Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Romans 13:10
Love worketh no ill to his neighbor: therefore love [is] the fulfilling of the law.
10. Love worketh, &c.] Such is its very nature, to avoid the kind of acts which as a fact the Law forbids. Therefore Love (“Charity,” 1 Corinthians 13, &c.), though its action is not, strictly speaking, originated by the Law, but the necessary result of its being Love, is in perfect harmony with the Law which is the precept of Eternal Love; and so is the surest secret of fulfilling it.
his neighbour ] Lit. the neighbour: the neighbour in each case.
the fulfilling ] Better, the fulfilment. The Gr. word means not the process of obedience, but the result of the process; obedience as an accomplished fact. For this view of Love, see note on Rom 13:8; “hath fulfilled.”
The doctrine of this passage (that to love one another is the true secret of obedience to the Divine Law,) is in perfect harmony with the doctrine of the “bondservice” of the Christian, as stated in ch. 6; for the true secret of that bondservice is adoring gratitude for emancipation from the slavery of sin; a gratitude which after all does but joyfully recognize the unchangeable fact of the lawful claim of the Creator and Redeemer to the devotion of the whole man. Thus love to God is in fact the full acceptance of His will, His law; and love to others for His sake is therefore the sure way to carry out that law in its special precepts regarding duty to fellow-Christians and fellow-men. Manifestly the law is to be the authoritative guide of “love.” Love is not “a law unto itself,” but the “fulfilment” of the definite and objective rule of God’s revealed will.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Love worketh no ill … – Love would seek to do him good; of course it would prevent all dishonesty and crime toward others. It would prompt to justice, truth, and benevolence. If this law were engraved on every mans heart, and practiced in his life, what a change would it immediately produce in society! If all people would at once abandon what is suited to work ill to others, what an influence would it have on the business and commercial affairs of people. How many plans of fraud and dishonesty would it at once arrest. How many schemes would it crush. It would silence the voice of the slanderer; it would stay the plans of the seducer and the adulterer; it would put an end to cheating, and fraud, and all schemes of dishonest gain. The gambler desires the property of his neighbor without any compensation; and thus works ill to him. The dealer in lotteries desires property for which he has never toiled, and which must be obtained at the expense and loss of others. And there are many employments all whose tendency is to work ill to a neighbor. This is pre-eminently true of the traffic in ardent spirits. It cannot do him good, and the almost uniform result is to deprive him of his property, health, reputation, peace, and domestic comfort. He that sells his neighbor liquid fire, knowing what must be the result of it, is not pursuing a business which works no ill to him; and love to that neighbor would prompt him to abandon the traffic; see Hab 2:15, Wo unto him that giveth his neighbor drink, that putteth thy bottle to him, and makest him drink also, that thou mayest look on their nakedness.
Therefore … – Because love does no harm to another, it is therefore the fulfilling of the Law, implying that all that the Law requires is to love others.
Is the fulfilling – Is the completion, or meets the requirements of the Law. The Law of God on this head, or in regard to our duty to our neighbor, requires us to do justice toward him, to observe truth, etc. All this will be met by love; and if people truly loved others, all the demands of the Law would be satisfied.
Of the law – Of the Law of Moses, but particularly the Ten Commandments.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 10. Love worketh no ill] As he that loves another will act towards that person as, on a reverse of circumstances, he would that his neighbour should act towards him; therefore, this love can never work ill towards another: and, on this head, i.e. the duty we owe to our neighbour, love is the fulfilling of the law.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
This verse is an argument to prove what was proposed, Rom 13:8. It may thus be formed: That which worketh no ill, or doth no hurt to our neighbour, fulfilleth the law: but
love worketh no ill to his neighbour; ergo. That this is the property of love, see 1Co 13:4,5. When he saith, Love doth no hurt, this is implied, that it doth good to his neighbour. Where only negatives are mentioned, the affirmative also is included; and the negative only is set down in this place, that it may the better correspond with the foregoing verse.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
10. Love worketh no ill to hisor,”one’s”
neighbour; therefore,&c.As love, from its very nature, studies and delights toplease its objects, its very existence is an effectual securityagainst our wilfully injuring him. Next follow some general motivesto the faithful discharge of all these duties.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Love worketh no ill to his neighbour,…. That is, the man that truly loves his neighbour, will contrive no ill against him, nor do any to him; he will not injure his person, nor defile his bed, nor deprive or defraud him of his substance; or do hurt to his character, bear false testimony against him, or covet with an evil covetousness anything that is his; but, on the contrary, will do him all the good he is capable of:
therefore love is the fulfilling of the law: so far as a man loves his neighbour, he acts agreeably to the law, and the particular precepts of it above mentioned: what the apostle says of love to the neighbour, the Jews frequently say of love to God;
“he that loveth God (they say d) , “hath fulfilled the decalogue”, both above and below.”
And again e,
“there is no service like the love of God, R. Abba saith it is , “the sum of the law”; for the ten words of the law , “are herein comprehended”, or “fulfilled”:”
and elsewhere f they observe,
“that , “the whole law is comprehended”, or fulfilled “in love”.”
d Zohar in Deut. fol. 111. 3. e Zohar in Deut. fol. 113. 1. f Moses Kotsensis Mitzvot Tora, praecept. affirm. 3. prope finem.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The fulfilment of the law ( ). “The filling up or complement of the law” like (perfect active indicative of , stands filled up) in verse 8. See 1Co 13 for the fuller exposition of this verse.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1) “Love worketh no ill to his neighbor,” (he agape to plesion kakon ouk ergazetai) “True love does not, of its own accord or will, work moral or ethical wrong to the neighbor of one;” Love not only avoids devising or designing evil against ones neighbors but also seeks ways of doing good to them, 1Co 13:4-7. Love will not covet, steal, bear false witness against, commit adultery, or do anything wrong against ones neighbor.
