Romans 2:14-15

“ For when Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things which the law prescribes, these, having not the law, are their own law unto themselves: for they show thereby the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness to it, and their thoughts accusing or else excusing them one with another. ”

There are four principal ways of connecting Romans 2:14 with what precedes.

1. Calvin goes back to Romans 2:12 a: “The Gentiles will perish justly, though they have not the law (Romans 2:12); for they have a law in their hearts which they knowingly violate” (Romans 2:14). The explanations of Neander, de Wette, Hodge, etc. are to the same effect. But the number of important intermediate propositions and ideas intervening between this and Romans 2:12 a renders it unnatural to connect the “ for ” of Romans 2:14 with this declaration. Besides, was it necessary to prove to the Jews the righteousness of the punishment which would be inflicted on the Gentiles!

2. Meyer connects the for with the immediately preceding proposition, 13b: “It is only doers of the law who can be justified, for this rule can be applied even to the Gentiles, since they too have a law engraved on their hearts.” The connection is simple and logical. But can the apostle really mean to say that a Gentile can obtain justification by observing the law of nature? That is impossible. We should require in that case to revert to the purely abstract explanation of Romans 2:13 b, to regard it as a hypothetical maxim, and consequently to take Romans 2:14-15 as an abstract proof of an impracticable maxim. These are too many abstractions.

3. Tholuck, Lange, Schaff likewise join the for with 13b; but they hold at the same time that this for will be veritably realized: “The doers of the law shall be justified, for God will graciously take account of the relative observance of the law rendered by the Gentiles” (here might be compared Matthew 25:40; Matthew 10:41-42); so Tholuck. Or: “Those Gentiles, partial doers of the law, will certainly come one day to the faith of the gospel, by which they will be fully justified;” so Lange, Schaff. But these are expedients; for there is nothing in the text to countenance such ideas. In Romans 2:15, Paul takes pains to prove that the Gentiles have the law, but not that they observe it; and about faith in the gospel there is not a word. This could not possibly be the case if the thought were an essential link in the argument.

4. The real connection seems to me to have been explained by Philippi. The for refers to the general idea of Romans 2:13: “It is not having heard the law, as the Jews think, but having observed it, which will justify; for if the hearing of it were enough, the Gentiles also could claim this advantage, since positive features in their moral life testified to the existence of a law engraved on their hearts, and the very definite application of it which they are able to make.” This connection leaves nothing to be desired; and Meyer's objection, that it is necessary in this case to pass over 13b in order to connect the for with 13a, is false; for the idea of 13b is purely restrictive: “The doers of the law shall alone be justified,” while the real affirmation is that of 13a: “Those who had been only hearers shall not be justified.” It is on this essential idea of Romans 2:13 that the for of Romans 2:14 bears. ῞Οταν, when it happens that. These are sporadic cases, happy eventualities.

The word ἔθνη, Gentiles, has no article: “people belonging to the category of the Gentiles.”

The logical relation included in the subjective negative μή is that which we should express by: “ without having the law,” or: “ though they have it not.” Τὰ τοῦ νόμου, literally: the things which are of the law, agreeable to its prescriptions. They do not observe the precept as such, for they have it not; but they fulfil its contents; for example, Neoptolemus in Philoctetes, when he refuses to save Greece at the expense of a lie; or Antigone, when she does not hesitate to violate the temporary law of the city to fulfil the eternal law of fraternal love; or Socrates, when he rejects the opportunity of saving his life by escaping from prison, in order to remain subject to the magistrates. Sophocles himself speaks of these eternal laws (οἱ ἀεὶ νόμοι), and contrasts this internal and divine legislation with the ever-changing laws of man. Φύσει, by nature, spontaneously, by an innate moral instinct. This dative cannot be joined with the preceding participle (ἔχοντα); it qualifies the verb ποιῇ, do; the whole force of the thought is in this idea: do instinctively what the Jew does in obedience to precepts. The readings ποιῶσιν and ποιοῦσιν may be corrections of ποιῇ with the view of conforming the verb to the following pronoun οὗτοι; the Byz. reading ποιῇ may also, however, be a correction to make the verb agree with the rule of neuter plurals. In this case the plural of the verb is preferable, since Paul is speaking not of the Gentiles en masse, but of certain individuals among them. Hence also the following οὗτοι, these Gentiles. This pronoun includes and repeats all the qualifications which have just been mentioned in the first part of the verse; comp. the οὗτος, John 1:2.

The logical relation of the participle μὴ ἔχοντες, “ not having law,” and of the verb εἰσίν, “ are law,” should be expressed by for; not having law, they therefore serve as a law to themselves. The negative μή, placed above before the participle and the object (τὸν νόμον), is here placed between the two. This separation is intended to throw the object into relief: “ This law (τὸν νόμον), for the very reason that they have it not (μὴ ἔχοντες), they prove that they have it in another way.” This delicate form of style shows with what painstaking care Paul composed. But so fine a shade can hardly be felt except in the original language. The phrase: to be a law to oneself, is explained in Romans 2:15.

