Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Romans 7:20
Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Now if I do … – This verse is also a repetition of what was said in Rom 7:16-17.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 20. It is no more I] My will is against it; my reason and conscience condemn it. But sin that dwelleth in me-the principle of sin, which has possessed itself of all my carnal appetites and passions, and thus subjects my reason and domineers over my soul. Thus I am in perpetual contradiction to myself. Two principles are continually contending in me for the mastery: my reason, on which the light of God shines, to show what is evil; and my passions, in which the principle of sin works, to bring forth fruit unto death.
This strange self-contradictory propensity led some of the ancient philosophers to imagine that man has two souls, a good and a bad one; and it is on this principle that Xenophon, in his life of Cyrus, causes Araspes, a Persian nobleman, to account for some misconduct of his relative to Panthea, a beautiful female captive, whom Cyrus had entrusted to his care:-“O Cyrus, I am convinced that I have two souls; if I had but one soul, it could not at the same time pant after vice and virtue; wish and abhor the same thing. It is certain, therefore, that we have two souls; when the good soul rules, I undertake noble and virtuous actions; but when the bad soul predominates, I am constrained to do evil. All I can say at present is that I find my good soul, encouraged by thy presence, has got the better of my bad soul.” See Spectator, vol. viii. No. 564. Thus, not only the ancients, but also many moderns, have trifled, and all will continue to do so who do not acknowledge the Scriptural account of the fall of man, and the lively comment upon that doctrine contained in the seventh chapter of the Epistle to the Romans.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Now if I do that I would not,…. The same conclusion is formed here, as in Ro 7:17, not with any view to excuse himself from blame in sinning, but to trace the lusts of his heart, and the sins of his life, to the source and fountain of them, the corruption of his nature; and to ascribe them to the proper cause of them, which was not the law of God, nor the new man, but sin that dwelt in him.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
It is no more I that do it ( ). Just as in verse 17, “no longer do I do it” (the real , my better self), and yet there is responsibility and guilt for the struggle goes on.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1) “Now if I do that I would not,” (ei de ho ou thelo ego touto poio) “But if I do what I wish not to do so badly,” and he did – this is the very admission of weakness and imperfection that he is both confessing and affirming, as an actual Christian experience.
2) “It is no more I that do it,” (ouketi ego katergazomai auto) “No more (is) it I that do it,” the regenerated “I”, the apostle “I”, the servant, steward, and minister “I” of the new Spirit nature, Rom 8:11; Rom 8:14; Rom 8:16; 1Co 2:14-16; Col 3:1-3.
3) “But sin that dwelleth in me,” (alla he oikousa en emoi hamartia)- “But the sin (nature) dwelling in me,” in the flesh, old carnal-born nature in which I dwell and tabernacle until death, predetermined in and thru Adam, Rom 5:12; Rom 5:14; Rom 5:17; Heb 9:27. Paul, who held the Spirit of God in him, still recognized that he was in a sinful tabernacle, groaning for deliverance because of his implanted new nature, 2Co 5:1-11.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
20. No more I sin (See note on 17.) What proves that it is no more I, but an overmastering I of sin that dwelleth in me, is the fact that I am overborne to do that which in conscience I would not.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘But if what I would not, that I do, it is no more I who do it, but sin which dwells in me.’
And the explanation for all this was the sin that dwelt in him that lay at the root of his fleshly disposition. It was because he was ‘a sinful man’ that he found it so impossible to live up to his own ideal of perfection, an ideal built up through spending time with God and His word.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Rom 7:20. I would not I, in the Greek, is very emphatical, and denotes the man in that part, which is chiefly to be countedhimself; and therefore with the like emphasis, Rom 7:15 it is called , I myself; “I, the man, with all my full resolution of mind.” The two words and might have both of them been spared, if nothing more had been meant here than the nominative case to the verb , serve. This verse seems no more than a repetition of Rom 7:17.: but it is a graceful and expressive repetition, andshews how near the affair lay to the heart of the person thus complaining; andin what sad and frequent successions the complaints were renewed. The beautiful passage in the 6th book of Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, where Araspas complains of two souls contending within him, (a passage which it is verypossible St. Paul might have read,) contains an agreeable illustration of this portion of Scripture. See Locke, Doddridge, and Wetstein.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Rom 7:20 . From this follows, however, the very proposition to be proved, Rom 7:17 , that it is not the moral self , but the sin-principle in man, that performs the evil.
] as in Rom 7:16 .
