Romans 13
Be subject to the governing authorities — the most contested instruction in the letter — and the debt that can never be fully paid: owe no one anything except to love one another.
Summary
Romans 13:1-7 is the most debated passage in the practical chapters of Romans. Paul instructs every person to be subject to the governing authorities, because there is no authority except from God — all existing authority has been instituted by him. The one who resists the governing authority resists God's appointment, and resistance will bring judgment. The governing authority is God's servant for the good of the one who does right; it bears the sword to execute God's wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore pay taxes, owe respect, give honor where honor is due. The passage was written for a small and vulnerable community in Rome in the 50s CE, and Paul's concern is the peace of a minority group in the imperial capital. The verses have been used, across nineteen centuries, to justify obedience to regimes Paul himself could never have endorsed, and they have been argued over by every generation of Christian political thought since Augustine.
Verse 8 pivots to a principle that governs the whole practical section: owe no one anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. Paul then summarizes the second table of the Decalogue — you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet — and any other commandment, in the single word: love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. The chapter closes with eschatological urgency: the hour has come to wake from sleep; salvation is nearer than when we first believed; the night is far gone; the day is at hand. Lay aside the works of darkness; put on the armor of light; make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires. The practical instruction is grounded, at every point, in the expected return of Christ.
- Romans 1Chapter 1 is the opening of a long letter to a community Paul did not found and has not yet visited.
- Romans 2Chapter 2 is the turn in Paul's argument.
- Romans 3Chapter 3 is the hinge of the letter's first movement.
- Romans 4Chapter 4 is Paul's exegetical demonstration of justification by faith, built entirely from the figure of Abraham.
- Romans 5Chapter 5 opens the second major movement of the letter (chapters 5-8), which draws out the consequences of the justification argued in chapters 1-4.
- Romans 6Chapter 6 opens with Paul's most pointed rhetorical question: Shall we continue in sin so that grace may abound? The question follows logically from the last verse of chapter 5, where he said grace abounds where sin increases, and it is the objection he expects.
- Romans 7Chapter 7 addresses the role of the law in the new life.
- Romans 8Chapter 8 is the climax Paul has been building toward since chapter 1.
- Romans 9Chapter 9 opens the three-chapter meditation on Israel — the hardest sustained argument in the letter.
- Romans 10Chapter 10 continues the argument of chapter 9 but shifts from divine sovereignty to human responsibility.
- Romans 11Chapter 11 brings the three-chapter meditation on Israel to its resolution.
- Romans 12Chapter 12 opens the practical movement of the letter with the word therefore, gathering everything from chapters 1-11 into a single imperative.
- Romans 13Chapter 13 contains the verses that have generated more controversy in the history of Romans' reception than any other passage in the letter.
- Romans 14Chapter 14 addresses a concrete dispute in the Roman church.
- Romans 15Chapter 15 continues directly from chapter 14.
- Romans 16Chapter 16 is the longest closing greeting in any of Paul's letters.