2) “Therefore love is the fulfilling of the law,” (pleroma oun nomou he agape) “Therefore love is or exists the essence of fulfillment of Divine law,” the things Divine law requires, as set forth Exo 20:1-20; 1Co 15:56.
Love is a motivating power, an inspiration to good and righteousness as well as a restraining force against evil. 1Co 13:4-7 describes the essential nature of love which enables one in Christ to meet the righteous principles embodied in the Law of Moses.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
10. Love doeth no evil to a neighbor, etc. He demonstrates by the effect, that under the word love are contained those things which are taught us in all the commandments; for he who is endued with true love will never entertain the thought of injuring others. What else does the whole law forbid, but that we do no harm to our neighbor? This, however, ought to be applied to the present subject; for since magistrates are the guardians of peace and justice, he who desires that his own right should be secured to every one, and that all may live free from wrong, ought to defend, as far as he can, the power of magistrates. But the enemies of government show a disposition to do harm. And when he repeats that the fulfilling of the law is love, understand this, as before, of that part of the law which refers to mankind; for the first table of the law, which contains what we owe to God, is not here referred to at all.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(10) Fulfilling of the law.The form of the Greek word implies not only that love helps a man to fulfil the law, but that in the fact of the presence of love in his heart the law is actually fulfilled.
The principle here stated is beautifully worked out in 1Co. 13:4-7.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
10. No ill fulfilling As working no ill, love performs the decalogue in the negative form in which it is written.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Love works no ill to his neighbour, love therefore is the fulfilment of the law.’
For love is such that it ‘works nothing ill’ for our neighbour. Rather love seeks the very best for them. That is why love is the fulfilment of the Law. It should, however, be noted that if we did not have the Law, especially as expanded by Jesus, we would not have recognised the many ways in which we could harm our neighbour. The law is holy and just and good. It is we who render it helpless as a means of making us acceptable with God.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Rom 13:10 . Since all, that the law forbids us to do to our neighbour, is morally evil , Paul may now summarily conclude his grounding of the commandment of love, as he here does.
, with instead of is also found, though not frequently, in the Greek writers; comp. 2Ma 14:40 ; Eur. Hec. 1085 and Pflugk in loc.; Khner, II. 1, p. 277.
] Rom 13:8 . Other interpretations of (“id quod in lege summum est,” Ch. Schmidt, Rosenmller; “plus enim continet quam lex, est everriculum omnis injustitiae,” Grotius; see on the other hand Calovius) are opposed to the context. Comp. Gal 5:14 , where the point of view of the fulfilment of the law by love is still more comprehensive. Observe, moreover, that is not equivalent to , but in the love of one’s neighbour that whereby the law is fulfilled has taken place and is realized .
The commentary on this point, how love works no ill to one’s neighbour, is given by Paul in 1Co 13:4-7 .
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
10 Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Ver. 10. The fulfilling of the law ] The filling up of the law in this, that it closeth the duties of the law with the glory of a due manner, and seateth them upon their due subjects, with the unwearied labours of a constant well doing.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
10 .] All the commandments of the law above cited are negative : the formal fulfilment of them is therefore attained, by working no ill to one’s neighbour. What greater things Love works, he does not now say: it fulfils the law , by abstaining from that which the law forbids .
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Rom 13:10 . . This is all that is formally required by the law as quoted above ( , etc.): therefore love is , law’s fulfilment. Of course love is an inspiration rather than a restraint, and transcends law as embodied in merely negative commandments; but the form in which the law actually existed determines the form in which the Apostle expresses himself. It is apparent once more that is the Mosaic law, and not law in general; it is from it the prohibitions are derived on the ground of which the Apostle argues, and to it therefore we must apply his conclusion, .
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Love. App-135.
worketh. See Rom 2:10.
ill. Greek. kakos, translated “evil” in verses: Rom 13:3, Rom 13:4.
the, the. Omit.
fulfilling = fulfilment, or fulness. Greek. pleroma. See Rom 11:12, Rom 11:25.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
10.] All the commandments of the law above cited are negative: the formal fulfilment of them is therefore attained, by working no ill to ones neighbour. What greater things Love works, he does not now say: it fulfils the law, by abstaining from that which the law forbids.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Rom 13:10. , no evil) Moreover, most duties are of a negative character; or at least, where there is no one injured, positive duties are pleasantly and spontaneously performed. Where there is true love, there a man is not guilty of adultery, theft, lying, covetousness, Rom 13:9.[140]
[140] , then) Love is not extinguished of itself; for well-doing, unless it meets with some obstruction from some evil, goes on without interruption: hence it is that from the avoiding of evil the fulfilment of the law, which also includes good, is derived [is made to flow].-V. g.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Rom 13:10
Rom 13:10
Love worketh no ill to his neighbor: love therefore is the fulfilment of the law.-The perfection of love is to fulfill the law of God in all things toward God, toward our fellow men, and toward ourselves. To fulfill, or come up to, the law of God in all things is to love-is the highest possible good to every being in the universe and is eternal in its nature. Love may exist independent of emotions or the fleshly. One sees it his duty to do good to his enemy; to return good for evil, blessing for cursing. All his fleshly emotions and feelings may demand that he should return evil for evil, cursing for cursing. With a resolute will he restrains these feelings and does him good, a kindly deed; he prays for him; blesses him. It may be mechanical and outward as we call it; that is, fleshly feelings do not enter into it. Yet it is love, love of the highest type; love that springs wholly from the purpose and will of the spirit-the inner man. This is the battle between the flesh and the spirit within man. The flesh demands the railing and cursing for cursing; the spirit good for evil.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Love and the Law
Love is the fulfilment of the law.Rom 13:10.
