A Grammatical
Problem
The grammatical problem posted by the
contraction eph’ hō in 5:12 is more complicated and theologically significant,
and will be best to deal with it here before proceeding to an analysis of Paul’s
train of thought. The problem is whether eph’ hō should be taken as a
relative clause or as a conjunction. On the one hand, if it is taken as a
relative clause, is hō to be construed as masculine or neuter, and to
what does it refer? Does it refer to the one man, the world, or death? On the
other hand, if eph’ hō is taken as a conjunction, what is the meaning of
the conjunction, and what does it say about the relationship between the sin of
Adam and the sins that other humans commit? Does the phrase mean “because,” as
most commentators and translations suggest? If so, is there any relation between
Adam’s sin and the sins of his descendants? Or does it mean, as Fitzmyer (1993,
416-17) suggests “as a result,” thereby drawing a connection between the sin of
Adam and those who follow him? The choice one makes here are crucial for the interpretation
of this passage.
The
Vulgate construes eph’ hō as a relative clause, translating it in quo
(in whom/what). Augustine, in an interpretation that has had a massive
influence on later theology, understood the referent to quo to be “the
one man,” meaning Adam. Understood in this way, the sense of the relative clause
is that in Adam all sinned because all of humanity was already present
in Adam. With this reading, Augustine laid the biblical foundations for the doctrine
of original sin. The personal pronoun (hō in Greek; quo in
Latin), however, could also refer either to “death” (Thanatos) or, if taken
as neuter, to “the world” (ton kosmon), giving the following senses: “death
spread to all so that all sinned in the sphere of death,” or “death spread to
all so that all sinned in the sphere of the world.” Jewett (2007, 376) has recently championed
the last of these interpretations. Although Augustine’s interpretation offers a
profound understanding of the text, grammatically it faces the greatest
difficulty since the purported referent, “the one man,” is so far removed. The other two suggestions, while grammatically
possible, seems banal. What does Paul mean by saying that humans sinned in
the sphere of the death? Why is it necessary to add that they sinned in
the sphere of the world?
Another line of interpretation is to
construe eph’ hō as a conjunction with the sense “because,” or “inasmuch
as.” In this instance the phrase explains why death spread to all (because all
sinned). While this line of interpretation has found support among most translations
and commentators, it is not without difficulties. First, Fitzmyer (1993, 415)
notes “that there are almost no certain instances in early Greek literature wherein
eph’ hō is used as the equivalent of dioti.” Second, while this translation
explains why death spread to all (because all sinned), it breaks the
nexus between Aam’s sin and the sin of his descendants that Paul clearly
affirms in 5:18-19. Consequently, commentators often introduce this nexus in
another way. For example, all sinned, but their sin was the result of the
corrupt nature they inherited from Adam (Cranfield 1975, 275).
Given
these difficulties, Fitzmyer’s suggestion (though not widely accepted) is worth
considering. Fitzmyer (1993, 416-17) proposes that eph’ hō be the result
that, “so that.” Thus the sense of 5:12 would be that death spread to all “with
the result that” all sinned. Byrne
(1996, 183) objects that this interpretation “makes little sense in the
context: the nub of Paul’s argument is that sin causes death, not vice versa.”
But if one reads this phrase as the conclusion to the whole of 5:12, as
Bryan (2000, 129) suggests, the sense is that sin entered the world through
Adam’s sin. As a consequence of this sin, death spread to all human beings. The
result of this is that all sinned as a consequence of Adam’s sin, which
introduced sin and death into the world. Fitzmyer’s suggestion appears to make
the best sense of what Paul says throughout 5:12-21. (Frank J. Matera, Romans
[Paideia Commentaries on the New Testament; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic,
2010], 126-27)
5:12. Therefore. The paragraph begins with the
phrase dia touto, lit., “for this
reason,” and might seem to introduce a conclusion drawn from v 11, or from
5:1–11, or even from 1:16–5:11. If it were limited to a conclusion drawn from v
11, it would indicate that justification and life have been given to Christians
through God’s grace. But it should instead be understood as drawing a
conclusion from vv 1–11 as a whole (Cranfield, Romans, 271): justification, acquired through Christ, and the
certainty of salvation and life are the basis of hope, as can be seen in the
conquest of sin and death. If the paragraph, however, had actually been
composed for another occasion, then the antecedent is lost. Consequently, the
phrase may now be merely transitional (compare 2:1; 15:22), introducing a new
stage in the thought as a conclusion from the preceding (Schlier, Römerbrief, 159; Wilckens, Römer, 1.314), or even
from all that precedes in the letter thus far (Nygren, Romans, 209–12).
