Romans - Lesson 13

Romans 3:21-26

But now apart from the law the righteousness of God (dikaiosyne) has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness (dikaiosyne) is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified (dikaioō) freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his justice (dikaiosyne) because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his justice (dikaiosyne) at the present time, so as to be just (dikaios) and the one who justifies (dikaioō) those who have faith in Jesus.

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A.  Dikaiosyne, dikaioō, and dikaios:  

Romans 3:21-26 is this great text that Paul brings together so much that is central to his presentation of the Gospel. That is what gives this passage its almost unparalleled power; not so much its individual elements, but the relationship of the elements to one another, the way in which Paul brings so many things together here. Not only our standing before God but how God secured that through Christ on our behalf, the importance of faith, what God did for us on the cross and the nature of that work, so many of his key ideas are brought together here. 

I want to illustrate a couple of things as you look at the passage as a whole. I have highlighted some of the key words here; it might be worthwhile working through the passage, so we all get a good sense of it. 

‘Apart from the law the righteousness’ – (here is this word dikaiosyne) -  ‘of God has been made known to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness’ (same word) ‘is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and all are justified' (here again, this issue in English we talked about where we move from righteousness to justified, two completely different English words but the same Greek root is involved here again.) ‘All are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement through the shedding of His blood to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate His justice’ - dikaiosyne – ‘because in His forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished. He did it to demonstrate his justice’ same word again ‘at the present time, so as to be just’- dikaios - ‘and the one who justifies’- dikaioō – ‘those who have faith in Jesus.’

B. Dikaios, Faith, and Universality: 

So, what I have tried to do here is highlight first of all, the language of righteousness, justified, justify, justice, justice; five times you get that single Greek root in our passage Second, you have the emphasis on faith. Faith in Jesus Christ and faith in Jesus. Third, you have the emphasis on universality again, ‘all who believe,’ ‘Jew and Gentile.’

So, there are the three very significant themes that are woven throughout our passage. Paul using this language of righteousness and justified and playing on it; talking about the importance of faith, and then talking about how faith is something available to both Jew and Gentile alike, the inclusive nature of faith in Christ. 

There are a number of emphases here that we want to talk about, and I will come to that in a moment. 

First of all, the balance of Romans is seen again in verse 21 where Paul says on the one hand, God’s righteousness is made known apart from the Law, but it is testified to by the Law and the Prophets. Continuity and discontinuity in the plan of God in salvation history.  

On the one hand, what God has done in Christ in making His righteousness known to us happens outside the confines of God’s Law. We could almost say that it is outside the confines of the Old Covenant. This was the mistake that a lot of the Jews were making in Paul’s day. They insisted on trying to fit Christ into the Old Covenant, tried to fit Him into the Law, rather than recognize how He had broken out of the boundaries of that framework. We think of Jesus’ illustration of the foolishness of trying to put new wine in old wineskins. This was the mistake many of the Jews were making in Paul’s day. They saw God’s Law as sort of absolute, God’s final word, and anything that God did had to be understood within the confines of that Law. So, you understood Christ within the Law rather than Christ apart from the Law. That was the mistake the Jews were making.

On the other hand, the mistake or tendency of some of the Gentiles in Paul’s day was to cast Christ loose from the Old Testament entirely. I can understand Gentiles taking this kind of attitude; saying, I am all for this Christianity thing, I believe in Jesus but what is all this Jewish stuff? I am not becoming a Jew; I am becoming a Christian. Why do I need the Old Testament? So, to counter that problem, Paul says remember that this righteousness of God is testified to by the Law and the Prophets, the Old Testament as a whole. 

So, in a sense what Paul is presenting us with here is a single salvation history. It is one big plan of God, the righteousness of God manifested in Christ is part of that history to which the Old Testament points forward. But it is a single plan divided into two stages: the old stage with the old covenant and its Law is now past with the coming of Christ; a new stage, a new context as it were, has been introduced and inaugurated. 

We have talked about the righteousness of God already, and clearly in verse 21 and 22, God’s righteousness means exactly what it means in chapter 1, verse 17: God’s promised action to put people in the right before Him. What is again particularly important for Paul is to emphasize this matter of faith. God’s righteousness is not simply to Israel, but it is for to everybody who believes.

C. Faith in Jesus Christ versus the Faithfulness of Christ:

Let me comment, if I may, on the phrase, ‘through faith in Jesus Christ.’ I talked about this this morning when we looked at Romans 1:17 This way of construing Paul’s Greek here takes Christ as the object of human faith: our faith directed toward Christ. But the other way to take it is to understand Christ as the one who is doing the believing or exercising the faithfulness, because the Greek word faith, the Greek word translated faith, can also sometimes be translated faithfulness. 

