, or the same renewed faculty; nor did he do it at the same time ordinarily; and for the most part he served the Law of God, though sometimes through the power of Temptation and in-dwelling corruption, he was enforced against his Will to serve the Law of Sin.

Observations Respecting the Law. (a. d. 58.)

1 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? 2 For the woman which hath a husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. 3 So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. 4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. 5 For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. 6 But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

Among other arguments used in the foregoing chapter to persuade us against sin, and to holiness, this was one (v. 14), that we are not under the law; and this argument is here further insisted upon and explained (v. 6): We are delivered from the law. What is meant by this? And how is it an argument why sin should not reign over us, and why we should walk in newness of life? 1. We are delivered from the power of the law which curses and condemns us for the sin committed by us. The sentence of the law against us is vacated and reversed, by the death of Christ, to all true believers. The law saith, The soul that sins shall die; but we are delivered from the law. The Lord has taken away thy sin, thou shalt not die. We are redeemed from the curse of the law, Gal. iii. 13. 2. We are delivered from that power of the law which irritates and provokes the sin that dwelleth in us. This the apostle seems especially to refer to (v. 5): The motions of sins which were by the law. The law, by commanding, forbidding, threatening, corrupt and fallen man, but offering no grace to cure and strengthen, did but stir up the corruption, and, like the sun shining upon a dunghill, excite and draw up the filthy steams. We being lamed by the fall, the law comes and directs us, but provides nothing to heal and help our lameness, and so makes us halt and stumble the more. Understand this of the law not as a rule, but as a covenant of works. Now each of these is an argument why we should be holy; for here is encouragement to endeavours, though in many things we come short. We are under grace, which promises strength to do what it commands, and pardon upon repentance when we do amiss. This is the scope of these verses in general, that, in point of profession and privilege, we are under a covenant of grace, and not under a covenant of works—under the gospel of Christ, and not under the law of Moses. The difference between a law-state and a gospel-state he had before illustrated by the similitude of rising to a new life, and serving a new master; now here he speaks of is under the similitude of being married to a new husband.

I. Our first marriage was to the law, which, according to the law of marriage, was to continue only during the life of the law. The law of marriage is binding till the death of one of the parties, no matter which, and no longer. The death of either discharges both. For this he appeals to themselves, as persons knowing the law (v. 1): I speak to those that know the law. It is a great advantage to discourse with those that have knowledge, for such can more readily understand and apprehend a truth. Many of the Christians at Rome were such as had been Jews, and so were well acquainted with the law. One has some hold of knowing people. The law hath power over a man as long as he liveth; in particular, the law of marriage hath power; or, in general, every law is so limited—the laws of nations, of relations, of families, &c. 1. The obligation of laws extends no further; by death the servant who, while he lived, was under the yoke, is freed from his master, Job iii. 19. 2. The condemnation of laws extends no further; death is the finishing of the law. Actio moritur cum personâ—The action expires with the person. The severest laws could but kill the body, and after that there is no more that they can do. Thus while we were alive to the law we were under the power of it—while we were in our Old-Testament state, before the gospel came into the world, and before it came with power into our hearts. Such is the law of marriage (v. 2), the woman is bound to her husband during life, so bound to him that she cannot marry another; if she do, she shall be reckoned an adulteress, v. 3. It will make her an adulteress, not only to be defiled by, but to be married to, another man; for that is so much the worse, upon this account, that it abuses an ordinance of God, by making it to patronise the uncleanness. Thus were we married to the law (v. 5): When we were in the flesh, that is, in a carnal state, under the reigning power of sin and corruption—in the flesh as in our element—then the motions of sins which were by the law did work in our members, we were carried down the stream of sin, and the law was but as an imperfect dam, which made the stream to swell the higher, and rage the more. Our desire was towards sin, as that of the wife towards her husband, and sin ruled over us. We embraced it, loved it, devoted all to it, conversed daily with it, made it our care to please it. We were under a law of sin and death, as the wife under the law of marriage; and the product of this marriage was fruit brought forth unto death, that is, actual transgressions were produced by the original corruption, such as deserve death. Lust, having conceived by the law (which is the strength of sin, 1 Cor. xv. 56), bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death, Jam. i. 15. This is the posterity that springs from this marriage to sin and the law. This comes of the motions of sin working in our members. And this continues during life, while the law is alive to us, and we are alive to the law.

II. Our second marriage is to Christ: and how comes this about? Why,

1. We are freed, by death, from our obligation to the law as a covenant, as the wife is from her obligation to her husband, v. 3. This resemblance is not very close, nor needed it to be. You are become dead to the law, v. 4. He does not say, "The law is dead" (some think because he would avoid giving offence to those who were yet zealous for the law), but, which comes all to one, You are dead to the law. As the crucifying of the world to us, and of us to the world, amounts to one and the same thing, so doth the law dying, and our dying to it. We are delivered from the law (v. 6), katergethemen—we are nulled as to the law; our obligation to it as a husband is cassated and made void. And then he speaks of the law being dead as far as it was a law of bondage to us: That being dead wherein we were held; not the law itself, but its obligation to punishment and its provocation to sin. It is dead, it has lost its power; and this (v. 4) by the body of Christ, that is, by the sufferings of Christ in his body, by his crucified body, which abrogated the law, answered the demands of it, made satisfaction for our violation of it, purchased for us a covenant of grace, in which righteousness and strength are laid up for us, such as were not, nor could be, by the law. We are dead to the law by our union with the mystical body of Christ. By being incorporated into Christ in our baptism professedly, in our believing powerfully and effectually, we are dead to the law, have no more to do with it than the dead servant, that is free from his master, hath to do with his master's yoke.

2. We are married to Christ. The day of our believing is the day of our espousals to the Lord Jesus. We enter upon a life of dependence on him and duty to him: Married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, a periphrasis of Christ and very pertinent here; for as our dying to sin and the law is in conformity to the death of Christ, and the crucifying of his body, so our devotedness to Christ in newness of life is in conformity to the resurrection of Christ. We are married to the raised exalted Jesus, a very honourable marriage. Compare 2 Cor. xi. 2; Eph. v. 29. Now we are thus married to Christ, (1.) That we should bring forth fruit unto God, v. 4. One end of marriage is fruitfulness: God instituted the ordinance that he might seek a godly seed, Mal. ii. 15. The wife is compared to the fruitful vine, and children are called the fruit of the womb. Now the great end of our marriage to Christ is our fruitfulness in love, and grace, and every good work. This is fruit unto God, pleasing to God, according to his will, aiming at his glory. As our old marriage to sin produced fruit unto death, so our second marriage to Christ produces fruit unto God, fruits of righteousness. Good works are the children of the new nature, the products of our union with Christ, as the fruitfulness of the vine is the product of its union with the root. Whatever our professions and pretensions may be, there is no fruit brought forth to God till we are married to Christ; it is in Christ Jesus that we are created unto good works, Eph. ii. 10. The only fruit which turns to a good account is that which is brought forth in Christ. This distinguishes the good works of believers from the good works of hypocrites and self-justifiers that they are brought forth in marriage, done in union with Christ, in the name of the Lord Jesus, Col. iii. 17. This is, without controversy, one of the great mysteries of godliness. (2.) That we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter, v. 6. Being married to a new husband, we must change our way. Still we must serve, but it is a service that is perfect freedom, whereas the service of sin was a perfect drudgery: we must now serve in newness of spirit, by new spiritual rules, from new spiritual principles, in spirit and in truth, John iv. 24. There must be a renovation of our spirits wrought by the spirit of God, and in that we must serve. Not in the oldness of the letter; that is, we must not rest in mere external services, as the carnal Jews did, who gloried in their adherence to the letter of the law, and minded not the spiritual part of worship. The letter is said to kill with its bondage and terror, but we are delivered from that yoke that we may serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness, Luke i. 74, 75. We are under the dispensation of the Spirit, and therefore must be spiritual, and serve in the spirit. Compare with this 2 Cor. iii. 3, 6, &c. It becomes us to worship within the veil, and no longer in the outward court.

Excellency of the Law; Usefulness of the Law. (a. d. 58.)

7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. 8 But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. 9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. 12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. 13 Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. 14a For we know that the law is spiritual:—

To what he had said in the former paragraph, the apostle here raises an objection, which he answers very fully: What shall we say then? Is the law sin? When he had been speaking of the dominion of sin, he had said so much of the influence of the law as a covenant upon that dominion that it might easily be misinterpreted as a reflection upon the law, to prevent which he shows from his own experience the great excellency and usefulness of the law, not as a covenant, but as a guide; and further discovers how sin took occasion by the commandment. Observe in particular,

I. The great excellency of the law in itself. Far be it from Paul to reflect upon the law; no, he speaks honourably of it. 1. It is holy, just, and good, v. 12. The law in general is so, and every particular commandment is so. Laws are as the law-makers are. God, the great lawgiver, is holy, just, and good, therefore his law must needs be so. The matter of it is holy: it commands holiness, encourages holiness; it is holy, for it is agreeable to the holy will of God, the original of holiness. It is just, for it is consonant to the rules of equity and right reason: the ways of the Lord are right. It is good in the design of it; it was given for the good of mankind, for the conservation of peace and order in the world. It makes the observers of it good; the intention of it was to better and reform mankind. Wherever there is true grace there is an assent to this—that the law is holy, just, and good. 2. The law is spiritual (v. 14), not only in regard to the effect of it, as it is a means of making us spiritual, but in regard to the extent of it; it reaches our spirits, it lays a restraint upon, and gives a direction to, the motions of the inward man; it is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, Heb. iv. 12. It forbids spiritual wickedness, heart-murder, and heart-adultery. It commands spiritual service, requires the heart, obliges us to worship God in the spirit. It is a spiritual law, for it is given by God, who is a Spirit and the Father of spirits; it is given to man, whose principal part is spiritual; the soul is the best part, and the leading part of the man, and therefore the law to the man must needs be a law to the soul. Herein the law of God is above all other laws, that it is a spiritual law. Other laws may forbid compassing and imagining, &c., which are treason in the heart, but cannot take cognizance thereof, unless there be some overt act; but the law of God takes notice of the iniquity regarded in the heart, though it go no further. Wash thy heart from wickedness, Jer. iv. 14. We know this: Wherever there is true grace there is an experimental knowledge of the spirituality of the law of God.

II. The great advantage that he had found by the law. 1. It was discovering: I had not known sin but by the law, v. 7. As that which is straight discovers that which is crooked, as the looking-glass shows us our natural face with all its spots and deformities, so there is no way of coming to that knowledge of sin which is necessary to repentance, and consequently to peace and pardon, but by comparing our hearts and lives with the law. Particularly he came to the knowledge of the sinfulness of lust by the law of the tenth commandment. By lust he means sin dwelling in us, sin in its first motions and workings, the corrupt principle. This he came to know when the law said, Thou shalt not covet. The law spoke in other language than the scribes and Pharisees made it to speak in; it spoke in the spiritual sense and meaning of it. By this he knew that lust was sin and a very sinful sin, that those motions and desires of the heart towards sin which never came into act were sinful, exceedingly sinful. Paul had a very quick and piercing judgment, all the advantages and improvements of education, and yet never attained the right knowledge of indwelling sin till the Spirit by the law made it known to him. There is nothing about which the natural man is more blind than about original corruption, concerning which the understanding is altogether in the dark till the Spirit by the law reveal it, and make it known. Thus the law is a schoolmaster, to bring us to Christ, opens and searches the wound, and so prepares it for healing. Thus sin by the commandment does appear sin (v. 13); it appears in its own colours, appears to be what it is, and you cannot call it by a worse name than its own. Thus by the commandment it becomes exceedingly sinful; that is, it appears to be so. We never see the desperate venom or malignity there is in sin, till we come to compare it with the law, and the spiritual nature of the law, and then we see it to be an evil and a bitter thing. 2. It was humbling (v. 9): I was alive. He thought himself in a very good condition; he was alive in his own opinion and apprehension, very secure and confident of the goodness of his state. Thus he was once, pote—in times past, when he was a Pharisee; for it was the common temper of that generation of men that they had a very good conceit of themselves; and Paul was then like the rest of them, and the reason was he was then without the law. Though brought up at the feet of Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, though himself a great student in the law, a strict observer of it, and a zealous stickler for it, yet without the law. He had the letter of the law, but he had not the spiritual meaning of it—the shell, but not the kernel. He had the law in his hand and in his head, but he had it not in his heart; the notion of it, but not the power of it. There are a great many who are spiritually dead in sin, that yet are alive in their own opinion of themselves, and it is their strangeness to the law that is the cause of the mistake. But when the commandment came, came in the power of it (not to his eyes only, but to his heart), sin revived, as the dust in a room rises (that is, appears) when the sun-shine is let into it. Paul then saw that in sin which he had never seen before; he then saw sin in its causes, the bitter root, the corrupt bias, the bent to backslide,—sin in its colours, deforming, defiling, breaking a righteous law, affronting an awful Majesty, profaning a sovereign crown by casting it to the ground,—sin in its consequences, sin with death at the heels of it, sin and the curse entailed upon it. "Thus sin revived, and then I died; I lost that good opinion which I had had of myself, and came to be of another mind. Sin revived, and I died; that is, the Spirit, but the commandment, convinced me that I was in a state of sin, and in a state of death because of sin." Of this excellent use is the law; it is a lamp and a light; it converts the soul, opens the eyes, prepares the way of the Lord in the desert, rends the rocks, levels the mountains, makes ready a people prepared for the Lord.