just as. The comparison begins with hōsper, but the conclusion is not introduced by houtōs kai, “so too,” as one might have
expected and as is done in vv 18 and 19. Instead, we find kai houtōs, which Cerfaux (Christ,
231–32), Barrett (Romans, 109), Kirby
(“The Syntax”), and Scroggs (Last Adam,
79–80) have tried to take as its equivalent. But if Paul had meant that phrase
to introduce the conclusion, he would have written houtōs (kai), as he does later on. For further examples of kai houtōs, see 11:26; 1 Cor 7:36;
11:28; Gal 6:2. Cf. Cranfield, “On Some,” 326–29. The conclusion to the
comparison is implied rather in the last clause of v 14, and not in v 15c (pollō mallon …), as Englezakis suggests
(Bib 58 [1977]: 232), nor in v 19, as
Black would have it (Romans, 79).
Rather, anacoluthon is involved.
sin entered the world. I.e., into the
cosmos or history of humanity. The words eis
ton kosmon eisēlthen echo Wis 2:24, “Through the devil’s envy death entered
the world.” Paul alludes to the story recorded in Gen 3:6; cf. 4 Ezra 3:21–22. Hamartia is the personified malevolent
force, Sin (with capital S), hostile
to God and alienating human beings from him; it strode upon the stage of human
history at the time of Adam’s transgression (6:12–14; 7:7–23; 1 Cor 15:56) and
has dominated “all human beings.” For the Pauline sense of sin, see
Introduction, section IX.D. Paul does not tell us precisely how sin entered the
world, save through Adam’s “transgression” (5:14), “trespass” (5:15), or
“disobedience” (5:19). Through his sin Adam began the common sinning of
humanity; he was the author of that malevolent force.
through one man. The phrase heis
anthrōpos occurs twelve times in this paragraph, thus emphasizing its
importance. The “man” is either Adam or Christ, both males, even though Paul
uses the generic anthrōpos. The
contrast between “one man” and the “many” highlights the universality of the
influence involved. In this case, the one man is Adam of Genesis 2–3, who is
mentioned in v 14 and described as the “type of the one who was to come” and
whose “transgression” (5:14) of Yahweh’s command unleashed into human history
an active evil force, sin. Adam is treated by Paul as the head of the old
humanity, and what happened to the head has influenced the body of human
beings. Adam is again referred to as “one man” in vv 15–19. Yet one should
guard against interpreting “one man” as the Urmensch, a term that has too many gnostic connotations
for Pauline theology (as Davies rightly notes, Paul and Rabbinic Judaism, 45). One can easily recognize the role
that Paul ascribes to Adam without introducing those connotations.
It may seem that
Paul is tributary to the rabbinic Jewish mode of thinking about Adam. At least
so Davies would have us believe (ibid., 53–57): “Paul accepted the traditional
Rabbinic doctrine of the unity of mankind in Adam. That doctrine implied that
the very constitution of the physical body of Adam and the method of its
formation was symbolic of the real oneness of mankind. In that one body of Adam
east and west, north and south were brought together, male and female.… The
‘body’ of Adam included all mankind.” But Davies should have scrutinized, first
of all, the meaning of the rabbinic passages to which he refers (e.g., m. Sanhedrin
4:5; b. Sanhedrin 38a; Gen. Rabbah 8; Pirqe de Rabbi Eliezer §11): none of them says a thing about the
“inclusion” of all humanity “in” the “ ‘body’ of Adam” in the manner of 1
Cor 15:22. Second, Davies should have paid more attention to the dates of the
rabbinic passages to which he alludes; the mishnaic passage comes from the
early third century a.d., and the
Babylonian Talmud passages are not earlier than the sixth century. Is there any
clear reference in pre-Christian Jewish literature to such a notion as the
incorporation of all human beings in Adam? Not even Philo has so specific a
notion. It seems to appear for the first time in 1 Cor 15:22.
