This righteousness, however, is not to
be understood in a legal sense as God’s retributive justice (justitia dei),
but as God’s saving justice, God’s covenant loyalty, God’s uprightness and
integrity, God’s faithfulness to what it means for God to be God. This dimension
of God’s righteousness, which appears in the Psalms and in the book of the
prophet Isaiah, can be seen in Isa. 51:5, 8 LXX, which equates God’s “righteousness”
(dikaiosynē) with God’s “salvation” (sōtēria):
My righteousness draws near
swiftly,
my salvation will go out, . . .
but my righteousness will be forever,
and my salvation for generations of generations. (Isa. 51:5, 8 NETS)
The parallel nature of these texts
indicates that God’s “righteousness” (dikaiosynē) is God’s “salvation” (sōtēria).
Righteousness, then, is not static quality whereby God exercises justice but a
dynamic quality whereby God effects salvation. This interpretation of the righteousness
of God puts the emphasis where it ought to be (on God’s saving justice) without
neglecting the righteousness that God grants as a free gift. For when the righteousness
of God’s revealed, those who respond in faith receive the gift of God’s righteousness.
(Frank J. Matera, Romans [Paideia Commentaries on the New Testament; Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2010], 35-36)
