Romans 6:12-14, Commentary (Now with More Ancient Greek Ethico-Psychology!)
Dec 11th, 2009 by Micah Tillman | Start the Discussion |
[ Romans 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6: Intro, 1-5, 6-11, 12-14, 15-18 ]
12 Therefore, do not let sin exercise dominion in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions. 13 No longer present your members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and present your members to God as instruments of righteousness. 14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
6:12– The topic of “dominion” recurs here. Paul brought it up first back in 5:14, apparently referring to the fact that humanity was given dominion over the earth, and then deserted their post (as it were), by trying to take up God’s post.
Thus, instead of exercising dominion over the world, humans subjected themselves to the dominion of sin.
Whatever that means. (Hopefully we’ll figure it out.)
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The second thing to note in this verse is that while “you” is plural (and there’s only one “you” in the verse), “body” is singular. Therefore, it would seem that the NRSV should read:
Therefore, do not let sin exercise dominion in y’all’s mortal body, so as to obey its passions
I don’t know that that actually makes any difference, but it’s kind of interesting.
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Anyway, Paul is claiming that if his listeners give sin dominion over them, the result will be that they will obey the desires or emotions of something mortal (rather than obeying the decrees of something eternal?).
This was a huge concern for the Founding Fathers of Greek philosophy.
Plato and Aristotle both based their ethical theories on the idea that the human soul has a certain order or hierarchy. It has a higher part, and a lower part.
The higher part of the soul is rational, the lower part is irrational (which didn’t mean “bad” for them, like it means for us nowadays).
The higher part gives us the ability to think. The lower part gives us the ability to feel emotions and have desires/experience revulsion. That kind of thing. (“Fighting gangs for local charities. That kind of thing.” Oh! What movie!?)
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To have a virtuous soul, for Plato and Aristotle, is to have a soul in which the part that should rule actually does rule, and the part that should follow actually does follow.
That is, a virtuous soul is one in which all the parts recognize and abide by the natural hierarchy of the soul.
Thus, the virtuous soul is one in which the rational part of the soul (the part that sees truths and can engage in reasoning with and thinking about those truths) is in charge, and the irrational part of the soul cooperates (by giving us joy in doing what the rational part of the soul sees as being the right way to act, and by making us desire to do what the rational part tells us we should do).
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A vicious soul, on the other hand, is a soul in which the rational part of the soul purposefully submits itself to the irrational part of the soul.
That is, rather than seeking out the truth, and then spurring the irrational part of the soul to enjoy and desire doing what the truth demands, the rational part of the soul simply seeks to figure out the most efficient ways to fulfill the desires of the irrational part of the soul.
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There is nothing wrong with “passion,” “emotion,” “desire,” etc. according to Plato and Aristotle.
What is wrong is when we have passion for what we shouldn’t, when we feel the wrong emotions for the wrong reasons at the wrong times, when we desire the wrong things, or desire things wrongly (too much, too little, at the wrong times, for the wrong reasons), etc.
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And, both Plato and Aristotle agree, the irrational part of the soul tends to go astray without a proper guide.
Something has to inform the irrational part of the soul about the truth of things, in order for it to have the correct passions, emotions, and desires, in the correct ways, at the correct times, etc.
Otherwise, the irrational part of the soul is just driving blind (and therefore is likely to take you off the cliff).
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Therefore, Plato and Aristotle both argue that the irrational part of your soul should be guided by the rational part of your soul.
The rational part of your soul, in turn, should be guided by eternal truths.
That is, the “passions” of “your mortal body” should submit to the guidance of what is eternal.
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I must say once again, however, that this means that the irrational part of the soul should give us passions for doing what we know we should do, not that we should not have passions at all!
Aristotle, for example, insists that you’re not a virtuous person unless you enjoy doing the right thing at the right time in the right way, etc. (The life of virtue is a life of pleasure — and of even greater pleasure than any other kind of life!)
For the passions to submit to reason is for them to cooperate with reason and to motivate us to do what is right. It is not for the passions to disappear, and thereby for us to become passionless!
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Anyway, it seems to me that Paul is appealing to his listeners’ knowledge of Ancient Greek psychology and ethics when he says that to give sin dominion is to obey the passions of your mortal body.
If that’s the case, what he’s saying is that when you let sin control you, you end up following a blind guide — your passions. Passion isn’t bad, it just can’t see truth, and therefore cannot lead. It is a natural born follower and encourager, not a natural born leader.
Why, then, would you want to put your soul in that state? This is what Paul is implicitly asking, I would claim.
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6:13– The words “wickedness” and “righteousness” could just as well been translated “injustice” and “justice.” That’s how we would translate them in a philosophical text, anyway.
