Romans 1:18-3:20 · Featured Study
The Universal Indictment
Before Romans announces the gospel’s remedy, it proves the disease. Paul opens his letter with a courtroom argument that runs two and a half chapters and closes every exit. The Gentile without the law, the moralist with his judgments, and the Jew with the law all stand in the same dock. The verdict comes from Israel’s own Psalms: there is none righteous, no, not one. Every mouth is stopped, so that at 3:21 grace can speak.
Summary
Romans 1:18-3:20 is Paul's opening case: the whole human race, Jew and Gentile alike, stands guilty before God. The argument moves through the Gentile world, the judging moralist, and the Jew with the law, then reads the verdict from the Psalms and stops every mouth, so that the righteousness of God through faith can be announced at 3:21.
- The wrath of God is revealed against a world that knew him from creation and exchanged his glory for images; they are "without excuse" (1:18-23)
- Three times the text says "God gave them up": to uncleanness, to vile passions, to a reprobate mind (1:24, 26, 28)
- The moralist who judges others condemns himself, for he practises the same things; God's judgment is impartial (2:1-16)
- The Jew's advantage is real, "much every way," chiefly the oracles of God (3:1-2); the advantage never becomes an exemption
- The verdict is Scripture's own: "There is none righteous, no, not one"; every mouth stopped, all the world under God's judgment (3:9-20)
The Case Paul Opens
1:16-18: the gospel's power, and the wrath it answers
Paul has just stated his thesis: the gospel is the power of God unto salvation, to the Jew first and also to the Greek, because in it a righteousness of God is revealed (1:16-17). Verse 18 begins the argument that makes the thesis necessary. Salvation only matters if something real threatens, and Paul names it before he explains anything else.
“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hinder the truth in unrighteousness;” Romans 1:18
From here to 3:20 the letter builds one continuous case. It moves from the Gentile world (1:18-32), to anyone who judges others (2:1-16), to the Jew who bears the law (2:17-3:8), and it closes with a verdict quoted from Israel’s own Scriptures (3:9-20). The order matters: each audience watches the previous one condemned, and then hears the same charge turned on itself.
For the wrath of God is revealed - The apostle has now finished his preface, and comes to the grand subject of the epistle; namely, to show the absolute need of the Gospel of Christ, because of the universal corruption of mankind; which was so great as to incense the justice of God, and call aloud for the punishment of the world.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Rom 1:18
Without Excuse
1:19-23: what creation showed, and what men exchanged
“For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse:” Romans 1:20
The charge against the Gentile world is not ignorance. It is suppression. What can be known of God, his everlasting power and divinity, stands displayed in the things he made, and the text says it was perceived. The failure came after the knowledge: they did not glorify him as God, they were not thankful, and the reasoning that refused worship grew dark (1:21).
“Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.” Romans 1:22-23
Thus, the outward creation is not the parent but the interpreter of our faith in God.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Rom 1:20
THOSE who boast of their knowledge betray their ignorance. Knowledge is not a possession to be proud of, since it brings with it so great a responsibility that a nurse might as well be proud of watching over a life in peril. Knowledge may become good or ill according to the use which is made of it.
Charles Spurgeon· The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1763: “Knowledge. Worship. Gratitude.”, 1884Particular (Reformed) Baptist
Rom 1:20-21
Because, knowing God - For the wiser heathens did know that there was one supreme God; yet from low and base considerations they conformed to the idolatry of the vulgar. They did not glorify him as God, neither were thankful - They neither thanked him for his benefits, nor glorified him for his divine perfection.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 1:21
God Gave Them Up
1:24-32: the exchange, and the judgment inside it
Three times in nine verses the text repeats one phrase: God gave them up. The judgment in this section is not fire from heaven. It is God handing men over to the desires they chose, each stage following an exchange the men themselves made.
“Wherefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves: for that they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.” Romans 1:24-25
gave them up--This divine abandonment of men is here strikingly traced in three successive stages, at each of which the same word is used.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Rom 1:24
“For this cause God gave them up unto vile passions: for their women changed the natural use into that which is against nature: and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another, men with men working unseemliness, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was due.” Romans 1:26-27
These two verses sit inside the same argument as everything around them. Verse 25 named an exchange, the truth of God for a lie; verses 26-27 name a second exchange, “the natural use” for “that which is against nature,” the word “changed” carrying over from verse 23. The page lets the text and the classical commentators speak in their own words.
Receiving the just recompense of their error - Their idolatry being punished with that unnatural lust, which was as horrible a dishonour to the body, as their idolatry was to God.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 1:27
The third giving-up is to “a reprobate mind” (1:28), and the section closes with a catalogue of twenty-one evils that reaches far beyond any one sin: covetousness, envy, murder, strife, deceit, whisperers, backbiters, boastful, disobedient to parents, covenant-breakers, unmerciful (1:29-31). The list ends on the deepest stage of all.
