RTS Papers / Acts-Romans / Fall 2018
An Exegetical Paper on Romans 13:1-7
THE OLD TESTAMENT SHADOWS OF THE DUTIFUL CITIZEN
Old Testament theology leaves no doubt as to divine sovereignty over even the pagan rulers: “The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will” (Prov. 21:1). God said to Pharaoh, “for this purpose I have raised you up” (Ex. 9:16). He calls “Nebuchadnezzar … my servant” (Jer. 27:6), and likewise the Assyrians, and by extension their king, “the rod of my anger” (Isa. 10:5). Here there is no question that the Jew understood world rulers to be completely under the power of YHWH. Paul never cites any of these, or other well known Old Testament texts, that would have powerfully made his case. On the other hand, Schreiner notes, Paul would not have disagreed with John’s depiction of the state playing the role of the evil beast (Rev. 13), which “stems from Dan. 7” [688].
How could there be any Old Testament theology of civil obedience? The Jews in the theocracy were bound to God, and thus his anointed; and the Jews only relation to pagan kings was as their captives in exile. However it is precisely the seasons in exile that the Scriptures use to provide exemplars of faithful citizenship. “How shall we sing the LORD’s song in a foreign land?” (Ps. 137:4) Joseph, Daniel, Esther and Mordecai, and Nehemiah are all examples of God’s people not merely submitting to, but serving in, the secular governments.
Even so, what do we see in their cases? With the exception of Nehemiah, all the main Old Testament exemplars were shown to go against, defy, or subvert, in some way, the ordinary rule of those they served.
The three Hebrew boys were a dramatic example of this. When Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego were ordered to bow down and worship the image of the king, they chose death over idolatry.
The people in Babylonian exile were instructed: “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare” (Jer. 29:7). While Beale and Carson see Paul’s logic rooted in the Jeremiah 29 passage, as well as the several divine sovereignty passages in Daniel, they must go to Wis. 6:1-11 and 6:5-8 to find a text from the ancient Jews that balances out the divine appointment of secular rulers with the accountability of these same rulers to God [681-82].
We may also consider the offices of priest and prophet in relation to the king. When the likes of Samuel, Nathan, and Amos reproved the king, or when the priests reached out against Uzziah to prevent him from exceeding his bounds, were they being insubordinate to God’s appointed authority? Were they setting themselves up in place of the king? Not many would make that argument. Instead it may be said that these offices, and their boundaries, belong to the Old Covenant alone and so are irrelevant to secular societies.
DIVINE JUSTICE: FROM GOSPEL DOCTRINE TO ETHICS
With the aid of the wider canonical meaning of civil submission, we are better prepared to relate Paul’s exhortation to specific doctrinal themes in the epistle to the Romans. The attribute of God that is most clearly on display in the magistrate-citizen relationship is justice. However, the way that God is glorified in his justice differs in each party: magistrate and citizen. For the magistrate, it is the function of his office. It is a more explicit action. He regularly executes civil justice. For the citizen, his relation to that office is also a relation to justice: both his internal attitude and his external response.
There is one Old Testament text that is relevant to Romans 13 not yet included in our survey. That is because it did not concern the citizen’s obedience so much as the power of the state. Genesis 9:5-6 may easily be argued to contain the seminal form of the legitimacy of civil force because of the scope of the parties to whom God addresses. Space prohibits such a justification here. However Schreiner seems to agree by saying, “Paul would not have flinched in endorsing the right of ruling authorities to practice capital punishment since Gen. 9:6 supports it by appealing to the fact that human beings are made in God’s image” [684, italics mine]. Paul uses a piece of imagery here to depict this legitimate force: the sword (v. 4). Murray comments that this “is not merely the sign of his authority but of his right to wield it in the infliction of that which a sword does” [152]. There are two reasons to see this as a euphemism for legitimate civil force per se.
First, Paul is not saying that anyone who goes around carrying a sword is therefore one of these legitimate authorities; second, Paul is not saying that any state that uses other instruments (guns, for example) for physical restraint or punishment is therefore an illegitimate state.
Now that may seem so obvious that it is condescending to even bring it up. However, it is worth noting that the Statist interpretation would have us take this text at “face value,” by which they will mean absolute submission to Caesar and his sword. When we point out all of the differences between the Christian’s legal standing in later Western Civilization versus what it was in Rome, it becomes plain that obedience to the law Paul is actually talking about is not the motive in the least, but rather mindless acquiescence by any means necessary.
Ladd sees Paul’s overall view of the state as essentially pragmatic and eschatological. As to the latter he even hypothesizes that “Paul’s reference to a restraining power holding back the lawlessness of antichrist (2 Thess. 2:6) is to the Roman government as an instrument of law and order” [575]. So much for circumstances. What about that idea of justice? Or, in other words, what does the civil magistrate say about God? Can we make a connection between the theology of Romans as a whole and this particular exhortation?
To answer this we must note another prominent divine attribute manifest in the civil sphere. What is meant by wrath in verses 4 and 5? The word ὀργή is one of two main Greek words that is translated into the English word “wrath” or “anger.” It is generally recognized to be that wrath that is a righteous disposition. Why then would Paul use ὀργή to describe the execution of temporal justice, as he did in 1:18 to describe what God executes upon sinners on the more eternal scale? One reason seems obvious. Paul is literally “putting the fear of God” into any Christian who is taking civil disobedience lightly. Another angle is that the word is here in the accusative: ὀργὴν. Now the significance cannot be plumbed simply by noting the grammar and syntax. It is an awkward use in verse 4, as the human actor is acting not “upon” wrath, but “with” it, he himself being God’s instrument. Nor is it his own human wrath [cf. Murray, 153]. A comparison of different translations of that portion of verse 4 may be useful.
for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil {KJV}.
for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil {NASB}.
They are God’s servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer {NIV}.
For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer {ESV}.
In other words, civil justice is a portion of God’s present wrath. In Chapter 1 the function of divine wrath was, in one sense of the word, permissive. Waters calls this “divine abandonment” [183]. Human beings were actually let go by God to fall deeper into their rebellion (1:24, 26, 28). If it seems as if God is being more lenient on his rebels than the earthly magistrate is called to be, that is only because of the difference between perfect-final vengeance and the imperfect-temporal kind. Paul appeals to the former in 12:19 as a motive for patient kindness in the face of mistreatment.
For many the dominant theological strand from Romans 1-11 that informs this text is not wrath, but sin, and that in an eschatological context. One author speaks as if 13:1-7 belongs to the old world of force, sin, and death. There is “in Rom 13 an expectation that rulers both know and serve the good, an expectation hard to reconcile with Paul’s insistence in chapters 1–8 that all human beings are subject to the power of Sin.” One solution is to see 13:1-7 as a later insertion. Another is to comfortably dismiss Paul as out of touch with the almost universal abuse of governmental power. This author, Beverly Roberts Gaventa, resists both temptations, and rightly brings in Paul’s use of Pharaoh in Romans 9 to make the point that Paul is exalting God in Romans 13 and not the earthly authorities [21]. Whatever good the office holder displays will be derivative and even dispensable.
(#authority #magistrate #state #statism #liberty #Christian #conscience #justice)
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