1. Of Law, says Hooker, in the celebrated sentence with which he closes the first book of his Ecclesiastical Polity,Of Law there can be no less acknowledged, than that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world; all things in heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power; both Angels and men and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent, admiring her as the mother of their peace and joy.
I cannot fancy to my self what the Law of Nature means, but the Law of God. How should I know I ought not to steal, I ought not to commit Adultery, unless some body had told me so? Surely tis because I have been told so? Tis not because I think I ought not to do them, nor because you think I ought not; if so, our minds might change, whence then comes the restraint? from a higher Power, nothing else can bind. I cannot bind myself, for I may untye myself again; nor an equal cannot bind me, for we may untye one another. It must be a superior Power, even God Almighty. If two of us make a Bargain, why should either of us stand to it? What need you care what you say, or what need I care what I say? Certainly because there is something about me that tells me Fides est servanda, and if we after alter our minds, and make a new Bargain, theres Fides servanda there too.1 [Note: John Selden, Table Talk, 66.]
2. There is a law which men recognize always, even when they refuse to obey it. There is a still, small voice that speaks within, which tells a man that the right is to be followed and the wrong is to be shunned, which condemns a man when he has succumbed to the wrong, and refused the right. To all mankind, said a pagan writer, the voice of conscience is the voice of God. Things may fill us with amazement in this world of perplexities and antitheses, but none of us will refuse to recognize that morality needs no defence. For man, however imperfect his moral ideal may be, will recognize that if he does not obey the voice of conscience, at any rate he ought to do so; and there is a power within, higher than himself, nobler than himself, which speaks to him without the voice of any preacher, This ought ye to have done.
3. The Jews designated by the term law the entire Old Testament, less in the literary sense, according to which the prophets were added, to complete the idea of the volume, than in the theological sense, all the other books being thus regarded as corollaries of the Mosaic legislation. It may be boldly affirmed that in most of the passages in which St. Paul makes use of the word law, it is in the historical or literary sense; the allusion is to the Old Testament as a whole, not to the Pentateuch in particular. On this account the term has most frequently that which was called in the old theology the economic significationthat is, it stands for the entire Old Testament economy.
4. But in the present passage, as often elsewhere in St. Pauls Epistles, the word law signifies purely and simply the Law of Moses as contained in the Pentateuch, or even more particularly, the Ten Commandments. It is true that the word in the original is without the articlelaw simply, not the law; and it is important to observe that distinction generally. As Lightfoot says: The distinction between law and the law is very commonly disregarded, and yet it is full of significance. Behind the concrete representationthe Mosaic Law itselfSt. Paul sees an imperious principle, an overwhelming presence, antagonistic to grace, to liberty, to spirit, and (in some aspects), even to lifeabstract law, which, though the Mosaic ordinances are its most signal and complete embodiment, nevertheless is not exhausted therein, but exerts its crushing power over the conscience in diverse manifestations. The onethe concrete and specialis the law; the otherthe abstract and universalis law.1 [Note: Revision of the New Testament, 110.]
But in spite of this, there is little doubt that in the present passage the Apostles thought is of the Law of Moses, and that it is concentrated on that part of the Law of Moses which we call the Decalogue. Not that we are bound to restrict the law which is fulfilled by love to the Ten Commandments. While the argument of the passage is satisfied in that way, love meets not only the negative demands of the Decalogue but also the positive precepts of the Sermon on the Mount. For viewed in its idea and essence as a revelation of Gods will, law requires for its fulfilment that we should not only cease to do evil, but also learn to do well.
The subject is the fulfilment of the Law. Its fulfilment is to be contrasted with partial or imperfect obedience to it. So we have these three divisions
I.Obeying the Law.
II.Fulfilling the Law.
III.Love the Fulfilment of the Law.
I
Obeying the Law
There are ways in which the Law may be obeyed without being fulfilled.
1. The law may be obeyed through fear; or on account of the punishment which would follow its violation. A person may pay his debts, for instance, because, if he does not, he will go to prison. But you can never be quite sure that the law is really obeyed when you appeal only to fear. If a man is a clever scoundrel he may avoid detection, or, if detected, he may perhaps be able to make his escape before the punishment can be inflicted. And a stupid scoundrel, probably not knowing that he is stupid, will often run a similar risk. Thus, so long as the law depends solely upon fear for its fulfilment, however vigilant may be our police, however upright our courts of justice, however severe may be the condemnation of society, we have no security for its fulfilment, and as a matter of fact we know that it is constantly being violated.
And certainly the law of God can never be obeyed through fear. Despots may feel flattered as they see a population pale with terror at their power. They may think themselves all the safer when their subjects quail before them. And they may not care much, if only outward obedience is rendered, whether there be behind it a feeling of loyalty or not. But we cannot submit to or obey God in any such manner. He is a King and a Father who asks for loveasks for it because He gives His love to us. He says, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; not, Thou shalt dread the Lord thy God. He is a Monarch whose laws we cannot obey except by loving Him. If there are words we would speak, but that we dread God, we have spoken them in our hearts. If there are deeds we would do, but that we dread God, we have already done them in our hearts. He clearly and strikingly discriminates between what seems obedience and what is. This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me.