III. The ill use that his corrupt nature made of the law notwithstanding. 1. Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence, v. 8. Observe, Paul had in him all manner of concupiscence, though one of the best unregenerate men that ever was; as touching the righteousness of the law, blameless, and yet sensible of all manner of concupiscence. And it was sin that wrought it, indwelling sin, his corrupt nature (he speaks of a sin that did work sin), and it took occasion by the commandment. The corrupt nature would not have swelled and raged so much if it had not been for the restraints of the law; as the peccant humours in the body are raised, and more inflamed, by a purge that is not strong enough to carry them off. It is incident to corrupt nature, in vetitum niti—to lean towards what is forbidden. Ever since Adam ate forbidden fruit, we have all been fond of forbidden paths; the diseased appetite is carried out most strongly towards that which is hurtful and prohibited. Without the law sin was dead, as a snake in winter, which the sunbeams of the law quicken and irritate. 2. It deceived men. Sin puts a cheat upon the sinner, and it is a fatal cheat, v. 11. By it (by the commandment) slew me. There being in the law no such express threatening against sinful lustings, sin, that is, his won corrupt nature, took occasion thence to promise him impunity, and to say, as the serpent to our first parents, You shall not surely die. Thus it deceived and slew him. 3. It wrought death in me by that which is good, v. 13. That which works concupiscence works death, for sin bringeth forth death. Nothing so good but a corrupt and vicious nature will pervert it, and make it an occasion of sin; no flower so sweet by sin will such poison out of it. Now in this sin appears sin. The worst thing that sin does, and most like itself, is the perverting of the law, and taking occasion from it to be so much the more malignant. Thus the commandment, which was ordained to life, was intended as a guide in the way to comfort and happiness, proved unto death, through the corruption of nature, v. 10. Many a precious soul splits upon the rock of salvation; and the same word which to some is an occasion of life unto life is to others an occasion of death unto death. The same sun that makes the garden of flowers more fragrant makes the dunghill more noisome; the same heat that softens wax hardens clay; and the same child was set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel. The way to prevent this mischief is to bow our souls to the commanding authority of the word and law of God, not striving against, but submitting to it.

CHAP. VII. Verſe 1. Know ye not Brethren]

BEllarmine ſaith of his Romans (more true perhaps of theſe) Romani ſicut non acumina, ita nec impoſturas habent. As they are not very knowing, ſo not cunning to deceive.

Verſe 2. She is looſed, &c.] And ſo at liberty to marry again, though Hierom compare ſuch to the unclean beaſts in the Arke, and to veſſels of diſhonour in an houſe, yea to dogs that return to their vomit, which was his errour. Patres legendi cum veniâ, ſaith one.

Verſe 3.M. Edwards his Gange. par. 2. p. 141. So then if] The Sectaries then are out, that ſay now-a-daies, that if they have husbands and wives that will not turn Saints, that is Sectaries, they may leave them, and marry others.

Verſe 4. That we ſhould bring forth fruit] The Miniſtery of the Word, ſaith one, is the bridall-bed; wherein God by his Spirit doth communicate with our ſouls his ſweeteſt favours, and maketh them be conceived with fruits of righteouſneſſe to everlaſting life.

Verſe 5. [non-Latin text not transcribed]. In the fleſh] In our pure naturals.

The motions of ſin] Thoſe maladies of the ſoul.

By the law] By the irritation of the law.

Did work] Gr. D[illegible: 1 letter]d inwardly work. [non-Latin text not transcribed].

Verſe 6. Not in the oldneſſe of the letter] That is, Not in that old kinde of life that we lived under ſubjection to the law, to the irritation, coaction, and curſe of it.

Verſe 7. I had not known luſt] Involuntary evil motions. The Apoſtle calleth concupiſcence ſin, ſaith Poſſevine the Jeſuite: but we may not ſay ſo.Poſſevin. Apparal ſa[illegible: 1 letter] verbo. Pat. Antiq. Moſt of the moſt dangerous opinions of Popery ſpring from hence, that they have ſlight conceits of concupiſcence, as a condition of nature. But inward bleeding will kill a man, ſo will concupiſcence, if not bewailed. The Councel of Trent ſaith, That it is not truly and properly a ſin, albeit it be ſo called, becauſe it proceeds from ſin, and enclines a man to ſinne. Neither want there amongſt us that ſay, That originall ſinne is not forbidden by the law: Directly indeed, and immediately it is not: but forbidden it is, becauſe curſed and condemned by the law.

Verſe 8. By the commandment] Not Commandments. Papiſts aboliſhing, or at leaſt deſtroying the ſenſe of the ſecond Commandment by making it a member of the firſt, that they may retain the number of ten words (ſo loth are heretikes to have their Aſſes ears ſeen) they divide this laſt; which yet Paul here cals the Commandment; and ſure he knew better then they, the Analyſis of the law.

Verſe 9. For I was alive] As being without ſenſe of ſin, and conſcience of duty.

Sin revived] ſc. In ſenſe and appearance.

And I died] ſc. In pride and ſelf juſtice.

Verſe 10. Ordained to life] By life and death, underſtand peace and perturbation.

Verſe 11. Deceived me] Irritated my corrupt nature, and made me ſin the more, per accidens, as Pharaoh was the worſe for a meſſage of diſmiſſion.

Verſe 12. The Commandement] Vis legis in mandando & praecipiendo. [non-Latin text not transcribed]. The word properly ſignifieth an affirmative precept.

Verſe 13. Exceeding ſinſull] Sin is ſo evil that it cannot have a worſe Epithite given it. Paul can call it no worſe then by it's own name, ſinfull ſin.

Verſe 14. Sold under ſin] But yet ill-apaid of my ſlavery, and luſting after liberty.

Verſe 15. I allow not] Gr. I know not, as being preoccupated, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Gal. 6.1. wherried and whirled away by ſin before I am aware, or have time to conſider.

Verſe 16. I conſent unto the law] I vote with it, and for it, as the rule of right, I wiſh alſo well to the obſervance of it, as David did, Pſal. 119 4.5.

Verſe 17. It is no more I] Mr Bradford Martyr, in a certain Letter thus comforteth his friend; At this preſent, my dear heart in the Lord, you are in a bleſſed eſtate;Act. and Mon. fol. 1497. although it ſeem otherwiſe to you, or rather to your old Adam; the which I dare now be bold to diſcern from you, becauſe you would have it not only diſcerned, but alſo utterly deſtroyed.M. Harris. Sam. Fun. God (ſaith another reverend man) puts a difference between us, and ſin in us, as betwixt poiſon, and the box that holds it.

Sin that dwelleth in me] An ill inmate that will not out, till the houſe falleth on the head of it. As the fretting leproſie in the walls of an houſe would not out, till the houſe it ſelf were demoliſhed. Sin, as Hagar will dwell with grace, as Sarah, till death beat it out of doors.

Verſe 18. Dwelleth no good thing] Horreo quicquid de meo eſt, ut ſim meus, ſaith Bernard. It was no ill wiſh of him that deſired God to free him from an ill man, himſelf. For,Domine, libera me à malo bomine meipſe. though engraffed into Chriſt, yet we carry about us a reliſh of the old ſtock ſtill. Corruption is though dejected from it's regency, yet not ejected from it's inherency: It intermingleth with our beſt workes.

How to perform] Gr. To do it thorowly; [non-Latin text not transcribed]. though I am doing at it, as I can.

Verſe 19. For the good, &c.] Nature, like Eve and Jobs wife is alwaies drawing us from God. As the ferry-man plies the oar, and eyes the ſhore homeward, where he would be, yet there comes a guſt of winde that carries him back again: ſo it is with a Chriſtian. Corruption edg'd with a temptation, gets as it were the hill, and the winde, and, upon ſuch advantages, too oft prevaileth.

Verſe 20. It is no more I] Every new man is two men. See the Note above on Verſ. 17.

Verſe 21.Tota vita bani Chriſtiani ſanctum deſiderti[illegible: 1 letter] eſt. Aug. When I would doe good] Something lay at the fountain head, as it were, and ſtopt him when he would do his duty. But God valueth a man by his deſires.

Evil is preſent] We can ſtay no more from ſinning, then the heart can from panting, and the pulſe from beating. Our lives are fuller of ſins then the firmament of ſtarres, or the furnace of ſparks. Eraſmus was utterly out, that ſaid with Origen, Paulum hoc ſermone balbutire, quum ipſe potiùs ineptiat, ſaith learned Beza. So Joannes Sylvius Aegranus, a learned, but a prophane perſon, reprehended Paul for want of learning, and ſaid, Quòd uſus ſit declamatorijs verbis, non congr[illegible: 2 letters]ntibus ad rem[illegible: 1 letter], &c.Joh. Manl. loc. com. 165, 486. Nominabat ſophiſma, quod diceremus homines non poſſe implere legem, &c.

Verſe 22. I delight] Germanicus reigned in the Romans hearts, Tiberius but in the Provinces. So here.

Verſe 23. A law in my members] Called the deeds of the body, Rom. 8.13. [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Pla[illegible: 1 letter]o [non-Latin text not transcribed] appellat. Phoedro. becauſe corruption acteth and uttereth it ſelf by the m[illegible: 1 letter]mbers of the body. The [non-Latin text not transcribed] (vox Empedoclea) is within, but eaſily and often budgeth and breaketh out.

Warring againſt the law] The regenerate part. Plato in Cratylo pulchre ait: Ʋt mentem appellamus [non-Latin text not transcribed], ita legem dicimus [non-Latin text not transcribed], quaſi [non-Latin text not transcribed], alioqui mens hominum vagatur.

And bringing me into captivity] The ſins of the Saints (thoſe of daily incurſion) are either of precipitancy, D. Preſton. as Gal. 6.1. or of infirmity, when a man wreſtles, and hath ſome time to fight it out, but for want of breath and ſtrength, fals, and is in ſome captivity to the law of ſin. This is the worſe.

Verſe 24. O wretched man] We muſt diſcontentedly be contented to be exerciſed with ſin, while we are here. It is ſo bred in the bone, that till our bones, as Joſephs, be carried out of the Egypt of this world, it will not out. The Romans ſo conquered Choſroes the Perſian, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. that he made a law, that never any King of Perſia ſhould move warre againſt the Romans. But let us do what we can to ſubdue ſin, it will be a Jebu[illegible: 1 letter]te, a falſe borderer, yea, a rank traitour rebelling againſt the Spirit. Only this we may take for a comfortable ſign of future victory, when we are diſcontent with our preſent ill eſtate. Grace will get the upper hand, as nature doth, when the humours are diſturbed, and after many fits. And as till then there is no reſt to the body: ſo neither is there to the ſoul.

Who ſhall deliver me] Nothing cleaves more pertinaciouſly, or is more inexpugnable then a ſtrong luſt.

From this body of death] Or, this dead body, by an H[illegible: 1 letter]braiſme, this carcaſe of ſin to which I am tied and lungold: as noi[illegible: 1 letter]ome every whit to my ſoul, as a dead body to my ſenſes; and as burdenſome, as a withered arm, or mortified lim, which hangs on a man, as a lump of lead.

Verſe 25. I think God, &c.] The Grecians being delivered but from bodily ſervitude by Flaminias the Roman [illegible: 1 letter]enerall, called him their Saviour: and ſo rang out, Saviour, Saviour, Plutarch. that the Fowls in the a[illegible: 1 letter]r fell down dead with the cry. How much greater cauſe have we to magnifie the grace of Chriſt, &c.

So then, with the minde, &c.] The ſtars by their proper motion are carried from the Weſt to the Eaſt: And yet by the motion of obedience to the firſt mover, they paſſe along from the Eaſt unto the Weſt. The waters by their naturall courſe follow the center of the earth, yet yeelding to the Moon, they are ſubject to her motions: So are Saints to Gods holy will, though corrupt nature repine and reſiſt.

Know ye not. This is an appeal to their own observation respecting the relation between husband and wife. The illustration (Rom 8:2,3) is designed simply to show, that as when a man dies, and the connexion between him and his wife is dissolved, his law ceases to be binding on her; so also a separation has taken place between Christians and the law, in which they have become dead to it; and they are not now to attempt to draw their life and peace from it, but from that new source with which they are connected by the gospel, Rom 8:4.

For I speak to them, etc. Probably the apostle refers here more particularly to the Jewish members of the Roman church, who were qualified particularly to understand the nature of the law, and to appreciate the argument. That there were many Jews fix the church at Rome has been shown, (see Introduction) but the illustration has no exclusive reference to them. The law to which he appeals is sufficiently general to make the illustration intelligible to all men.

