Romans 5

Ro 5:1-11.

THE

BLESSED

EFFECTS OF

JUSTIFICATION BY

FAITH.

The proof of this doctrine being now concluded, the apostle comes

here to treat of its fruits, reserving the full consideration of

this topic to another stage of the argument

(Ro 8:1-39).

1. Therefore being--"having been."

justified by faith, we have peace with God, &c.--If we are to be

guided by manuscript authority, the true reading here, beyond doubt, is,

"Let us have peace"; a reading, however, which most reject, because they

think it unnatural to exhort men to have what it belongs to God to

give, because the apostle is not here giving exhortations, but

stating matters of fact. But as it seems hazardous to set aside the

decisive testimony of manuscripts, as to what the apostle did write,

in favor of what we merely think he ought to have written, let us

pause and ask--If it be the privilege of the justified to "have peace

with God," why might not the apostle begin his enumeration of the

fruits of justification by calling on believers to "realize" this peace

as belonged to them, or cherish the joyful consciousness of it as their

own? And if this is what he has done, it would not be necessary to

continue in the same style, and the other fruits of justification might

be set down, simply as matters of fact. This "peace" is first a change

in God's relation to us; and next, as the consequence of this, a change

on our part towards Him. God, on the one hand, has "reconciled us to

Himself by Jesus Christ"

(2Co 5:18);

and we, on the other hand, setting our seal to this, "are reconciled to

God"

(2Co 5:20).

The "propitiation" is the meeting-place; there the controversy on both

sides terminates in an honorable and eternal "peace."

2. By whom also we have--"have had"

access by faith into this grace--favor with God.

wherein we stand--that is "To that same faith which first gave

us 'peace with God' we owe our introduction into that

permanent standing in the favor of God which the justified enjoy."

As it is difficult to distinguish this from the peace first mentioned,

we regard it as merely an additional phase of the same

[MEYER,

PHILIPPI,

MEHRING], rather than something new

[BEZA,

THOLUCK,

HODGE].

and rejoice--"glory," "boast," "triumph"--"rejoice" is not strong

enough.

in hope of the glory of God--On "hope," see on

Ro 5:4.

3, 4. we glory in tribulation also; knowing that tribulation worketh

patience--Patience is the quiet endurance of what we cannot but wish

removed, whether it be the withholding of promised good

(Ro 8:25),

or the continued experience of positive ill (as here). There is indeed

a patience of unrenewed nature, which has something noble in it, though

in many cases the offspring of pride, if not of something lower. Men

have been known to endure every form of privation, torture, and death,

without a murmur and without even visible emotion, merely because they

deemed it unworthy of them to sink under unavoidable ill. But this

proud, stoical hardihood has nothing in common with the grace of

patience--which is either the meek endurance of ill because it is of God

(Job 1:21, 22; 2:10),

or the calm waiting for promised good till His time to dispense it come

(Heb 10:36);

in the full persuasion that such trials are divinely appointed, are the

needed discipline of God's children, are but for a definite period, and

are not sent without abundant promises of "songs in the night." If such

be the "patience" which "tribulation worketh," no wonder that

4. patience worketh experience--rather, "proof," as the same word is

rendered in

2Co 2:9; 13:3;

Php 2:22;

that is, experimental evidence that we have "believed through

grace."

and experience--"proof."

hope--"of the glory of God," as prepared for us. Thus have we hope in

two distinct ways, and at two successive stages of the Christian life:

first, immediately on believing, along with the sense of peace and

abiding access to God

(Ro 5:1);

next, after the reality of this faith has been "proved,"

particularly by the patient endurance of trials sent to test it. We

first get it by looking away from ourselves to the Lamb of God;

next by looking into or upon ourselves as transformed by

that "looking unto Jesus." In the one case, the mind acts (as they say)

objectively; in the other, subjectively. The one is (as

divines say) the assurance of faith; the other, the assurance

of sense.

5. And hope maketh not ashamed--putteth not to shame, as empty hopes

do.

because the love of God--that is, not "our love to God," as the Romish

and some Protestant expositors (following some of the Fathers) represent

it; but clearly "God's love to us"--as most expositors agree.

is shed abroad--literally, "poured forth," that is, copiously diffused

(compare

Joh 7:38;

Tit 3:6).

given unto us--that is, at the great Pentecostal effusion, which is

viewed as the formal donation of the Spirit to the Church of God, for

all time and for each believer.