“who, knowing the ordinance of God, that they that practise such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but also consent with them that practise them.” Romans 1:32
Not only do the same, but have pleasure in those that practice them - This is the highest degree of wickedness. A man may be hurried by his passions to do the thing he hates; but he that has pleasure in those that do evil, loves wickedness for wickedness' sake. And hereby he encourages them in sin, and heaps the guilt of others upon his own head.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 1:32
The Moralist in the Dock
2:1-16: the judgment that judges the judge
Chapter 1 ends with a reader nodding along at the pagan world. Chapter 2 turns on that reader. Whoever passes judgment on the catalogue of chapter 1 has just supplied the standard by which he himself will be judged, because he practises the same things.
“Wherefore thou art without excuse, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest dost practise the same things.” Romans 2:1
The design of this and the following chapter is to show that the Jews were no less guilty that the Gentiles, and that they needed the benefit of the same salvation.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments, 1832-1869Presbyterian
Rom 2:1
“Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?” Romans 2:4
The moralist reads God’s patience as approval. Paul reads it as an invitation being refused, and warns that refusing it stores something up (2:5). God’s judgment in this section has three marks: it is according to truth (2:2), according to works (2:6), and without respect of persons (2:11). It reaches past appearances into “the secrets of men” and it is rendered “by Jesus Christ” (2:16).
The apostle is intensely personal in his address. This verse is not spoken to us all in the mass, but to some one in particular. The apostle fixes his eyes upon a single person, and speaks to him as “Thee” and “Thou.”
Charles Spurgeon· The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1714: “Earnest Expostulation”, 1883Particular (Reformed) Baptist
Rom 2:4
What an awful idea is here expressed--that the sinner himself is amassing, like hoarded treasure, an ever accumulating stock of divine wrath, to burst upon him in "the day of the revelation of the righteous judgment of God!" And this is said not of the reckless, but of those who boasted of their purity of faith and life.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Rom 2:5
Jews and Gentiles stand upon the same level before God. This was Peter's remark upon the first taking down of the partition-wall ( Acts x. 34 ), that God is no respecter of persons; and it is explained in the next words, that in every nation he that fears God, and works righteousness, is accepted of him.
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710Puritan (Presbyterian)
Rom 2:11
The Gentiles and the law written in their hearts2:12-16
Verses 12-16 answer a fairness question before anyone can raise it: how can Gentiles who never received the law of Moses be judged? Paul's answer is that they will not be judged by a law they never had. Those who sinned without the law perish without the law (2:12), and yet they are not lawless: when Gentiles do by nature the things of the law, they show “the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness therewith” (2:14-15). Conscience is the internal courtroom, thoughts accusing or excusing, and its verdicts anticipate the day when God judges the secrets of men by Jesus Christ (2:16). No one is judged by light he never received; everyone is judged by the light he had.
The Jew and the Law
2:17-29: the teacher taught out of his own preaching
Now Paul addresses his own people directly, and he begins by granting everything: the name of Jew, the law, the boast in God, the knowledge of his will, the calling to be a guide of the blind and a light to those in darkness (2:17-20). These are real privileges, and Paul, himself a Jew, does not mock one of them. His question is narrower and sharper: does the man who teaches the law keep it?
“thou therefore that teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal?” Romans 2:21
The greatest obstructors of the success of the word are those whose bad lives contradict their good doctrine, who in the pulpit preach so well that it is a pity they should ever come out, and out of the pulpit live so ill that it is a pity they should ever come in.
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710Puritan (Presbyterian)
Rom 2:21
The section closes by reaching back into the law’s own depths. Circumcision profits if the law is kept (2:25); the outward sign was always meant to carry an inward reality. That is not a Christian innovation laid over the Torah. It is the Torah’s own promise: “Jehovah thy God will circumcise thy heart” (Deuteronomy 30:6), echoed by Jeremiah 4:4. Paul is quoting Israel’s law back to Israel.
“For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh: but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.” Romans 2:28-29
But he is a Jew - That is, one of God's people. Who is one inwardly - In the secret recesses of his soul. And the acceptable circumcision is that of the heart - Referring to Deut. xxx, 6; the putting away all inward impurity.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 2:29
Much Every Way
3:1-8: the advantage that is real, and the objections answered
If the Jew and the Gentile stand in the same dock, has Israel’s calling come to nothing? Paul asks the question himself, out loud, and his answer is immediate and emphatic.
“What advantage then hath the Jew? or what is the profit of circumcision? Much every way: first of all, that they were intrusted with the oracles of God.” Romans 3:1-2
The indictment levels the ground before God’s judgment; it does not erase Israel’s calling. The advantage is “much every way,” and the first item Paul names is the one this whole argument depends on: Israel was entrusted with the very Scriptures from which the verdict of 3:10-18 will be read. Even the unbelief of some cannot annul the faithfulness of God: “God forbid: yea, let God be found true, but every man a liar” (3:3-4). Where Romans takes Israel’s story from here, chapters 9-11 and the olive tree, this page doors to rather than compresses.
