Romans Chapter 3 verse 21 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerses 21-31. - (4) The righteousness of God, manifested in Christ and apprehended by faith, is the sole remedy, and available for all. The position enunciated in Romans 1:18 being now sufficiently established, the apostle enters here on his main argument, announced in Romans 1:17. Verse 21. - But now (νυνὶ here may have either its temporal sense of at the present time, or its logical sense of as things are. For its use in the latter sense, cf. Romans 7:17; 1 Corinthians 5:11; 1 Corinthians 13:13; 1 Corinthians 15:20) the righteousness of God without law (i.e. apart from law) is (or, has been) manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the prophets. On the essential meaning of God's righteousness (Θεοῦ δικαιοσύνη), see on Romans 1:17, and Introduction. This passage, in which the thesis of Romans 1:17 is formally enunciated, is consistent with this meaning; in confirmation of which observe vers. 25, 26, where δικαιοσύνη αὐτοῦ evidently means God's own righteousness, as also above, ver. 5. If this view is correct, there is no need to follow commentators into their discussions of the significance of χωρὶς νόμου in supposed connection with the idea of man's imputed righteousness; such as whether it is meant to declare justification through Christ to be without the aid of the Law - "sine legis adminiculo" (Calvin) - or to exclude all legal works, done before, or even after justification, from any share in the office of justification. However true these positions may be, what is said here seems simply to mean that God's righteousness has been manifested in Christ in a different way, and on a different principle, from that of law. The principle of law is to enjoin and forbid, and to require complete obedience; but law, even as exhibited in the Divine Law of the Jews, has been shown to fail to enable man thus to attain to δικαιοσύνη; therefore, apart from this exacting principle, the righteousness of God is now revealed to man, embracing him in itself. The absence of the article before νόμου here, and its insertion in the latter clause of the same verse, where the Mosaic Law is definitely referred to, is fully explained by what has been said above under Romans 2:13. Being witnessed, etc., is introduced parenthetically by way of intimating that this manifestation of God's righteousness, though "apart from law," is not in any opposition to the teaching of the Law and the prophets, being, in fact, anticipated by them. The proof of this appears afterwards in ch. 4.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(21-26) This then introduces the solemn enunciation, repeated more fully from Romans 1:16-17, of the great subject of the Epistle, the declaration of that new scheme by which, through Christ, God had removed the guilt which the Law (whether Jewish or any other) could not remove.(21-22) Such was the condition of the world up to the coming of Christ. But now, in contrast with the previous state of things, a new system has appeared upon the scene. In this system law is entirely put on one side, though the system itself was anticipated in and is attested by those very writings in which the Law was embodied. Law is now superseded, the great end of the Law, the introduction of righteousness, being accomplished in another way, viz., through faith in Christ, by which a state of righteousness is superinduced upon all believers.(21) But now.--In these latter days. The Apostle conceives of the history of the world as divided into periods; the period of the Gospel succeeds that of the Law, and to it the Apostle and his readers belong. (Comp. for this conception of the gospel, as manifested at a particular epoch of time, Romans 16:25-26; Acts 17:30; Galatians 3:23; Galatians 3:25; Galatians 4:3-4; Ephesians 1:10; Ephesians 2:12-13; Colossians 1:21; Colossians 1:26; 1Timothy 2:6; 2Timothy 1:10; Hebrews 1:1; 1Peter 1:20.) . . .