Romans 6:1

At this point in Romans, it is customary for commentators to interrupt their exegesis and build a wall of separation between this chapter and the fifth, Moule, for example, expending some 200 lines of text for that purpose. Other devices of separation have also been employed as, for example, when that same author declared that:

We shall now think less directly of the foundations than of the superstructure, for which the foundation was laid.[1]

From all of the explaining, and readjusting, and hesitation that marks the works of people as they are about to engage upon an interpretation of this chapter, and from all of their efforts to disengage it from the preceding chapters, one is truly led into a state of wonderment about what so troubles the commentators at this point; but the mystery is not far to seek.

Proceeding in the same line of argument, and without so much as getting his breath (Paul knew nothing of chapter divisions), Paul poured out a few paragraphs that explode completely any interpretation of his doctrine of justification by faith, as a justification that came without submission to the ordinance of baptism. The apostle suddenly spoke of that rite, not as something added, but as an ordinance that all Christians of that era honored, thus making it absolutely certain that justification by faith cannot mean justification without baptism. That is the fact which looms so starkly in this chapter and which gives the commentators such a phenomenal pause as they suddenly confront it.

This error of commentators who have sought so diligently to separate these two chapters was mentioned by Steele, thus:

The origin of the misinterpretation must be traced to the separation of the sixth chapter from the fifth, as if a whole new subject began at Romans 6:1.[2]

As for the delusion that Paul was writing of foundations earlier and of superstructure in the chapter dealing with baptism, a reference to Hebrews 6:1,2 will reveal that baptism is there listed as part of the foundation doctrine of Christianity; and thus the mention of it in chapter 6 would be misplaced if that chapter is not dealing with foundations.

In this chapter, as throughout Romans, the grand theme continually in view is the righteousness of God's character; and the thrust of Paul's words in chapter 6 is that the truly righteous character of God requires that all antinomian license be rejected by the baptized believers who make up the true body of Jesus' disciples. The righteous God requires that representatives of his kingdom on earth BE righteous. The necessity of this line of admonition arose from a paragraph Paul had just finished at the conclusion of the last chapter. The intimate connection between the two chapters was pointed out thus:

(Commenting on Romans 6:1) This question was prompted by a sentence, the very cadence of which seemed to be still alive in the apostle's memory (Romans 5:20). It is well to trace the continuity of scripture, to read the letter of an inspired writer, as you would any other, as an entire composition.[3]

Regarding antinomianism:

(It) is an interpretation of the antithesis between law and gospel, recurrent from the earliest times. Christians, being released in important particulars, from conformity to the Old Testament as a whole, a real difficulty attended the settlement of the limits and the immediate authority of the remainder, known vaguely as the moral law. ... During the Commonwealth period, Antinomianism was found in England under the high Calvinists who maintained that an elect person, being predestined to salvation, is absolved from the moral law, and is not called upon to repent. In less extreme forms, Antinomianism is a feature of those forms of Christianity which lay stress on justification by faith.[4]

There are surely many obligations imposed in the Old Testament which are not binding upon Christians; but such non-binding obligations do not include the requirements of morality; nor can the non-binding nature of the Old Testament be extended to include by implication certain grand ordinances of the Christian religion, these latter being called "the law of faith" or "the law of liberty," and being obligatory, absolutely.

The doctrine of justification by faith is scriptural; but the perversion of this to mean justification by faith ALONE is to be rejected. The modern form of antinomianism which clings so tenaciously to the latter position is not nearly so extreme as formerly, there being few religionists who would go so far as to exempt the Christian from any moral duty on the ground that he is saved by "faith only"; their name is legion who categorically exempt believers from any compliance whatever with such ordinances as baptism and the Lord's supper, or even any mandatory membership in the church. It never seems to strike such advocates as inconsistent that the meaning of the word "alone" cannot be so restricted. If it is truly by faith "alone" that people are saved, of course, morality, being something other than faith, is also unnecessary! Luther, however, made "alone" to apply less extensively, as follows:

But you ask how it can be that faith alone justifies, and affords without works so great a treasure of good things, when so many works, ceremonies, and laws, are prescribed to us in the scriptures. I answer: Before all things, bear in mind what I have said, that faith alone, without works justifies, sets free, and saves.[5]

Martin Luther's statement clarifies the fact that the "ceremonies" of the Christian faith, such as baptism and the Lord's supper, were classified by him as being among the so-called "works" that have nothing to do with salvation. Also, the basis of the authority upon which Luther depended for this dogmatic statement was also forcefully exposed:

I answer! Bear in mind what I have said!