Every father fathoms the secret of obedience. You know that it is not worth the name of obedience if your child serves you from dread of consequences. You may have two children, one of whom is self-willed and fulfils your commands only from fear. He may fulfil them with strict literalness, doing exactly what you order, and no more. He may be most careful not to be found wanting in any particular, but you have reason to know that this is from no love of you or of your commands, but from dread of the consequences. Another obeys because he loves; perhaps he is not quite so punctilious in his obedience as the other; there may be occasional failure, occasional forgetfulness, blunders every now and then; but you know that, under all, there is a real love which is never more wounded than when you are wounded. Which of these two do you feel most fulfils your law? which meets most your fatherly sense of what is due to you? in which of them have you most confidence, not only when they are in your sight, but when they are out of your sight? You do not hesitate about the answer; and if the first child were only to do some act of obedience to you because he had begun to love you, you would feel that that one act weighed more than all the deeds of hollow servility he had ever performed. You would feel that love was the fulfilling of the law.1 [Note: E. Mellor.]
Fear acts chiefly as a restraint. It has checked many in a career of wickedness, and brought a few, perhaps, to the scrupulous observance of some precepts. In all things which are thought necessary to avert vengeance, it has often a strong influence, and its effects may even seem greater for a time than that which better principles produce; but it never yet brought a man with his whole heart into the service of Christ; nor does it lead to anything from which we think we may with safety be excused. It neither sets the affection on things above, nor kindles any zeal in the cause of the Redeemer. The dread of Gods anger will not make us cheerfully submissive to His will, or cherish the gentler graces which He requires from us to mankind.
While the law on stone is written,
Stone-like is the mighty word;
We with chilling awe are smitten,
Though the word is Thine, O Lord.
Firm it is as mountains old,
As their snowy summits cold.1 [Note: T. T. Lynch, The Rivulet, 29.]
2. The law may be obeyed from motives of self-interest; there is profit in obedience. To serve for profit is only the other side of the same spirit that serves from fear. Obedience is profitable. But there is a great difference between pursuing a course which is profitable, and pursuing it because it is profitable. A faithful servant of a monarch may be paid for his service; but if he serves only for his pay, he is not a faithful servant. The obedience we render only for the sake of what it will bring, we should not render at all if it brought us nothing; and in such a case the first and ruling motive is not service, but pay.
We cannot in this spirit obey the law of God. The rewards of God, the promised joys and glories of heaven, are far more than the wages of service. The crowns are not given to those who have served for gain; they are given to those who have served from love, who have found the service itself to be a joy, who would be content to serve for love for ever, even if there were no other recompense.
We sometimes meet with men who never commit any punishable injury, but who are to the last degree cold, callous, hard-hearted, and selfish. We are quite sure they would not rob or murder us, but we are equally sure they would not move their little finger to do us any good, would not raise their hand to save us from destruction. These men do incalculable mischief, and that of the worst kind. They injure the moral nature of their neighbours, whose best affections are dwarfed, or it may be destroyed, by their inhumanity, just as fruit is blighted by the frost. They do all that in them lies to make other men into moral pigmies like themselves. Hence, though they are not guilty of any punishable breach of the law, they are guilty of violating itthey do ill to their neighbours.1 [Note: A. W. Momerie.]
3. The law may be obeyed in the letter while its spirit is violated. The letter of the law is enforced by the punishment of society, and just because it is so enforced it is of necessity very limited in its scope. As Bentham explains in his principles of jurisprudence, the written law only takes cognizance of vices which can be clearly defined and readily distinguished. If it attempted to cover a larger areaif, for example, it endeavoured to punish ingratitude or unkindnessit would do more harm than good. It is difficult, or rather impossible, to find out when and to what extent such sins have been committed. If, therefore, the law attempted to deal with them, it would be in constant danger of punishing the less guilty or even the innocent, and of allowing the more guilty to get off scot-free. And, further, this unjust administration of justice would involve an amount of inquisitive surveillance which would be more hurtful to society than the evils which, after all, it failed to prevent. For these reasons, then, the spirit of the law, which is Thou shalt do no ill to thy neighbour, has to be narrowed in the letter, where we read only, Thou shalt not injure thy neighbour in a certain few definite ways. From this, of course, it follows that the man who is contented with keeping the letter of the law is most undoubtedly guilty of violating its spirit. He goes but a little way along the path of duty.
This was the sin of the Pharisees, the class that Christ denounced most strongly, and the only class that He did denounce. At the time when Jesus first began, with His Gospel of repentance and of Divine love, to teach the simple fishermen of Galilee, scribes and Pharisees had managed, by their interpretation of the law, which was at once a law of religion and a law of righteousness, to bind heavy burdens upon mens shoulders, and to reduce the simple moral code to a series of minute ritual observances. He was held to fulfil the law who could remember what to do ceremonially, and he was held to have disregarded the law, however faithfully, kindly, and nobly he might be living, who had forgotten or who never knew what the proper ritual was. Then came Jesus and swept it all away; and, humanly speaking, He died for doing it. His protest was entered in the name of religion against the burdensome ritual and minute useless observances with which men were troubled in His day.
The Pharisees were active and zealous. The Gospel was an active religion, and Pharisaism was an active religion; particular virtues were common to both. But the Gospel was an active religion founded upon love, and Pharisaism was an active religion founded upon egoism.
In our own day also a conscious obedience to particular laws of the Gospel determines the lives of large numbers among us; we pray, we worship, we learn the knowledge of Divine things, we give alms, we even fast, we follow the approved methods of repentance, we practise intercession, we bring all our daily interests,our politics, our friendships, our households, to the feet of God in prayer; we could not be safe or happy for half a day of our lives without God being in all our thoughts; yet when our work for God is over, or even in the dread intervals of silence which stop the hearts pulses in the stir of work, there comes to all of us this question, Have I, after all, any true love for God? If God and I were alone in the world where would be my love for God? If there were no work to be donethat work which I loveshould I love God at all?
