Romans. Craig S. Keener
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1:21–22). They did not “approve” (from dokimazō) God in their knowledge, so God gave them “unapproved” (adokimos) minds to do “unfitting” things.99 For Paul, humanity’s distortion of the truth about God’s character leads to their distortion of the purpose of human sexuality, and ultimately to every kind of vice. As he will point out later, though, retaining true knowledge about God’s standards by the law makes one responsible for sin, rather than saving one (2:20; 7:23–25; 8:5–8).
Paul then lists examples of the “unfitting” things produced by this depraved mind, what he will later call the perspective of the flesh (8:5–8). Ancient moralists commonly used vice lists,100 sometimes arranged with repetitions to rhetorically drive home the point. Paul’s is longer than average, though far briefer than some. His rhetorical repetition and variation makes the list all the more effective: “filled with” four basic evils; “full of” five sins; a summary of eight kinds of sinners; and deficiency in four positive traits (1:29–31).101 Whereas Jewish people could relegate idolatry and homosexual intercourse to the corrupted ideologies of Gentiles, the present sins also appear in lists of Jewish misbehavior: envy, strife, gossip, slander, arrogance, disobedience to parents, and so forth. By the end of his list, Paul has inductively convicted both Jews and Gentiles as being under sin (he might do so deductively in 3:9–19), paving the way for his argument in ch. 2.
Paul shows that humanity rightly stands under the sentence of death (1:32). For though they technically should know better (1:19–20; cf. 2:14–15), they do what they know to be worthy of death (the way of the fleshly worldview, which yields death, 8:6).102 Those who refused to approve God in their thinking (1:28) now approve others who share their own behavior (1:32). God’s “righteous standard” or “requirement,”103 however, demands capital punishment for all transgressors, whether idolaters or gossipers and (most relevant for Paul’s continuing argument in 2:17, 23; 3:27, albeit with different terminology) boasters.
1. For purpose statements as titles, see Porphyry Ar. Cat. 57.15–19. Because 1:16–17 is not explicit that it so functions, however, ancient commentators (in contrast to modern ones) do not seem to have identified it as such.
2. Weima 2000: 328; Aune 1987: 163. This is true even when orators write the letters (e.g., Seneca Controv. 2.pref. intro).
3. See Stowers 1986: 20–21, 66. Paul’s expansions reflect rhetorical interest (Anderson 1999: 113) and are unusual (Anderson 1999: 207 n. 45); for connections to the letter body, cf. Wuellner 1976: 335.
4. See e.g., Rhet. Alex. 29, 1436a, lines 33–39; Dionysius of Halicarnassus Lys. 24; Seneca Controv. 1.pref.21; Quintilian Inst. 4.1.35. Outside speeches, see e.g., Polybius 3.1.3—3.5.9; 11.1.4–5; Dionysius of Halicarnassus Thuc. 19; Virgil Aen. 1.1–6; Aulus Gellius Noct. att. pref. 25.
5. Paul’s Roman name itself was most often a Roman cognomen usually belonging to Roman citizens and typically associated with high status (cf. Judge 1982: 36 n. 20). Roman Jews usually avoided using their full (three-part) Roman names, and most letters omit such full names anyway, but Romans would likely infer Paul’s citizen status (cf. Rapske 1994: 85–86; Lüdemann 1989: 241). Paul’s own interest, however, is in communicating his divinely ordained mission.
6. See discussion and sources on ancient slavery in e.g., Keener 2003b: 448–49, 748; see also Martin 1990 (positively, see esp. 47–49, 55–56); Buckland 1908; Barrow 1968. For “slaves of God” as a positive image in Judaism, see Hezser 2003: 418–20.
7. See Aune 2003: 347; but cf. BDF §464.
8. Reusing earlier poetry was common (Menander Rhetor 2.4.393, lines 9–12), and many argue forcefully that Paul draws here on a pre-Pauline tradition (Beasley-Murray 1980: 147–54; Dunn 1988: 1:5; Jewett 2007: 24–25, 97–108); their evidence allows this usage but need not require it (see Poythress 1976; Moo 1996: 45–46; Haacker 2003: 108–9; Anderson 1999: 207 n. 45). Paul might simply shift to grand epideictic style, appropriate to discussing the sublime or deities, when elaborating Christology. At the least it cannot be a “hymn,” since it lacks meter.
9. The contrast between “flesh” and “Spirit” here lays emphasis on the divine empowerment involved in the latter (see 8:4, 5, 6, 9, 13). It does not denigrate the fleshly relationship, but relativizes its importance (cf. 4:1; 9:3, 5), perhaps why Paul rarely emphasizes this aspect of messiahship relevant to his contemporaries (but cf. also Mark 12:35–37).
10. On horizō as “appointed” or “established” with reference to Jesus, see also Acts 10:42; 17:31.
11. Although not relevant exclusively to Rome, this central message of Jesus as Israel’s messianic ruler would reaffirm Roman believers who had apparently already suffered for that claim (Suetonius Claud. 25.4; see our introduction). It also contrasted with the “merely procedural” deifications of Roman emperors (Elliott 2008: 71–72).
12. In the second of the “Eighteen Benedictions” (cf. m. Roš Haš. 4:5); similarly in later Islam (Qur’an 42.9; 46.33; 57.2). Contrast pagan deities (e.g., Ovid Metam. 2.617–18).
13. “Spirit of holiness” may associate the Spirit with being set apart for God (1 Thess 4:7–8; cf. Dunn 1970: 105–6; Smith 2006: 98; Keener 1997: 8–10) but is also simply a good Semitic way of speaking of the “Holy Spirit” (for both concepts together, cf. e.g., 1QS 3.7; 4.21).
14. For the Spirit and resurrection, see also m. Sotah 9:15.
15. Some take “among the Gentiles” as indicating that they were predominantly Gentile. Literally, it might simply locate them in the Diaspora; one may infer their largely Gentile status, however, in 1:13–15.
16. Cf. also discussion in Schlatter 1995: 11; Jewett 2007: 110. For the nations’ promised obedience, cf. Gen 49:10; Isa 45:14; 49:23; 60:14. Paul’s vision of Gentiles’ incorporation as Abraham’s children (see ch. 4) contrasts with the empire’s subjugation of nations (see Lopez 2008).
17. Schreiner (1998: 23, 35–36) rightly emphasizes the centrality of God’s glory and honor in this letter. See e.g., Rom 1:21, 23; 2:24; 3:23; 4:20; 9:17, 23; 11:36; 14:6; 15:6–9.
18. Although the churches in Rome may not have been more unified at this time than Rome’s synagogues were, we should not read much into Paul’s lack of mention of