(The Holy Ghost is here first introduced in this Epistle.) It is as

if the apostle had said, "And how can this hope of glory, which as

believers we cherish, put us to shame, when we feel God Himself, by His

Spirit given to us, drenching our hearts in sweet, all-subduing

sensations of His wondrous love to us in Christ Jesus?" This leads the

apostle to expatiate on the amazing character of that love.

6-8. For when we were yet without strength--that is, powerless to

deliver ourselves, and so ready to perish.

in due time--at the appointed season.

Christ died for the ungodly--Three signal properties of God's love

are here given: First, "Christ died for the ungodly," whose character,

so far from meriting any interposition in their behalf, was altogether

repulsive to the eye of God; second, He did this "when they were

without strength"--with nothing between them and perdition but that

self-originating divine compassion; third, He did this

"at the due time," when it was most fitting that it should take place

(compare

Ga 4:4),

The two former of these properties the apostle now proceeds to

illustrate.

7. For scarcely for a righteous man--a man of simply

unexceptionable character.

will one--"any one"

die: yet peradventure for a good man--a man who, besides being

unexceptionable, is distinguished for goodness, a benefactor to

society.

some--"some one."

would--rather, "doth."

even dare to die--"Scarce an instance occurs of self-sacrifice for

one merely upright; though for one who makes himself a blessing to

society there may be found an example of such noble surrender of

life" (So BENGEL,

OLSHAUSEN,

THOLUCK,

ALFORD,

PHILIPPI).

(To make the "righteous" and the "good" man here to mean the same person,

and the whole sense to be that "though rare, the case may occur, of one

making a sacrifice of life for a worthy character" [as

CALVIN,

BEZA,

FRITZSCHE,

JOWETT], is extremely flat.)

8. But God commendeth--"setteth off," "displayeth"--in glorious

contrast with all that men will do for each other.

his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners--that is, in a

state not of positive "goodness," nor even of negative "righteousness,"

but on the contrary, "sinners," a state which His soul hateth.

Christ died for us--Now comes the overpowering inference, emphatically

redoubled.

9, 10. Much more then, being--"having been"

now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.

10. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the

death of his Son, much more, being now--"having now been"

reconciled, we shall be saved by his life--that is "If that part of

the Saviour's work which cost Him His blood, and which had to be wrought

for persons incapable of the least sympathy either with His love or His

labors in their behalf--even our 'justification,' our

'reconciliation'--is already completed; how much more will He do all

that remains to be done, since He has it to do, not by death agonies any

more, but in untroubled 'life,' and no longer for enemies, but for

friends--from whom, at every stage of it, He receives the grateful

response of redeemed and adoring souls?" To be "saved from wrath through

Him," denotes here the whole work of Christ towards believers, from

the moment of justification, when the wrath of God is turned away from

them, till the Judge on the great white throne shall discharge that

wrath upon them that "obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ"; and

that work may all be summed up in "keeping them from falling, and

presenting them faultless before the presence of His glory with

exceeding joy"

(Jude 24):

thus are they "saved from wrath through Him."

11. And not only so, but we also joy--rather, "glory."

in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by--"through"

whom we have now received the atonement--rather, "the reconciliation"

(Margin), as the same word is rendered in

Ro 5:10

and in

2Co 5:18, 19.

(In fact, the earlier meaning of the English word "atonement" was "the

reconciliation of two estranged parties") [TRENCH]. The foregoing effects of justification were all

benefits to ourselves, calling for gratitude; this last may be termed a

purely disinterested one. Our first feeling towards God, after we have

found peace with Him, is that of clinging gratitude for so costly a

salvation; but no sooner have we learned to cry, Abba, Father, under

the sweet sense of reconciliation, than "gloriation" in Him takes the

place of dread of Him, and now He appears to us "altogether

lovely!"

On this section, Note, (1) How gloriously does the Gospel evince its

divine origin by basing all acceptable obedience on "peace with God,"

laying the foundations of this peace in a righteous "justification" of

the sinner "through our Lord Jesus Christ," and making this the entrance

to a permanent standing in the divine favor, and a triumphant

expectation of future glory!

(Ro 5:1, 2).