To be just/righteous was, for the Greeks, to be in line with the general order of the universe. (See After Virtue, by MacIntyre.) It was for your soul and actions to be properly ordered, and therefore properly reflective of the true order of things.
It was for you to recognize what was more important as being more important, and to recognize what was less important as being less important, and for you to act accordingly.
To be just or righteous, in other words, was for you to be true to the way things really are, not only in your thoughts, but in your actions and emotions. It was for you to not misrepresent things by how you thought, felt, and acted about them.
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Now, the question we have to ask is what kind of “of” is being used in the phrases “instruments of wickedness” and “instruments of righteousness.”
Are the “ofs” genitives of possession or genitives of definition? (Do I have my terms right there?)
That is, does wickedness and righteousness own your members, using them as instruments, or do your members produce wickedness and righteousness?
I would argue that the Greek philosophical context should lead us to read the “ofs” as genitives of definition (if that’s the right term). Your members are “of” wickedness if they create wickedness, and are “of” righteousness if they create righteousness.
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This reading is further supported by the fact that Paul says we “present” our members either to sin or to God.
If we present them to sin, they are used to create wickedness. If we present them to God, they are used to create righteousness.
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But what does it mean to create wickedness?
It means to put things out of order; it means to organize and prioritize and arrange things (i.e., thoughts, actions, emotions, desires, objects, people, etc.) in a way that does not reveal the true order of things.
And what does it mean to create righteousness?
It means to put things into order; it means to organize and prioritize and arrange things (i.e., thoughts, actions, emotions, desires, objects, people, etc.) in a way that does reveal the true order of things.
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Between Paul’s instructions to his listeners to not to let their members be used to create wickedness, and to let their members be used to create righteousness, he tells them to present themselves to God as having been brought to life out of death.
Sin, after all, is deadly. To submit to sin, therefore, is to commit suicide.
But if Paul’s listeners have taken on Christ’s states, they have taken on the state of being raised to life out of death. And therefore they should “present” themselves to God in this light.
That is, they should represent themselves to God as being what they are. They shouldn’t lie to God about their status as living beings. They shouldn’t pretend that they are dead (i.e., that they are under the dominion of sin).
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In other words, Paul is instructing his listeners to be truthful both with sin and with God.
They shouldn’t lie to sin by misrepresenting their members as things that are to be used for creating disorder. That’s not what their members are for at all, and therefore they shouldn’t misrepresent their members.
(They shouldn’t misrepresent them even to sin!? It’s not that sin has the right to be told the truth. It’s just that people shouldn’t be liars/fakers.)
Instead, they should represent themselves to God as being what they are, and therefore represent their members as being for what they are in fact for.
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6:14– Here the word for “have dominion over” is more literally “be lord over.”
Evidently, if you are under the law, sin can be lord over you, but if you are under grace, sin can’t be lord over you.
Somehow, being under the law makes you vulnerable, and being under grace makes you invulnerable? It is simply impossible for sin to be your lord if you are under grace, evidently.
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Here one wants to ask, “What does it mean to be ‘under’ either law or grace?”
Evidently it means something like “to obey” or “to follow,” or, perhaps “to be obliged to obey” or “to be obliged to follow.”
But can that really be what Paul means? After all, he’s not arguing that people are no longer obliged to follow the Law, but rather that coming from the group of people to whom the Law was given doesn’t make you automatically better than coming from the group of people to whom the Law wasn’t given.
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Perhaps what Paul is saying here, therefore, is that the Law isn’t the authority. It’s the giver of the Law who is the authority, and the giver of the Law has also given Paul’s listeners grace.
The word for “grace” in Greek, after all, is “charis.” And “charis” means something like “good thing” or “gift” (cf. “charity,” “charisma,” “charismatic”).
So, maybe Paul is trying to focus his listeners on the Giver, rather than making the gifts the priority.
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Or maybe Paul is highlighting God’s attitude toward his listeners. Since the Law isn’t primary, and since Jesus frees Paul’s listeners from the consequences of sin (i.e., frees them from death, in some sense), God’s relationship to them is not that of condemning judge.
Instead, God’s relationship to them is that of a giver of charity.
Maybe?
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Or perhaps Paul is pointing out that since his listeners don’t become righteous through following the Law, but through faith. Therefore, if you try to become righteous by following the Law, you inevitably fail, and remain a sinner. However, by accepting God’s gift of righteousness frees you from sin.
Maybe?
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Or maybe Paul is saying that Jesus — in bringing grace — has reminded us that grace has always been prior to Law. And this defuses our tendency to respond to the Law with rebellion (i.e., sin), which Paul will talk about later.
Maybe?
[ Romans 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6: Intro, 1-5, 6-11, 12-14, 15-18 ]
