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4:4-5
Now to the one who works, his pay is not
credited due to grace but due to obligation. 4:5 But
to the one who does not work, but believes in the one who
declares the ungodly righteous, his faith is credited as
righteousness.
Immediately upon the heels
of the citation of the passage we are provided what can only
be called an inspired interpretation of Genesis 15:6.
Interestingly, Paul will not return to the specific context
of Genesis until verse nine, but each verse between three
and nine is directly related to Pauls understanding of what
Genesis 15:6 is saying. Before getting into the specifics
of this vital passage, we should see what the original
readers of the letter would have seen. That is, there is a
complete, 180 contrast between the person being described
in verse four and the one in verse five. This can be seen
by placing the first few words of each verse in direct
contrast to the other:
|
Verse |
Greek Text |
|
Verse 4 |
tw'/
de; ejrgazomevnw/ |
|
Verse 5 |
tw'/
de; mh; ejrgazomevnw |
|
|
English Text |
|
Verse 4 |
But to the working
one |
|
Verse 5 |
But to the not working
one |
What is not always clear to
the reader is that Paul purposefully uses the exact same
participial phrase in the two verses, only in verse five he
uses the direct negation thereof. So it is plainly
his intent to provide a black and white contrast between the
two individuals presented in each verse. And why is this
important? Because we find in these verses the clearest
explication of what it means to work and, in contrast
to that, to believe, in all of Pauls writings. The
effort he puts into making that contrast as strong as
possible answers many of the attempts by modern men to
insert some kind of meritorious works into the
doctrine of justification.
Now to the one who works
Paul uses a participle to describe the working one. The
illustration is drawn from the normal life of those who
would be reading his letter. A person who works is an
employee, maybe in those days, an artisan, merchant,
teacher. The picture is of a person who engages in regular
human activity so as to receive a reward, pay. The normal
koine Greek term for wage, misthos (misqo;"),
is used by Paul when he says the pay is not credited due
to grace. He is speaking of the legal, necessary giving of
pay to the employee who has worked for it. When a person
engages in this kind of work, the pay is not credited due
to grace, i.e., as a gift (Paul uses his normal word for
grace here, cavrin).
No employer walks up to an employee, pays them what is due,
and says, here is a gift. Such is not a gift because
it was earned. And that is exactly what Paul says when
he says it is credited due to obligation. Literally it is
according to what is owed (kata;
ojfeivlhma), a term often used to refer to that which
is given in payment of a debt. The pay is not reckoned
or imputed according to grace but according to debt is the
literal idea. Part of the meaning of working is that it
results in a debt being incurred. This will become
very important.
It should also be noted
that just as Paul uses the theologically-rich term grace
in this rather mundane, daily example of working and
receiving pay, he also uses another of his favorite terms,
reckon or impute (logivzetai).
The reason for that is close at hand: he intends to contrast
this kind of working-for-reward with the means of
justification in verse five.
We noted in 4:2 that Paul
uses the simple phrase, of works. We now see the
definition of the works, even works of law, to which he
refers. The key element of working is not the standard by
which one labors (i.e., Mosaic law, some other law). As we
have asserted, there is no higher standard than Gods law to
which Paul could possibly refer us as to moral behavior.
The law is just and holy and good and it shows us our sin.
The key element of working then is the attitude and
goal of the one doing the work. The working one in
4:5 is seeking to gain something by the work that is done.
This becomes the contrast with verse 5.
But to the
one who does not work The phrase is defined in its own
context. There is no reason to be confused between this
verse and such passages as Ephesians 2:10, for both are
easily understood in their native contexts. This phrase is
the contrast to verse 4. Whatever is inherent in the idea
of working so that the result is debt (ojfeivlhma)
is completely negated in verse five. And why must
this be understood? Because Paul is defining what it means
to have saving faith. Upon giving the negative, does not
work, he then gives the positive, but believes. The
polar opposite of working so as to create a situation of
debt is believing. There are few more important truths
than this, for the vast majority of confusion and false
teaching on the subject of justification misses this very
thing!
The
believing of which Paul speaks is, by the contrast he
draws here, a belief that creates no debt, that brings no
plea, that makes no offer or bargain. It is the empty hand
of faith. It hides no bribe, makes no effort at earning or
coercing anything from God. It knows its bankruptcy and
does not hide it. All acts of obedience to a law performed
so as to gain a right standing with God in any way, shape,
or form, violate the definition of the faith that brings
justification presented here. This passage slams the
door on any and all works-salvation schemes that attempt to
pay lip-service to grace by saying it is necessary but
insufficient outside of the addition of some level of
human works.