Other peace, worthy of the name, there is none; and as those who are

strangers to it rise not to the enjoyment of such high fellowship with

God, so they have neither any taste for it nor desire after it. (2) As

only believers possess the true secret of patience under trials, so,

although "not joyous but grievous" in themselves

(Heb 12:17),

when trials divinely sent afford them the opportunity of evidencing

their faith by the grace of patience under them, they should "count it

all joy"

(Ro 5:3, 4;

and see

Jas 1:2, 3).

(3) "Hope," in the New Testament sense of the term,

is not a lower degree of faith or assurance (as many now say, I hope

for heaven, but am not sure of it); but invariably means "the

confident expectation of future good." It presupposes faith; and what

faith assures us will be ours, hope accordingly expects. In the

nourishment of this hope, the soul's look outward to Christ for the

ground of it, and inward upon ourselves for evidence of its reality,

must act and react upon each other

(Ro 5:2

and

Ro 5:4

compared). (4) It is the proper office of the Holy Ghost to beget in

the soul the full conviction and joyful consciousness of the love of

God in Christ Jesus to sinners of mankind, and to ourselves in

particular; and where this exists, it carries with it such an assurance

of final salvation as cannot deceive

(Ro 5:5).

(5) The justification of sinful men is not in virtue of their

amendment, but of "the blood of God's Son"; and while this is

expressly affirmed in

Ro 5:9,

our reconciliation to God by the "death of His Son,"

affirmed in

Ro 5:10,

is but a variety of the same statement. In both, the blessing meant is

the restoration of the sinner to a righteous standing in the

sight of God; and in both, the meritorious ground of this, which is

intended to be conveyed, is the expiatory sacrifice of God's

Son. (6) Gratitude to God for redeeming love, if it could exist without

delight in God Himself, would be a selfish and worthless feeling; but

when the one rises into the other--the transporting sense of eternal

"reconciliation" passing into "gloriation in God" Himself--then the

lower is sanctified and sustained by the higher, and each feeling is

perfective of the other

(Ro 5:11).

Ro 5:12-21.

COMPARISON AND

CONTRAST BETWEEN

ADAM AND

CHRIST IN

THEIR

RELATION TO THE

HUMAN

FAMILY.

(This profound and most weighty section has occasioned an immense deal

of critical and theological discussion, in which every point, and almost

every clause, has been contested. We can here but set down what appears

to us to be the only tenable view of it as a whole and of its successive

clauses, with some slight indication of the grounds of our judgment).

12. Wherefore--that is, Things being so; referring back to the whole

preceding argument.

as by one man--Adam.

sin--considered here in its guilt, criminality, penal desert.

entered into the world, and death by sin--as the penalty of sin.

and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned--rather,

"all sinned," that is, in that one man's first sin. Thus death reaches

every individual of the human family, as the penalty due to himself.

(So, in substance, BENGEL,

HODGE,

PHILIPPI). Here we should have

expected the apostle to finish his sentence, in some such way as this:

"Even so, by one man righteousness has entered into the world, and life

to five verses, to illustrate the important statement of

Ro 5:12;

and it is only at

Ro 5:18

that the comparison is resumed and finished.

13, 14. For until the law sin was in the world--that is during all the

period from Adam "until the law" of Moses was given, God continued to

treat men as sinners.

but sin is not imputed where there is no law--"There must therefore

have been a law during that period, because sin was then imputed";

as is now to be shown.

14. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that

had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression--But who

are they?--a much contested question. Infants (say some), who being

guiltless of actual sin, may be said not to have sinned in the way

that Adam did [AUGUSTINE,

BEZA,

HODGE]. But why should infants be

specially connected with the period "from Adam to Moses," since they die

alike in every period? And if the apostle meant to express here the

death of infants, why has he done it so enigmatically? Besides, the

death of infants is comprehended in the universal mortality on account

of the first sin, so emphatically expressed in

Ro 5:12;

what need then to specify it here? and why, if not necessary, should we

presume it to be meant here, unless the language unmistakably point to

it--which it certainly does not? The meaning then must be, that "death

reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those that had not, like Adam,

transgressed against a positive commandment, threatening death to the

disobedient." (So most interpreters). In this case, the particle

"even," instead of specifying one particular class of those who lived

"from Adam to Moses" (as the other interpretation supposes), merely

explains what it was that made the case of those who died from Adam to

Moses worthy of special notice--namely, that "though unlike Adam and

all since Moses, those who lived between the two had no positive

threatening of death for transgression, nevertheless, death reigned

even over them."

