Romans 6:16

Romans 6:16. Know ye not ‘I take it for granted that ye know and believe' (Stuart).

To whom ye render yourselves, etc. This principle is obvious: To present yourselves as servants to any one implies service to that one: in this matter the masters are opposed, hence either,.... or, there is no third.

Of sin unto death. Both terms are used in the usual wide sense: ‘sin' is personified as the master, the result of the service is ‘death,' including all the consequences of sin.

Of obedience unto righteousness. Here ‘righteousness' refers not to justification but to inwrought righteousness, not excluding the final verdict at the judgment. Meyer accepts the latter sense alone. The more exact parallelism would be: ‘of righteousness unto life.' The deviation may be thus explained: Of our own free choice we give ourselves as bondmen to sin, but cannot thus give ourselves to righteousness: we can only yield ourselves up to God's grace, to save us, as servants of obedience, unto righteousness, given to us and inwrought of the Holy Ghost (so Forbes). In Romans 6:18, ‘servants of righteousness' occurs, after ‘being made free from sin.'