This initial post will begin my first exegetical study for this blog. I will be studying Rom 7.7-25. This passage has a number of exegetical questions that I will attempt to answer. Some of these include: Paul’s enigmatic and varied use of nomos and the identity of the first person singular ‘I’. I will do my best to give my thoughts on these and other questions.
I will start by posting my generic translation of the passage. This is a very wooden translation that does not include my interpretation of the aktionsarts or other grammatical and syntactical structures. As the study moves forward, I will eventually produce a more nuanced English translation.
7Therefore, what will we say? The Law is sin, It cannot be. But I do not know sin if not through the Law. For I would not have known lust, except the Law said “Do not Lust.” 8But sin, taking the occasion through the commandment, worked itself in me all lust, for without the Law, sin is dead. 9But I lived apart from the Law at some time, but by the coming of the commandment, sin becomes alive 10and I died and in me the commandment which is for life, this is for death. 11For the sin, taking the occasion through the commandment, deceived me and through it I die. 12So then, the Law is holy and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. 13Therefore, did the good thing become death to me? It cannot be. But sin, in order that sin may appear, through the good thing produced death, in order that sin may be exceedingly sinful, through the commandment. 14For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I fleshly having been sold under sin. 15For that which I do I do not know, for what do not I want, this I do, but what I hate, this I do. 16But if what I do not want this I do, I agree with the Law that it is good. 17But now I no longer do it but the sin living in me. 18For I know that good does not live in me, this is in my flesh, for to will is in me, but the doing good is not. 19For the good I want I do not do, but the evil I do not want, this I do. 20But if what I do not want, this I do, it is no longer I doing it, but the sin living in me. 21Therefore I find the Law, the wanting in me to do the good, that in me the evil presides. 22For I delight in the Law of God according to what is within man. 23But I see another law in my body parts, warring against the law of my mind and putting me captive to the law of sin being in my body parts. 24I am a wretched man. Who will deliver me from the body of this death. 25But thanks to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore then, I myself indeed in mind serve the law of God, but the flesh serves the law of sin.
Next will be my understanding of the background and purpose of the Letter to the Romans.