That the law. The immediate reference here is probably to the Mosaic law. But what is here affirmed is equally true of all laws.

Hath dominion. Greek, Rules; exercises lordship. The law is here personified, and represented as setting up a lordship over a man, and exacting obedience.

Over a man. Over the man who is under it.

As long as he liveth. The Greek here may mean either as HE liveth," or "as it liveth," that is, the law. But our translation has evidently expressed the sense. The sense is, that death releases a man from the laws by which he was bound in life. It is a general principle, relating to the laws of the land, the law of a parent, the law of a contract, etc. This general principle the apostle proceeds to apply in regard to the law of God.

For the woman. This verse is a specific illustration of the general principle in Rom 7:1, that death dissolves those connexions and relations which make law binding in life. It is a simple illustration; and if this had been kept in mind, it would have saved much of the perplexity which has been felt by many commentators, and much of their wild vagaries in endeavouring to show that "men are the wife, the law the former husband, and Christ the new one;" or that "the old man is the wife, sinful desires the husband, sins the children." Beza. (See Stuart.) Such expositions are sufficient to humble us, and to make us mourn over the puerile and fanciful interpretations which even wise and good men often give to the Bible.

Is bound by the law, etc. See the same sentiment in 1Cor 7:39.

To her husband. She is united to him; and is under his authority as the head of the household. To him is particularly committed the headship of the family, and the wife is subject to his law, in the Lord, Eph 5:22,23.

She is loosed, etc. The husband has no more authority. The connexion from which obligation resulted is dissolved.

(h) "For the woman" 1Cor 7:39

So then if, etc. Comp. Mt 5:32.

She shall be called. She will be. The word used here (χρηματισει) is often used to denote being called by an oracle, or by Divine revelation. But it is here employed in the simple sense of being commonly called, or of being so regarded.

(i) "while her husband" Mt 5:32

Wherefore. This verse contains an application of the illustration in the two preceding. The idea there is, that death dissolves a connexion from which obligation resulted. This is the single point of the illustration, and consequently there is no need of inquiring whether by the wife the apostle meant to denote the old man, or the Christian, etc. The meaning is, as death dissolves the connexion between a wife and her husband, and of course the obligation of the law resulting from that connexion, so the death of the Christian to the law dissolves that connexion, so far as the scope of the argument here is concerned, and prepares the way for another union, a union with Christ, from which a new and more efficient obligation results. The design is to show that the new connexion would accomplish more important effects than the old.

Ye also are become dead to the law. Rom 6:3, Rom 6:4, Rom 6:8. The connexion between us and the law is dissolved, so far as the scope of the apostle's argument is concerned. He does not say that we are dead to it, or released from it as a rule of duty, or as a matter of obligation to obey it; for there neither is, nor can be, any such release; but we are dead to it as a way of justification and sanctification. In the great matter of acceptance with God, we have ceased to rely on the law, having become dead to it, and having embraced another plan.

By the body of Christ. That is, by his body crucified; or, in other words, by his death. Comp. Eph 2:15, "Having abolished in his flesh the enmity," etc.; that is, by his death. Col 1:22, "In the body of his flesh through death," etc.; Rom 2:14, 1Pet 2:24, "Who bare our sins in his own body on the tree." The sense is, therefore, that by the death of Christ as an atoning sacrifice; by his suffering for us that which would be sufficient to meet the demands of the law; by his taking our place, he has released us from the law as a way of justification, freed us from its penalty, and saved us from its curse. Thus released, we are at liberty to be uffited to the law of him who has thus bought us with h is blood.

That ye should be married to another. That you might be united to another, and come under his law. This is the completion of the illustration in Rom 7:2,3. As the woman that is freed from the law of her husband by his death, when married again comes under the authority of another, so we who are made free from the law and its curse by the death of Christ, are brought under the new law of fidelity and obedience to him with whom we are thus united. The union of Christ and his people is not unfrequently illustrated by the most tender of all earthly connexions--that of a husband and wife, Eph 5:23-30, Rev 21:9, "I will show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife;" Rev 19:7.

Even to him who is raised, etc. See the force of this explained, Rom 6:8.

That we should bring forth fruit unto God. That we should live a holy life. This is the point and scope of all this illustration. The new connexion is such as will make us holy. It is also implied that the tendency of the law was only to bring forth fruit unto death, Rom 6:5 and that the tendency of the gospel is to make man holy and pure. Comp. Gal 5:22,23.

(l) "fruit unto God" Gal 5:22

For when, etc. The illustration in this verse and the following is designed to show more at length the effect of the law, whenever and wherever applied; whether ill a state of nature or of grace. It was always the same. It was the occasion of agitation and conflict in a man's own mind. This was true when a sinner was under conviction; and it was true when a man was a Christian. In all circumstances where the law was applied to the corrupt mind of man, it produced this agitation and conflict. Even in the Christian's mind it produced this agitation, Rom 7:14-24, as it had done and would do in the mind of a sinner under conviction, Rom 7:7-12 and consequently there was no hope of release but in the delivering and sanctifying power of the gospel, Rom 7:25, 8:1-3.

In the flesh. Unconverted; subject to the controlling passions and propensities of a corrupt nature. Comp. Rom 7:8,9. The connexion shows that this must be the meaning here, and the design of this illustration is to show the effect of the law before a man is converted, Rom 7:5-12. This is the obvious meaning, and all the laws of interpretation require us so to understand it.

The motions of sins. (ταπαθηματα). This translation is unhappy. The expression "motions of sins" conveys no idea. The original means simply the passions, the evil affections, the corrupt desires. See the margin. The expression, passions of sins, is a Hebraism, meaning sinful passions, and refers here to the corrupt propensities and inclinations of the unrenewed heart.

Which were by the law. Not that they were originated or created by the law; for a law does not originate evil propensities, and a holy law would not cause sinful passions; but they were excited, called up, inflamed by tile law, which forbids their indulgence.

Did work in our members. In our body; that is, in us. Those sinful propensities made use of our members as instruments to secure gratification. Rom 6:12,13. Comp. Rom 7:23.

To bring forth fruit unto death. To produce crime, agitation, conflict, distress, and to lead to death. We were brought under the dominion of death; and the consequence of the indulgence of those passions would be fatal. Comp. Rom 6:21.

(m) "in the flesh" Rom 8:8,9 (1) "motions" or, "passions" (n) "bring forth fruit unto death" Rom 6:21

But now. Under the gospel. This verse states the conse- quences of the gospel, in distinction from the effects of the law. The way in which this is accomplished the apostle illustrates more at length in Rom 8, with which this verse is properly connected. The remainder of Rom 7 is occupied in illustrating the statement in Rom 7:5, of the effects of the law; and after having shown that its effects always were to increase crime and distress, he is prepared in Rom 8, to take up the proposition in this verse, and to show the superiority of the gospel in producing peace.

We are delivered. We who are Christians. Delivered from it as a means of justification, as a source of sanctification, as a bondage to which we were subjected, and which tended to produce pain and death. It does not mean that Christians are freed from it as a rule of duty.

That being dead. Margin, "Being dead to that." There is a variation here in the Mss. Some read it, as in the text, as if the law was dead; others, as in the margin, as if we were dead. The majority are in favour of the reading as in the margin; and the connexion requires us to understand it in this sense. So the Syriac, the Arabic, the Vulgate, and the AEthiopic. The sentiment here, that we are dead to the law, is that which is expressed in Rom 7:4.

Wherein we were held. That is, as captives, or as slaves. We were held in bondage to it, Rom 7:1.

That we should serve. That we may now serve or obey God

In newness of spirit. In a new spirit; or in a new and Spiritual manner. This is a form of expression implying,

(1.) that their service under the gospel was to be of a new kind, differing from that under the former dispensation.

(2.) That it was to be of a spiritual nature, as distinguished from that practised by the Jews. Comp. 2Cor 3:6. Rom 2:28. Rom 2:29. The worship required under the gospel is uniformly described as that of the spirit and the heart, rather than that of form and ceremony. Jn 4:23, "The true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth." Php 3:3.

And not in the oldness of the letter. Not in the old letter. It is implied here in this,

(1.) that the form of worship here described pertained to an old dispensation that had now passed away; and

(2.) that that was a worship that was in the letter. To understand this, it is necessary to remember that the law which prescribed the forms of worship among the Jews, was regarded by the apostle as destitute of that efficacy and power in renewing the heart which he attributed to the gospel. It was a service consisting in external forms and ceremonies; in the offering of sacrifices and of incense, according to the literal requirement of the law, rather than the sincere offering of the heart. 2Cor 3:6, "The letter killeth; the spirit giveth life." Jn 6:63, Heb 10:1-4, 9:9,10. It is not to be denied that there were many holy persons under the law, and that there were many spiritual offerings presented; but it is at the same time true that the great mass of the people rested in the mere form; and that the service offered was the mere service of the letter, and not of the heart. The main idea is, that the services under the gospel are purely and entirely spiritual, the offering of the heart, and not the service rendered by external forms and rites.

(1) "delivered from the law" or, "being dead to that"

What shall we say then? The objection which is here urged is one that would very naturally rise, and which we may suppose would be urged with no slight indignation. The Jew would ask, "Are we then to suppose that the holy law of God is not only insufficient to sanctify us, but that it is the mere occasion of increased sin? Is its tendency to produce sinful passions, and to make men worse than they were before?" To this objection the apostle replies with great wisdom, by showing that the evil was not in the law, but in man; that though these effects often followed, yet that the law itself was good and pure.

Is the law sin? Is it sinful? Is it evil? For if, as it is said in Rom 7:5, the sinful passions were by the law," it might naturally be asked whether the law itself was not an evil thing?

God forbid. Rom 3:4.

Nay, I had not known sin. The word translated nay (αλλα) means more properly but; and this would have more correctly expressed the sense, "I deny that the law is sin. My doctrine does not lead to that; nor do I affirm that it is evil. I strongly repel the charge; BUT, notwithstanding this, I still maintain 'hat it had an effect in exciting sins, yet so as that I perceived that the law itself was good," Rom 7:8-12. At the same time, therefore, that the law must be admitted to be the occasion of exciting sinful feelings, by crossing the inclinations of the mind, yet the fault was not to be traced to the law. The apostle in these verses refers, doubtless, to the state of his mind before he found that peace which the gospel furnishes by the pardon of sin.

But by the law. Rom 3:20. By the law here, the apostle has evidently in his eye every law of God, however made known. He means to my that the effect which he describes attends all law, and this effect he illustrates by a single instance drawn from the tenth commandment. When he says that he should not have known sin, he evidently means to affirm, that he had not understood that certain things were sinful unless they had been forbidden; and having stated this, he proceeds to another thing, to show the effect of their being thus forbidden on his mind. He was not merely acquainted abstractly with the nature and existence of sin, with what constituted crime because it was forbidden, but he was conscious of a certain effect on his mind resulting from this knowledge, and from the effect of strong, raging desires when thus restrained, Rom 7:8,9.

For I had not known lust. I should not have been acquainted with the nature of the sin of covetousness. The desire might have existed, but he would not have known it to be sinful, and he would not have experienced that raging, impetuous, and ungoverned propensity which he did when he found it to be forbidden. Man without law might have the strong feelings of desire. He might covet that which others possessed. He might take property, or be disobedient to parents; but he would not know it to be evil. The law fixes bounds to his desires, and teaches him what is right and what is wrong. It teaches him where lawful indulgence ends, and where sin begins. The word "lust" here is not limited as it is with us. It refers to all covetous desires; to all wishes for that which is forbidden us.

Except the law had said. In the tenth commandment, Ex 20:17.

Thou shalt not covet. This is the beginning of the command, and all the rest is implied. The apostle knew that it would be understood without repeating the whole. This particular commandment he selected because it was more pertinent than the others to his purpose. The others referred particularly to external actions. But his object was to show the effect of sin on the mind and conscience. He therefore chose one that referred particularly to the desires of the heart.

(o) "not known sin" Rom 3:20 (1) "lust" or "concupiscence" (p) "had said" Ex 20:17

But sin. To illustrate the effect of the law on the mind, the apostle in this verse depicts its influence in exciting to evil desires and purposes. Perhaps nowhere has he evinced more consummate knowledge of the human heart than here. He brings an illustration that might have escaped most persons, but which goes directly to establish his position that the law is insufficient to promote the salvation of man. Sin here is personified. It means not a real entity; not a physical subsistence; not something independent of the mind, having a separate existence, and lodged in the soul; but it means the corrupt passions, inclinations, and desires of the mind itself. Thus we say that lust burns, and ambition rages, and envy corrodes the mind, without meaning that lust, ambition, or envy are any independent physical subsistences; but meaning that the mind that is ambitious, or envious, is thus excited.