The faith that saves is a faith that clings in helpless
dependence upon another: the God who justifies.
Exegetical
commentaries agree on the intention of the apostle here.
Charles Hodge said,
But to him that worketh not,
tw'/ de; mh; ejrgazomevnw/.
That is, to him who has no works to plead as the ground
of reward; pisteuvonti de;
ejpi; k.t.l., but believeth upon, i.e. putting
his trust upon. The faith which justifies is not mere
assent, it is an act of trust. The believer confides upon
God for justification. He believes that God will justify
him, although ungodly; for the object of the faith or
confidence here expressed is
oj dikaiw'n to;n ajsebh',
he who justifies the ungodly. Faith therefore is
appropriating; it is an act of confidence in reference to
our own acceptance with God.
Likewise, John Murray focused upon the
clear contrast and asserted,
The antithesis is therefore between the
idea of compensation and that of gracethe worker has
compensation in view, he who does not work must have regard
to grace.The description given in verse 5, him who
justifies the ungodly is intended to set off the
munificence of the gospel of grace. The word ungodly is a
strong one and shows the magnitude and extent of Gods
grace; his justifying judgment is exercised not simply upon
the unrighteous but upon the ungodly.
And C.E.B. Cranfield added,
The sense intended by
tw'/...mh; ejrgazomevnw/
here would seem to be to him who does no works which
establish a claim on God or to him who has no claim on God
on the ground of works, and, by contrast,
tw'/...ejrgazomevnw/
in the previous verse would seem to mean to him who
does works which establish a claim on God (there being no
such man, according to Paul, Jesus Christ alone
excepted).Calvin was of course right to observe that Paul
has no intention of discouraging the doing of good works (p.
84). tw'/...mh;
ejrgazomevnw/ does not imply that Abraham did no good
works, but only that he did none which constituted a claim
on God.
The saving
faith that is contrasted with works always has the same
object: but believes in the one who declares the ungodly
righteous. God, the justifier of the ungodly, is the
object of saving faith. Just as Abraham believed Yahweh, so
every person who will hear Gods declaration of right
standing with him will do so only upon belief in Him and His
promises.
But it is
right here that many stumble, for the ones who are declared
righteous are the ungodly. The person whose mouth
has yet to be closed, who has not yet come to fully
understand their sin and its guilt, may not understand just
how precious it is that Paul inserted those two words, the
ungodly, at this point. It is not the godly, the
righteous, who need to hear about the God who justifies (as
if such even exist outside of their own self-deception).
God justifies the ungodly. Such an assertion runs directly
counter to everything mans religions teach. Men believe
themselves capable of cleaning themselves up, of doing good
works so as to receive from God the sentence of
justification. One cannot help but think of these words
from Roman Catholic writer Ludwig Ott:
The reason for the uncertainty of the state
of grace lies in this that without a special revelation
nobody can with certainty of faith know whether or not he
has fulfilled all the conditions which are necessary for
achieving justification.
Pauls response to such an assertion
would be two-fold: first, the conditions necessary for
achieving justification were accomplished in our place by
Jesus Christ, who alone fulfilled the law perfectly.
Secondly, no person can fulfill conditions to achieve
justification in the sense Ott is presenting it here. The
sole condition for the sinner to receive justification from
the God who justifies sola fide, by a faith that is
here contrasted in the strongest terms with any idea of
merit or work. And the only one who need look for this kind
of justification is the one who knows himself to be ungodly,
incapable of good in the sight of God. Jonathan Edwards
commented,
It is as much as if the apostle had said,
As for him who works, there is no need of any gracious
reckoning or counting it for righteousness, and causing the
reward to follow as if it were a righteousness; for if he
has works, he has that which is a righteousness in itself,
to which the reward properly belongs.
Modern religious movements
have likewise faltered at this point. Joseph Smith, the
founder of Mormonism, was so scandalized by the idea of God
justifying the ungodly that in his Inspired Translation
he completely rewrote the verse, and inserted a negation so
that for his followers the object of faith is the God who
does not justify the ungodly!