who is the figure--or, "a type."

of him that was to come--Christ. "This clause is inserted on the first

mention of the name "Adam," the one man of whom he is speaking, to

recall the purpose for which he is treating of him, as

the figure of Christ"

[ALFORD]. The point of analogy intended here

is plainly the public character which both sustained, neither of

the two being regarded in the divine procedure towards men as mere

individual men, but both alike as representative men. (Some

take the proper supplement here to be "Him [that is] to come";

understanding the apostle to speak from his own time, and to refer to

Christ's second coming [FRITZSCHE,

DE

WETTE,

ALFORD]. But this is

unnatural, since the analogy of the second Adam to the first has been

in full development ever since "God exalted Him to be a Prince and a

Saviour," and it will only remain to be consummated at His second

coming. The simple meaning is, as nearly all interpreters agree, that

Adam is a type of Him who was to come after him in the same public

character, and so to be "the second Adam").

15. But--"Yet," "Howbeit."

not as the offence--"trespass."

so also is the free gift--or "the gracious gift," "the gift of grace."

The two cases present points of contrast as well as resemblance.

For if, &c.--rather, "For if through the offense of the one the

many died (that is, in that one man's first sin), much more did the

grace of God, and the free gift by grace, even that of the one man,

Jesus Christ, abound unto the many." By "the many" is meant the

mass of mankind represented respectively by Adam and Christ, as

opposed, not to few, but to "the one" who represented them. By

"the free gift" is meant (as in

Ro 5:17)

the glorious gift of justifying righteousness; this is expressly

distinguished from "the grace of God," as the effect from the

cause; and both are said to "abound" towards us in Christ--in

what sense will appear in

Ro 5:16, 17.

And the "much more," of the one case than the other, does not mean that

we get much more of good by Christ than of evil by Adam (for it is not

a case of quantity at all); but that we have much more reason to

expect, or it is much more agreeable to our ideas of God, that the many

should be benefited by the merit of one, than that they should suffer

for the sin of one; and if the latter has happened, much more

may we assure ourselves of the former [PHILIPPI,

HODGE].

16. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift--"Another

point of contrast may be mentioned."

for the judgment--"sentence."

was by one--rather, "was of one," meaning not "one man," but, as

appears from the next clause, "one offense."

to condemnation, but the free gift--"gift of grace."

is of many offences unto justification--a glorious point of contrast.

"The condemnation by Adam was for one sin; but the justification by

Christ is an absolution not only from the guilt of that first offense,

mysteriously attaching to every individual of the race, but from the

countless offenses it, to which, as a germ lodged in the bosom of

every child of Adam, it unfolds itself in his life." This is the meaning

of "grace abounding towards us in the abundance of the gift of

righteousness." It is a grace not only rich in its character, but

rich in detail; it is a "righteousness" not only rich in a

complete justification of the guilty, condemned sinner; but rich in

the amplitude of the ground which it covers, leaving no one sin of

any of the justified uncancelled, but making him, though loaded with the

guilt of myriads of offenses, "the righteousness of God in Christ."

17. For if by--"the"

one man's offence death reigned by one--"through the one."

much more shall they which receive--"the"

abundance of grace and of the gift of--justifying

righteousness . . . reign in life by one Jesus

Christ--"through the one." We have here the two ideas of

Ro 5:15

and Ro 5:16

sublimely combined into one, as if the subject had grown upon the

apostle as he advanced in his comparison of the two cases. Here, for

the first time in this section, he speaks of that LIFE which springs out of justification, in contrast

with the death which springs from sin and follows condemnation. The

proper idea of it therefore is, "Right to live"--"Righteous life"--life

possessed and enjoyed with the good will, and in conformity with the

eternal law, of "Him that sitteth on the Throne"; life therefore in its

widest sense--life in the whole man and throughout the whole duration

of human existence, the life of blissful and loving relationship to God

in soul and body, for ever and ever. It is worthy of note, too, that

while he says death "reigned over" us through Adam, he does not say

Life "reigns over us" through Christ; lest he should seem to invest

this new life with the very attribute of death--that of fell and

malignant tyranny, of which we were the hapless victims. Nor does he

say Life reigns in us, which would have been a scriptural enough

idea; but, which is much more pregnant, "We shall reign in

life." While freedom and might are implied in the figure

of "reigning," "life" is represented as the glorious territory or

atmosphere of that reign. And by recurring to the idea of

Ro 5:16,

as to the "many offenses" whose complete pardon shows "the abundance of

grace and of the gift of righteousness," the whole statement is to this

effect: "If one man's one offense let loose against us the tyrant power

of Death, to hold us as its victims in helpless bondage, 'much more,'

