question has indeed a peculiar force, as it affirms the certainty of what is spoken; for it shows that
it was not a thing new or unknown to any of them, but acknowledged equally by them all.
(For to those who know the law I speak.) This parenthesis is to be taken in the same sense with
the question, as though he had said — that he knew that they were not so unskilful in the law as to
entertain any doubt on the subject. And though both sentences might be understood of all laws, it
is yet better to take them as referring to the law of God, which is the subject that is discussed. There
are some who think that he ascribes knowledge of the law to the Romans, because the largest part
of the world was under their power and government; but this is puerile: for he addressed in part the
Jews or other strangers, and in part common and obscure individuals; nay, he mainly regarded the
Jews, with whom he had to do respecting the abrogation of the law: and lest they should think that
he was dealing captiously with them, he declares that he took up a common principle, known to
them all, of which they could by no means be ignorant, who had from their childhood been brought
up in the teaching of the law.
2.For a woman subject to a man,etc. He brings a similitude, by which he proves, that we are
so loosed from the law, that it does not any longer, properly and by its own right, retain over us
any authority: and though he could have proved this by other reasons, yet as the example of marriage
was very suitable to illustrate the subject, he introduced this comparison instead of evidence to
prove his point. But that no one may be puzzled, because the different parts of the comparison do
not altogether correspond, we are to be reminded, that the Apostle designedly intended, by a little
change, to avoid the invidiousness of a stronger expression. He might have said, in order to make
the comparison complete, “A woman after the death of her husband is loosed from the bond of
marriage: the law, which is in the place of a husband to us, is to us dead; then we are freed from
its power.” But that he might not offend the Jews by the asperity of his expressions, had he said
that the law was dead, he adopted a digression, and said, that we are dead to the law^202 To some
indeed he appears to reason from the less to the greater: however, as I fear that this is too strained,
I approve more of the first meaning, which is simpler. The whole argument then is formed in this
manner “The woman is bound to her living husband by the law, so that she cannot be the wife of
another; but after the death of her husband she is loosed from the bond of his law so, that she is
free to marry whom she pleases.”
Then follows the application, —
The law was, as it were our husband,
under whose yoke we were kept until it became dead to us:
After the death of the law Christ received us, that is, he joined us,
(^202) This is a plausible reason, derived from Theodoret and Chrysostom; but hardly necessary. Commentators have felt much
embarrassed in applying the illustration given here. The woman is freed by the death of the husband; but the believer is represented
as freed by dying himself. This does not correspond: and if we attend to what the Apostle says, we shall see that he did not
contemplate such a correspondence. Let us notice how he introduces the illustration; “the law,” he says in the first verse, “rules,
or exercises authority, over a man while he lives;” and then let us observe the application in Romans 7:4, where he speaks of
our dying to the law The main design of the illustration then was, to show that there is no freedom from a law but by death; so
that there is no necessity of a correspondence in the other parts, As in the case of man and wife, death destroys the bond of
marriage; so in the case of man and the law, that is, the law as the condition of life, there must be a death; else there is no freedom.
But there is one thing more in the illustration, which the Apostle adopts, the liberty to marry another, when death has given a
release: The bond of connection being broken, a union with another is legitimate. So far only is the example adduced to be
applied — death puts an end to the right and authority of law; and then the party released may justly form another connection.
It is the attempt to make all parts of the comparison to correspond that has occasioned all the difficulty. — Ed.