4:6
So even David himself speaks regarding the
blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness
apart from works:
NA27 Text:
6
kaqavper kai; Daui;d levgei to;n makarismo;n tou' ajnqrwvpou
w|/ oJ
qeo;"
logivzetai dikaiosuvnhn cwri;" e[rgwn:
Paul is not here leaving
Genesis 15:6 and Abraham. He is simply bringing in further
confirmation from a statement of David. He is not shifting
the focus to David, to Davids life, or anything of the
kind.
The appeal to David and to the psalm which
is here attributed to him is not, however, independent of
that demonstration drawn from the case of Abraham. It is
confirmatory or, to use Meyers expression, accessory.
Instead, he is very specific in his
understanding of the quotation he provides from the 32nd
Psalm (Psalm 31 in the Septuagint). He says David spoke of
a particular kind of blessing (makarismo;n)
upon a certain man (ajnqrwvpou).
He does not say this blessing was limited to, or even
focused upon, David. The use of man indicates a wider
context than David, or even Abraham. Instead, this is a
blessing that belongs to all men and women to whom
righteousness is imputed apart from, separate from, works.
This gives us yet another inspired interpretation of an
Old Testament passage. Paul gives us the proper
understanding up front, so to speak: he quotes Psalm 32
solely to illustrate the imputation of righteousness
apart from works (cwri;"
e[rgwn), for this is supportive of the thesis he
continues to demonstrate regarding the means by which
Abraham himself was justified. To attempt to go back into
the life of David and undercut the Apostles own
interpretation of these words by pointing to some actions
David engaged in is to question Pauls own understanding of
the texts and his own authority as an apostle in this
passage.
Surely this passage
supports the previously demonstrated teaching that
imputation does not subjectively change a person but instead
treats them as if they are in possession of what is imputed
to them. Hodge commented,
The words are
levgei to;n makarismo;n,
utters the declaration of blessedness concerning the
man, &c. whom God imputeth righteousness without works,
that is, whom God regards and treats as righteous,
although he is not in himself righteous. The meaning of this
clause cannot be mistaken. To impute sin, is to lay sin to
the charge of any one, and to treat him accordingly, as is
universally admitted; so to impute righteousness, is to
set righteousness to ones account, and to treat him
accordingly. This righteousness does not, of course, belong
antecedently to those to whom it is imputed, for they are
ungodly, and destitute of works. Here then is an imputation
to men of what does not belong to them, and to which they
have in themselves no claim. To impute righteousness is the
apostles definition of the term to justify. It is
not making men inherently righteous, or morally pure, but it
is regarding and treating them as just. This is done, not on
the ground of personal character or works, but on the ground
of the righteousness of Christ.
7-8
7 Blessed are those whose lawless
deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered;
8 blessed is the one against whom the Lord
does not count sin.
NA27 Text:
7 makavrioi
w|n ajfevqhsan aiJ ajnomivai kai; w|n ejpekaluvfqhsan aiJ
aJmartivai:
8 makavrio"
ajnh;r ou| ouj mh; logivshtai kuvrio" aJmartivan.
w|/
2 A C D2
F
Y
33. 1881
�
txt
* B D* G 1506. 1739
pc
The quotation provided by
Paul is directly from the Septuagint, word-for-word. The
triad of blessings are not upon three different men but upon
the same man to which Paul refers. Therefore, the three
descriptions are to be taken together: the forgiveness of
the lawless deeds is equivalent to the covering of sins. And
if this is the case, then both of these are equivalent to
the non-imputation of sins in verse 8.
John Murray, combining
depth of scholarship with the passion of the believing
theologian, saw the centrality of this section of Scripture
to the definition of justification by faith. His comments
are not only worthy of citation, but of close examination:
What David spoke
of in terms of the non-imputation and forgiveness of
sin Paul interprets more positively as the imputation of
righteousness.
This is a vitally important
observation: Paul defines the words of David as referring to
the blessedness of the imputation of righteousness apart
from works, but the only imputation spoken of in the
citation from Psalm 32 is that of the non-imputation
of sin (4:8). Protestant exegetes have often pointed to the
reality of double-imputation, that is, of the imputation
of the righteousness of Christ to the believer and
the imputation of our sins to Christ, the necessary
corollary to the non-imputation of sins to those who
have faith in Jesus.
And the blessed man is not the man who has
good works laid to his account but whose sins
are not
laid to his account. Davids religion, therefore, was
not one determined by the concept of good works but by that
of the gracious remission of sin, and the blessedness,
regarded as the epitome of divine favour, had no affinity
with that secured by works of merit.