when we stand forth enriched with God's 'abounding grace' and in the

beauty of a complete absolution from countless offenses, shall we

expatiate in a life divinely owned and legally secured, 'reigning' in

exultant freedom and unchallenged might, through that other matchless

'One,' Jesus Christ!" (On the import of the future tense in this

last clause, see on

Ro 5:19,

and

Ro 6:5).

18. Therefore--now at length resuming the unfinished comparison

of

Ro 5:12,

in order to give formally the concluding member of it, which had

been done once and again substantially, in the intermediate

verses.

as by the offence of one judgment came--or, more simply, "it came."

upon all men to condenmation; even so by the righteousness of one the

free gift came--rather, "it came."

upon all men to justification of life--(So CALVIN,

BENGEL,

OLSHAUSEN,

THOLUCK,

HODGE,

PHILIPPI). But better, as we judge: "As through one

offense it [came] upon all men to condemnation; even so through one

righteousness [it came] upon all men to justification of life"--(So

BEZA,

GROTIUS,

FERME,

MEYER,

DE

WETTE,

ALFORD, Revised Version). In

this case, the apostle, resuming the statement of

Ro 5:12,

expresses it in a more concentrated and vivid form--suggested no doubt

Ro 5:16,

"through one offense," representing Christ's whole work, considered as

the ground of our justification, as "ONE

RIGHTEOUSNESS." (Some would render the peculiar word here

employed, "one righteous act" [ALFORD, &c.];

understanding by it Christ's death as the one redeeming act

which reversed the one undoing act of Adam. But this is to limit the

apostle's idea too much; for as the same word is properly rendered

"righteousness" in

Ro 8:4,

where it means "the righteousness of the law as fulfilled by us who

walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit," so here it denotes

Christ's whole "obedience unto death," considered as the one

meritorious ground of the reversal of the condemnation which came by

Adam. But on this, and on the expression, "all men," see on

Ro 5:19.

The expression "justification of life," is a vivid combination of two

ideas already expatiated upon, meaning "justification entitling to and

issuing in the rightful possession and enjoyment of life").

19. For, &c.--better, "For as by the one man's disobedience the

many were made sinners, even so by the obedience of the One shall the

many be made righteous." On this great verse observe: First, By the

"obedience" of Christ here is plainly not meant more than what divines

call His active obedience, as distinguished from His sufferings and

death; it is the entire work of Christ in its obediential character.

Our Lord Himself represents even His death as His great act of obedience

to the Father: "This commandment (that is, to lay down and resume His life)

have I received of My Father"

(Joh 10:8).

Second, The significant word twice rendered made, does

not signify to work a change upon a person or thing, but to

constitute or ordain, as will be seen from all the places

where it is used. Here, accordingly, it is intended to express that

judicial act which holds men, in virtue of their connection with

Adam, as sinners; and, in connection with Christ, as righteous.

Third, The change of tense from the past to the

future--"as through Adam we were made sinners, so through Christ

we shall be made righteous"--delightfully expresses the enduring

character of the act, and of the economy to which such acts belong, in

contrast with the for-ever-past ruin of believers in Adam. (See on

Ro 6:5).

Fourth, The "all men" of

Ro 5:18

and the "many" of

Ro 5:19

are the same party, though under a slightly different aspect. In the

latter case, the contrast is between the one representative

(Adam--Christ) and the many whom he represented; in the former

case, it is between the one head (Adam--Christ) and the human

race, affected for death and life respectively by the actings of

that one. Only in this latter case it is the redeemed family of man

that is alone in view; it is humanity as actually lost, but also

as actually saved, as ruined and recovered. Such as refuse to fall in

with the high purpose of God to constitute His Son a "second Adam," the

Head of a new race, and as impenitent and unbelieving finally perish,

have no place in this section of the Epistle, whose sole object is to

show how God repairs in the second Adam the evil done by the first.

