Romans 4 - Part One

In chapter 3 Paul concluded that for Jews and non-Jews to be made righteous by God on the basis of faith instead of law-keeping did not prevent the law from doing what it was designed to do, which was to make humans aware of their sins and create in them a desire that God himself make them righteous. But up to this point Paul had provided no evidence that this righteousness by faith, which he claimed was "testified to by the law and the prophets" really was mentioned in the Old Testament. He will now turn to that task.

What is the train of Paul's argument here? Some have suggested the following:

Abraham is Paul's first example. Paul knows that if he can make a convincing case for Abraham's justification by faith, Jews might be more open to considering the claims of the gospel. After all, if the ancestral father of the Jewish nation did not attempt to earn his way into God's favor, neither should his offspring. Paul was anxious that his fellow Jews discover what he and their father Abraham had discovered- that justification comes by faith (Life Application Commentary: Romans, 81).

Now this is a perfectly correct assessment of the value of the argument in chapter 4, if Paul had been trying to evangelize Jews with it. But we have seen that this was not the purpose of the letter. Paul was writing to believers, and his overrriding concerns were twofold: (1) to minister to his hearers' spiritual needs with a "spiritual gift" (which, as I argued previously, was the text of this letter) in order to make their faith firm, and (2) to foster in the majority gentile group an appreciation for the Jewish roots of their faith. The text of chapter 4 does both of these things admirably. Not only is God not just the "God of the Jews", but also the "God of the gentiles" (chapter 3), but the Jewish patriarch Abraham is also not just the "father of the Jews", but also "the father of all believers" (chapter 4). Some commentators see Paul's purpose here to make Abraham less "Jewish." And indeed it is true that by emphasizing the chronological dimension of the Genesis story, Paul stresses that Abraham was counted righteous by God on the basis of his believing God's promise before he was circumcized, thus making him a "gentile" at the time of his "justification." But one should not overlook the implications in the opposite direction: gentile believers in Jesus look back to a man as their own spiritual father who physically sired the Jewish people, which makes of the two groups one big family.

 4:1

Of the 7 occurrences in Romans (3:5; 4:1; 6:1; 7:7; 8:31; 9:14, 30) of τί ἐροῦμεν "what shall we say?", five of them introduce questions that must be answered with "No." Here it does not introduce a question, but the functional equivalent is the hypothetical statement "if Abraham was justified by works," which Paul will deny. For this reason, the translation "was gained by Abraham" (NRSV, ESV; BDAG εὑρίσκω 3) is to be preferred to the translation "discovered" (NAB, NET, NIV, TNIV, NLT, The Message), which is just another way of saying "hath found" (KJV, ASV, NASB). This may be another way of asking “Did Abraham our father in fact gain/achieve anything? Or was something rather given to him graciously on the basis of his faith? The question is not “was he justified by works or by faith?” If that had been Paul’s question, he would have written “How did Abraham our father achieve (righteousness)?” The question “What did he achieve/gain?” cannot be answered by “he achieved it by faith,” since “by faith” does not answer the question “what…?”

Since Paul here is addressing his argument to a hypothetical Jew who wishes to claim Abraham was justified by works, he calls Abraham "our forefather according to the flesh," acknowledging that both he and his interlocutor are ethnic Jews. The TNIV paraphrases and calls him "the forefather of us Jews." You’ll notice that I take the words “according to the flesh” as modifying “our forefather”, not the verb “achieve” (or “discover”).

4:2-3 If Abraham earned his righteousness by his deeds (“what did Abraham our forefather gain/achieve?”), Paul argues, he would have something to take credit for. He could boast. But since he was given it instead, because he believed God, he did nothing to earn it. The answer to Paul’s rhetorical question in verse 1 is therefore “He gained/achieved nothing!” To prove that Abraham's right standing with God resulted from believing God's promise, Paul quotes Genesis 15:6. That text says that God "reckoned" (or “credited”) righteousness to Abraham, which means it was a gift. In v. 3 Paul quotes Genesis 15:6 according to the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament, not according to the literal meaning of the Hebrew, which is “and he reckoned it to him as righteousness. Why did the Septuagint change the verb from an active “and he reckoned it” to a passive “and it was reckoned”? First of all, the ancient Jews of that period felt it more reverent to refer to God’s actions in the passive (“it was said” rather than “he [God] said”).

And secondly, the Hebrew text of Genesis 15:6 as it stands is ambiguous, having the possiblity of meaning “and he (Abraham) reckoned it (God’s promise) to him (God) as the right thing (i.e., true).” This would be saying the same thing as the immediately preceding statement (“And Abraham believed God”) in slightly different words, a kind of poetic parallelismus membrorum. But the translators of the Septuagint (and undoubtedly Paul also) wished to exclude that possible alternative interpretation, which they considered wrong. So they changed “he reckoned it” to “it was reckoned,” which makes the alternative interpretation no longer possible.

4:4-5 The example of Abraham, while very neat and persuasive, is not an exact parallel to the situation of the believer in Christ. At least, not as Paul phrases the matter here. He could have drawn a tighter analogy by suggesting that as Abraham believed God’s promise of a miraculous gift (the birth of Isaac) and because of his trust in God’s word was counted righteous, so also we believe God’s promise of a miraculous gift (forgiveness of sins through Christ’s death and resurrection), and because of our trust in God’s word are counted righteous. But he did not use such words or such an analogy. Instead he focused almost entirely on the matter of whether Abraham’s being counted righteous was something given or earned. This was Paul’s main concern. This was undoubtedly because such an idea—that God would justify someone simply on the basis of his trust—was so utterly new. It is somewhat startling that by adding “(justifies) the wicked” (v. 5) Paul by the analogy characterized Abraham himself, that paragon of faith and righteousness, as “wicked” (so NIV; NRSV, ESV “ungodly”) in the eyes of God prior to his response in faith to the promise. But this is an unavoidable conclusion, once one understands the “righteousness” credited to Abraham as a necessary gift. If he was already righteous, Paul reasoned, he would not have needed this gift from God. Ergo, Abraham was “ungodly/wicked” at the time, just like all of us prior to our faith in God’s promise.

How about you? Like me, you have followed Paul’s argument in chapters 1-3 of Romans and have seen that all of us—Jews and non-Jews—although some of us may have been raised in godly homes and have tried to “be good”, all of us have fallen short of sinless lives. And whedre does that leave us? Just where it left Abraham: we are all “wicked” or “ungodly” in God’s holy eyes. We all need the gift of righteousness. We cannot possibly gain/achieve or earn righteousness from such a holy God, who demands absolute perfection. But we can and should accept this wonderful gift from a God who wants to make us righteous. If you have never done so, will you even now tell God that you accept his gift and thank him that his Son Jesus made it possible by his death for your and my sins? I hope that you will.

Meanwhile, since the choir Sunday School does not meet this week, we have time to consider only the first half of Romans 4 today and reserve the remainder for next Sunday.

God bless you all. Have a great week.