Original Meaning
THE QUESTION THAT begins this paragraph suggests it is closely related to 3:21–26. Many commentators, therefore, attach verses 27–31 to verses 21–26. But we think that verses 27–31 go more with chapter 4 than with 3:21–26, for two reasons. (1) Romans 3:27–31 only develops one of the ideas from 3:21–26: faith as the only way to experience God’s justification. The other significant theological concepts brought up in verses 21–26 (redemption, grace, propitiation, God’s justice) are dropped. (2) The topics treated in 3:27–31 mirror those taken up in chapter 4:
Romans 3:27–31 | Romans 4 |
Boasting is excluded (v. 27) | Abraham had no right to boast (vv. 1–2) |
… because one is justified by faith, not works of the law (v. 28) | … because Abraham was justified by faith, not works (vv. 3–8) |
Circumcised and uncircumcised are united under the one God through faith (vv. 29–30) | Circumcised and uncircumcised are united as children of Abraham through faith (vv. 9–17) |
What Paul does in 3:27–31, then, is quickly touch on the basic points he wants to make about faith before developing them at greater length with respect to Abraham.
Paul reverts in verse 27 to the question-and-answer format so popular in the diatribe. This suggests that he is again engaged in dialogue with someone about the significance of the gospel. Who is this person? A human being in general, most commentators answer: Paul wants every person to understand that God’s way of justifying people—by grace—absolutely excludes any possibility that we may take credit for our salvation. But another possible identification of this person is more specific: the Jew. Paul used this same language of “boasting” or “bragging” about Jews in 2:17, so he may be reminding Jews that they can no longer brag about their superiority to Gentiles. God justifies both Jew and Gentile on the same basis (see vv. 29–30).1
Paul probably does have a Jew in mind here. But, as verses 27b–28 show, it is the Jews’ tendency to take pride in their obedience to the law that he particularly criticizes. As elsewhere in Romans, then, Jewish boasting in “works of the law” is representative of human boasting in accomplishments. All such boasting is nonsense in light of God’s grace.
Paul explains why all such boasting is ruled out in the end of verse 27, but the translation and interpretation are debated. The Greek literally translates, “Through what law [nomos]? Of works? No, but through the law [nomos] of faith [pistis].” The NIV reflects a popular interpretation by translating the word nomos as “principle.” In effect, then, nomos becomes something of a formal addition without any real significance.
This meaning of the word is possible. But many recent commentators protest that giving nomos this general meaning does not do justice to Paul’s focus in this context on the Mosaic law. They therefore argue that Paul is contrasting two ways of viewing, or responding to, the law of Moses: one way that focuses only on the works it demands, and another that recognizes in the law a demand for faith as well.2 But the NIV interpretation is probably better, since Paul generally avoids associating faith with the Mosaic law (see comments on 2:13 and 2:26–27).
If this is the case, then verse 28 unpacks this “principle … of faith”: “For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law.” “Observing the law” again here translates the Greek erga nomou, “works of the law” (see comment on 3:20); as in that earlier verse, the phrase means “works done in obedience to the law of Moses.” Significantly, even in what seems so general a principle, Paul focuses on Jewish obedience to the law of Moses. His primary concern continues to be to show that Jews need the gospel, for by demonstrating this, he will have shown that all people need it.
Verse 28 is a famous statement of the doctrine of justification by faith, and, under the influence of Luther, many of us almost automatically add an “alone” after faith. The word is not, of course, found in the verse. But it legitimately brings out the sense of what Paul is saying (long before Luther, the Roman Catholic theologian Aquinas had also added it). For in denying that even the best human works can justify us (e.g., Jewish obedience to God’s holy law), Paul is, in effect, denying that anything a human being does will ever justify one before God.
Verses 29–30 bring to the surface again one of the central subthemes of the letter: the equality between Jew and Gentile before God. Paul turns the Jews’ vaunted belief in monotheism against their tendency to confine salvation to themselves in exclusion from Gentiles. For if, as Jews proudly confess, there is only one God, then this God must be equally God of Gentiles as well as Jews. Rightly understood, this demolishes any ultimate difference between Jew and Gentile before the Lord. Thus, Paul concludes, God will justify both “the circumcised” (Jews) and “the uncircumcised” (Gentiles) on the same basis: through faith.