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Ver. 20. It is no more I ] Every new man is two men. See Trapp on “ Rom 7:17 “
But sin that dwelleth in me ] A scripture ill applied by that female Antinomian; who when her mistress charged her for stealing her linens and other things which she found in her chest or trunk, she denied that she stole them; and when she was asked how they came to be laid and locked up there? Did not you do this? No, said she, “it was not I, but sin that dwelleth in me.” See Trapp on “ Rom 6:15 “ See Trapp on “ Rom 7:17 “
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
20 .] The inference of Rom 7:17 restated, with the premiss of Rom 7:16 in the place of : but its meaning is now clearer and deeper than then; we know now that the which in the present verse does not the evil thing, is the better of the , whereas the in which sin dwells and rules, though included in the complex self, is the lower , . And so the way is now prepared for at once setting forth the conflict within us between these two .
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Rom 7:20 . The same conclusion as in Rom 7:17 . If the first is right, it must go with : Paul distinguishes himself sharply, as a person whose inclination is violated by his actions, from the indwelling sin which is really responsible for them.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Now, &c. = But if what I do not myself wish, this I do.
it is, &c. = no longer I myself (emph.)
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
20.] The inference of Rom 7:17 restated, with the premiss of Rom 7:16 in the place of :-but its meaning is now clearer and deeper than then; we know now that the which in the present verse does not the evil thing, is the better of the ,-whereas the in which sin dwells and rules, though included in the complex self, is the lower , . And so the way is now prepared for at once setting forth the conflict within us between these two.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Rom 7:20. ) no longer,[76] namely, as I formerly used to perpetrate it [taken from ]. Some degree of serenity and deliverance gradually arises. I is emphatic, in antithesis to sin. He who says with emphasis, it is not I that will it [non volo ego], instead of the former, I would not [non volo (without ego) I do not will] (Rom 7:15) is already farther removed from sin.
[76] Not now, as in former times, when I was wholly dead in sin.-ED.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Rom 7:20
Rom 7:20
But if what I would not, that I do, it is no more I that do it,-If he did the things that his mind desired not to do, it was not his inner self doing it.
but sin which dwelleth in me.-But if sin that dwelled in him ruled, it would defile his heart and carry him down to ruin.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
sin Sin. (See Scofield “Rom 5:21”).
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
it is no: Rom 7:17
Reciprocal: Joh 13:10 – needeth Rom 7:15 – what Rom 8:1 – no
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Rom 7:20. But if what I wish not, etc. Since this is the case (as Rom 7:19 shows), then the position of Rom 7:17 is sustained: it is no longer I, etc. The repetition in this clause is exact, but in the phrase I wish, some emphasis rests on I. This is taken by many as indicating a progress in thought. But there is no sign as yet of a more hopeful condition. The progress is still toward wretchedness, despite, or perhaps because of, this increased desire.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Vv. 20. Now if I do that I would not, I myself, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
A conclusion uniform with that before enunciated, Rom 7:16-17 : I am not master of myself; a stranger has forced his way into my house and holds me captive.
This is really the proof of the sold unto sin, Rom 7:14. Paul does not say so by way of excuse, but to describe a state of the profoundest misery. And every time he repeats this confession, it is as if he felt himself seized with a stronger conviction of its truth. The , I (after that I would not), is rejected by important authorities, and condemned by Meyer. But Tischendorf seems to me to be right in preserving it. It stands in a moral relation to the , I, which follows: What I would not, I myself, it is not really I who do it.
Fuente: Godet Commentary (Luke, John, Romans and 1 Corinthians)
But if what I would not, that I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwelleth in me.
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
20. But if I do that which I do not wish, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. Unscholarly people reason over this, founding a grave charge against Paul on the identity of I, which is utterly untrue, because I is not at all identical with itself, as it alternately represents carnality and spirituality, which instead of being identical are unlike as God and Satan, the one being the Son of God, the other that of the devil. Hence such an argument is radically untrue. Here the carnal I, representing old Adam, does all the mischief. Rom 7:20 repeats Rom 7:17, certifying his utter innocence in the matter, and laying all the blame on that indwelling sin represented in Rom 7:18-19 by carnal I. Hence Paul repeatedly affirms his irresponsibility, laying all the blame on the inbred sin which is causing all the trouble. It is a matter of fact that we are not condemned for the existence of inbred sin in our hearts nor its stirring within us. All this we can not prevent, but we are guilty if we yield to it and commit known and willing sin. This Paul repeatedly abnegates. Again, we become guilty if we do not walk in the light which God gives, and do our best by the grace of God to have this inbred sin destroyed.
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
Verse 20
It is no more I, &c.; that is, in doing it, I am, as it were, under the bondage and coercion of sin.