Chiefly in that they were intrusted with the oracles of God - The scriptures, in which are so great and precious promises. Other prerogatives will follow, chap. ix, 4-5. St. Paul here singles out this by which, after removing the objection, he will convict them so much the more.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 3:2
THE seed of Israel had great privileges even before the coming of Christ. God had promised by Covenant that they should have those privileges and they enjoyed them. They had Revelation and a Divine Light, while all the rest of the world sat in heathen darkness.
Charles Spurgeon· The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 2255: “God Justified, Though Man Believes Not”, 1892Particular (Reformed) Baptist
Rom 3:3
The slander Paul refuses: let us do evil, that good may come3:5-8
Verses 5-8 answer a twisted inference that was already being pinned on Paul in his own lifetime: if human unrighteousness makes God's righteousness shine brighter, is God unjust to punish it? And why not sin more, so grace can abound? Paul calls the report slander and answers on God's own character: if God could not judge sin, he could not judge the world at all (3:6). The objection returns at 6:1, where it gets a full chapter. Here it gets one line: “whose condemnation is just” (3:8).
None Righteous, No, Not One
3:9-18: the verdict read from Israel's own Scriptures
Paul now states the charge in full: Jews and Greeks alike are all under sin (3:9). And for the proof he does not argue in his own voice at all. He reads the verdict from the Psalms and Isaiah, a chain of quotations Israel had been singing for centuries.
“as it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none that understandeth, There is none that seeketh after God; They have all turned aside, they are together become unprofitable; There is none that doeth good, no, not so much as one:” Romans 3:10-12
The chain then moves down the body, part by part: an open sepulchre of a throat, deceitful tongues, the poison of asps under the lips (3:13, from Psalm 5:9 and Psalm 140:3), a mouth full of cursing (3:14, Psalm 10:7), feet swift to shed blood and the way of peace unknown (3:15-17, Isaiah 59:7-8), and finally the eyes: “There is no fear of God before their eyes” (3:18, Psalm 36:1). The anatomy of a whole race, examined member by member, and no member found clean.
As it is written - That all men are under sin appears from the vices which have raged in all ages. St. Paul therefore rightly cites David and Isaiah, though they spoke primarily of their own age, and expressed what manner of men God sees, when he "looks down from heaven;" not what he makes them by his grace. There is none righteous - This is the general proposition.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 3:10
Every Mouth Stopped
3:19-20: the verdict, and the hinge it turns toward
“Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it speaketh to them that are under the law; that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight; for through the law cometh the knowledge of sin.” Romans 3:19-20
This is where the case has been heading since 1:18. The law speaks first to those who have it, so that no one, Jew or Gentile, has an answer left. The law’s work in this argument is diagnosis: through it comes the knowledge of sin, and by its works no flesh will be justified. Every mouth stopped is not the end of the letter. It is the silence into which grace speaks.
Now we know that what . . . the law--that is, the Scriptures, considered as a law of duty. saith, it saith to them that are under the law--of course, therefore, to the Jews. that every mouth--opened in self-justification. may be stopped, and all the world may become--that is, be seen to be, and own itself. guilty--and so condemned before God.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Rom 3:19
For by the law is only the knowledge of sin - But no deliverance either from the guilt or power of it.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Evangelical
Rom 3:20
Romans 3:21-22 (ASV)
“But now apart from the law a righteousness of God hath been manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ unto all them that believe; for there is no distinction;” Romans 3:21-22
“But now.” Two words, and the whole letter turns. The indictment existed for the sake of this announcement: the same impartiality that condemned everyone now offers righteousness to everyone who believes, with no distinction. The full study of what follows lives at Justification by Faith.
Only when these humiliating conclusions are accepted and felt, are we in a condition to appreciate and embrace the grace of the Gospel, next to be opened up.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Rom 3:20
The Voices
with the work named
Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament (1755) · public domain
Walks the whole argument verse by verse: the heathen who knew one supreme God, the recompense of idolatry, the oracles entrusted to Israel, and the law that gives the knowledge of sin without deliverance from it.
The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermons No. 1714, 1763, 2255 (1883-1892) · public domain
Preached three of this passage's turning points: knowledge without worship (1:20-21), the goodness that leads to repentance (2:4), and God justified though man believes not (3:3).
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) · public domain
Traces the three stages of divine abandonment in chapter 1, the treasured-up wrath of 2:5, and the stopped mouth of 3:19.
Commentary on the Bible (1832) · public domain
Marks 1:18 as the end of Paul's preface and the start of the epistle's grand subject: the absolute need of the gospel.
Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710) · public domain
Levels the ground at 2:11, Jews and Gentiles on the same footing before God, and turns 2:21 on every teacher whose life contradicts his doctrine.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869) · public domain
States the design of chapter 2 plainly: the Jews were no less guilty than the Gentiles, and needed the benefit of the same salvation.
Marcus Brown's own commentary leads above all; within a tier, all voices are equal. No modern (living-copyright) roster voice appears in the site's quote pool for these three chapters; the relevance gate is honored by carrying none rather than reaching for one.
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