Paul’s pastoral sensitivity reveals itself again in verse 31. As we have noted (see comment on 2:1), the sequence of thought in Romans is to some extent dictated by the questions and objections Paul knows people will raise about the gospel. He has just insisted that doing the law contributes nothing to justification. But he knows that some people will conclude from that teaching that the law is no good at all: It is “nullified.” Thus he responds: “Not at all [me genoito]! Rather, we uphold the law.”
In other words, the Mosaic law may not play a role in justification, but Paul does not want his readers to conclude that it plays no role at all in God’s plan of salvation. But just what role does it play? Paul does not explicitly say how his preaching “upholds” the law, but we can surmise that he elaborates elsewhere in the letter. Four main possibilities should be considered:
1. We uphold the Mosaic law as a testimony to the gospel (ch. 4).3
2. We uphold the Mosaic law as bringing conviction of sin (3:19–20).4
3. We uphold the Mosaic law as a source of guidance for the Christian life (13:8–10).5
4. We uphold the Mosaic law as a standard of God’s holiness, now fulfilled in Christ (8:4).6
The first possibility is popular and may seem the most obvious reading, for Paul goes on in chapter 4 to show how the story of Abraham testifies to justification by faith. But if this had been Paul’s intention, it is surprising that he does not use the word nomos (law) in 4:2 to signify this connection. The second is also unlikely because Paul, in this context at least, is talking about the law as a moral authority. Both the third and fourth interpretations fit this emphasis, and which Paul intends we cannot determine from this context alone.
Our understanding, in light of the way that the argument develops, is that the fourth is the more likely. Paul affirms the valid demand that God makes of people in the law, and that demand cannot simply be swept under the carpet. But one of the things Christ does is to fulfill the law on our behalf. We who are in Christ are therefore accounted as having fulfilled the law and been set free from its penalties for disobedience. It is, paradoxically, this very freedom from the law’s condemnation that puts us into a relationship in which true obedience, motivated and directed by the Spirit, can come about.
Bridging Contexts
THE MEANING OF “LAW.” As we noted when the word nomos first appeared in Romans (see comment on 2:12), the contemporary reader must read this word in light of its usage in Paul’s context, not in ours. We use “law” is an extraordinary number of ways, and we easily misunderstand Paul if we read one of those meanings when he intends quite another. We argued that Paul uses the word in a thoroughly Jewish context. He, of course, is a Jew himself (a fact we sometimes forget), his vocabulary is formed by long and intimate acquaintance with the Old Testament, and in Romans he writes about Jewish matters. There can be no doubt, then, that for Paul nomos is basically and usually the Mosaic law—the revelation of God’s will for Israel mediated through Moses at Mount Sinai.
Yet we have just argued that nomos does not have this meaning in verse 27. Is this consistent? We earlier set down the principle that we should assume Paul uses nomos to refer to the Mosaic law unless clear contextual indicators pointed in another direction. Our case for taking nomos in verse 27 to mean principle, rule, or authority rests on this caveat. We think Paul provides sufficient clues in the context that he is not using the word in the normal way.
First, of course, it must be established that the alternate meaning for the word actually exists. For, except in rare circumstances, context is never a strong enough basis to justify a new meaning for a word. Some interpreters indeed deny that nomos ever has the general sense of rule or principle—what we might call a “formal” meaning. But enough examples exist, even from Jewish writers contemporary to Paul, to show that this meaning is possible.
Josephus, for instance, a Jewish historian who wrote just after Paul’s time, speaks of the “nomoi of warfare,” that is, the (unwritten) rules that govern military strategy (J.W. 5.123). Similarly, Philo, a first-century Jewish philosopher, can refer to the nomoi or norms of music (On the Creation 54, 70).7 So this meaning of the word is available for Paul to use if he wants to.