I put a loaded gun in the corner of a room, and tell my child not to touch it. There is a rule or maxim. Knowing nothing of the reason of my command, his plain duty as a child is implicit servile obedience to my order; his conscience should be grieved if, even to prevent its being broken by a fall, he is induced to touch it, because there is a harm in doing it which is to him mysterious and unknown. But suppose him older, and suppose him to understand by natural intelligence, that the reason of my prohibition was to prevent the possibility of its exploding, and suppose him to see a sheet of paper fall from the table on fire close to it, what would his duty beto cleave to the maxim, or to cut himself adrift from it? Surely to snatch up the forbidden gun directly. His first duty, in point of time, is to obey the rule; his first in point of importance, is to break it. Indeed, this is the very essence, according to St. Paul, of the difference between the legal and the Gospel state. In the legal state we are under tutors, governors, and must not go beyond rules; for rules are disciplining us to understand the principles of themselves. But in the Gospel state we are redeemed from this bondage, serving in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. We discern principles, and are loyal to them; we use rules or dispense with them, as they save or destroy the principle for which they exist.1 [Note: F. W. Robertson, Life and Letters, 358.]
II
Fulfilling the Law
1. To fulfil a thing is to fill it full, so that no part of it is left void or empty. It is an image taken from a cup filled to the brim, as full as it can hold; and it is applied to a number of things both in Scripture and in common life. We read in the Book of Exodus, that Pharaohs taskmasters compelled the children of Israel to fulfil their daily tasks of making brick as heretofore, after they had taken away the straw from them. In other words, they had to give in quite as many bricks as they had been accustomed to make when the straw was duly supplied them. They were not to diminish the tale or quantity of bricks demanded of them. And in the same way, to fulfil a promise is to keep it fully and completely; and also if we fulfil a duty we discharge it fully and completely, leaving no part of it unperformed.
Now this is what St. Paul means by fulfilling the law. He means that we should do to the very utmost everything required of us. It is incumbent upon us to give in every single one of the tale of bricks, or rather of the fine hewn stones, which God demands from us towards building up the edifice of duty. We must not, we dare not, break, or neglect, or overlook any part of any one of the commandments, for the reason that it is a little one, or that it is a trifle, that it cannot signify, that there is no use in being too particular. We are to remember the words of the Sermon on the Mount, where our Lord says that whosoever shall break one of the least of these commandments or shall teach men so, shall be reckoned the least in the Kingdom of heaven.
Men are apt to think that they cannot have too much of a good thingtoo much piety, too much religious feeling, too much attendance at the public worship of God. They forget the truth which the old philosophy taught, that the life of man should be a harmony; not absorbed in any one thought, even of God, or in any one duty or affection, but growing up as a whole to the fulness of the perfect man. That is a maimed soul which loves goodness and has no love of truth, or which loves truth and has no love of goodness. The cultivation of one part of religion to the exclusion of another seems often to exact a terrible retribution both in individual characters and in churches. There is a Nemesis of believing all things, or indeed of any degree of intellectual dishonesty, which sometimes ends in despair of all truth.1 [Note: Benjamin Jowett.]
2. The fulfilling of the law, therefore, is keeping it in its fullest, its deepest, its most spiritual meaning. Every angry feeling, every wanton thought, every uncharitable and suspicious thought, every unfair advantage and dishonest trick, however it may be allowed to pass free by human laws, and however customary in mens dealings with each other,all these, and all manner of greediness after the things of this world, are breaches of one or other of the commandments. Nothing short of perfect kindness, perfect purity, perfect honesty, perfect truth, and perfect temperance will fulfil the law. Nothing short of perfect kindness, because every degree of unkindness is forbidden by the sixth commandment; nothing short of perfect purity, because all impurity is forbidden by the seventh; nothing short of perfect honesty, because every kind of dishonesty is forbidden by the eighth; nothing short of perfect truth, because all falsehood is condemned by the ninth; nothing short of perfect temperance, because all greediness and covetous desires are forbidden by the tenth commandment. Such are the vast claims which Gods law has upon us, when taken in its full extent.
When Christ denounced the breaking of any of the commandments, He spoke on the very point that St. Paul is speaking of. His subject was fulfilling the law. Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you,I, the Eternal Word and Infallible Truththat except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. Or we might paraphrase it thus: I am come to fulfil the law of Moses; I am come to show you the exceeding depth of Gods commandments; I am come to show you how much they require of every one, when they are taken in their full meaning. This is one object of My mission. If any man, then, fancies that I am come to bring a licence for sinningif a person conceives he may continue in sin, because I have brought pardon and grace into the worldhe takes a mistaken view of the object of My coming. My Father sent Me not to abolish holiness, or to diminish aught from its claims, but to place it on a firmer foundation, and to give it its true scope; so that it shall embrace, not only the outward actions of men, but their very thoughts and inmost wishes. I am not come to make the law void, but to fill it up.
III
How Love Fulfils the Law
Love is the fulfilment of the law. If we had perfect love for our neighbour we should keep the commandments perfectly: and in proportion as love fills us, in the same proportion shall we fulfil them. Love will enable us to keep the commandments. That is the Apostles argument.
1. The love which is here spoken of, and which the writers of the New Testament set before us on every occasion when they teach about the inner principle of Christianity, is a reverent goodwill, not only from man to God, but from man to man. The very same word which describes love to God is used by New Testament teachers, by the great Apostle of the Gentiles, and by John the Divine, to describe the relations which should exist between man and man. The same quality of reverent affection which is due from man to God is due from man to man.
