Romans 4
Paul takes the founding figure of Jewish identity and demonstrates that faith — not circumcision, not law — is what made Abraham righteous before God.
Summary
Romans 4 is an extended piece of scriptural exegesis focused on Genesis. Paul's argument is that the great ancestor of the Jewish people, Abraham, was declared righteous by God on the basis of faith — Genesis 15:6, and he believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness — and that this happened before either of the other two distinctives of Israel's identity was in place. Abraham was not yet circumcised when Genesis 15 takes place; circumcision comes in Genesis 17. And the Mosaic law was given four centuries after Abraham. The timing is not incidental in Paul's reading. It is decisive. Abraham was reckoned righteous as a Gentile, as an uncircumcised man who had no law to keep. He is therefore the father not only of the circumcised but of all who share his faith — Gentile and Jew alike — on exactly the same basis.
The second half of the chapter draws out the analogy between Abraham's faith and Christian faith. Abraham's specific act of trust, as Paul reads it, was believing that God could give him a child through the dead womb of Sarah and his own body as good as dead — he did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, now as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. He grew strong in faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. The God Abraham trusted is the God who gives life to the dead and calls into existence things that do not exist. And Christians trust the same God for the same kind of impossible act — the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness; the same will be counted to those who believe in the God who raised Jesus.
- 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.