Taking occasion. The word occasion--(αφορμην) properly denotes any material, or preparation, for accomplishing anything; then any opportunity, occasion, etc. of doing it. Here it means that the law was the exciting cause of sin; or was that which called the sinful principle of the heart into exercise. But for this, the effect here described would not have existed. Thus we say that a tempting object of desire presented is the exciting cause of covetousness. Thus an object of ambition is the exciting cause of the principle of ambition. Thus the presentation of wealth, or of advantages possessed by others which we have not, may excite covetousness or envy. Thus the fruit presented to Eve was the exciting cause of sin; the wedge of gold to Achan excited his covetousness. Had not these objects been presented, the evil principles of the heart might have slumbered, and never have been called forth. And hence no men understand the full force of their native propensities until some object is presented that calls them forth into decided action. The occasion which called these forth in the mind of Paul was the law crossing his path, and irritating and exciting the native strong inclinations of the mind.

By the commandment. By all law appointed to restrain and control the mind.

Wrought in me. Produced or worked in me. The word used here means often to operate in a powerful and efficacious manner. (Doddridge.)

All manner of. Greek, "All desire." Every species of unlawful desire. It was not confined to one single desire, but extended to everything which the law declared to be wrong.

Concupiscence. Unlawful or irregular desire. Inclination for unlawful enjoyments. The word is the same which in Rom 7:7 is rendered lust. If it be asked in what way the law led to this, we may reply, that the main idea here is, that opposition by law to the desires and passions of wicked men only tends to inflame and exasperate them. This is the case with regard to sin in every form. An attempt to restrain it by force; to denounce it by laws and penalties; to cross the path of wickedness; only tends to irritate, and to excite into living energy, that which otherwise would be dormant in the bosom. This it does, because

(1.) it crosses the path of the sinner, and opposes his intention, and the current of his feelings and his life.

(2.) The law acts the part of a detector, and lays open to view that which was in the bosom, but was concealed.

(3.) Such is the depth and obstinacy of sin in man, that the very attempt to restrain often only serves to exasperate, and to urge to greater deeds of wickedness. Restraint by law rouses the mad passions; urges to greater deeds of depravity; makes the sinner stubborn, obstinate, and more desperate. The very attempt to set up authority over him throws him into a posture of resistance, and makes him a party, and excites all the feelings of party rage. Any one may have witnessed this effect often on the mind of a wicked and obstinate child.

(4.) This is particularly true in regard to a sinner. He is calm often, and apparently tranquil; but let the law of God be brought home to his conscience, and he becomes maddened and enraged. He spurns its authority, yet his conscience tells him it is right; he attempts to throw it off, yet trembles at its power; and, to show his independence, or his purpose to sin, he plunges into iniquity, and becomes a more dreadful and obstinate sinner. It becomes a struggle for victory, and in the controversy with God he resolves not to be overcome. It accordingly happens that many a man is more profane, blasphemous, and desperate when under conviction for sin than at other times. In revivals of religion it often happens that men evince violence, and rage, and cursing, which they do not in a state of spiritual death in the church; and it is often a very certain indication that a man is under conviction for sin when he becomes particularly violent, and abusive, and outrageous in his opposition to God.

(5.) The effect here noticed by the apostle is one that has been observed at all times, and by all classes of writers. Thus Cato says, (Livy, xxxiv. 4,) "Do not think, Romans, that it will be hereafter as it was before the law was enacted. It is more safe that a bad man should not be accused, than that he should be absolved; and luxury not excited would be more tolerable than it will be now, by the very chains irritated and excited as a wild beast." Thus Seneca says, (de Clementia, i. 23,) "Parricides began with the law." Thus Horace; (Odes, i. 3,) "The human race, bold to endure all things, rushes through forbidden crime." Thus Ovid, (Amor. iii. 4,) "We always endeavour to obtain that which is forbidden, and desire that which is denied." (These passages are quoted from Tholuck.) See also Prov 9:17, "Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant." If such be the effect of the law, then the inference of the apostle is unavoidable, that it is not adapted to save and sanctify man.

For without the law. Before it was given; or where it was not applied to the mind.

Sin was dead. It was inoperative, inactive, unexcited. This is evidently in a comparative sense. The connexion requires us to understand it only so far as it was excited by the law. Men's passions would exist; but without law they would not be known to be evil, and they would not be excited into wild and tumultuous raging.

For I. There seems to be no doubt that the apostle here refers to his own past experience. Yet in this he speaks the sentiment of all who are unconverted, and who are depending on their own righteousness.

Was alive. This is opposed to what he immediately adds respecting another state, in which he was when he died. It must mean, therefore, that he had a certain kind of peace; he deemed himself secure; he was free from the convictions of conscience and the agitations of alarm. The state to which he refers here must be doubtless that to which he himself elsewhere alludes, when he deemed himself to be righteous, depending on his own works, and esteeming himself to be blameless, Php 3:4-6 Acts 23:1, 26:4,5. It means, that he was then free from those agitations and alarms which he afterwards experienced when he was brought under conviction for sin. At that time, though he had the law, and was attempting to obey it, yet he was unacquainted with its spiritual and holy nature. He aimed at external conformity. Its claims on the heart were unfelt. This is the condition of every self-confident sinner, and of every one who is unawakened.

Without the law. Not that Paul was ever really without the law--that is, without the law of Moses; but he means before the law was applied to his heart in its spiritual meaning, and with power.

But when the commandment came. When it was applied to the heart and conscience. This is the only intelligible sense of the expression; for it cannot refer to the time when the law was given. When this was, the apostle does not say. But the expression denotes whenever it was so applied; when it was urged with power and efficacy on his conscience, to control, restrain, and threaten him, it produced this effect. We are unacquainted with the early operations of his mind, and with his struggles against conscience and duty. We know enough of him before conversion, however, to be assured that he was proud, impetuous, and unwilling to be restrained. See Acts 8:1-9:43. In the state of his self-confident righteousness and impetuosity of feeling, we may easily suppose that the holy law of God, which is designed to restrain the passions, to humble the heart, and to rebuke pride, would produce only irritation, and impatience of restraint, and revolt.

Sin revived. Lived again. This means that it was before dormant, Rom 7:8 but was now quickened into new life. The word is usually applied to a renewal of life, Rom 14:9, Lk 15:24,32 but here it means substantially the same as the expression in Rom 7:8, "Sin--wrought- in me all manner of concupiscence." The power of sin, which was before dormant, became quickened and active.

I died. That is, I was by it involved in additional guilt and misery. It stands opposed to "I was alive," and must mean the opposite of that; and evidently denotes that the effect of the commandment was to bring him under what he calls death, Rom 5:12,14,15 that is, sin reigned, and raged, and produced its withering and condemning effects; it led to aggravated guilt and misery. It may also include this idea: that before, he was self-confident and secure; but that by the commandment he was stricken down and humbled, his self-confidence was blasted, and his hopes were prostrated in the dust. Perhaps no words would better express the humble, subdued, melancholy, and helpless state of a converted sinner than the expressive phrase "I died." The essential idea here is, that the law did not answer the purpose which the Jew would claim for it, to sanctify the soul and to give comfort, but that all its influence on the heart was to produce aggravated, unpardoned guilt and woe.

And the commandment. The law to which he had referred before.

Which was ordained to life. Which was intended to produce life, or happiness. Life here stands opposed to death, and means felicity, peace, eternal bliss. Jn 3:36. When the apostle says that it was ordained to life, he probably has reference to the numerous passages in the Old Testament which speak of the law in this manner. Lev 18:5, "Ye shall keep my statutes and my judgments; which if a man do, he shall live in them," Eze 20:11 Eze 20:11,13,21, 18:9,21. The meaning of these passages, in connexion with this declaration of Paul, may be thus expressed:

(1.) The law is good; it has no evil, and is itself fitted to produce no evil.

(2.) If man was pure, and it was obeyed perfectly, it would produce life and happiness only. On those who have obeyed it in heaven, it has produced only happiness.

(3.) For this it was ordained; it is adapted to it; and when perfectly obeyed, it produces no other effect. But,

(4.) man is a sinner; he has not obeyed it; and in such a case the law threatens woe. It crosses the inclination of man; and instead of producing peace and life, as it would on a being perfectly holy, it produces only woe and crime. The law of a parent may be good, and may be appointed to promote the happiness of his children; it may be admirably fitted to it if all were obedient; yet in the family there may be one obstinate, self-willed, and stubborn child, resolved to indulge his evil passions, and the results to him would be woe and despair. The commandment, which was ordained for the good of the family, and which would be adapted to promote their welfare, he alone, of all the number, would find to be unto death.

I found. It was to me. It produced this effect.

Unto death. Producing aggravated guilt and condemnation, Rom 7:9.

(q) "ordained to life" Eze 20:11

For sin. This verse is a repetition, with a little variation, of the sentiment in Rom 7:8.

Deceived me. The word here used properly means, to lead or seduce from the right way; and then to deceive, solicit to sin, cause to err from the way of virtue, Rom 16:18, 1Cor 3:18, 2Cor 11:3, "The serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty; "2Th 2:3. The meaning here seems to be, that his corrupt and rebellious propensities, excited by the law, led him astray; caused him more and more to sin; practised a species of deception on him by urging him on headlong, and without deliberation, into aggravated transgression. In this sense, all sinners are deceived. Their passions urge them on, deluding them, and leading them farther and farther from happiness, and involving them, before they are aware, in crime and death. No being in the universe is more deluded than a sinner in the indulgence of evil passions. The description of Solomon in a particular case will apply to all, Prov 7:21-23. "With much fair speech she caused him to yield; With the flattering of her lips she forced him. He goeth after her straightway, As an ox goeth to the slaughter, Or as a fool to the correctran of the stocks; Till a dart strike through his liver, As a bird hasteth to the snare." By it. By the law, Rom 7:8.

Slew me. Meaning the same as "I died," Rom 7:9.

Wherefore. So that. The conclusion to which we come is, that the law is not to be blamed, though these are its effects under existing circumstances. The source of all this is not the law, but the corrupt nature of man. The law is good; and yet the position of the apostle is true, that it is not adapted to purify the heart of fallen man. Its tendency is to excite increased guilt, conflict, alarm, and despair. This verse contains an answer to the question in Rom 7:7, "Is the law sin?"

Is holy. Is not sin. Comp. Rom 7:7.

It is pure in its nature.

And the commandment. The word commandment is here synonymous with the law. It properly means that which is enjoined.

Holy. Pure.

Just. Righteous in its claims and penalties. It is not unequal in its exactions.

Good. In itself good; and in its own nature tending to produce happiness. The sin and condemnation of the guilty is not the fault of the law. If obeyed, it would produce happiness everywhere. See a most beautiful description of the law of God in Ps 19:7-11.

(r) "the law is holy" Ps 19:7-9.

Was then that which is good, etc. This is another objection, which the apostle proceeds to answer. The objection is this: "Can it be possible that that which is admitted to be good and pure, should be changed into evil? Can that which tends to life, be made death to a man?" In answer to this, the apostle repeats that the fault was not in the law, but was in himself, and in his sinful propensities.

Made death. Rom 7:8,10.

God forbid. Rom 3:4.

But sin. This is a personification of sin as in Rom 7:8.

That it might appear sin. That it might develope its true nature, and no longer be dormant in the mind. The law of God is often applied to a man's conscience, that he may see how deep and desperate is his depravity. No man knows his own heart until the law thus crosses his path, and shows him what he is.

By the commandment. Rom 7:8.

Might become exeeedingly sinful. In the original this is a very strong expression, and is one of those used by Paul to express strong emphasis, or intensity, καθυπερβολην. By hyperboles. In an extensive degree; to the utmost possible extent, 1Cor 12:31, 2Cor 1:8, 4:7, 12:7, Gal 1:13. The phrase occurs in each of these places. The sense here is, that by the giving of the command, and its application to the mind, sin was completely developed; it was excited, inflamed, aggravated, and showed to be excessively malignant and deadly. It was not a dormant, slumbering principle; but it was awfully opposed to God and his law. Calvin has well expressed the sense: "It was proper that the enormity of sin should be revealed by the law; because unless sin should break forth by some dreadful and enormous excess, (as they say,) it would not be known to be sin. This excess exhibits itself the more violently, while it turns life into death." The sentiment of the whole is, that the tendency of the law is to excite the dormant sin of the bosom into active existence, and to reveal its true nature. It is desirable that that should be done; and as that is all that the law accomplishes, it is not adapted to sanctify the soul. To show that this was the design of the apostle, it is desirable that sin should be thus seen in its true nature, because

(1.) man should be acquainted with his true character. He should not deceive himself.

(2.) Because it is one part of God's plan to develope the secret feelings of the heart, and to show to all creatures what they are.

(3.) Because only by knowing this will the sinner be induced to take a remedy, and strive to be saved. God often thus suffers men to plunge into sin; to act out their nature, that they may see themselves, and be alarmed at the consequences of their own crimes.

