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Rom.7.1-6

Dear Andrew, Jim and everyone

I find myself in the difficult situation that I am sure you have all 
been in before of desperately wanting to continue an interesting 
exchange but being rather limited for time - we are right in the 
middle of examinations here and I have to finish an article for 
end of the week at the same time.  But I would very much like to say 
something more on this topic.  I will try to be as brief and clear as 
possible.

Andrew is right that we have got into 'thorny' questions about Paul 
and the Law and perhaps we should have tried to avoid these.  As soon 
as one is touching on this huge area, it is inevitable that there 
will be clashes over fundamentally different ways of reading Paul.  
Let me simply state, therefore, that broadly speaking I am with Ed 
Sanders on Paul and the Law (hence my contributions earlier about the 
role of the Law in salvation), but I have some (only some) leanings 
towards Tom Wright.

In response to Jim, I appreciate that 'salvation' is something of 
an all-encompassing term and more broadly includes sanctification 
etc.  Forgive me, but I don't want to get into the broader 
questions, and, if possible to limit my comments to the function of 
the analogy in Rom. 7.1-6.

On which, Andrew wrote:  

> Are you saying that the married woman is playing two roles, one of which is also played by
> the first husband when you write that she is "the individual + the
> body of sin" ? Or are you saying that she is "the individual" but by
> her marriage has been bound to "the body of sin" ?  Does that
> distinction make sense to you ?  It's important for your second
> point concerning who dies in Paul's application of the analogy in
> v4.

I am pleased that you ask.  This helps to clarify things nicely.  I 
over-simplified things before to try to get the point over.  Look at 
7.2.  The woman is described as hH hUPANDROS GUNH, 'the married 
woman'.  This corresponds with 'the old self', if you like - the 
individual who is bound to Sin by the Law (bound to her husband by 
the law of marriage).  The husband dies and the marriage relationship 
(and with it the law of marriage) ends.   In the interpretation, the 
old self is crucified with Christ (cf. 6.6) and the result is 
twofold:

1. Sin is put to death - we are no longer EN THi SARKI (7.5)

2. The death of this husband releases us from the Law, that 
specific Law = Torah that bound us to Sin.

The analogy is quite coherent.  One does not need to ask whether the 
woman 'dies', nor whether she is playing two roles.  In the 
analogy itself (7.1-3) she does not die; the husband does, 
bringing to an end the old relationship.  In the interpretation 
(7.4-6) it becomes clear that it is the old self who is crucified 
with Christ.  One only makes 'the woman' in the analogy die if one 
artificially forces the interpretation back into the analogy so as to 
manipulate it.

I suppose that if one really does want to push the point one could 
say that marriage is a good choice of analogy because of the concept 
of 'one flesh' - the married woman is bound up with her husband in 
such a way that the death is effectively that of the one-flesh 
married woman.  I do not really want to push this, though, because it 
misses the point of an analogy.  One needs to examine the way in 
which the analogy is functioning in context and should not try to 
force it to do something it does not want to do.

This reminds me of Jim's point that if law of marriage means Law = 
Torah in the first marriage, then it necessarily means it also in the 
second.  This is just not the way that analogies / parables work.  
You need to look at each constituent element and see how it is 
functioning.  Thus Jim says 'The law of marriage is binding wherever 
there is a marriage', to which I respond that of course this is the 
case in life in general, but we are talking here about the 
confines of the analogy of 7.1-3 in which there is no reference to a 
'law of marriage' for the second marriage.

Let me return to Andrew:

> Perhaps I wasn't clear.  Of course, the woman does not die in the
> analogy of vv2,3 but, in the usual interpretation of v4 [even your
> modified form] "you", the individual who are playing the part of the
> woman in the application of v4 do "die".  So, above you talk of the
> husband's death [as in the analogy] but then explicate that as
> "individual now crucified with Christ" which seems to me to be
> saying that the "you" of v4 who is playing the part of the wife must
> die for the application of v4 to make sense.  But then - as you
> rightly say - it contradicts the marriage analogy because the woman
> does not die there, the husband does. Hence my question as to
> whether KAI HUMEIS ETHANATOTHETE TO NOMO could just be another way
> of talking about the "discharge" and "freedom" from the law without
> needing to read into it - as you do - the wife's death in and with
> Christ.

This is all dealt with by realising that in the analogy the husband 
dies which effects the end of the married relationship.  The old 
self is crucified with Christ; Sin dies; we are released from the 
Law.  In short, one needs to do three things:

1. Distinguish clearly between analogy (vv.1-3) and application 
(vv.4-6).

2. Not push the analogy in ways it does not want to go, like 
importing a new 'law of marriage' into v.3, etc. 

3.  Look carefully at how the analogy functions in context.


Andrew continued (some omitted):

> I think - although I fear I'm the
> only one who does - it must be, quite literally, "the law of the
> husband" ie the husband's rule over the wife who is bound to him by
> law.  This - even if not very PC - then makes wonderful sense of all
> that follows in Rom 7 and early ch 8 - especially when the first
> husband is Sin.  It also allows Jim to have law, in some sense,
> still functioning for the Christian, but now the law of the risen
> Christ/of the Spirit [the second husband] and not either Torah or
> the Law of Sin [the first husband]. 

I like your translation - it makes good sense to me, especially of 
how Sin is being understood here.  Jim does not want a different Law, 
though, for v.3.  I have said that, if anything, the law that binds 
the two together at the end of v.3 is that of the Spirit (cf. v.6).  
I think you are quite right here, and that we are really not that far 
from each other.  Perhaps you *can* have your cake and eat it.

Well, I have not been as brief as I had intended and have written 
this now over a long period of time because of constant interruptions 
from people at the door + the phone.  So apologies if this is 
scrappy.

Kind wishes to all

Mark




------------------------
Dr Mark Goodacre
Department of Theology
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham   B15 2TT

Tel.: 0121 414 7512         Email: M.S.Goodacre@Bham.ac.uk
Fax.: 0121 414 6866