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tion on your account be rendered void in this particular, that you may 4 be (as I have been telling them you would be) prepared"; lest haply, should any Macedonians accompany me and find you unprepared, we (not 5 to say, you) might be put to shame over this confidence. I have therefore considered it needful to appeal to the brothers to go on to you and make up beforehand your long-promised liberality, so that it might be ready as 6 a matter of liberality and not of grudging avarice. Mark this!

He who sows sparingly, sparingly shall he also reap: And he who sows liberally, liberally shall he also reap. 7 Let each one give as he has determined in his heart, without any 8 regret or compulsion. For it is a cheerful giver that God loves. And God has the power of making all grace abound to you, that on all sides, at all times, in all ways, you may have sufficient, and have ample for every good 9 work even as it is written,

He scatters abroad, he gives to the poor;

His charity lasts for ever.

10 Now he who supplies the sower with seed and with bread for food, shall supply and multiply your seed, and make the fruits of your charity grow— 11 as on all sides you become enriched to all generosity, generosity that 12 results in thanksgiving being offered through us to God. For the ministering of this service not merely supplies the wants of the saints, but also 13 abounds through many a thanksgiving to God. Through the proof afforded by this ministry you cause God to be magnified for your submission in confessing the gospel of Christ and for the generosity of your 14 contribution to them and to all, while they too pray for you and long for 15 you on account of the surpassing grace of God that is with you. Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift!

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Farewell, then, brothers: be at harmony, be encouraged, be of the same mind, be at peace. So shall the God of love and peace be with you. Salute one another with a saints' kiss.

All the saints salute you.

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the holy Spirit be with you all.

ROMANS.

The epistle to the Romans marks the exact point at which controversy resolves itself naturally into dogma. The apostle's doctrine, disentangled from external incidents, is raised to a higher level and attains a freer and fuller development. Escaping from the violent antithesis by which it was hitherto dominated, it tends towards a general and culminating synthesis. Paul at last brings Judaism and Paganism within the scope of his contemplation. He is not content to contrast them with his gospel, and to condemn them purely and simply; he endeavours to understand them in their historical function and actual value, to assign them their due place as transitional but essential stages in the Divine plan of redemption. In this manner the new circle of Pauline thought is enlarged and completed. Having taken possession of the sphere of the conscience, it conquers the domain of history. The epistle to the Romans is the first attempt at what we should call, in modern phrase, a philosophy of the religious history of mankind.-Sabatier.

11-17 Introduction.

118-521 Dogmatic: Uprightness, missed by Paganism and

331-425

51-11

512-21

6-8

9-11

Judaism,

attainable by faith in Christ. Evidence

for this in

the OT and the Law-the

problem of Abraham

and his faith,

the Christian experience,

the history of humanity—

Adam and Jesus.

Obligations of this Christian freedom:

the problem of sin,

the problem of the moral law.

The career of life in the Christian spirit.

The problem of Israel rejection of Israel in relation

:

to God's purpose and justice

its cause and significance.

12-14 Ethical: A cycle of Christian duties and relationships

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1514-33 Personal: Object of epistle: coming visit to Rome.

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ROMANS

1 1 PAUL, a slave of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the 2 gospel of God-which he formerly promised by his prophets in holy 3 scriptures-concerning his Son, who was born of David's offspring 4 according to the flesh, and installed as Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection of the dead; even Jesus Christ 5 our Lord, through whom we received the favour of being commissioned 6 to secure obedience to the faith for his name's sake among all the nations, 7 among whom you yourselves are also, called to be Jesus Christ's:

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to all who are in Rome, God's beloved ones, called to be saints;
grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ.

At the very outset, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, 9 because your faith is proclaimed through the whole world. For God, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, is my witness, that 10 without ceasing I always make mention of you in my prayers, entreating that some day at last I may be sped upon my way to you by the will of 11 God. For I am yearning to see you that I may impart to you some 12 spiritual privilege, so that you may be established; that is, so that I also 13 may be comforted among you, I by your faith as you by mine. I would not have you ignorant, brothers, that I often purposed to come to you (yet up till now I have been prevented) to possess some fruit among 14 you as well as among the rest of the nations. To Greeks and to bar15 barians, to wise and to foolish, I am debtor. Hence my eagerness to 16 preach the gospel to you in Rome as well. For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is God's power for salvation to every one who believes, to the 17 Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it God's uprightness is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written: Now by faith shall the upright live.

