Romans 7:18-19

Vv. 18 b, 19. “ For to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. For the good that I would I do not; but the evil which I would not, that I do. ”

In what precedes, Paul had already claimed a certain will in relation to good; he here affirms the same thing more expressly. This will is present; παράκεισθαι, to be beside, and as it were within reach. The verb θέλειν, to wish, denotes, as in Romans 7:15-16, a simple desire, an intention rather than a fixed and deliberate decision; comp. the passages quoted. Paul means: as to good intentions, they are present and in abundance; but the execution...that is what I find not. Not finding is the opposite of being within reach. Instead of οὐχ εὑρίσκω, I find not, read by the Byzs. and the Greco-Lats., there is found in the four Alex. a simple οὐ, not: “But the doing of good, not!” (οὐ παράκειται). This reading has something harsh and abrupt which renders it suspicious. Whence could this word εὑρίσκω, I find, have come into the text, corresponding so well with the term παράκεισθαι, to be present? Has not Meyer ground for suspecting a copyist of having passed carelessly from the οὐχ, Romans 7:18, to the following οὐ, Romans 7:19 ?