It is not easy for men to comprehend the full meaning of this term love. We identify it with amiability and mildness and sentimentality. We confuse it with the petty standards of love that are partial, weak, and blind: that limit their favours to one or two; that are no more than a flush in the blood or a thrill along the nerves. Love as St. Paul means it, love as it was newly and divinely characterized by the Saviour, is a broader and more comprehensive thing than any of these,rises higher, runs deeper, sweeps around larger interests, includes nobler ideals. It is a feeling which pervades all conduct, governs all motives, sustains every duty, extends to all souls. It is the kindliness which prompts to courtesy, the sensitive fairness which insists on perfect equity, the sympathy which reaches after the lost, the mercy which softens the doom of crime. And it is the strength and the courage which dare to undertake severities which are destined to end in blessings; to be a little hard in order to be very tender; and to go forth with the scourge against offenders, and draw the sword of retribution against the oppressor and his hard-hearted crew. And, over and above all these peculiarities, love rises above this earth and the humanity it supports, and exalts the soul to heavens gates; reaches out for God, and loses itself in the Being whence its holy impulse was derived. That is what Christianity means by love.
Oh, there are moments in mans mortal years,
When for an instant that which long has lain
Beyond our reach, is on a sudden found
In things of smallest compass, and we hold
The unbounded shut in one small minutes space,
And worlds within the hollow of our hand,
A world of music in one word of love,
A world of love in one quick wordless look,
A world of thought in one translucent phrase,
A world of memory in one mournful chord,
A world of sorrow in one little song.
Such moments are mans holiest,the full-orbed
And finite form of Loves infinity.1 [Note: Henry Bernard Carpenter, Liber Amoris.]
2. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. St. Paul seems to limit the action of love here to doing no ill. That is simply because the commandments are mostly negative; and that they are is a sad token of the lovelessness natural to us all. But do we love ourselves only negatively, or are we satisfied with doing ourselves no harm? That stringent pattern of love to others prescribes not only degree, but manner. It teaches that true love to men is not weak indulgence, but must sometimes chastise, and thwart, and always must seek their good, and not merely their gratification. Whoever will honestly seek to apply that negative precept of working no ill to others, will find it positive enough. We harm men when we fail to help them. If we can do them a kindness, and do it not, we do them ill. Non-activity for good is activity for evil.
Some years ago we were reading day by day of a murder that had been committed in the swamps of Niagara, and such was the solidarity of the human race that that isolated deed was discussed right round the globe. We saw it all enacted, like some stage drama, before our very eyes. We saw this man, an Oxford graduate, a man of good family, a man reared in honourable traditions, leading his victim on and on to some lonely spot in that dismal swamp, and then the pistol shot rings, and without remorse he turns away, leaving his victimwho has eaten with him, jested with him, trusted in himto die miserably and unpitied. We tried this man for murder, but that red blossom of murder was only the outward sign of something else. Go deeper to the root, and you will see that he wants to steal, and he covets, and he lies before he wants to murder. These were the active causes of the crime; this was the black sap that fed the tree upon which this hideous blossom of murder at last sprang into life. Reduce all these things to a sentence, and you have said everything when you have said, This man did not love. If he had loved his friend he would not have lied to him; if he had loved him he would not have coveted his money; still less could he have pushed him out of life for the sake of paltry gain, whichsuch is the irony of crimehe never even handled. For that unhappy youth love would literally have been the fulfilling of the law.1 [Note: W. J. Dawson.]
3. Love fulfils the commandments. We may take the commandments one by one, and apply this test to them, and we shall see at once that they would not have been needed if only men had loved one another. Do we need to be told not to murder any one we love, not to defraud him, not to covet his possessions, not to dishonour his home? Why, we not only cannot do it, we simply cannot conceive the thought of doing it. If we have love, we cannot help keeping the law. If we have love, we cannot help being moral. It may seem but a scanty equipment to produce perfection, and so the seven notes of music may seem to be a scanty equipment to produce the heaven-born melodies of a Handel or a Beethoven. But see how they use them,of what infinite and glorious combinations are they capable! How the highest and deepest emotions of our nature find liberation and a language as we thrill to the majestic strains which purify and exalt us, which give us visions of truth, of self, of heaven, of God, and of the joy of God, which no speech could utter and no articulate array of words could express. Yet there are but seven notes of music in it all, something a child might learn in an hour, but which a Handel or a Beethoven cannot exhaust in a lifetime. So it is with this supreme quality of love! It is capable of all but infinite combinations and interpretations; it utters the grand music of heroism and the soft lute-music of courtesy; it is patriotism, it is altruism, it is martyrdom; it stoops to the smallest things of life and it governs the greatest; it controls the temper and it regulates the reason; it extirpates the worst qualities and it develops and refines the best; it reforms and transforms the whole man into the image of God, for there is no height of character to which love cannot lift a man, and there is no height of character possible without it. Love is character. Love is the fulfilling of the law.
Love is so comprehensive a grace that it includeth all the rest; and so is in effect the fulfilling of the whole law. There is a thread of love which runneth through all the particular duties and offices of Christian life, and stringeth them like so many rich pearls into one single chain.1 [Note: Bishop Sanderson.]
4. Love is the fulfilling of the law for three reasons:
(1) It removes the bias of self-love that is in our nature.That there is such a bias in our nature is plain. Else why should we all be such unfair judges in our own case, and, comparatively speaking, such fair judges in matters we are not concerned with? Any man of common sense can see the rights of a case, where the question is between neighbour and neighbour. Not one in ten, or in fifty, or in a hundred, can see the right of the case, when the question is between his neighbour and himself. Where self is concerned, the weight of self-love is sure to slip into one of the scales; and so they become uneven. Nor is this to be remedied, except by putting into the opposite scale that love to our neighbour which Christ commands us to cherish.