(Thus the doctrine of universal restoration has no place here.

Thus too the forced interpretation by which the "justification of all"

is made to mean a justification merely in possibility and

offer to all, and the "justification of the many" to mean the

actual justification of as many as believe [ALFORD, &c.], is completely avoided. And thus the

harshness of comparing a whole fallen family with a recovered

part is got rid of. However true it be in fact that part

of mankind is not saved, this is not the aspect in which the

subject is here presented. It is totals that are compared and

contrasted; and it is the same total in two successive

conditions--namely, the human race as ruined in Adam and

recovered in Christ).

20, 21. Moreover the law--"The law, however." The Jew might say, If

the whole purposes of God towards men center in Adam and Christ, where

does "the law" come in, and what was the use of it? Answer: It

entered--But the word expresses an important idea besides "entering."

It signifies, "entered incidentally," or "parenthetically." (In

Ga 2:4

the same word is rendered, "came in privily.") The meaning is,

that the promulgation of the law at Sinai was no primary or essential

feature of the divine plan, but it was "added"

(Ga 3:19)

for a subordinate purpose--the more fully to reveal the evil occasioned

that the offence might abound--or, "be multiplied." But what offense?

Throughout all this section "the offense" (four times repeated besides

here) has one definite meaning, namely, "the one first offense of Adam";

and this, in our judgment, is its meaning here also: "All our

multitudinous breaches of the law are nothing but

that one first offense, lodged mysteriously in the bosom of every

child of Adam as an offending principal, and multiplying itself

into myriads of particular offenses in the life of each." What was one

act of disobedience in the head has been converted into a vital and

virulent principle of disobedience in all the members of the human

family, whose every act of wilful rebellion proclaims itself the child

of the original transgression.

But where sin abounded--or, "was multiplied."

grace did much more abound--rather, "did exceedingly abound," or

"superabound." The comparison here is between the multiplication of one

offense into countless transgressions, and such an overflow of grace as

more than meets that appalling case.

21. That as sin--Observe, the word "offense" is no more used, as that

had been sufficiently illustrated; but--what better befitted this

comprehensive summation of the whole matter--the great general term

sin.

hath reigned unto death--rather, "in death," triumphing and (as it

were) revelling in that complete destruction of its victims.

even so might grace reign--In

Ro 5:14, 17

we had the reign of death over the guilty and condemned in Adam;

here it is the reign of the mighty causes of these--of

SIN which clothes Death a Sovereign with venomous

power

(1Co 15:56)

and with awful authority

(Ro 6:23),

and of GRACE, the grace which originated the

scheme of salvation, the grace which "sent the Son to be the Saviour of

the world," the grace which "made Him to be sin for us who knew no

sin," the grace which "makes us to be the righteousness of God in Him,"

so that "we who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift

of righteousness do reign in life by One, Jesus Christ!"

through righteousness--not ours certainly ("the obedience of

Christians," to use the wretched language of

GROTIUS)

nor yet exactly "justification"

[STUART,

HODGE];

but rather, "the (justifying) righteousness of Christ"

[BEZA,

ALFORD,

and in substance,

OLSHAUSEN,

MEYER];

the same which in

Ro 5:19

is called His "obedience," meaning His whole mediatorial work in the

flesh. This is here represented as the righteous medium through

which grace reaches its objects and attains all its ends, the stable

throne from which Grace as a Sovereign dispenses its saving benefits to

as many as are brought under its benign sway.

unto eternal life--which is salvation in its highest form and fullest

development for ever.

name," the echoes of this hymn to the glory of "Grace" die away, and

"Jesus is left alone."