The remainder of this chapter has been the subject of no small degree of controversy. The question has been whether it describes the state of Paul before his conversion, or afterwards. It is not the purpose of these Notes to enter into controversy, or into extended discussion. But after all the attention which I have been able to give to this passage, I regard it as describing the state of a man under the gospel, as descriptive of the operations of the mind of Paul subsequent to his conversion. This interpretation is adopted for the following reasons:

(1.) Because it seems to me to be the most obvious. It is that which will strike plain men as being the natural meaning; men who have not a theory to support, and who understand language in its usual sense.

(2.) Because it agrees with the design of the apostle, which is to show that the law is not adapted to produce sanctification and peace. This he had done in regard to a man before he was converted. If this relates to the same period, then it is a useless discussion of a point already discussed. If it relates to that period also, then there is a large field of action, including the whole period after a man's conversion to Christianity, in which the question might still be unsettled, whether the law there might not be adapted to sanctify. The apostle therefore makes thorough work with the argument, and shows that the operation of the law is everywhere the same.

(3.) Because the expressions which occur are such as cannot be understood of an impenitent sinner. Rom 7:15, Rom 7:22.

(4.) Because it accords with parallel expressions in regard to the state of the conflict in a Christian's mind.

(5.) Because there is a change made here from the past tense to the present. In Rom 7:7, etc., he had used the past tense, evidently describing some former state. In Rom 7:14 there is a change to the present, a change inexplicable, except on the supposition that he meant to describe some state different from that before described. That could be no other than to carry his illustration forward in showing the inefficacy of the law on a man in his renewed state; or to show that such was the remaining depravity of the man, that it produced substantially the same effects as in the former condition.

(6.) Because it accords with the experience of Christians, and not with sinners. It is just such language as plain Christians, who are acquainted with their own hearts, use to express their feelings. I admit that this last consideration is not by itself conclusive; but if the language did not accord with the experience of the Christian world, it would be a strong circumstance against any proposed interpretation. The view which is here expressed of this chapter, as supposing that the previous part (Rom 7:7-13) refers to a man in his unregenerate state, and that the remainder describes the effect of the law on the mind of a renewed man, was adopted by studying the chapter itself, without aid from any writer. I am happy, however, to find that the views thus expressed are in accordance with those of the late Rev. Dr. J.P. Wilson, than whom, perhaps, no man was ever better qualified to interpret the Scriptures. He says, "In the fourth verse, he (Paul) changes to the first person plural, because he intended to speak of the former experience of Christians, who had been Jews. In the seventh verse he uses the first person singular, but speaks in the past tense, because he describes his own experience when he was an unconverted Pharisee. In the fourteenth verse, and unto the end of the chapter, he uses the first person singular, and the present tense, because he exhibits his own experience since he became a Christian and an apostle."

We know. We admit. It is a conceded, well-understood point.

That the law is spiritual. This does not mean that the law is designed to control the spirit, in contradistinction from the body, but it is a declaration showing that the evils of which he was speaking were not the fault of the law. That was not, in its nature, sensual, corrupt, earthly, carnal; but was pure and spiritual. The effect described was not the fault of the law, but of the man, who was sold under sin. The word spiritual is often thus used to denote that which is pure and holy, in opposition to that which is fleshly or carnal, Rom 8:5,6; Gal 5:16-23. The flesh is described as the source of evil passions and desires; the spirit as the source of purity, or as that which is agreeable to the proper influences of the Holy Spirit.

But I am. The present tense shows that he is describing himself as he was at the time of writing. This is the natural and obvious construction; and if this be not the meaning, it is impossible to account for his having changed the past tense (Rom 7:7) to the present.

Carnal. Fleshly; sensual; opposed to spiritual. This word is used because in the Scriptures the flesh is spoken of as the source of sensual passions and propensities, Gal 5:19-21. The sense is, that these corrupt passions still retained a strong, and withering, and distressing influence over the mind. The renewed man is exposed to temptations from his strong native appetites; and the power of these passions, strengthened by long habit before he was converted, has travelled over into religion, and they continue still to influence and distress him. It does not mean that he is wholly under their influence; but that the tendency of his natural inclinations is to indulgence.

Sold under sin. This expression is often adduced to show that it cannot be of a renewed man that the apostle is speaking. The argument is, that it cannot be affirmed of a Christian that he is sold under sin. A sufficient answer to this might be, that, IN FACT, this is the very language which Christians often now adopt to express the strength of that native depravity against which they struggle, and that no language would better express it. It does not mean that they choose or prefer sins. It strongly implies that the prevailing bent of their mind is against it, but that such is its strength that it brings them into slavery to it. The expression here used, "sold under sin," is "borrowed from the practice of selling captives taken in war, as slaves." (Stuart.) It hence means to deliver into the power of any one, so that he shall be dependent on his will and control. (Schleusner.) The emphasis is not on the word sold, as if any act of selling had taken place, but the effect was as if he had been sold; i.e., he was subject to it, and under its control, and it means that sin, contrary to the prevailing inclination of his mind, (Rom 7:15-17) had such an influence over him as to lead him to commit it, and thus to produce a state of conflict and grief, Rom 7:19-24. The verses which follow this are an explanation of the sense, and of the manner in which he was "sold under sin."

(s) "sold under sin" 2Kgs 17:17

For that which I do. That is, the evil which I do, the sin of which I am conscious, and which troubles me.

I allow not. I do not approve; I do not wish it; the prevailing bent of my inclinations and purposes is against it. Greek, "I know not." See the margin. The word know, however, is sometimes used in the sense of approving. Rev 2:24, "Which have not known [approved] the depths of Satan." Comp. Ps 101:4, "I will not know a wicked person." Jer 1:5.

For what I would. That which I approve, and which is my prevailing and established desire. What I would wish always to do.

But what I hate. What I disapprove of; what is contrary to my judgment; my prevailing inclination; my established principles of conduct.

That do I. Under the influence of sinful propensities, and carnal inclinations and desires. This represents the strong native propensity to sin; and even the power of corrupt propensity under the restraining influence of the gospel. On this remarkable and important passage we may observe,

(1.) that the prevailing propensity--the habitual fixed inclination of the mind of the Christian--is to do right. The evil course is hated; the right course is loved. This is the characteristic of a pious mind. It distinguishes a holy man from a sinner.

(2.) The evil which is done is disapproved; is a source of grief; and the habitual desire of the mind is to avoid it, and be pure. This also distinguishes the Christian from the sinner.

(3.) There is no need of being embarrassed here with any metaphysical difficulties or inquiries how this can be; for (a) it is in fact the experience of all Christians. The habitual, fixed inclination and desire of their minds is to serve God. They have a fixed abhorrence of sin; and yet they are conscious of imperfection, and error, and sin, that is the source of uneasiness and trouble. The strength of natural passion may in an unguarded moment overcome them. The power of long habits of previous thoughts may annoy them. A man who was an infidel before his conversion, and whose mind was filled with scepticism, and cavils, and blasphemy, will find the effect of his former habits of thinking lingering in his mind, and annoying his peace for years. These thoughts will start up with the rapidity of the lightning. Thus it is with every vice and every opinion. It is one of the effects of habit. "The very passage of an impure thought through the mind leaves pollution behind it;" and where sin has been long indulged, it leaves its withering, desolating effect on the soul long after conversion, and produces that state of conflict with which every Christian is familiar.

(b) An effect somewhat similar is felt by all men. All are conscious of doing that, under the excitement of passion and prejudice, which their conscience and better judgment disapprove. A conflict thus exists, which is attended with as much metaphysical difficulty as the struggle in the Christian's mind referred to here.

(c) The same thing was observed and described in the writings of the heathen. Thus Xenophon, (Cyrop. vi. 1,) Araspes, the Persian, says in order to excuse his treasonable designs, "Certainly I must have two souls; for plainly it is not one and the same which is both evil and good; and at the same time wishes to do a thing and not to do it. Plainly, then, there are two souls; and when the good one prevails, then it does good; and when the evil one predominates, then it does evil." So also Epictetus (Enchirid. ii. 26) says, "He that sins does not do what he would; but what he would not, that he does." With this passage it would almost seem that Paul was familiar, and had his eye on it when he wrote. So also the well known passage from Ovid, Meta. vii. 9:

Aliudque Cupido, Mens aliud suadet. Video meliora, proboque, Deteriora sequor.

"Desire prompts to one thing, but the mind persuades to another. I see the good, and approve it, and yet pursue the wrong."--See other passages of similar import quoted in Grotius and Tholuck. (1) "allow not" "know not"

I consent unto the law. The very struggle with evil shows that it is not loved, or approved, but that the law which condemns it is really loved. Christians may here find a test of their piety. The fact of struggling against evil--the desire to be free from it, and to overcome it, the anxiety and grief which it causes--is an evidence that we do not love it, and that therefore we are the friends of God. Perhaps nothing can be a more decisive test of piety than a long-continued and painful struggle against evil passions and desires in every form, and a panting of the soul to be delivered from the power and dominion of sin.

It is no more I that do it. This is evidently figurative language, for it is really the man that sins when evil is committed. But the apostle makes a distinction between sin and that which he intends by the pronoun I. By the former he evidently means his corrupt nature; by the latter he refers to his renewed nature, his Christian principles. He means to say that he does not approve or love it in his present state, but that it is the result of his native propensities and passions. In his heart, and conscience, and habitual feeling, he did not choose to commit sin, but abhorred it. Thus every Christian can say that he does not choose to do evil, but would wish to be perfect; that he hates sin, and yet that his corrupt passions lead him astray.

But sin. My corrupt passions and native propensities.

That dwelleth in me. Dwelling in me as its home. This is a strong expression, denoting that sin had taken up its habitation in the mind, and abode there. It had not yet been wholly dislodged. This expression stands in contrast with another that occurs, where it is said that "the Spirit of God dwells" in the Christian, Rom 8:9, 1Cor 3:16. The sense is, that he is strongly influenced by sin on the one hand; and by the Spirit on the other. From this expression has arisen the phrase so common among Christians, indwelling sin.

For I know. This is designed as an illustration of what he had just said, that sin dwelt in him.

That is, in my flesh. In my unrenewed nature; in my propensities and inclinations before conversion. Does not this qualifying expression show that in this discussion he was speaking of himself as a renewed man? Hence he is careful to imply that there was at that time in him something that was right or acceptable with God, but that that did not pertain to him by nature.

Dwelleth. His soul was wholly occupied by that which was evil. It had taken entire possession.

No good thing. There could not be possibly a stronger expression of belief of the doctrine of total depravity. It is Paul's own representation of himself. It proves that his heart was wholly evil. And if this was true of him, it is true of all others. It is a good way to examine ourselves, to inquire whether we have such a view of our own native character as to say that we know that in our flesh there dwelleth no good thing. The sense here is, that so far as the flesh was concerned--that is, in regard to his natural inclinations and desires-- there was nothing good; all was evil. This was true in his entire conduct before conversion, where the desires of the flesh reigned and rioted without control; and it was true after conversion, so far as the natural inclinations and propensities of the flesh were concerned. All those operations in every state were evil, and not the less evil because they are experienced under the light and amidst the influences of the gospel.

To will. To purpose or intend to do good.

Is present with me. I can do that. It is possible; it is in my power. The expression may also imply that it was near to him, (παρακειται), that is, it was constantly before him; it was now his habitual inclination and purpose of mind. It is the uniform, regular, habitual purpose of the Christian's mind to do right.

But how. The sense would have been better retained here if the translators had not introduced the word how. The difficulty was not in the mode of performing it, but to do the thing itself.

I find not. I do not find it in my power; or I find strong, constant obstacles, so that I fail of doing it. The obstacles are not natural, but such as arise from long indulgence in sin; the strong native propensity to evil.

(t) "no good thing" Gen 6:5

For the good, etc. This is substantially a repetition of what is said in Rom 7:15. The repetition shows how full the mind of the apostle was of the subject; and how much inclined he was to dwell upon it, and to place it in every variety of form. It is not uncommon for Paul thus to express his intense interest in a subject, by placing it in a great variety of aspects, even at the hazard of much repetition.

(u) "the good" Gal 5:17

Now if I do, etc. This verse is also a repetition of what was said in Rom 7:16,17.

I find then a law. There is a law whose operation I experience whenever I attempt to do good. There have been various opinions about the meaning of the word law in this place. It is evident that [it] is used here in a sense somewhat unusual. But it retains the notion which commonly attaches to it of that which binds, or controls. And though this to which he refers differs from a law, inasmuch as it is not imposed by a superior, which is the usual idea of a law, yet it has so far the sense of law that it binds, controls, influences, or is that to which he was subject. There can be no doubt that he refers here to his carnal and corrupt nature; to the evil propensities and dispositions which were leading him astray. His representing this as a law is in accordance with all that he says of it, that it is servitude, that he is in bondage to it, and that it impedes his efforts to be holy and pure. The meaning is this: "I find a habit, a propensity, an influence of corrupt passions and desires, which, when I would do right, impedes my progress, and prevents my accomplishing what I would." Comp. Gal 5:17. Every Christian is as much acquainted with this as was the apostle Paul.

Do good. Do right. Be perfect.