Self is the only prison that can ever bind the soul;
Love is the only angel who can bid the gates unroll;
And when he comes to call thee, arise and follow fast;
His way may lie through darkness, but it leads to light at last.1 [Note: Henry van Dyke.]
(2) It gives us sympathy, and is the only effective principle of duty.This love is far more amenable to reason than the passion which goes by the same name. We may set ourselves, as George Eliot has put it,we may studiously set ourselves to learn something of the poetry and pathos lying in the experience of all human soulspoetry and pathos that look out through dull grey eyes, and that speak in a voice of quite ordinary tones. We may know something of this if we will only think. And such knowledge will inevitably give birth to sympathy.
If ever you see in your neighbour the downcast, suffering, timid look, that unmistakable air which marks so often the first apprenticeship to hardness, the beginning of the death of finer feelings, does it strike you to show kindness, to administer comfort or ensure protection? Does it not sometimes rather happen that you help to break the bruised reed, that you show contempt or indifference when you should show loving-kindness, or that you even join in mocking or cruelty when you ought to have put your heel upon it? Do as you would be done by is only a low form of practical maxim, but even this is very often higher than our practice. Does it never happen that you get your pleasure out of annoyance to another? Does it never happen that you allow this to be done by some one near you? Does a stranger coming amongst us young, inexperienced, or it may be with some peculiarity, never find his life made miserable by some cruel, or hard, or low-toned neighbour?2 [Note: Bishop Percival, Some Helps for School Life, 175.]
Do thy days work, my dear,
Though fast and dark the clouds are drifting near,
Though time has little left for hope and very much for fear.
Do thy days work, though now
The hand must falter and the head must bow,
And far above the failing foot shows the bold mountain brow.
Yet there is left for us,
Who on the valleys verge stand trembling thus,
A light that lies far in the westsoft, faint, but luminous.
We can give kindly speech
And ready, helping hand to all and each,
And patience to the young around by smiling silence teach.
We can give gentle thought,
And charity, by lifes long lesson taught,
And wisdom, from old faults lived down, by toil and failure wrought.
We can give love, unmarred
By selfish snatch of happiness, unjarred
By the keen aims of power or joy that make youth cold and hard.
And, if gay hearts reject
The gifts we hold, would fain fare on unchecked
On the bright roads that scarcely yield all that young eyes expect,
Why, do thy days work still.
The calm, deep founts of love are slow to chill;
And heaven may yet the harvest yield, the work-worn hands to fill.
(3) It springs from love to God.There is no true love of man unconnected with the love of God, nor any which does not originate there. The feeling which takes the name of benevolence is too fickle in its nature, too narrow in its range, too easily checked and extinguished, to fulfil, in any due degree, the duties with which God charges us towards each other. To do this we must love each other for His sake after His pattern, and by extending to them the love we bear to Himself. Then it becomes Christian charity, and is equal to every precept. Love worketh no ill to our neighbour; it thinketh none. It suffereth long and is kind. In no case doth it behave itself unseemly. It furnishes unto all good works. It is a principle broad enough for the whole range of our duty; and to be improving in every grace of the Gospel, we need only to be growing perfect in love.
He who loves his neighbour also fulfils the commandments written in the first table of the law. Because he is Gods child and therefore must needs have loved God first, and have thus conformed himself to the obligations of the whole law, he loves his neighbour with a pure heart and true charity. He can, in point of fact, keep the commandments which concern his neighbour only through love of God. For, as the law of Moses was powerless to produce in the heart of the Jew that true love for his fellow-men, without which the law itself could not be fulfilled, which is the effect only of grace, so only those who are filled with the love of God, and possess the grace which grows from this love, can really possess that true love to man which is the fulfilment of the law.
When thy heart, love filled, grows graver,
And eternal bliss looks nearer,
Ask thy heart, nor show it favour,
Is the gift or giver dearer?
Love, love on; love higher, deeper;
Let loves ocean close above her;
Only, love thou more loves keeper,
More, the love-creating lover.
5. Love not only fulfils the precepts of the law, it also completes and perfects the law itself. No law can provide for all cases that may come before us in the course of life. Every law can only lay down general principles and rules, and at the utmost can only name some cases in particular. Much less can a lawgiver prescribe exactly the application of his law to the individual case; for the application must necessarily differ with the difference between men, their actions, and the accompanying circumstances. Love alone can take account of all the cases that occur in human life, of all men and their actions, all their surrounding circumstances and peculiarities, and provide completely and suitably for all. In this sense love is not only the fulfilling, but also the fulness (plenitudo), i.e. the completion and perfection of the law. Where love rules wholly and perfectly, there the precepts of the law become superfluous, and the rule of love takes the place of law; where love withdraws and becomes cold, there the machinery of the law must come in, and the more love removes herself, so much the more must the legal machinery rule until it sinks to the slavery of simple government by police.
A mightier church shall come, whose covenant word
Shall be the deeds of love. Not Credo then,
Amo shall be the password through its gates.
Man shall not ask his brother any more,
Believest thou? but Lovest thou? and all
Shall answer at Gods altar, Lord, I love.
For Hope may anchor, Faith may steer, but Love,
Great Love alone, is captain of the soul.1 [Note: Henry Bernard Carpenter, Liber Amoris.]
Love and the Law
Literature
Adams (J. C.), The Leisure of God, 51.
Body (G.), The Life of Love, 10.
Bonar (H.), Gods Way of Holiness, 104.
Campbell (R. J.), City Temple Sermons, 108, 122.
Dawson (W. J.), The Church of To-morrow, 229.
Fuller (M.), The Lords Day, 355.
Gibbons (J. C.), Discourses and Sermons, 89.
Hall (C. R.), Advent to Whitsun-Day, 1.