Murray is again referring to the Roman
Catholic concept of doing good works in a state of grace
with the result that these good works are meritorious in
Gods sight. He rightly denies this is Pauls view, for the
biblical view is wholly based upon the gracious remission of
sins and the perfection of imputed righteousness, not
inherent or state of grace righteousness.
When Paul speaks of God as imputing
righteousness (vs. 6), he must be using this expression as
synonymous with justification. Otherwise his argument would
be invalid. For his thesis is justification by faith without
works. Hence to impute righteousness without works is
equivalent to justification without works.When Paul derives
his positive doctrine of justification, in terms of the
imputation of righteousness (vs. 6), from a declaration of
David that is in terms of the remission and non-imputation
of sin (vss. 6, 7) and therefore formally negative, he must
have regarded justification as correlative with, if not as
defined in terms of, remission of sin. This inference is
conclusive against the Romish view that justification
consists in the infusion of grace. Justification must be
forensic, as remission itself is.
The last line in the above citation
should be repeated. If Murray is rightly following the
argument of the Apostle, as he most assuredly is, the
argument is indeed conclusive. Paul has not moved to some
other issue than justification by citing Davids words. He
is still speaking of justification, the imputation of
righteousness apart from meritorious works. Paul then is
saying that the remission of sin and the non-imputation of
sin of 4:5-8 is correlative with the doctrine of
justification he is defending. Therefore, since remission
of sin is, beyond all dispute and question, a forensic
declaration, so, too, must justification be a forensic
declaration on the part of God. No one can possibly deny
that to remit sin is to speak of an action that requires a
judge with the authority to pronounce sentence, and then to
remit sentence. So, if remission of sin is being seen as
correlative with justification by the Apostle, it follows
that justification is, as we have already proven, but now
confirm beyond dispute, a forensic, legal declaration on the
part of God the Father regarding the believer, based upon
the work of another, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The appeal to David and to Psalm 32:1, 2,
in addition to that said of Abraham, is for the purpose of
demonstrating that what the Scripture conceives of as the
epitome of blessing and felicity is not the reward of works
but the bestowment of grace through faith. Blessedness
consists in that which is illustrated by the remission of
sins and not by that which falls into the category of reward
according to merit.
Murray has touched upon the key
difference between those who come to these passages with
their traditions and systems of authority and those who come
with a commitment to sola scriptura and a desire to
hear only what is spoken by the Holy Spirit in the
Scriptures. Mans religions focus upon man, mans works,
mans merits, and limit God to the gracious way-maker, who
works out a plan but then leaves it to the creature to
succeed, or fail, as the case may be. But the Apostle saw
that such systems missed the heart and soul of what God has
done in Christ. The greatest blessing is not receiving
sufficient grace so as to be able to do good works in a
state of grace so as to receive, at least in part, a
reward of eternal life. The greatest blessing is to be
forgiven of sin.
Who is the Blessed Man?
This brings us to a
question that must be answered by every person who believes
the Bible to be Gods Word. Who is the blessed man of
Romans 4:8? It seems an obvious question. The Apostle
tells us the blessed man in 4:6 is the one to whom God
imputes righteousness apart from works. But verse eight, as
we have seen, defines this in terms of non-imputation of
sin. So who is the blessed man?
The religions of men cannot
answer this question. Mans religions, centered as they are
upon mans works and merits and will, must, as a result,
lack a perfect Savior who can save in and of himself,
without the aid of the creature. Their systems, drawing
from the nearly universal synergism of human religiosity,
always make room for mans success, or failure, in doing
things, whether they be called sacraments, rituals, works,
or good deeds, so that the final outcome of salvation is
always in doubt. And if these systems contain any kind of
belief in a punishment after life, there must be some means
of holding man accountable for the sins committed during
life. Without a perfect sin-bearer, the issue of unforgiven
sin, rightly imputed to the one who committed it, must
have resolution.
But it is just here that
the question we are asking comes into full play. Who is the
blessed man to whom the Lord will not impute sin? If
a religion claims to follow the Bible and yet has no
meaningful answer to this question, its error is immediately
manifest. But before we press the question home, there are
two issues about the passage itself that must be addressed.
First, as was noted above,
there is a textual variant in the underlying Greek text.