Evil. Some corrupt desire, or improper feeling, or evil propensity.

Is present with me. Is near; is at hand. It starts up unbidden, and undesired. It is in the path, and never leaves us, but is always ready to impede our going, and to turn us from our good designs. Comp. Ps 65:3, "Iniquities prevail against me." The sense is, that to do evil is agreeable to our strong natural inclinations and passions.

(v) "evil is present" Ps 65:3

For I delight. The word used here (συνηδομαι) occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It properly means, to rejoice with any one; and expresses not only approbation of the understanding, as the expression, "I consent unto the law," in Rom 7:16, but, more than that, it denotes sensible pleasure in the heart. It indicates not only intellectual assent, but emotion--an emotion of pleasure in the contemplation of the law. And this shows that the apostle is not speaking of an unrenewed man. Of such a man it might be said that his conscience approved the law; that his understanding was convinced that the law was good; but never yet did it occur that an impenitent sinner found emotions of pleasure in the contemplation of the pure and spiritual law of God. If this expression can be applied to an unrenewed man, there is, perhaps, not a single mark of a pious mind which may not with equal propriety be so applied. It is the natural, obvious, and usual mode of denoting the feelings of piety, an assent to the Divine law followed with emotions of sensible delight in the contemplation. Comp. Ps 119:97, "O how love I thy law; it is my meditation all the day." Ps 1:2, "But his delight is in the law of the Lord." Ps 19:7-11, Job 23:12.

In the law of God. The word law here is used, in a large sense, to denote all the communications which God had made to control man. The sense is, that the apostle was pleased with the whole. One mark of genuine piety is to be pleased with the whole of the Divine requirements.

After the inward man. In respect to the inward man. The expression "the inward man" is used sometimes to denote the rational part of man as opposed to the sensual; sometimes the mind as opposed to the body, (comp. 2Cor 4:16, 1Pet 3:4). It is thus used by the Greek classic writers. Here it is used evidently in opposition to a carnal and corrupt nature; to the evil passions and desires of the soul in an unrenewed state; to what is called elsewhere "the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts," Eph 4:22. The "inward man" is elsewhere called "the new man," (Eph 4:24) and denotes not the mere intellect, or conscience, but is a personification of the principles of action by which a Christian is governed; the new nature; the holy disposition; the inclination of the heart that is renewed.

(w) "delight" Ps 1:2 (x) "inward man" 2Cor 4:16, 1Pet 3:4

But I see another law. Rom 7:21.

In my members. In my body; in my flesh; in my corrupt and sinful propensities. Rom 6:13. Comp. 1Cor 6:15, Col 3:5 The body is composed of many members; and as the flesh is regarded as the source of sin, (Rom 7:18) the law of sin is said to be in the members, i.e. in the body itself.

Warring against, fighting against; or resisting.

The law of my mind. This stands opposed to the prevailing inclinations of a corrupt nature. It means the same as was expressed by the phrase "the inward man," and denotes the desires and purposes of a renewed heart.

And bringing me into captivity. Making me a prisoner, or a captive. This is the completion of the figure respecting the warfare. A captive taken in war was at the disposal of the victor. So the apostle represents himself as engaged in a warfare; and as being overcome, and made an unwilling captive to the evil inclinations of the heart. The expression is strong; and denotes strong corrupt propensities. But though strong, it is believed it is language which all sincere Christians can adopt of themselves, as expressive of that painful and often disastrous conflict in their bosoms when they contend against the native propensities of their hearts.

(z) "captivity to the law" Ps 142:7

O wretched man that I am! The feeling implied by this lamentation is the result of this painful conflict; and this frequent subjection to sinful propensities. The effect of this conflict is

(1.) to produce pain and distress, it is often an agonizing struggle between good and evil; a struggle which annoys the peace, and renders life wretched.

(2.) It tends to produce humility. It is humbling to man to be thus under the influence of evil passions. It is degrading to his nature; a stain on his glory; and it tends to bring him into the dust, that he is under the control of such propensities, and so often gives indulgence to them. In such circumstances, the mind is overwhelmed with wretchedness, and instinctively sighs for relief. Can the law aid? Can man aid? Can any native strength of conscience or of reason aid? In vain all these are tried, and the Christian then calmly and thankfully acquiesces in the consolations of the apostle, that aid can be obtained only through Jesus Christ.

Who shall deliver me. Who shall rescue me; the condition of a mind in deep distress, and conscious of its own weakness, and looking for aid.

The body of this death. Marg. This body of death. The word body here is probably used as equivalent to flesh, denoting the corrupt and evil propensities on the soul. Rom 7:18. It is thus used to denote the law of sin in the members, as being that with which the apostle was struggling, and from which he desired to be delivered. The expression "body of this death" is a Hebraism, denoting a body deadly in its tendency; and the whole expression may mean the corrupt principles of man; the carnal, evil affections that lead to death or to condemnation. The expression is one of vast strength, and strongly characteristic of the apostle Paul. It indicates,

(1.) that it was near him, attending him, and was distressing in its nature.

(2.) An earnest wish to be delivered from it. Some have supposed that he refers to a custom practised by ancient tyrants, of binding a dead body to a captive as a punishment, and compelling him to drag the cumbersome and offensive burden with him wherever he went. I do not see any evidence that the apostle had this in view. But such a fact may be used as a striking and perhaps not improper illustration of the meaning of the apostle here. No strength of words could express deeper feeling; none more feelingly indicate the necessity of the grace of God to accomplish that to which the unaided human powers are incompetent.

(a) "O wretched" Ps 38:2,10, 77:3-9 (1) "the body" or, "this body of death"

I thank God. That is, I thank God for effecting a deliverance to which I am myself incompetent. There is a way of I of rescue, and trace it altogether to his mercy in the Lord Jesus Christ. What conscience could not do, what the law could not do, what unaided human strength could not do, has been accomplished by the plan the gospel; and complete deliverance can be expected there, and there alone. This is the point to which all his reasoning had tended; and having thus shown that the law was insufficient to effect this deliverance, he is now prepared to utter the language of Christian thankfulness that it can be effected by the gospel. The superiority of the gospel to the law, in overcoming all the evils under which man labours, is thus triumphantly established. Comp. 1Cor 15:57.

So then. As the result of the whole inquiry we have come to this conclusion.

With the mind. With the understanding, the conscience, the purposes or intentions of the soul. This is a characteristic of the renewed nature. Of no impenitent sinner could it be ever affirmed that with his mind he served the law of God.

I myself. It is still the same person, though acting in this apparently contradictory manner.

Serve the law of God. Do honour to it as a just and holy law, (Rom 7:12,16) and am inclined to obey it, Rom 7:22,24.

But with the flesh. The corrupt propensities and lusts, Rom 7:18.

The law of sin. That is, in the members. The flesh throughout, in all its native propensities and passions, leads to sin; it has no tendency to holiness; and its corruptions cart be overcome only by the grace of God. We have thus

(1.) a view of the sad and painful conflict between sin and God. They are opposed in all things.

(2.) We see the raging, withering effect of sin on the soul. In all circumstances it tends to death and woe.

(3.) We see the feebleness of the law and of conscience to overcome this. The tendency of both is to produce conflict and woe. And

(4.) we see that the gospel only can overcome sin. To us it should be a subject of ever-increasing thankfulness, that what could not be accomplished by the law can be thus effected by the gospel; and that God has devised a plan that thus effects complete deliverance, and which gives to the captive in sin an everlasting triumph.

(e) "I thank God" 1Cor 15:57

As if the apostle had said, "You Jews, who study the law and are well acquainted with it, cannot but know that the law of God hath power over a man to require of him exact, perfect, and perpetual obedience, and to accuse, condemn, and bind him over to the curse for the least breach and violation of it; and all this a long as he liveth under the law, and is not freed from the malediction of it by faith in Christ"

Learn hence, 2. That the law of God, in the force and strength of it, and as considered in itself, is a very hard lord and master, exacting perfect, personal, and perpetual obedience to its commands and binding sinners over to the curse for the least transgression and violation of it.

Learn, 2. That Jesus Christ has freed all believers from the rigour of the law, from the curse of the law, and from the irritation of the law: that is, from the power which is in the law, to stir them up in sin through the corruption of their own hearts and natures.

Blessed be God! we are by Christ freed from, and dead to the law, as a covenant of life; but we are under it, and may we all our days sit under the shadow of it with great delight, as an eternal rule of holy living.

Here the apostle doth exemplify and illustrate the foregoing assertion, namely, That believers are freed from the law, by a similitude taken from the law of marriage: As death freeth husband and wife from the law which bound them to each other, and empowereth the survivor to marry to another person; in like manner the death of Christ was the death of the law,, as a covenant of works, holding us under the bond of the curse of it; and so his dying gave a manumission or freedom from that bond, and a capacity of espousal unto Christ; that so living in conjugal affection and obedience to him, we may be made fuitful by his Spirit, doing such things as are agreeable to the will of God, and tending to the glory of God. Ye are dead to the law by the body of Christ: That is, through the offering up of Christ's body upon the cross.

Learn hence, 1. That he that is under the law, is as strictly bound to the rigour and curse of the law, as a married woman is bound to her husband during his life.

Learn, 2. That one great end of Christ's death was to purchase our freedom from the law, that we might be capable of being espoused to himself. For whilst we were under the curse of the law, we were not in a capacity of being married unto Christ. He or she that is a slave to another, is not capable to be disposed of in marriage until made free.

In like manner we were in bondage to the law, as well as in slavery unto sin and Satan; but Christ has bought out our liberty, and thereby put us into a capacity of being espoused unto himself.

Behold what manner of love the Redeemer has shewed unto us, that we should be called his spouse, and he our husband! He loved us, but not for any advantage he could have by us; for we had nothing but sin and shame to present him with. Nay, he must purchase us, and that with his own blood, before he could be united to us. Oh incomparable love! Oh fervent desires!

Learn, 3. That though believers are free from the rigour and curse of the law by the death of Christ, yet have they not an undoubted liberty, but are still under government, under an head and guide. As a wife is under the government of her husband, so are believers under the guidance and government of Jesus Christ, who in a special manner guideth them by his word and Spirit; and their being said to be dead to the law, signifies no more than the law's not having dominion over them, in regard of the curse and condemnation of it.

As if the apostle had said, "When we lived under the dispensation of the law, and were married to the law, we brought forth fruit suitable to that state and condition. But now being freed from the law, and married unto Christ, it is meet and right, equal and fit, that we should bring forth fruit answerable to our more excellent state and condition. That now we serve God with new hearts and lives by the Spirit of Christ, according to the law of grace, and not carnally in the bondage and terror of the old law, called here the oldness of the letter."

Learn hence, 1. That all sincere and serious Christians, who are dead to the law, and espoused unto Christ, ought to bring forth fruit unto God, suitable to their noble estate, and most honourable condition. Freedom and deliverance from the rigour and curse of the law ought to bind us more strongly to God, to love and serve him, to glorify and obey him.

Learn, 2. That all true believers, who are freed from the rigour and curse of the law, ought to serve the Lord in true holiness both of heart and life, and to yield a new and universal obedience to him.

This the apostle here calls the newness of the Spirit, to intimate to us, that new obedience is the work of the holy Spirit in us, as the author of all grace and sanctification. And whereas the newness of the Spirit is opposed to the oldness of the letter; that is, the ministry of the law, which is itself a dead letter, discovering sin, but not discovered how sin may be either pardoned or subdued; we may gather, That the law of God, and indeed the whole word of God, without the Spirit, is but a dead letter, unable to work grace and holiness in us, or to excite and quicken us unto newness of life.

Whenever then we place ourselves under the word, let us pray with David, Lord, open thou mine eyes, that I may see the wonderous things of thy law.

Observe here, 1. The objection (which the apostle answers) that some were ready to make against the holiness of the law. He had affirmed at that the motions of sin were stirred up by the law. Rom 7:5 "If so, say some, then the law may seem to be the cause of sin;" God forbid: says the apostle. the thought of such a conclusion ought to be abhorred.

Hence learn, 1. That the holiest doctrines and truths of God are subject to be perverted and abused, and to have absurd inferences and conclusions drawn from them.

2. That the ministers of Christ must be able and careful, not only to propound the truth soundly, but to defend it solidly, against all cavils, and wicked objections whatsoever, and to declare their utter detestation and utmost abhorrency of any such opinion as reflects dishonour upon the holy law of God.

Observe, 2. The apostle's argument to confute this wicked notion of the law's being the cause of sin: I had not known sin, but by the law. As if the apostle had said, "That which forbids sin discovers and condemns sin, cannot be the cause of sin; but so doth the holy law of God: It makes sin manifest in and to the conscience of the sinner; therefore the law is not sin, no exciter to it, or cause of it."

Learn hence, That the law of God is so far from being the cause of sin, that by it men came to a more clear, full, distinct, and effectual, knowledge of sin; I had not known sin, but by the law. That is, not so clearly and effectually, so as to be duly humbled for it, and turned from it.