Thus, very sharply defined, appears the old conflict between the word of God and the word of men.

Martin Luther, in many respects, was one of the greatest men of the past millennium; and that he should have fallen into such an error provokes some further reflection upon it. Luther well knew that such ceremonies as baptism and the Lord's supper were connected in the word of God with salvation, as for example, when Jesus himself said that,

He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved (Mark 16:16).

He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. ... Except ye eat my flesh and drink my blood ye have no life in you (John 6:53,54).

How then could Martin Luther have rationalized his position that salvation is procured without such things? He did so by supposing that faith INCLUDES such observances. If that supposition of Luther's had been the truth, then his doctrine would have been true, and it may be presumed that the apostles would have pointed it out and used the same terminology Luther used. That such indeed was the ground of Luther's false conclusion appears in the following statement made by him:

On this ground, faith is the sole righteousness of a Christian man, and the fulfilling of all the commandments.[6]

But faith is not the fulfilling of all the commandments; and there are scriptural examples of faith that was the fulfilling of none of the commandments. Thus, from John's Gospel,

Nevertheless, even of the rulers many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not con-confess it, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: for they loved the glory that is of men more than the glory that is of God (John 12:42,43).

Thus, Luther's definition of faith is untrue, being contradicted by none other than an apostle, who declared that certain Jewish rulers "believed on" the Lord Jesus Christ and were yet unsaved. The word translated "believed on" has exactly the same meaning as the word of which Martin Luther said that this "alone" procures salvation; but it did not for those rulers mentioned by John. It is grammatically impossible to make "believed on" in the quotation from John mean something less than "faith" as used elsewhere in scripture. Moreover, there is the glaring fact that the scriptures nowhere either affirm or even imply that faith includes the keeping of the commandments. Luther, not the word of God, said that.

Another popular argument alleged to support Luther's "faith only" theory is premised upon certain slanders of Paul's teaching, principally that in which his enemies were suggesting that they should sin the more that grace should abound the more (Romans 3:8; 6:1). Any argument from what the enemies of Christianity said is so weak as to be worthless. Their allegations were not based upon anything that Paul taught, but upon a perverted view of it, a fact made clear in this chapter. Furthermore, if Paul had actually taught what some of the advocates of Luther's theory teach, their slanders would have been truth! "Faith only" as a basis of salvation is antinomianism; and a whole dictionary of sectarian movements followed in the wake of Luther's teaching, many of them denying basic morality. Note:

Kindred to this latter view was the position of sundry sects of fanatics during the Reformation period, who denied that regenerated persons sinned, even when committing acts in themselves gross and evil.[7]

It was the scandalous conduct of such fanatical interpreters of Luther's position that forced a readjustment of it, the adjusted position being that morality was indeed required, but that such commands as baptism were not. The overwhelming conviction registered here is that all of God's commandments are righteousness, and that none on them may be bypassed with impunity. Sins there will be, ah yes; but repentance and prayer are the banisters on either side of the bridge of life; and these will preserve the true Christian through the temptations of life unto eternal glory.

[1] H. C. G. Moule, The Epistle to the Romans (London: Pickering and Inglis, Ltd.), p. 156.

[2] David N. Steele, Romans, An Interpretative Outline (Philadelphia: The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1967), p. 47.

[3] Joseph S. Exell, The Biblical Illustrator (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1963), p. 443.

[4] The Encyclopedia Brittanica, Vol. II, p. 69.

[5] J. Leslie Dunstan, Protestantism (New York: George Braziller, 1962), p. 43.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Encyclopedia Brittanica, Vol. II, p. 69.

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? (Romans 6:1)

The objection Paul was about to answer here was founded upon allegations based upon a perverted understanding of justification by faith. See introduction to this chapter, above. Some of Paul's hearers and readers had concluded that as long as a Christian had faith it made no difference at all what kind of life he lived, such a position arising from a misunderstanding of justification by faith, which they had understood to be "faith only," just as some still misunderstand it. Paul's obvious reference here to Romans 5:20 shows that no new subject is being introduced.