and through sin death. I.e., death, the
opposite of life, entered the world of human beings because of sin; see Gen
2:17 and esp. 3:19, where God sentences Adam; cf. 1 Cor 15:21a. Thanatos, “death,” is also personified
as another actor who “enters” on the stage of human history, playing the role
of a tyrant (5:14, 17) and dominating human beings. “Death” is not merely
physical, bodily death (separation of body and soul), as it has often been
interpreted by theologians in the past, but includes spiritual death (the definitive
separation of human beings from God, the unique source of life), as 5:21 makes
clear (cf. 6:21, 23; 7:5, 10, 13, 24; 8:2, 6; 1 Cor 15:21–22, 26). It is the
same as apōleia, “destruction” (9:22;
cf. 2:12, apolountai; 1 Cor 1:18;
Phil 1:28; 3:19). Death is thus a personified cosmic force (8:38; 1 Cor 3:22),
the “last enemy” to be vanquished (1 Cor 15:56). See de Boer, Defeat of Death, 141–80. Ever since Adam
the human race has lain in servitude to Sin and Death, personified powers of
destruction. Because of the very essence of Sin, derived from Adam, the power
of Death has entered the world of humanity.
Paul alludes to
contemporary Jewish belief about Adam’s influence: see Wis 2:24, quoted above
(where thanatos has the same sense,
“total death”); 2 Apoc. Bar. 17:3:
“The length of time that he [Adam] lived profited him not, but brought death
and curtailed the lives of his descendants”; 23:4: “When Adam sinned, death was
decreed against those who were to be born (from him)”; 48:42: “What was it that
you, Adam, did to all your posterity? What should be said of Eve who first
listened to the serpent? For this multitude is going to corruption”; 54:15:
“Though Adam sinned first and brought untimely death on all human beings, yet
each one of those who were born of him has either prepared for his own soul
(its) future torment or chosen for himself the glories that are to be.” 4 Ezra
3:7: “He [Adam] transgressed it [the command of Gen 2:17], and immediately you
appointed death for him and his descendants”; 3:21: “The first Adam, burdened
with a wicked heart, transgressed (the command) and was overcome, as were also
all who were descended from him. So the disease became permanent”; 7:118: “O
Adam, what have you done? Though it was you who sinned, the fall was not yours
alone, but ours too who are your descendants.” But there also emerges in this
tradition the awareness that individuals are also responsible for their deaths:
2 Apoc. Bar. 54:19: “Thus Adam is not
the cause, except for himself only; each one of us is his own Adam.”
and so. The adv. houtōs
is important; it establishes the connection between Adam’s sin and that of “all
human beings.” Death is in part a fate that humanity shares because of Adam,
but also an experience stemming from its own guilt, as the rest of the verse
makes clear.
death spread to all human beings. So Paul states the
universal baleful effect of Adam’s sin. Paul uses the vb. dierchesthai, “pass through unto” (cf. Mark 4:35). Death’s
influence has affected all without exception. Cf. 1 Cor 15:21–22 (en tō Adam pantes apothnēskousin). From
this statement it might seem that all humanity has been doomed to death without
any responsibility; but Paul corrects that impression by the addition of the
following clause, which asserts in addition to Adam’s causality the causality
of individual responsibility. Sin brings death not only as punishment (1:32),
but also as “wages” (6:23); it is the telos,
“result” of sin (6:21), that toward which it tends (8:6). See W. Bieder, EDNT 2.129–33.