The light of nature shews a difference between good and evil, but the law of God represents sin as the evils of evils. In it, as in a glass, we behold the foul face of sin, and are convinced by it of the monstrous evil that it is.

Observe, 3. How the apostle produces his own experience in this matter, and gives a particular instance in himself, that he had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet; that is, he should not have understood that the first irregular motions of the heart, the first inclinations and desires of the soul towards sin, (though not consented to by the will) were evil, had he not, by a more attentive consideration of the tenth commandment, found that they were so.

Learn hence, 1. That lust or concupiscence is sin; that is, original lust, the first motions of corrupt and rebellious nature, whereby our inclinations are towards evils, though our wills do not fully consent to evil.

Learn, 2. That so holy and spiritual is the law of God, that it discovers the sin of nature, and condemns the first motions and inclinations of the soul to sin, even to the pit of hell. All the wisdom of the heathen, yea, of the wisest and most learned persons in the world, was never able to discover the first motions arising from our rebellious natures to be sin; only the holy law of God makes them known, and discovers them to be sins. I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. Such is the holiness of the law of God, that it requires not only the purity of our actions, but also the integrity of all our faculties.

Observe here, A concession or grant made by the apostle, that although the law was not the formal cause of sin, yet sin was an accidental event of the law, through the depravity and corruption of our natures; lust or concupiscence in us being stirred up more strongly, and breaking forth more violently in us, by being prohibited and restrained by the law. As things forbidden us are the more desired by us; the more the law would restrain sin through our corruption, the more it enrages sin: As the more you could dam up a torrent, the higher it swells. Thus sin takes occasion by the commandment to work all manner of concupiscence in us.

Learn hence, That such is the depravity and perverseness of our present natures, that there is found within us a propensity and inclination to all sin; and although the law of God doth not give the least countenance to sin, yet sin takes occasion, from the restraints of the law, to grow more impetuous, and is the more irritated by being prohibited; and consequently it is not from ourselves, but from God's restraining grace, that those evil inclinations which are in our hearts do not break forth in our lives.

The apostle adds, Without the law sin was dead: that is, without the knowledge and due consideration of the law, sin is comparatively dead: that is, the corruption of nature lies hid, and is not so much known to be sin; nor had it so much power to terrify the conscience, and to stir up inordinate affections, as after the law is known and duly considered.

Learn hence, that such as either know not the word and law of God, or do not duly consider it, have very little sense of inward pollution. But their corruption lies, as it were, dead in them, and they in that without touching the conscience, or laying the soul under sensible apprehensions of its sin and danger: Without the law sin is dead. Sin in the conscience is like a lion asleep in his den; it awakes not, stirs not, terrifies and accuses not, till the law of God rouses it; and then the sinner sees himself under the curse, and liable to perdition.

As if the apostle had said, "Formerly, when I lived a Pharisee, and had the law in my hand, but did not consider in my heart what exactness and perfection it required in my life, I contented myself with an outward observation of it, and concluded my state to be good and safe: But when I came to a right understanding of the word and law of God, and to be convinced by it, that the inward lustings and ordinate desires of the heart were sins, then I found myself a guilty creature, obnoxious to wrath, and in a state of death."

Here note, 1. The good opinion the apostle had, and all unregenerate men have of themselves before conversion: I was alive once. By life understand liveliness, confidence and assurance of his good estate and condition; he was full of vain hope; false joy, and presumptuous confidence.

Learn hence, That natural and unregenerate persons are usually very full of groundless confidence and cheerfulness without the least suspicion of their bad estate and sad condition: I was alive without the law once.

Note, 2. The apprehension and opinion which St. Paul had, and others will have of themselves, when they come under the regenerating work of the Spirit, by the ministry of the word and law of God: When the commandment came, I died.

Death here stands opposed to life before, and denotes the sorrows, fears, and tremblings which seized upon his soul, when he was convinced of the badness of his condition: it stabbed all his carnal mirth, joy, and jollity, as the very heart: I died.

Note, 3. The cause and reason or this wonderful alteration and change of judgment in the apostle,; it was the commandment and law of God: When the commandment came, that is, close and home to my heart and conscience with a divine efficacy. The commandment was come before to him by way of promulgation, and he had the literal knowledge to it; but now it came in the convincing power and spiritual application of it. Accordingly sin revived, that is, the sense of sin was more lively imprinted upon his soul; and now he died, all his vain hopes gave up the ghost now, and his sin and guilt stared in the face of his conscience.

Learn hence, That there is mighty efficacy in the word or law of God to kill vain confidence, and quench carnal mirth in the hearts of men, when God sets it home upon their consciences: I was alive without the law once; but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

Observe here, 1. The natural end and use of the commandment or law of God, It was ordained unto life; that is, it was given for a rule of life, a promised eternal salvation to the perfect fulfilling of it. But no man since the fall being able perfect the law in his own person, can be justified by the law in the sight of God. However, the proper end for which the law was ordained, was to give life to them that should perfectly keep it.

Observe, 2. The contrary use which the apostle found the law to be of, with reference unto himself. What was ordained to life, he found to be unto death: that is, through his own corruption and transgression, it became an occasion of death to him, by binding him over to punishment, and rendering him obnoxious to the wrath of God.

Thus the word of God, the sweet and saving word of God, that word which God had ordained to bring men to life and salvation, is found to some the savour of death unto death; but the fault is not in the word, but in themselves.

As if the apostle had said, "Sin, or the corruption of my heart and nature, being stirred up by the commandment which forbids lust, and condemns it, enticed me, and persuaded me, and prevailed over me, to yield to the lusts of my own heart, and then condemned me, and slew men for yielding to them."

See here the true and genuine nature of sin: it first deceives, and then destroys: It deceived me, saith the apostle, and then slew me. Sin doth perfectly besot the creature, and renders it injudicious: it befools and deceives us, it pollutes and defiles us, it doth debase and degrade us, and, without repentance, damns and destroys.

God keep us from being hardened in sinning through the deceitfulness of sin; let no profit tempt us, no pleasure entice us, no power embolden us, no privacy encourage us, to adventure upon any known sin; for its embraces are deadly, it leads to death, and ends in death; after it has deceived us, it certainly destroys us, Sin taking occasion, deceived me, and by it slew me.

Observe here, What care and holy caution the apostle uses to vindicate and clear the holy law of God from all fault and blame, charging his guilt, not upon the commandment, but upon the corruption of his own heart, which took occasion to be stirring in him, and by the commandment slew him; affirming nevertheless, that the law of God in itself, and in its own nature, is holy, just, and good.

Here note, that the apostle adorns the law with the most excellent eulogy and commendation.

'Tis holy, 1. As it enjoins all acts of piety towards God; namely, adoration of his majesty, imitation of his purity, resignation to his providence, obedience to his commands.

2. 'Tis just, as it directs us in our duty to others in every capacity and relative wherein we stand, and obliges us to walk by that rule of equity, to do to others as we would they should do unto us.

3. 'Tis good to the man that keeps it, commanding nothing but what is influential upon his well-being both here and hereafter.

Could we set aside the authority of the Lawgiver, yet all the precepts of the law, for their moral goodness, deserve our esteem, and choice, and entire observation; nothing being required of us but what is our duty and interest as men, and which tends to the perfecting and ennobling of our natures: Well then might our apostle determine, that the law is holy, the commandment holy, and just, and good.

From what the apostle had said in the former verse, he moves an objection unto this verse: "Seeing the law was holy, and just, and good, how comes it to be unto death? Was that which was good made death unto me?" To this he replies, both by way of negation, God forbid; for to find fault with the law, is to find fault with God himself! and also by way of affirmation, asserting, that sin is the true cause of death.

The commandment indeed condemns, or is death to the sinner, yet not of itself, but because of sin; as we say of a condemned malefactor, it is not the judge, but the law, that condemns him; or, strictly speaking, it is not the law, but his own guilt, that condemns him; the judge is but the mouth of the law, to denounce the sentence that guilt deserves.

And hereby sin appears to be what really it is, sin sinful, exceedingly sinful, masculinely and vigorously sinful, excessively and out of measure sinful, extremely and beyond all expression, nay, beyond our comprehension, sinful.

Learn hence, 1. That the law of God, in the whole, and in every part thereof, is holy in its institution with respect to man: for it was ordained unto life, Rom 7:10.

Learn, 2. That this good and holy law violated and transgressed, condemns and kills, and assigns a person over unto death.

Learn, 3. That though the law condemns man's sin, and man for his sin, yet still the law is good, and not to be blamed; the law is to be justified by man, even when it condemns man: as man had no reason to break the law, so he has no cause to find fault with the law, though it binds him over to death for the breaking of it.

Learn, 4. That 'tis not the law, but sin, that worketh man's death and ruin. Sin aims at not less, and will end in no less; for the wages of sin is death.

Yet, 5. Sin certainly worketh man's death and destruction by that which is good, to wit, the law; for when sin hath used man to break the law, it then makes use of the law to break man; that is, to undo him by condemnation and death for breaking of it.

Lastly, from hence it follows, that sin is therefore exceedingly, yea, unmeasurably sinful, poisonous and pernicious, because it kills men, and not only so, but it kills men by that which is good, to wit, the law. That which was appointed for life, becomes the occasion of death; consequently was in the world.

"Ah! sinful sin, hyperbolically and out of measure sinful, thou art a contempt of God's sovereign authority, a contrariety to his infinite holiness, a violation of his royal and righteous law, and the highest affront that can be offered to the majesty of the great and glorious God.

Thou hast made man like a beast, like the worst of beasts; worse than the worst of beasts; yea, sin is worse than the devil himself, than hell itself. Sin made the devil what he is: A devil and hell never had an existence till sin had one: God was never angry till sin made him angry.

Oh sin! 'tis thou that makest hell to be hell; and the more sin the more hell. Well might the apostle then say here, Sin, that it might appear sin, worketh death in me, and is become exceeding sinful."

Still observe, How the apostle goes on to assert the purity and spirituality of the law of God: The law is spiritual; spiritual in the author of it, God, who is an Holy Spirit; spiritual in the matter of it, requiring perfect purity both of heart and life.

Learn hence, That the moral law of God is in the nature of it purely spiritual, perfectly holy, being breathed forth by the Holy Spirit of God, and requireth perfect purity both of heart and life, and perfect conformity to it, both in the inward and outward man.

Hence some derive the word which we translate law, from a root which signifies to behold and consider, to contemplate and look about: Intimating thereby that the holy and spiritual law of God is diligently to be observed and considered, looked into, and mediated upon; it being so perfectly pure and holy, that it requires not only the purity of our actions, but also the integrity of our very faculties, our hearts and natures.

So may, 1. every unregenerate man truly say, I am carnal, having not only flesh in me, but prevailing in me, sin having a regency and dominion over me: he fights under the banner of corrupt nature, acting in a willing, ready, and full subjection to sin, and compliance with it; he is carnal, being under the power and unbroken strength of carnal lusts, and sensual propensions, and following them in the daily course of his life.

2. I am carnal, may a regenerate person truly say,

1. With respect to that exact purity and spirituality both of heart and life; which the holy law of God requires; the law is spiritual, but I, alas! compared with the spiritual law, am but a lump of corruption, coming infinitely short, God knows, of that uprightness and spirituality which the law of God requires.

2. A regenerate person may truly say he is carnal, that is, in part, in part so, having much, too much carnality in his carnal affections found with him, and carnal infirmities cleaving to him:

Such as are truly acquainted with the spirituality of the word and law of God, and also well acquainted with their own hearts, do see sufficient cause to complain of carnal corruption abiding in them and cleaving to them. I am carnal, have said, and may say, the holiest of saints, with respect to the perfect measure and degrees of holiness.

Thus that holy and blessed martyr, Mr. Bradford, complains, styling himself the heard-hearted, unbelieving, earthly-minded Bradford; yet was a man of a very tender spirit, full of faith, fruitful in good works, and exceedingly mortified to the world. Dost thou groan under the burthen of indwelling corruption? know, that the whole spiritual creation groaneth, and travelleth in pain together with thee until now: But blessed be God for the hopes of a deliverer and a deliverance.

This phrase is borrowed from bondmen or capatives, some of which are sold, others sell themselves into captivity. The unregenerate man, with Ahab, sells himself to work wickedness. This denotes willfulness and obstinacy; such a person doth prostitute himself to the lust of Satan: A regenerate person doth not, with Ahab, sell himself, but is sold, like Joseph by his brethren, and Sampson by his wife; being rather passive than active: He is sometimes sin's captive, but never sin's slave; he is never sin's willing servant, but sometimes its unwilling prisoner.

The holiest and best of saints, though not held in wilful slavery, thraldom and bondage unto sin, yet corruption holds them too much, though in part unwillingly, under the tyranny of sin; they do not yield to sin, as good subjects yield to their lawful prince, voluntary obedience; but as captives yield to a tyrant, paying him involuntary subjection. His soul is betrayed, says one, by corruption to temptation, and by temptation to corruption.

