Romans 7:1

In order to strengthen their minds in the divine teaching, Paul uses an example drawn from human law, in order once again to argue for heavenly things on the basis of earthly ones, just as God also is known by the creation of the world.

"Or are you ignorant, brothers (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives? For the woman who is under a husband is bound by the law while her husband lives. But if her husband dies, she is loosed from the law of her husband. Therefore, while her husband lives, she shall be called an adulteress if she be with another man. But if her husband dies, she is freed from the law of her husband, so that she is no longer an adulteress if she be with another man. And so, my brothers, you also have been made dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may belong to another, who rose from the dead, that we may bear fruit to God. For when we were in the flesh, the vices of sins, which were through the law, worked in our members, so that they bore fruit unto death. But now we have been loosed from the law, being dead to that in which we were held, so that we may serve in newness of spirit, and not in oldness of the letter." Discoursing more broadly in the preceding passages about faith and the law, he shows that faith is in all things to be preferred — the faith, that is, only of those who believe "in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead." After this he adds what sort of conduct theirs ought also to be, in which he discoursed both about the sin of Adam and the righteousness of Christ; but he also disputed about servitude and liberty, by which one either serves righteousness and is free from sin, or serves sin and is free from righteousness. […]

Add to this the fact that the apostle, with regard to widows and the unmarried, advises them to remain permanently in that state, when he says, "But I desire all to persevere in (imitation of) my example: " but touching marrying "in the Lord," he no longer advises, but plainly bids. Therefore in this case especially, if we do not obey, we run a risk, because one may with more impunity neglect an "advice" than an "order; "in that the former springs from counsel, and is proposed to the will (for acceptance or rejection): the other descends from authority, and is bound to necessity. In the former case, to disregard appears liberty, in the latter, contumacy.

Accordingly, it will be without cause that you will say that God wills not a divorced woman to be joined to another man "while her husband liveth," as if He do will it "when he is dead; " whereas if she is not bound to him when dead, no more is she when living.

Since then he had said, we are "dead to sin," he here shows that not sin only, but also the Law, hath no dominion over them. But if the Law hath none, much less hath sin: and to render his language palatable, he uses a human example to make this plain by. And he seems to be stating one point, but he sets down at once two arguments for his proposition. One, that when a husband is dead, the woman is no longer subject to her husband, and there is nothing to prevent her becoming the wife of another man: and the other, that in the present case it is not the husband only that is dead but the wife also. So that one may enjoy liberty in two ways. Now if when the husband is dead, she is freed from his power, when the woman is shown to be dead also, she is much more at liberty. For if the one event frees her from his power, much more does the concurrence of both. As he is about to proceed then to a proof of these points, he starts with an encomium of the hearers, in these words, "Know ye not, brethren, for I speak to them that know the Law, that is, I am saying a thing that is quite agreed upon, and clear, and to men too that know all these things accurately, "How that the Law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?" He does not say, husband or wife, but "man," which name is common to either creature; "For he that is dead," he says, "is freed from sin." The Law then is given for the living, but to the dead it ceaseth to be ordained. Do you observe how he sets forth a twofold freedom?