But what is the evidence from the context that this is what he in fact means? Three items point in this direction. (1) The first is the most general and the weakest; by itself it is not compelling. The word nomos often has a formal meaning when it is followed by a nonpersonal word in the genitive, as it is here with “works” (ergon) and “faith” (pisteos).8 In fact, of the four other places where Paul qualifies nomos in this way, three may very well have this formal meaning (Rom. 7:25; 8:2; 9:31; Eph. 2:15 is probably a reference to the Mosaic law).
(2) Paul distances faith from the Mosaic law in this particular context (v. 28). This makes the combination “law of faith” unexpected.
(3) The final argument is broader, involving the more general theological context that Paul sets up and within which he uses words like nomos and pistis. Any given occurrence of an author’s words must be interpreted in light of the particular field of usage an author has himself established. Paul seems to have established a “field of discourse” in which nomos and pistis exist in separate categories. This is seen, for example, in the way he contrasts “faith” and “law” or “works of the law” (Rom. 3:20; Gal. 2:16; 3:2, 5, 10, 11–12; Phil. 3:9). Another indication is that the apostle frequently speaks of the law as something to be obeyed or done but never as something to be believed (see esp. the contrasts in Rom. 10:5–6 and Gal. 3:11–12).
What all this suggests is that Paul’s own world of discourse did not allow for pistis and nomos (in the sense of Mosaic law) to be associated. They are on opposite sides of his linguistic categories. Some will, of course, reply that verses like this one as well as 8:2 and 9:31–32 show that this distinction does not always hold. Thus, the decision gets down to a matter of weighing the strength of these verses against the preponderant usage in Paul. We certainly understand how scholars can reach different decisions on the matter. But what I wanted to do here was briefly sketch the method that lies behind my decision to interpret “law of faith” in Romans 3:27 as I do. Only by taking into consideration all these factors can we accurately move from Paul’s meaning to its application in our day.
Contemporary Significance
BOASTING. ONE OF the most common and perhaps basic of all sins is illegitimate pride—what Paul calls “boasting.” The tendency for finite, weak, and sinful human beings to think too much of ourselves is endemic and hard to rid ourselves of. John calls it “boasting of what [a person] has and does” (1 John 2:16). We easily bring such boasting into our relationship with God. In addition to being sinful, it carries two great dangers. (1) It stifles our worship. As long as we think, however subconsciously, that we have contributed something to our salvation, we will not put God on as high a plane as we should. We will loom too large and he will seem too small—and we will not worship with the absolute sense of humility, dependence, and thanksgiving that always marks the best worship.
(2) The other danger arises from the fact that the accomplishments in which we are tempted to boast are so inconsistent and imperfect. When things are going well and we are feeling pretty good about ourselves, it is easy to put confidence in ourselves. But the inevitable difficult times will come—and if our confidence rests in ourselves, we will find ourselves with no good foundation on which to stand.
A more subtle kind of illegitimate boasting is often only a hair’s breadth from a legitimate sense of contentment from doing the will of the Lord. When we obey the Lord by avoiding a sin we were tempted to commit or by doing an act of kindness, it is entirely appropriate for us to have a sense of contentment and even of self-satisfaction. Paul, for instance, can express legitimate pride in his ministry, calling himself an “expert builder” (1 Cor. 3:10) and boasting about how he “worked harder” than all the other apostles (15:10). But, significantly, in each of these texts, Paul attributes the value of his ministry to the working of God’s grace. Pride in our good deeds or works of ministry must always recognize that God, not ourselves, is the cause of whatever good we accomplish.
But this perspective is hard to maintain. I know I can hardly perform a “righteous act” without instantly marring it with pride. I recently joined some other people from my church to help paint the house of a brother who was seriously ill. In the midst of my painting comes a persistent voice that begins by saying, “You are doing a good deed. God is going to be happy with you.” Perhaps there is nothing wrong with this feeling—so far. But quickly the voice moves on to say, “You should take pride in what you are doing. God is surely bound to reward you because you are being so good.” The minute we think that our good works exert a claim on God, we have moved from legitimate contentment to illegitimate boasting. All our works, however good they may be—and all our works in this life are inevitably stained by sin—are the product of God’s grace, as his Spirit moves in us.