Romans 7:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Consequently, the law is appointed for the living and does not extend to the dead. Do you see how he depicted a twofold freedom?

Then, having hinted at this at the beginning, in the proof he speaks about the wife, saying: "A married woman is bound by law to her living husband. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband."

"Therefore, if while her husband lives she becomes another man's, she will be called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is no adulteress, though she becomes another man's" (Rom 7:2-3).

The Apostle explains this often and with great precision, because he is firmly confident in the truth he is proving. By the husband he means the law, and by the wife all believers.

When the husband dies, the wife has the authority to be joined in marriage to another. Here he likened the law to the husband, and his hearers to the wife.

Then he ought to have said: therefore, brethren, the law has no authority over you, for it has died. But the Apostle did not say this, so as not to grieve the Jews.

Instead, he presents the wife as having died, that is, the Jews themselves. For this reason they enjoy a twofold freedom. If the wife is free from the authority of the law when her husband dies, much more is she free when she herself has died.

He everywhere shows the danger of seeking to remain under the law. He exhorts them instead to pursue and thirst with their whole mind for grace through faith, that is, justification in Christ. Those who were baptized, he says, were also buried with Him, so that, having died to sin, they might live to God in righteousness.

Therefore he says: "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness. But present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members to God as instruments of righteousness. Sin shall not have dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace" (Rom 6:12-14).

For just as a married woman is bound to the law of her husband while her husband lives, but if her husband dies, she is freed from the law of her husband, that is, the marriage with the dead husband is considered dissolved.

Then she is free to marry whomever she wishes. So you also were put to death to the law through the Body of our Lord, which you received.

It is fitting and righteous that you should belong to Him Who descended to the dead for our sake and ascended, so that at His coming He might bring you to God as holy fruit.

Just as a woman is freed from the law of marriage when her husband dies, but not from the law of nature, so also those who by God's grace have been freed from the law are no longer transgressors when they are joined to Christianity.

They were held in guilt by that law, and it dies for them. For when the law lives in them, they are transgressors, and it is useless for them to be called Christians, since they are liable to punishment.

But the one who, after the death of the law, has joined himself to the Gospel and then returns again to the law will no longer be a transgressor of the law. He is now a transgressor of the Gospel.

When the authority of the law ceases, the law is said to be dead.

That is, the law calls adulteress not the woman who is joined to another after her spouse's death, but the woman who has relations with another while her companion is still alive. It commands the latter to be punished, because she has mocked the law of marriage.

Therefore it is clear from this that if the husband ends his life, it is lawful, and not unlawful, for the widow to enter marriage with another.

Although the divine Apostle knew that the law gave the living the right to dissolve marriage when it was displeasing to them, he nevertheless heeded the Master's teaching.

In that teaching it is said that Moses gave this law because of the Jews' hardness of heart. But the natural law did not allow this, because, as it is said, God created one husband and one wife.

"The law has dominion over a man as long as he lives." Who lives, the man or the law? Origen and Estius refer this to the law. Chrysostom, Ambrose, and many others refer it to the man, which is confirmed by the general course of thought.

"The law is appointed for the living and does not extend to the dead," says Chrysostom. He compares the law to the husband, and believers to the wife.

At the same time he observes that the Apostle does not adapt the conclusion to what preceded. In verse 4 he should have said that the law died and that Christians may belong to another.

Instead, the Apostle speaks of the death of Christians to the law, with the purpose, as Chrysostom notes, of not offending the Jews. Yet this substitution of persons does not alter the matter.

Third, when the Christian breaks the union with the law of works, like a marital union, he enters another obligation, fidelity in union with Christ. The aim of this joining is the bearing of the fruit of virtue, or holiness unto God (Rom 7:1-6).

Just as "a married woman is bound by law to her living husband, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law of marriage," so also "you, my brethren, have died to the law through the body of Christ. " a compressed metaphor signifying Christ's death, "that you may belong to another, to Him who has risen from the dead, that we may bring forth fruit to God" (Rom 7:2-4).

And what is this fruit? The Apostle has already spoken of it above. This fruit is holiness (Rom 6:22).

Having proved in chapter 6 how unfitting it is to remain in sin after justification and sanctification are granted to all through Christ, the Apostle Paul now shows that there is no reason to remain under the law either.

If in chapter 6 he exhorted his readers to abandon a sinful, pagan life, here he exhorts another sort of readers, those from the Hebrews, to abandon attachment to the law. He explains, first, the temporary significance of the law, and second, its replacement by a new spiritual life with Christ.

Therefore, if those under the law depart from it and submit to other rules while the law lives and has force, they are guilty before the law and must be subject to its penalties. They are like a wife who gives herself to another while her husband lives.

But if they give themselves to other rules after the death of the law, after its cessation and the end of its force, they cannot be considered guilty before the law or subject to its penalties.

After the cessation of the law, they are free to submit to whatever they wish, without becoming like an adulterous wife.

Applying this to believers who left the law and gave themselves to the Lord Jesus Christ through faith in Him and submission to new rules of life in His Spirit, one should have said the following.