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For God's wrath is revealed from heaven against all the impiety and 19 iniquity of men who impede the truth by iniquity; inasmuch as what is to be known of God is disclosed to them. God himself disclosed it to 20 them; for from the creation of the world his invisible things, his everlasting power and divinity, are clearly seen, understood through the 21 things of his workmanship. So they are without excuse, inasmuch as they knew God yet neither honoured him as God nor gave him thanks. They were befooled as they reasoned, and their ignorant heart was dark22, 23 ened; pretending to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the majesty of the imperishable God for the likeness of an image of perishing man, of 24 birds, of things fourfooted and creeping. Wherefore God gave

them up in the desires of their hearts to impurity, to dishonour their 25 bodies among themselves-men who had exchanged the truth of God for what is false, worshipping and serving the created rather than the Creator, 26 who is blessed for ever: Amen. Therefore God gave them up to vile passions their women exchanged the sexual use that is natural for the

27 unnatural; and so too the men, abandoning the natural use of the woman, flamed up in their lust for one another, men perpetrating unseemliness with men and receiving within themselves the due recom28 pense of their error. And as they disdained to keep God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do what is un29 befitting, filled with all iniquity, wickedness, covetousness, and malice, full of envy, murder, quarrelling, deceit, and malignity, slanderers, 30 defamers, loathed by God, outrageous, haughty, braggarts, devisers of 31 evil, disobedient to their parents, ignorant, untrue to their word, without 32 natural affection, unmerciful-men aware of God's ordinance, that those who practise such things deserve death, yet not only themselves doing the very things, but also applauding those who practise them.

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Wherefore thou art without excuse, O man, whoever thou art that judgest; in judging the other man thou art condemning thyself, for thou 2 that judgest art practising the very things. We know that the doom of God falls justly upon those who practise such things.

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And dost thou imagine, O man, who judgest those who practise such things and doest the same thyself,

That thou shalt escape the doom of God?

Or art thou despising the riches of his kindness and forbearance and long-suffering,

Not knowing that the kindness of God points thee to repentance? With thy stubbornness and impenitent heart thou art laying up wrath for thyself

At the day of wrath, when the just doom of God is revealed: Who will render to every man according to his works,

To those who patiently in good work seek praise and honour and the imperishable,

eternal life;

But to those who factiously disobey the truth and moreover obey

iniquity,

anger

and wrath

Distress and calamity fall upon every human soul that perpetrates evil,
Upon the Jew first and also upon the Greek :

But praise and honour and peace are for everyone who does what
is good,

For the Jew first and also for the Greek.

For with God there is no respect of persons.

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All who have sinned apart from law,

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Apart from law shall they also perish :

And all who have sinned under law,

By law shall they be condemned.

For those who hear law are not upright before God,

It is those that obey law who shall be justified [For when Gentiles who have no law obey by nature the requirement of the law, they are a 15 law to themselves, although they have no law-men who show written in their hearts the work required by the law; while their conscience also bears witness to it, indeed their thoughts accuse or it may be defend them, 16 one with another] in the day when God judges the secrets of men, according to my gospel, by Jesus Christ.

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But if thou bearest the name of "Jew," relying on the law, exulting 18 in God, knowing his will, prizing the things that transcend, getting in19 struction from the law, and confident that thou art thyself a guide to the 20 blind, a light to those in darkness, a corrector of the stupid, a teacher of

children, since in the law thou hast the embodiment of knowledge and 21 truth-well then, thou teacher of another person, teachest thou not 22 thyself? thou preacher against stealing, dost thou steal? thou forbidder

of adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou detester of idols, dost thou 23 rob temples? thou who art exulting in the law, art thou transgressing the 24 law and dishonouring God? Why, it is

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owing to you that God's name is maligned among the Gentiles, even as it is written;

Circumcision is indeed of use, if thou art observing the law:

But if thou art transgressing the law, thy circumcision is turned to uncircumcision.

If then the Uncircumcision keep the ordinance of the law,

shall not its uncircumcision be reckoned as circumcision?

And shall not the Uncircumcision which by nature fulfils the law judge thee who with written law and circumcision art a transgressor of the law?

He is no Jew who is one outwardly,

nor is circumcision something outward in the flesh:

He is a Jew who is one inwardly,

and circumcision is of the heart, wrought by the spirit not by the written law,

whose praise is of God, not of men.

What is the Jew's advantage, then? or, what is the use of circum2 cision? Much in every way. This at the outset : that the oracles of God 3 were intrusted to them. What though some were unfaithful? is their 4 faithlessness to annul the faithfulness of God? God forbid ! let God be truthful, but every man perfidious; even as it is written,

That thou mightest be vindicated in what thou sayest,

And win when thou art on trial.

5 But if our iniquity establishes God's justice, what shall we say? Is God unjust because he inflicts wrath? (I use a merely human way of 6,7 speaking.) God forbid! otherwise how is he to judge the world? If through my perfidy the truth of God redounded to his honour, says one, 8 why am I too still judged then to be a sinner? why not (as we are slanderously reported-and as some people declare we say) "let us do evil that good may come"? Such conduct is justly condemned.

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What then? are we better off? Not at all. For against Jews as well as Greeks we have already brought the charge that all are under sin; 10 even as it is written,

There is none upright, not one;

There is none to understand, none to seek after God;

All have swerved, have turned bad together,

There is none to show kindness, not so much as one.

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An open sepulchre is their throat,

With their tongues have they deceived,

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Venom of asps is under their lips—

Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness,

Swift are their feet to shed blood,

Destruction and calamity are in their ways,

And the way of peace they have not known;

There is no fear of God before their eyes.

19 Now we know in all that the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped and all the world 20 brought under the judgment of God; inasmuch as in his sight no flesh

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