The descriptive pronoun οἵτινες, “as people who,” is meant to introduce this explanation; it is in consequence of what is about to follow that Paul can affirm what he has just said of them, Romans 2:14. The relation of the verb ἐνδείκνυνται, show, and its object ἔργον, the work of the law, may be thus paraphrased: “show the work of the law (as being) written;” which would amount to: prove that it is written. But it is not even necessary to assume an ellipsis (ὡς ὄν). What the Gentile shows in such cases is the law itself written (as to its contents) within his heart. Paul calls these contents the work of the law, because all the law commanded was meant to become work; and he qualifies νόμου by the article (the law), because he wishes to establish the identity of the Gentile's moral instinct with the contents of the Mosaic law strictly so called. But this phrase: the work of the law, does not merely designate, like that of Romans 2:14, τὰ τοῦ νόμου (the things agreeable to the law), certain isolated acts. It embraces the whole contents of the law; for Romans 2:15 does not refer to the accidental fulfilment of some good actions; it denotes the totality of the moral law written in the heart. The figure of a written law is evidently borrowed from the Sinaitic law graven on the tables of stone. The heart is always in Scripture the source of the instinctive feelings from which those impulses go forth which govern the exercise of the understanding and will. It is in this form of lofty inspiration that the law of nature makes its appearance in man. The plural: their heart, makes each individual the seat of this sublime legislation. The last propositions of the verse have embarrassed commentators not a little. They have not sufficiently taken account of the starting-point of this whole argument. St. Paul, according to the connection of Romans 2:14 with Romans 2:13, does not wish merely to prove that the Gentile possesses the law; he means to demonstrate that he hears it, just as the Jew heard it at Sinai, or still hears it every Sabbath in the synagogue (ἀκροατής, hearer of the law, Romans 2:13 a). And to this idea the appendix refers which closes Romans 2:15. That the Gentile has the law (is a law to himself), is already demonstrated. But does he hear this law distinctly? Does he give account of it to himself? If it were not so, he would certainly remain inferior to the Jew, who brings so much sagacity to bear on the discussion of the sense and various applications of the legal statute. But no; the Gentile is quite as clever as the Jew in this respect. He also discusses the data of the moral instinct which serves as his guide. His conscience joins its approving testimony afterhand to that of the moral instinct which has dictated a good action; pleaders make themselves heard within, for and against, before this tribunal of conscience, and these discussions are worth all the subtleties of Rabbinical casuistry. Συνείδησις, the conscience (from συνειδέναι, to know with or within oneself). This word, frequently used in the New Testament, denotes the understanding (the νοῦς, for it is a knowing, εἰδέναι, which is in question), applied to the distinction of good and evil, as reason (the διάνοια) is the same νοῦς applied to the discernment of truth and falsehood. It is precisely because this word denotes an act of knowledge that it describes a new fact different from that of the moral instinct described above. What natural impulse dictated without reflection, conscience, studying it afterward, recognizes as a good thing. Thus is explained the σύν, with, in the compound verb συμμαρτυρεῖν, to bear witness with another. Conscience joins its testimony to that of the heart which dictated the virtuous action by commending it, and proves thereby, as a second witness, the existence of the moral law in the Gentile. Volkmar: “Their conscience bears testimony besides the moral act itself which already demonstrated the presence of the divine law.” Most really, therefore, the Gentile has a law law not only published and written, but heard and understood. It seems to me that in the way in which the apostle expresses this assent of the conscience to the law implanted within, it is impossible not to see an allusion to the amen uttered aloud by the people after hearing the law of Sinai, and which was repeated in every meeting of the synagogue after the reading of the law.

But there is not only hearing, there is even judging. The Rabbins debated in opposite senses every kind of acts, real or imaginary. The apostle follows up the comparison to the end. The soul of the Gentile is also an arena of discussions. The λογισμοί denote the judgments of a moral nature which are passed by the Gentiles on their own acts, either (as is most usually the case) acknowledging them guilty (κατηγορεῖν, accusing), or also sometimes (such is the meaning of ἢ καί; comp. Romans 2:14: when it happens that...) pronouncing them innocent. Most commonly the voice within says: That was bad! Sometimes also this voice becomes that of defence, and says: No, it was good! Thus, before this inner code, the different thoughts accuse or justify, make replies and rejoinders, exactly as advocates before a seat of judgment handle the text of the law. And all this forensic debating proves to a demonstration not only that the code is there, but that it is read and understood, since its application is thus discussed.

The μεταξὺ ἀλλήλων, between them (among themselves). Some, like Meyer, join this pronoun with αὐτῶν, the Gentiles; he would refer it to the debates carried on between Gentiles and Gentiles as to the moral worth of an action. But it is grammatically more natural, and suits the context better, to connect the pronoun between themselves with λογισμῶν, judgments. For this internal scene of discussion proves still more clearly than a debate of man with man the fact of the law written in the heart. Holsten proposes to understand the participle συμμαρτυρούντων (borrowed from συμμαρτυρούσης) with λογισμῶν : “their conscience bearing witness, and the judgments which they pass on one another's acts in their mutual relations also bearing witness.” This construction is very forced, and it seems plain to us that the two participles accusing or else excusing refer to the thoughts, just as the participle bearing witness referred to their conscience.

How can one help admiring here, on the one hand, the subtle analysis whereby the apostle discloses in the Gentile heart a real judgment-hall where witnesses are heard for and against, then the sentence of the judge; and, on the other hand, that largeness of heart with which, after drawing so revolting a picture of the moral deformities of Gentile life (chap. 1), he brings into view in as striking a way the indestructible moral elements, the evidences of which are sometimes irresistibly presented even by this so deeply sunken life?