The Majority Text (and hence the KJV and NKJV) read, to
whom the Lord shall not impute sin, following the
reading of w|/,
to whom. The Nestle-Aland text, and hence modern
translations such as the NASB and NIV, read whose sin
the Lord will not take into account. The NET, while
following the Nestle-Aland text, in essence follows a middle
road, interpreting the phrase in such a way as to render the
variant meaningless, and truly, there is no real difference
in the two readings, as far as the actual thrust of the
passage goes.
The second issue is how we
should understand the phrase
ouj mh; logivshtai kuvrio"
aJmartivan, the Lord will not impute sin.
Commentaries, even the best, are almost silent in discussing
this issue. Often Old Testament citations are passed over
unless there is a reason to go into some discussion of their
text. It is taken almost as a given that the writer uses
the form of the Septuagint as a default text, and only if
there is an alteration is much attention devoted to the
grammar and syntax of the citation. But at this point we
wish to suggest that something important must be noted in
the syntax of the passage.
ouj mh; logivshtai
is an aorist subjunctive of strong denial, sometimes called
the emphatic negation subjunctive.
The aorist subjunctive is the strongest form of denial.
Given the base meaning of the subjunctive, the aorist
subjunctive denies the possibility of a future event.
That is, it denies potentiality, saying something
simply cannot and will not be. The aorist subjunctive
is used primarily in the sayings of Jesus (John 6:37, 10:28,
11:26) and in quotations from the Septuagint, such as here.
It is often soteriologically significant. That is, Jesus
twice denies He will ever fail in His work of salvation by
using the aorist subjunctive (John 6:37, 10:28), and other
passages such as Hebrews 13:5 fall into the same category.
Now if we take the classic
meaning of the aorist subjunctive in this passage we have
the nature of the blessing being defined as the denial of
the possibility of the imputation of sin to the believer.
Now the immediate question that arises is, Does this refer
solely to past sins, so that what is being said is that God
will not impute past sins to one who has been forgiven?
Or, is there something more here? Is the aorist subjunctive
saying this blessedness is found in the non-imputation of
sin ever? That is, do we have warrant, in the
grammar or in the context, to say that the aorist
subjunctive is here referring to the denial of the
possibility of there ever being imputation of sin?
On the basis of the strict
grammar itself, the issue could not be decided, for the
question is not about what the aorist subjunctive indicates,
but it is about the meaning of the word sin and whether
that is referring to past sin only or all a
persons sin. In either case, that sin cannot, in any
fashion, be imputed to the believer.
But there is indication in
the passage that Paul has chosen this text from Psalm 32
specifically to make the very point that the believers sin
en toto will never be imputed to him. The signs that
point to this conclusion are two: first, Paul ends his
quotation in the middle of a verse in Psalm 32. He chose
what he cited for a reason, and surely he knew what the
aorist subjunctive indicated. Secondly, join this with the
fact that we already know that Paul is interpreting the
non-imputation of sin in 4:8 as the direct equivalent of the
imputation of righteousness apart from works from
4:6, and the key fact is then brought into play. Is the
righteousness that is imputed to the believer one that is
merely a now righteousness that can be undone by a single
act of disobedience, or is it a perfect righteousness, the
righteousness of Christ, that cannot be added to or
diminished? We have already seen that it is the
righteousness of God, so it would follow, then, that if the
imputation of this righteousness results in the perfect
salvation of all those who receive it, then the
corresponding non-imputation of sin would have to refer to
all the sin of the individual, not just sins up to a
certain point. This becomes very clear in light of Pauls
stated belief that the Father made the sinless Son sin in
our place, with the express purpose being that we would, as
a result, be made the righteousness of God in Him (2
Corinthians 5:21). If Christ is made sin, the question is,
what sin? The only answer is the sin that is
never imputed to the blessed man!
And so with these issues
addressed, we ask the question again: who is the blessed
man? The blessed man in Pauls context is the believer, the
one who, having given up all hope of personal righteousness,
has put his or her faith and trust in the God who justifies
the ungodly. This one is imputed a perfect righteousness,
his or her sins having been borne substitutionarily by
Christ on the cross. This is the blessed man.
That God acts toward his creatures graciously
without compulsion or necessity is one of Pauls
nonnegotiable theological axioms. He uses it here to
show that the faith that gained righteousness for
Abraham was a faith that excluded works. For many of
us, accustomed by four centuries of Protestant
theology to the Pauline faith vs. works contrast,
this point might appear mundane. But it flew in the
face of the dominant Jewish theology of the day,
which joined faith and works closely together,
resulting in a kind of synergism with respect to
salvation.
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