The subject ho thanatos is read by MSS א, A, B,
C, K, P, 33, 81, 614, 1739 and the Koinē
text-tradition, but is omitted by MSS D, F, G, 2495 and some MSS of the VL. Its
omission affected the controversy between Pelagius and Augustine, when pantes, “all,” was taken to include
infants, a precision that Paul did not envisage. See Augustine, De natura et origine animae 4.11.16
(CSEL 60.395). Cf. de Ocaña, “Cristo, segundo Adán.”
with the result that. The meaning of the
phrase ephʾ hō has been much debated
throughout the centuries. It has been understood, first, as introducing a
genuine relative clause.
(1) “In whom,” with
the masc. pron. referring to Adam; it would imply incorporation in him, a
meaning based on the VL and Vg translations in
quo and commonly used in the western church since Ambrosiaster (In ep. ad Romanos 5.12 [CSEL 81:165]:
“in Adam … quasi in massa”). Augustine, who at first (a.d. 412) explained the antecedent of quo as either sin (“peccatum”) or Adam (“ille unus homo”) in De peccatorum meritis et remissione
1.10.11 [CSEL 60.12]), later (a.d.
420) opted for Adam, when he realized that the Greek word for sin was feminine
(Contra duas epistolae Pelagianorum
4.4.7 [CSEL 60.527]: “in illo homine peccaverunt omnes”). Augustinian
interpretations were generally followed by Latin theologians: either “sive in
Adamo, sive in peccato” (Peter Chrysologus, Ps.-Primasius, Ps.-Bede, Thomas
Aquinas, Denis of Chartres) or “in Adamo” (Sedulius, Fulgentius of Ruspe,
Walafrid Strabo, Alexander of Hales, Hugh of Saint-Cher, Bonaventure). The
latter interpretation was unknown to the Greek Fathers before John Damascene.
Incorporation would not have been an impossible idea for Paul, and it is
sometimes further explained by invoking the OT idea of corporate personality or
solidarity; so Bruce, Romans 126;
Ellis, Paul’s Use of the Old Testament,
58–60; de Fraine, Adam, 142–52. Yet
if Paul had meant “in whom” (in the sense of incorporation), he would have
written en hō, as he does in 1 Cor
15:22; cf. Heb 7:9–10. Moreover, Adam
as the personal antecedent of the rel. pron. is too far removed in the sentence
from the pronoun.
(2) “Because of
whom,” i.e., Adam, all have sinned. So several Greek Fathers: John Chrysostom (In ep. ad Romanos hom. 10.1 [PG 60.474]:
ekeinou pesontos); Theodoret of
Cyrrhus (Interpretatio ep. ad Romanos
5.12 [PG 82.100]); John Damascene (In ep.
ad Romanos 5.12 [PG 95.477]: diʾ hou);
Theophylact (Expositio in ep. ad Romanos
5.12 [PG 124.404]: pesontos ekeinou).
Similarly Cambier, “Péchés.”
(3) “Because of the
one by whom” (ephʾ hō would
elliptically equal epi toutō ephʾ hō),
an interpretation that spells out a possibly elliptical phrase and refers the
masc. pron. to Adam. It would thus imply “a relationship between the state of
sin and its initiator” (Cerfaux, Christ,
232). But it is not clear that the phrase is elliptical, or that the epi could tolerate two diverse meanings,
“because of” and “by,” in such close proximity.
(4) “To the extent
that all have sinned,” an interpretation that understands ephʾ hō as neuter and equal to kathʾ
ho; so Cyril of Alexandria (In ep. ad
Romanos 5.12 [PG 74.784]). See further J. Meyendorff, “Ephʾ hō (Rom. 5,12) chez Cyrille d’Alexandrie et Théodoret,” Studia patristica 4, TU 79 (1961),
157–61. Cyril, however, also understood it to mean that all sinned in imitation
of Adam: tēs en Adam parabaseōs gegonamen
mimētai, a meaning that Pelagius also used, even though he understood ephʾ hō as “in quo.” Nygren (Romans, 214) seems to align himself with
this meaning.
(5) “On the grounds
of which,” or “because of which,” an interpretation that takes “death” as the
antecedent of masc. ephʾ hō and
explains it as the origin of sin (so Galling, Leipoldt, Schlier, and apparently
Bultmann [who toys with it in “Adam,” 153]). But this meaning is hard to
reconcile with 5:21 and 6:23, where death is the result of sin, not its source.
