Romans 8:3

what the law could not do Lit. the Impossible of the Law. What was this? The answer lies in Romans 8:4. The Law could not procure the "fulfilment" of its own "legal claim;" could not make its subjects "live after the Spirit." This was beyond its power, as it was never within its scope: it had to prescribe duty, not to supply motive. Here, obviously, the Law is the Moral Code; just alluded to as inseparably connected with sin and death in its effects (apart from Redemption) on fallen man.

in that it was weak Better, in which it was weak. It was "weak" (i.e. "powerless," in fact,) "inits impossibility" (see last note); in the direction, in the matter, of producing holiness of soul.

through the flesh The construction is instrumental;the flesh was, as it were, the instrument by which sin made the Law powerlessto sanctify. Observe how St Paul here again (as in Romans 7:7, &c.) guards the honour of the Law; laying the whole blame of the failure on the subjectwith which it deals. On "the flesh" see below, on Romans 8:4.

God Not in antithesis to "the Law," which, equally with grace, is from Him. The antithesis to the Law here is the whole idea of the Gift and Work of His Son.

his own Son So Romans 8:32; though the Gr. is not precisely identical. In both places the emphasis is on the Divine nearness and dearness between the Giver and the Given One. The best commentary is such passages as John 1:1; John 1:18; Colossians 1:13-20; Hebrews 1:1-4.

in the likeness of sinful flesh Lit. in the likeness of the flesh of sin; i.e. of the flesh which is, in us, inseparably connected with sin. The Apostle is careful not to say "in sinful flesh;" for "in Him was no sin" as to His whole sacred being. But neither does he say "the likeness of flesh," which might seem to mean that the flesh was unreal. The Eternal Son took real "flesh," (John 1:14; Romans 9:5; Colossians 1:22; &c., &c.;) and it was "like" to our "flesh of sin" in that it was liable to all such needs and infirmities as, not sinful in themselves, are to us occasions of sinning. He felt the strain of those conditions which, in us, lead to sin. See Hebrews 4:15. This is kept in view here (by the phrase "flesh of sin") because the victory over sin in its own strongholdis in question.

and for sin The Gr. preposition is one specially used in sacrificial connexions in LXX. Sin-offerings are frequently there called "for-sins," (to translate literally). So in the quotation Hebrews 10:8. We are prepared for a sacrificial phrase here, not only by the idea of Substitution so often before us in the previous Chapter s, but by the explicit passage Romans 3:25.

condemned sin i.e. in act:He didjudgment upon it. Perhaps the ideas of disgrace and deposition are both in the phrase: the sacrifice of the Incarnate Son both exposed the malignity of sin and procured the breaking of its power. But the idea of executed penaltyis at least the leading one: Christ as the Sin-offering bore "the curse;" (see Galatians 3:13;) sin, in His blessed humanity, (representing our "flesh of sin,") was punished; and this, (as is immediately shewn,) with a view to our deliverance from the powerof sin, both by bringing to new light the love and loveliness of God, and by meriting the gift of the Holy Ghost to make the sight effectual. (See ch. Romans 5:1; Romans 5:5.)

in the flesh i.e. in our flesh as represented by the flesh of Christ; our sinful by His sinless flesh. Meyer and others take the words as = "in humanity in its material aspect." But through this passage the idea of the flesh is an idea connected with evil:even the Lord's flesh is "in the likenessof the flesh of sin;" and St Paul goes on at once to the hopeless antagonism of the flesh and the Spirit. It seems consistent then to refer the word here, in some sense, to the unregenerate state and element in man; to man, in fact, as unregenerate. On man as such the doom of sin behoved to fall: but in his place it was borne by his Representative, who, to do so, behoved to come "in the flesh;" "in the likeness of sinful flesh;" with thatabout Him, as part of His being, which in us is unregenerate and calls for doom. Thus the idea is of substitutionary penalty;fallen man's sinfulness was punished, but in the incarnate Manhood of the Son.