On reviewing this golden section of our Epistle, the following

additional remarks occur: (1) If this section does not teach that the

whole race of Adam, standing in him as their federal head, "sinned in

him and fell with him in his first transgression," we may despair of any

intelligible exposition of it. The apostle, after saying that Adam's sin

introduced death into the world, does not say "and so death passed upon

all men for that Adam "sinned," but "for that all sinned." Thus,

according to the teaching of the apostle, "the death of all is for the

sin of all"; and as this cannot mean the personal sins of each

individual, but some sin of which unconscious infants are guilty equally

with adults, it can mean nothing but the one "first transgression" of

their common head, regarded as the sin of each of his race, and

punished, as such, with death. It is vain to start back from this

imputation to all of the guilt of Adam's first sin, as wearing the

appearance of injustice. For not only are all other theories liable

to the same objection, in some other form--besides being inconsistent

with the text--but the actual facts of human nature, which none

dispute, and which cannot be explained away, involve essentially the

same difficulties as the great principle on which the apostle here

explains them. If we admit this principle, on the authority of our

apostle, a flood of light is at once thrown upon certain features of the

divine procedure, and certain portions of the divine oracles, which

otherwise are involved in much darkness; and if the principle itself

seem hard to digest, it is not harder than the existence of evil,

which, as a fact, admits of no dispute, but, as a feature in the divine

administration, admits of no explanation in the present state. (2) What

is called original sin--or that depraved tendency to evil with which

every child of Adam comes into the world--is not formally treated of in

this section (and even in the seventh chapter, it is rather its nature

and operation than its connection with the first sin which is handled).

But indirectly, this section bears testimony to it; representing the one

original offense, unlike every other, as having an enduring vitality in the bosom of every child of Adam, as a principle

of disobedience,

whose virulence has gotten it the familiar name of "original sin." (3)

In what sense is the word "death" used throughout this section? Not

certainly as mere temporal death, as Arminian commentators affirm.

For as Christ came to undo what Adam did, which is all comprehended in

the word "death," it would hence follow that Christ has merely dissolved

the sentence by which soul and body are parted in death; in other words,

merely procured the resurrection of the body. But the New Testament

throughout teaches that the salvation of Christ is from a vastly more

comprehensive "death" than that. But neither is death here used merely

in the sense of penal evil, that is, "any evil inflicted in

punishment of sin and for the support of law" [HODGE]. This is too

indefinite, making death a mere figure of speech to denote "penal evil"

in general--an idea foreign to the simplicity of Scripture--or at least

making death, strictly so called, only one part of the thing meant by

it, which ought not to be resorted to if a more simple and natural

explanation can be found. By "death" then, in this section, we

understand the sinner's destruction, in the only sense in which he

is capable of it. Even temporal death is called "destruction"

(De 7:23;

1Sa 5:11,

&c.), as extinguishing all that men regard as life. But a destruction

extending to the soul as well as the body, and into the

future world, is clearly expressed in

Mt 7:13;

2Th 1:9;

2Pe 3:16,

&c. This is the penal "death" of our section, and in this view of it we

retain its proper sense. Life--as a state of enjoyment of the favor of

God, of pure fellowship with Him, and voluntary subjection to Him--is a

blighted thing from the moment that sin is found in the creature's

skirts; in that sense, the threatening, "In the day that thou eatest

thereof thou shalt surely die," was carried into immediate effect in

the case of Adam when he fell; who was thenceforward "dead while he

lived." Such are all his posterity from their birth. The separation of

soul and body in temporal death carries the sinner's destruction" a

stage farther; dissolving his connection with that world out of which

he extracted a pleasurable, though unblest, existence, and ushering him

into the presence of his Judge--first as a disembodied spirit, but

ultimately in the body too, in an enduring condition--"to be punished

(and this is the final state) with everlasting destruction from

the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power." This final

extinction in soul and body of all that constitutes life, but yet

eternal consciousness of a blighted existence--this, in its amplest and

most awful sense, is "DEATH"! Not that Adam

understood all that. It is enough that he understood "the day" of his

disobedience to be the terminating period of his blissful "life." In

that simple idea was wrapt up all the rest. But that he should

comprehend its details was not necessary. Nor is it necessary to

suppose all that to be intended in every passage of Scripture where the

word occurs. Enough that all we have described is in the bosom of the

thing, and will be realized in as many as are not the happy

subjects of the Reign of Grace. Beyond doubt, the whole of this is

intended in such sublime and comprehensive passages as this: "God

. . . gave His . . . Son that whosoever believeth

in Him might not

PERISH,

but have everlasting

LIFE"

(Joh 3:16).

And should not the untold horrors of that "DEATH"--already "reigning over" all that are not in

Christ, and hastening to its consummation--quicken our flight into "the

second Adam," that having "received the abundance of grace and of the

gift of righteousness, we may reign in LIFE by the

One, Jesus Christ?"