It seems to put the cart before the horse.
(6) “Toward which,”
again with thanatos as the
antecedent, but expressing the end or goal of human sin. So Héring (Le Royaume, 157); Stauffer (New Testament Theology [London: SCM,
1955], 270 n. 176). But this meaning is farfetched.
(7) “On the basis of
what (law) all sinned,” understanding nomō
from the general context and especially v 13; so Danker, comparing Menander, Fragment 531.6–7. But that reading
introduces into the sentence a notion that is not clearly envisaged. See
Porter, “Pauline Concept.”
(8) “On the basis of
which” or “under which circumstances,” with the antecedent understood as the
preceding clauses in the verse; so Zahn (Römer, 263–67), who thus stresses the fact and the
reason for the universality of sin. Of the relative-pronoun understandings of ephʾ hō, this one makes the best sense,
and it has extrabiblical parallels.
Second, ephʾ hō has been understood as
equivalent to a conjunction.
(9) “Since, because,
inasmuch as,” the equivalent of a causal conj. dioti, or as the equivalent of epi
toutō hoti, as many modern commentators understand ephʾ hō, comparing 2 Cor 5:4; Phil 3:12; 4:10 (BAGD, 287; BDF
§235.2); so Achtemeier, Althaus, Bardenhewer, Barrett, Bengel, Bonsirven,
Brandenburger, Bruce, Bultmann, Byrne, Cranfield, Dibelius, Dodd, Dunn,
Gaugler, Huby, Käsemann, Kuss, Lagrange, Lindeskog, Meyer, Michel, Moule, Moo,
Murray, Pesch, Prat, Sanday and Headlam, Schlier, Wilckens, and Winer.
Montagnini (Rom 5,12–14) thinks that ephʾ hō is the equivalent of Hebrew ʿal kēn and would translate it as “ecco
perché,” which is only a refinement of the commonly used “because.” This
interpretation would ascribe to human beings an individual responsibility for
death.
The trouble with
this interpretation is that there are almost no certain instances in early
Greek literature wherein ephʾ hō is
used as the equivalent of causal dioti.
Most of the examples cited by BAGD (287) or B-A (582) are invalid. Thus, ephʾ hō in Diodorus Siculus, Bibliothēkē historikē 19.98, means “for
which reason” (not the conj. “because”); Appian, Bellum Civile 1.112: “for which reason”; Synesius, Ep. 73: “on condition that” (see 10
below); Aelius Aristides, Oratio 53
640D. Only Damascius, Vita Isidori,
154 and tenth-century Syntipas, p. 124/5, 127/8 may be relevant.
Fourteenth-century Thomas Magister (p. 129, 3) says that ephʾ hō with a past verb stands for dioti, but gives only the dubious example of Synesius (see 10
below).
Moreover, alleged
examples in the Pauline corpus itself, apart from 5:12, are far from certain.
In Phil 3:12 ephʾ hō means “that for
which”; in Phil 4:10, “for whom,” or possibly “with regard to which” (Moule, Idiom Book, 132). Not even 2 Cor 5:4
does ephʾ hō certainly mean “because”
(despite the v.l. epeidē in minuscule
MSS 7*, 20*, 93 and the Vg translation “eo quod”); there it could easily mean
“because of that which.”
Hence one has to
take with a grain of salt the statement of Photius that myriad examples of this
phrase in the causal sense can be found (Quaestio
84 ad Amphiloch., PG 101.553). Lyonnet was undoubtedly right: “the alleged
current use” of ephʾ hō for hoti or dioti “has in no way been proved” (Bib 36 [1955]: 455).