These words are an argument to prove what the apostle had asserted in the foregoing verse; namely, That he was held under the power of sin unwillingly, because he did not allow or approve of any evil which he did contrary to the holy law of God, but did hate and abominate it, was displeased with it, and with himself for it.

An unregenerate man's judgment and conscience is sometimes against sin; which makes him afraid to commit it; but a gracious person's will, heart and affections, are all set against sin;: Indeed there is a regenerate and an unregenerate part in the Christians will (he is sanctified totus, but not totaliter;) so far the will is renewed, it hates all sin, and meditates the ruin and destruction of it.

And observe, It was not this or that particular evil, but all evil which the apostle hated. A wicked man may hate a particular evil, as Absalom hated Ammon's uncleanness; but to hate all sin, is the character of none but a regenerate person.

Observe, lastly, That a good man sometimes, through the power of corruption, and the prevalency of temptation, doth that evil which is disallowed and disapproved by him; yea, which is very odious and hateful to him: he loaths in part what he doth, and afterwards loaths himself for the doing of it; and when he doth evil, allows not of the evil that he doth.

Note, 1. How readily the apostle consented to the equity and holiness of God's law; he did love the law of God, which made holiness his duty: I consent, says he, to the law, that it is good; he assented to it in his judgment, he complied with it in his will, he clave to it in his inward affections. So far as a person is regenerate, his heart doth correspond with God's law: But may not a unregenerate person consent in his judgments approve, yet not in their hearts like and love the law of God: At the same time, that they commend it with their mouths, they cast it behind their backs.

Note, 2. How the apostle disclaims though not disowns, the evil done by him; It is no more I, but sin that dwelleth in me. As if he had said, "My corrupt affections sometimes overpower me against the approbation of my judgment, the inclination of my will: But it is not I, (according to my better part, from which I am denominated,) but sin dwelleth in me."

Learn hence, That if we disclaim the evil done by us, as being contrary to us, contrary to the habitual frame and disposition of our hearts, contrary to the deliberate purpose and settled resolution of our wills, Almighty God will not charge our failings upon us to our condemnation, but mercifully distinguish between the weakness of the flesh, and the willingness of the spirit; between us, and sin that dwelleth in us. Sin will remain and dwell, but it must not reign and rule: 'Tis a busy inmate in a gracious heart, but 'tis a lordly master, yea, an imperious tyrant in a sinner's heart. Happy he that can in truth and sincerity say, It is not I, but sin that dwelleth in me.

Observe here, 1. The apostle's proposition; I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing: That is in my corrupt and unregenerate nature, there is nothing truly and spiritually good; and this I myself am sensible of, and privy to, and very well acquainted with.

Learn thence, That good men are intimately acquainted with themselves, privy to their own corruptions, sensible of the indwelling presence of sin in themselves, which calls upon them to be humble, and excites them to be watchful: I know that in me dwelleth no good thing.

Observe, 2. The confirmation of the foregoing proposition; for to will is present with me; that is, to will what is good, to purpose good, and to desire that which is good, is present with me; but I want ability to perform that good I purpose.

Learn hence, That though to will that which is good is ready and at hand with God's regenerated children, yet through that corruption which still abides in them, they are sometimes disabled for doing that good which they purpose, design, and desire to do; and that little good they do, is very brokenly and imperfectly done.

A mortal father may as soon beget an immortal child, as an imperfect saint can perform anything perfectly good: There can never be more in the effect than there is in the cause: A weak grape cannot make strong wine: Whilst we are saints on earth, though we may and ought to aspire after, yet we shall not be able to attain unto the sinless perfection of the saints in heaven: A real Christian is one that is continually labouring after the attainment of that which he knows in this life he shall never attain unto; namely, perfection in grace; In heaven we shall have no occasion to complain, that how to perform that which is good, we find not.

Here the apostle repeats what he had before asserted; namely, That he did not always do that good which he desired to do, but sometimes being overpowered by the flesh, did what the law prohibits, and what he would not do.

And further adds, That it was no longer himself, (chusing and approving the action in his mind) that did this, but sin dwelling in him, which sometimes hurried him to the commission of it, against the inclination and law of his mind.

Here note, 1. That the corruption of nature in the soul of man, is a real, but a distinct thing from the soul itself. A dweller in an house, is really distinguished from the house he dwells in. Sin is not a substance, but the pravity, and depravity of our faculties.

Note, 2. That the corruption of our own hearts and natures, is the root and cause of all that evil that is done by us.

Note, 3. That the habitual bent, the settled purpose, and determinate resolution of a Christian's will, is against all sin; and he doth not sin with the full consent of his will. Although there are not two distinct persons, yet there are two distinct principles in a regenerate man.

Sin and he are distinguished. In a good man there is a conflict between sin and grace, but in an unregenerate man there is no combat between the flesh and the Spirit; for he is all flesh; the flesh and he are one; the combat is not between grace and sin, but between one sin and another, and between one faculty and another: Light in the understanding, opposes lust in the will; whereas the conflict in a gracious person is not between his judgment and his will, but betwixt the regenerate and unregenerate part in his will.

Sin, like a preternatural bias clapped upon the soul, sometimes carries it away from the mark which the Christian aims at: However, though a good man be overcome in praelio, yet not in bello; though grace is sometimes foiled in the combat, yet it keeps the field, maintains and recovers its ground. The saint will not throw down the weapon till he lays down his life, and grace shall at length be finally victorious.

As if the apostle had said, "I verily find sin, having an impelling power and impulsive virtue in it, like a law in my members, thwarting and contradicting the inclinations of my mind, and the resolutions of my will, that when I would do good, evil is present with me to oppose and hinder me from the doing of it."

Note here, A double burden which the apostle complained of;

1. Of presence of sin at all times, Evil is present with me. It follows me, as if he had said, and is as inseparable from me as my shadow. This he calls a law, because of its mighty power and efficacy, and because of its constant residence in his nature.

2. Of the operation of it, especially at some particular and special times and seasons. When I would do good, then evil is present with me. As if he had said, "When I address myself to any holy duty, and heavenly employment, when I desire and design to draw near to God, and would hope for the sweetest fellowship and communion with him, then, alas! then to my great sorrow, is evil present with me.

Ah, when I promise myself most comfort and communion in the enjoyment of my God, how do I then find a bad heart in the best season, a dead and drowsy spirit when I would be most spiritual in the duties I perform!"

From whence we learn, That the holiest and best of saints in this their imperfect state, do sensibly feel, and sadly bewail, the working of sin and corruption in them,; and that in the very seasons and opportunities of their communion with God; When I would do good, then evil is present with me.

If by the inward man we understand the mind and understanding of a man only, then the unregenerate person may be said to delight in the all of God, with Ezekiel's hearers, Ezek 33:32; with Herod, Mr 6:20; with the stony ground, Matt 13:20. That is, they delight and satisfy themselves with the bare hearing of the word, and with a notional and speculative knowledge of their duty; either the eloquence of the preacher whom they hear, or the pleasingness of some truths which they hear, affect them with a sudden joy: they delight to hear the word, but they take no delight to do it. It is neither a spiritual delight, nor an abiding delight, that such men take in the law of God.

If by the inward man we understand that which St. Peter calls the hidden man of the heart, the new man, or the regnerate part in man, as being seated in the inward powers and faculties of the soul; then, to delight in the law of God, is to love it for its purity and spirituality, becausse it makes holiness our duty; to take pleasure in the knowledge of the law, in meditating upon it, and in practising every good duty contained in it, and enjoined by it.

Thus David did delight to do the will of God, because the law of God was within his heart. Where there is lex in corde, there will be cor in lege; where the law of God is in the heart, there the heart will be engaged in that obedience which is by the law required, and by the Christians performed. He delights in the law, and the law is delighted by him.

Here observe, That in this and the foregoing verses, mention is made of four laws contending one against another, whereof two are on one side, and two on the other; namely, the law of God, and the law of the mind; the law of the members, and the law of sin. By the law of God is understood the word of God; by the law of the mind, is understood in the regenerate, grace in the heart; in the unregenerate, light in the conscience; by the law of the members, understand original lust and concupiscence; by the law of sin those corrupt principles according to which lust governs.

Learn hence, That there is a conflict or combat between the law of the mind, and the law of the members, and this both in regenerate and unregenerate persons.

This appears, 1. By the testimony of nature speaking in the Heathen. Thus Medea, video meliora proboque, deterior a sequor their rational appetite displeaseth reason, and leads it captive.

2. By the testimony of scripture, and that

1. As to the unregenerate, witness Herod, Mr 6:26. who had conflict between lust and conscience; as had also Pilate upon the occasion of our Savior's death: Conscience bid him spare, popularity bid him kill.

2. As to the regenerate, The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh, &c. Gal 5:17

3. By the testimony of experience: Who finds not every day within himself a contest of contrary motions and inclinations? A Christian's bosom is like Rebecca's womb, it has twins of two contrary natures: A smooth Jacob and rough Esau, flesh and spirit.

But wherein consists the difference between that conflict which is found in the natural and spiritual, the regenerate and unregenerate man?

Ans. 1. The conflict in an unregenerate person is not between grace and sin, but between one lust and another; the struggle is, which lust shall be in the throne, as rebels in a kingdom, having cast off the authority of their lawful prince, everyone snatches at the sceptre, and would command and rule. Thus every lust is ambitious of superiority, and usurps a regency in the soul: So that though the sinner oft changes his master, yet not his servitude, he is a slave still.

Now, from this contrariety of lust rebelling in a carnal heart, he is necessitated to oppose the lust which he favours less, to gratify another which he favours more. Thus the conflict is between sin and sin, not between grace and sin.

2. As an unregenerate man's combat with sin is betwixt one lust and another, so it is only between one faculty and another. Thus light in the understanding opposes lust in the will. The judgment and conscience of a sinner says, "Oh do not that abominable thing which the soul of God hates." But then lust in the will votes for it, and is angry with conscience for being so bold as to oppose it.

Whereas, the conflict in a regenerate person, is between grace and sin, not betweixt sin and sin, and not betwixt the understanding and the will, but betwixt the regenerate and unregenerate part in the same will.

And although grace be foiled in a particular combat, yet it keeps the field, and the Christian will not throw down his weapon, till he lays down his life.

These words are a sad and sorrowful complaint of the present and too great prevalency of indwelliung sin and unsubdued corruption; and in them observe,

1. The person complaining, St. Paul.

2. The matter of the complaint, not of affliction, but of sin; not of a death, but of a body of sin and death, which he carried about with him.

3. The manner of the complaint, 'tis with vehemence and affection, it is vox anhelantis, the voice of one that pants and breaths after deliverance; not of one that doubted, much less desponded of a deliverer and a deliverance.

As if the apostle had said, "Oh how am I tired and wearied with continual conflicts and strivings with indwelling sin? How do the remains of unsubdued sin, and (as yet) unmortified corruption, affect and afflict me? who will deliver me? and when shall deliverance be enjoyed by me?"

Learn hence, That there are sad remains of indwelling sin, and unsubdued corruption, in the very best and holiest of God's children and servants in this life, which they sadly complain of, sensibly groan under, daily watch against, continually conflict with, and shall, in God's time, be fully and finally delivered from.

Here the apostle spies a deliverer, the Lord Jesus Christ; one that had delivered him from the condemning and reigning power of sin, and would ere long deliver him from the presence as well as prevalency of sin.

And whereas the apostle styles Christ Jesus not his Lord, but our Lord; that is, the Lord of all believers; it gives us this consolation and joyful assurance, that the happy hour is at hand, when we shall be everlastingly freed from the indwelling presence of sin, from all temptations to sin, from all inclinations to offend, yea, from all possibility of sinning: when we shall obey God with vigour, praise him with cheerfulness, love him without measure, fear him without torment, trust in him without despondency, serve him without weariness, without interruption or distraction, being perfectly like unto God, as well in holiness as in happiness, as well in purity as immortality.

Lord strengthen our faith in the belief of this desirable happiness, (when and where nothing shall corrupt our purity, nothing shall disturb our peace,) and set our souls a longing for the full fruition and final enjoyment of it.

Here the apostle acknowledges two principles in himself; grace and sin, a sweet and bitter fountain, from whence did flow suitable streams.

The law of the mind inclined to serve the law of God; but the law in his members disposed him to obey the law of sin.

The habitual bent of a good man's heart is to serve the law of God; he loves it, and delights to obey it. Yet sometimes, contrary to his firmest resolutions, through the power of temptations and indwelling corruption, he is carried aside contrary to his covenant and his conscience; but he laments it, it is his grief, his shame, the sorrow of his heart, the burden of his soul, that ever he should be so false and unworthy.

In fine, if a good man, at a particular time, does the evil that he hates, he always hates the evil which he does.

Blessed be God, sin shall never hurt us, if it does not please us. As God will not finally judge us, so we ought not censoriously to judge one another, or injuriously to judge ourselves by a single act, by a particular action, but by the habitual and constant bent of our resolutions and the general course and tenor of our conversation.

Blessed be God for the covenant of grace!