I Was Once Alive, But Then I Died
Thinking about Romans 7:9-11.
I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. (Romans 7:9-11)
These few verses are rather challenging.
Three different perspectives on these verses are given from the commentaries I refer to. I will do my best to walk us through the passages and consider what’s going on.
Some think that Paul is using “I” to represent the Jews - specifically the Jews who were seeking to be justified by the Law. I don’t believe that’s what Paul is doing here - I think he’s speaking of himself. We don’t have any indication in the context to take his statement as representing the Jewish people.
“I was alive once without the law.”
When Paul was born, the Law of Moses was still in effect since Jesus had not died on the cross yet (Ephesians 2:14-16). So he was “under the Law” in one sense - so what does Paul mean by “I was alive once without the law?”
Likely, Paul refers to his early childhood before he became aware of the Law’s demands. At this point in his life,t he was “alive” spiritually speaking. Certainly, the Bible teaches the innocence of young children (Matthew 18:1-4). There comes a point in everyone’s life where they become “accountable” for the sin they have committed.
The Reviving and Deception of Sin.
The commandment was meant to bring life, brought death. Why?
Because sin came alive - and Paul died, spiritually speaking. As Paul just stated in Romans 7:8, Sin used the Law to bring death.
But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. (Romans 7:8)
Sin brought death, and it used the Law to do it. Just as the serpent had deceived Eve to sin (2 Corinthians 11:3), so Paul had been deceived.
Paul spoke very strongly of what Sin had done - it had “killed” him. This is the idea of being a murderer.
Paul continues to paint a picture of Sin as an evil, cruel, blood-thirsty tyrant.
This is starting to make more sense. I invested in a Romans commentary. :-)
A couple of tidbits. Regarding νόμος,
7:7–8 Paul begins the first two verses of 7:7–13 with a question, an answer, and an explanation. Two linguistic features in these two verses appeared earlier in Paul’s letter to Rome (and will continue to appear throughout this passage and beyond): (1) Paul uses νόμος (“law”) and ὁ νόμος (“the law”) interchangeably to mean the Mosaic law, using the noun twice in its anarthrous form and twice in its articular form in these two verses, and (2) he uses ἁμαρτία (“sin”) and ἡ ἁμαρτία (“the sin”) as a personified power that has come into human experience through Adam and is in opposition to God and his will.
["Anarthrous" refers to a noun not preceded by the article (ὁ or ἡ in this case)]
Also, regarding ἐντολῄ and more,
Two other distinctive linguistic features are highlighted in these verses for the first time: (1) Paul’s particularizing “the law” by his focus on a specific “commandment” (ἡ ἐντολῄ), which speaks against “covetousness” or “covetous desire” (ἐπιθυμία), and (2) his references to himself in a specifically personal manner by his use of the first-person singular aorist verb ἔγνων (from γινώσκω, “I know”), the first-person singular pluperfect verb ᾔδειν (from οἶδα, “I know”), and the first-person dative singular personal pronoun ἐμοί (“in me”), with these uses of the personal pronoun “I” and its verbal suffixes developed more fully in 7:9–13 (and then more fully still in 7:14–25).
So I seem to have been rather off-course. That is not unusual, when the text is this complex.
These Greek texts of Paul's letters express his thoughts in ways that English cannot do in a comparable number of words. Bible publisher do not -- and realistically cannot -- translate many such passages "well". That task is left to technical commentaries like this one, that work from the original language texts. These excerpts are, by the way, from _New International Greek Testament Commentary: Romans_ by Richard N. Longenecker.
I see that I have a rather long way to go with chapter 7, but some of the confusion created by condensing the Greek into English is already beginning to clear away. I don't expect to find anything especially new and profound, but it would be great to be able to read it as it was intended to be read. I have already done that with certain other passages. I memorized Mt. 6:9-13 in the Greek.
Learning the Greek at this level is something that is available to many, for a commitment of time and practice. And a bit of money. You don't have to learn the language at a seminary class level. There are software tools that can make it accessible for personal use without nearly as much study and memorization. I've wanted to learn since teenage, but it took me over 40 years to actually get around to it.
Rather challenging? Yes. "I was" in "I was alive once without the law" is emphatically singular, and I wouldn't put much stock in a comment that says otherwise. I see a little bit of a rhyming pattern in the Greek words used to connect then/now segments of the passage, and I wonder about that. The entire passage needs to be viewed as a whole, and that is difficult to do. Paul and his long thoughts!
I think there may be more clues in vv. 14-20 and following, but I could spend all day with this just trying to connect things, and I don't have all day. To make things more interesting, Paul here employs two very different words translated "do". One may have a meaning more toward "undertaking to do" while the other may be more toward actually accomplishing a thing. I don't know. My mind says "go have lunch".