(10) “In view of the
fact that, on condition that,” an interpretation that employs the proviso meaning
of neuter ephʾ hō understood as a
conj. in classical and Hellenistic Greek. So Rothe (Neuer Versuch, 17–19); Moulton (A Grammar of New Testament Greek [Edinburgh: Clark], 1 [1908],
107); Lyonnet; and Black (Romans,
82). Normally, however, ephʾ hō, expressing
a proviso, governs an infin. or a fut. indic. (occasionally a subjunc. or
opt.). Cf. Plato, Apology 17 §29C;
Xenophon, Anabasis 6.6.22; Hellenica 2.2.20; Thucydides, Peloponnesian War 1.103.1; 1.126.11;
Herodotus, History 3.83; 7.158. An
example of it with an aor. indic., apart from Phil 3:12, is found in a letter
of the fourth-century bishop Synesius (Ep.
73 [PG 66.1440]): ephʾ hō Gennadion
egrapsato, “on condition that he wrote (an accusation against) Gennadius,”
which expresses a fulfilled condition.
The last two
meanings, both proviso and causal, seem to make Paul say in 5:12d something
contradictory to what he says in 5:12abc. In the beginning of v 12 sin and
death are ascribed to Adam; now death seems to be owing to human acts. So
Lietzmann (An die Römer, 62); Bultmann
(“Adam,” 153); Kuss (Römerbrief, 231).
(11) “With the
result that, so that,” the equivalent of consecutive conj. hōste, a meaning found in Plutarch, Cimon 8.6.4 (“[Cimon] brought them [the bones of Theseus] back to
the city after almost 400 years with the result that the citizenry became most
kindly disposed toward him” [ephʾ hō kai
malista pros auton hēdeōs ho dēmos eschen]); Aratus 44.4.1; De curiositate
552E.4–6; Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae
2.49d (“It was a custom at banquets that a tablet was handed to the one who had
just reclined containing a list of what had been prepared so that he would know
what food the cook would provide” [ephʾ
hō eidenai ho ti mellei opson pherein ho mageiros]); Cassius Dio, Historia Romana 59.19.1–2; 59.20.3;
61.33.8; 63.28.5; 67.4.6; 73.18.2; Diogenes Laertius, Vitae philos. 7.173.1–5. For the recent discovery and full
discussion of this consecutive meaning, see Fitzmyer, “Consecutive Meaning.”
Ephʾ hō, then, would mean that Paul is expressing a
result, the sequel to Adam’s baleful influence on humanity by the ratification
of his sin in the sins of all individuals. He would thus be conceding to
individual human sins a secondary causality or personal responsibility for
death. Moreover, one must not lose sight of the adv. kai houtōs, “and so” (5:12c), which establishes the connection
between the sin of “one man” and the death and sins of “all human beings.” Thus
Paul in v 12 is ascribing death to two causes, not unrelated: to Adam and to
all human sinners. The fate of humanity ultimately rests on what its head,
Adam, has done to it. The primary causality for its sinful and mortal condition
is ascribed to Adam, no matter what meaning is assigned to ephʾ hō, and a secondary causality to the sins of all human beings.
For “no one sins entirely alone and no one sins without adding to the
collective burden of mankind.” (Byrne, Reckoning,
116). The universal causality of Adam’s sin is presupposed in 5:15a, 16a, 17a,
18a, 19a. It would then be false to the thrust of the whole paragraph to
interpret 5:12 as though it implied that the human condition before Christ’s
coming were due solely to individual personal sins.
all have sinned. See the Comment
on 3:23. The vb. hēmarton should not
be understood as “have sinned collectively” or as “have sinned in Adam,”
because they would be additions to Paul’s text. The vb. refers to personal,
actual sins of individual human beings, as Pauline usage elsewhere suggests
(2:12; 3:23; 5:14, 16; 6:15; 1 Cor 6:18; 7:28, 36; 8:12; 15:34), as the context
demands (vv 16, 20), and as Greek Fathers understood it (see Lyonnet, Bib 41 [1960]: 325–55). Cf. the LXX of
Isa 24:6, where one finds a very similar use of the vb. hamartanein: dia touto ara
edetai tēn gēn, hoti hēmartosan hoi katoikountes en tē gē, “for this reason
a curse swallows up the land, because the dwellers on the land have sinned.” (Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Romans: A New Translation with
Introduction and Commentary [AB 33; New Haven: Yale University Press,
2008], 411-17)