So, as I mentioned this morning, what has become a very popular option, and it is increasing in popularity almost every year, is to understand this phrase to mean not given through faith in Jesus Christ but given through the faithfulness exercised by Jesus Christ. Those who argue that view among other things say it makes excellent sense here because otherwise Paul would be repeating himself. Whereas if the first reference is to Christ’s faithfulness and the second is to our faith, then that makes a very neat two-sided picture that Paul may want to present to us: that of our standing with God, God’s righteousness is manifested through Christ’s faithfulness; Christ, who in obedience to the Father went to the Cross on our behalf. So, God’s righteousness is manifested through Christ’s faithfulness to His mission and activated by all of us who believe. 

Theologically, to me this is unobjectionable; there is no question that Christ’s faithfulness is important as a means by which God has brought His righteousness and His salvation to us. I continue to think that the traditional reading is superior, however. Again, I don’t think a lot rests on this, I think you could go either way on this one, theologically each is fine. 

The particular phrase Paul uses here, in the Greek is a genitive. It is by its nature somewhat ambiguous. Probably the best way to translate it would be ‘Christ’s faith’ How do those two words function together. Think of some English parallels here: firehose. How do you know the way those two words function together? A firehose is a hose used for the purpose of putting out fires.  Someone is asking you who doesn’t know English very well, what do you mean by that phrase? Another word, pencil-holder; well, it is something that holds a pencil in it. There are many other examples. 

The best illustration that I can think of is a personal example; I really enjoy photography, as some of you know. I had a student up in my office one day and he was looking at my photographs. I said to the student, doesn’t that remind you of the famous photograph of Ansel Adams? The minute I said it I thought, oh there is a critical ambiguity there. I think it’s a good illustration.  If you would just hear that phrase by itself “a photograph of Ansel Adams,” you would bring your knowledge to bear on that phrase and assume what was meant, was “a photograph taken by Ansel Adams.

In fact, in this situation, I was pointing to a photograph in my office as I am standing on top of my pickup truck with my camera on a tripod taking a photograph, and thinking of the famous Ansel Adam’s photograph, some of you may have seen it, of Ansel Adams standing on top of a station wagon in Yosemite with his tripod and his big 8 by 10 inch view camera up there.  I was thinking of a photograph in which Ansel Adams is the subject of the photograph, not the taker of the photograph. 

I thought, that is kind of an interesting way to think about the way this phrase works then, when we’re thinking of moving from the Greek to the English; the way we construe it is through the information we bring to the phrase. Syntactically, the same phrase, “a photograph of Ansel Adams;” “a photograph of Marilyn Monroe.” Take those two phrases: a photograph of Ansel Adams and a photograph of Marilyn Monroe. They are exactly the same construction- “of” - in each case but the information we bring to it would normally lead us to think a photograph taken by Ansel Adams and a photograph in which Marilyn Monroe appears. 

So, when we come to the phrase like ‘the faith of Christ,’ my argument would be because Paul talks so often about our believing in Christ, never talks about Christ actually believing as the subject of that verb, that we would expect that phrase then to be unpacked, the faith we humans put in Christ rather than the faith or faithfulness Christ is exercising.

So, that would be one way in which I would want to argue for the traditional view here. Again, I want to say this is not a matter of orthodoxy versus heresy Certainly, to talk about Christ’s faithfulness as instrumental in securing our righteousness is appropriate and biblical, but I am just not sure that is what Paul is saying here though. You will see this view appearing quite a lot

E. Student Questions

Student question: 
Are there a lot of places in the New Testament where faith means faithfulness? 

Dr. Moo: 
It certainly is debated how many there are, there are certainly some. How many would maybe be a debated question.

Student question: 
Enough to warrant (?)

Dr. Moo: 
Oh sure.  Take a look at Romans 3:3 ’what then? If some have disbelieved, will their unbelief nullify the pistis of God?’ The Greek word there, clearly is not the faith of God, but it is the faithfulness exercised by God. 

So here advocates of the faithfulness of Christ, would say right here in the context of Romans 3, you have a reference to the faithfulness exercised by God. No doubt that that is a possible way to understand it. 

Interesting again, two of the most prominent New Perspective advocates are on opposite sides on this one. Tom Wright is a strong advocate of the faithfulness of Christ interpretation; James Dunn is an equally strong advocate of the traditional our faith in Christ. So, this just shows that on this one that the dividing lines are not neat between the different viewpoints. It’s just a matter of interpretation.

Student question: 
So, if we take the traditional reading then really it is for emphasis’ sake? Is the emphasis going to be on the word “all?” 

Dr. Moo: 
Yeah, again, this is so important for Paul as we have seen to talk about that. He goes on to explain that all who believe, here in this famous verse, it is for all who believe, there is no difference between Jew and Gentile, all sin, all fall short that is why it is for all who believe as well. You have to view it as sort of repeating the same idea for emphasis. It is through faith, and it is for all who have faith.