Hall (W. A. N.), Do Out the Duty, 50.
Hancock (T.), The Pulpit and the Press, 67.
Hare (A. W.), Alton Sermons, 538.
Hathaway (E. P.), The Ten Commandments and Lords Prayer, 79, 81.
Horne (W.), Religious Life and Thought, 111.
Kuegele (F.), Country Sermons, ii. 121.
Lee (R.), Sermons, 215, 228.
MCosh (J.), Gospel Sermons, 199.
Maclaren (A.), Expositions: Romans, 304.
Mellor (E.), In the Footsteps of Heroes, 1.
Momerie (A. W.), The Origin of Evil and Other Sermons, 160.
Percival (J.), Some Helps for School Life, 165.
Sauter (B.), The Sunday Epistles, 79.
Streatfeild (G. S.), in Sermons for the People, New Ser., i. 23.
Christian World Pulpit, xiii. 131 (Beecher); xxv. 129 (Furse); xl. 152 (Dawson); lxix. 203 (Hutton); lxx. 372 (Muir).
Church Pulpit Year Book, v. (1908), 162.
Churchmans Pulpit, i. (Pt. 47), 284 (Atkin).
Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible
worketh: 1Co 13:4-7
love is: Rom 13:8, Mat 22:40
Reciprocal: Psa 15:3 – doeth Mat 22:39 – Thou Luk 3:14 – Do violence to no man Rom 2:27 – if it fulfil Rom 14:15 – now 1Jo 4:21 – General
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
CHRISTIAN LOVE
Love worketh no ill to his neighbour.
Rom 13:10
Holy Scripture shows that universal kindness and benevolence is the true spirit of Christianity.
I. The obstacle is our natural selfishness, which is our strongest characteristic. The desire to get on is natural; the desire for amusement is natural. Natural affection is not necessarily a Christian virtue.
II. Christian love is the gift of God. It can be sought and obtained. By the spirit of love shall we know that we are Christs disciples.
III. The result will be that our way will ever be growing brighter and happier because no unregenerate ill and no coldness or deadness or unselfishness.
Archdeacon William Sinclair.
Illustration
Without taking the extreme casea man who hates me as his enemyhow am I to feel brotherly love for the selfish, the mocker, the ungrateful, the mean, the sordid, the depraved, the impure, and the liar? Jesus Christ gives more than a hint of how this can be done. We must try to look on all men as God does. We must try to see our brother men even at their worst as God sees them. We must learn to know that behind all these superficial vices and defects there is a poor, suffering, blinded, ignorant, precious, human soul for whom Christ died on the Cross. We must recognise that the seemingly ungrateful are probably most grateful, and that, with the fewest possible exceptions, every living soul is trying to do his best according to his lights and understanding, so far as his partial knowledge or complete ignorance will permit, so far as his hereditary defects, uncongenial surroundings, and training will allow. God, we must remember, hates only the sin and loves the sinner. We must endeavour to draw the same distinction, remembering at the same time the words Judge not, that ye be not judged. We do not know what another mans temptation may be, nor how we might fare if we had them to face ourselves. But we do know that all men are tempted to sin, and that few indeed consciously and wilfully sin with deliberate intent. Let us therefore strive to see our fellow-men as God sees them. While hating their sins as we hate our own, let us learn to love them as precious souls, for whom the Lord of glory died.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
:10
Rom 13:10. Love (one of the requirements of the Gospel) fulfills the law by prompting one to do these neighborly acts specified by the law.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Rom 13:10. Love worketh no ill to his neighbor, lit, the neighbor. Alford: All the commandments of the law above cited are negative: the formal fulfilment of them is therefore attained, by working no ill to ones neighbor. What greater things love works he does not now say. Pauls further comments on this thought may be found in 1Co 13:4-7 (Meyer).
Love therefore is the fulfilment of the law. A repetition of the proposition of Rom 13:8 after its truth has been demonstrated (Rom 13:9-10). Fulfilment is a more accurate rendering than fulfilling (E. V.).
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Vv. 10. The asyndeton between these two verses arises from the vividness with which the author perceives their logical relation: No, certainly! love cannot do wrong…It has been asked why the apostle speaks here only of the evil which love does not do, and not of the good which it does. The good to be done, answers Hofmann, was understood as a matter of course. But the evil not to be done was still more so. The explanation of the fact arises from what precedes. Love is spoken of here only as the means and pledge of the fulfilment of justice. Now, the functions of justice have a negative character (not to do wrong).
The second proposition of this verse serves only to express as a conclusion (therefore, true reading) the maxim laid down as a thesis in Rom 13:8, and regarded as demonstrated., the fulfilment; strictly: what fills a void; the void here is the commandment to be fulfilled.
Paul has thus closed his exposition of the Christian’s duties as a member of civil society. It only remains for him to direct the minds of his readers to the solemn expectation which can sustain their zeal and perseverance in the discharge of all those religious and social obligations.
The nature of the state, according to Romans 13
The apostle’s doctrine on this important subject occupies the mean between two opposite errors, both equally dangerous: that which opposes the state to the church, and that which confounds them. The first view is that which is expressed in the famous maxim: The state is godless (Odillon Barrot). Bordering on this saying, as it seems, was Vinet’s thought when he wrote the words: The state is the flesh, thus contrasting it with the church, which would be the incarnation of the Spirit. This opinion appears to us false, because the state represents the natural man, and the natural man is neither godless, nor the flesh pure and simple. There is in him a moral element, the law written in the heart (chap. Rom 2:14-15), and even a religious element, God’s natural revelation to the human soul (Rom 1:19-21). And these two elements superior to the flesh ought to enter also into the society of natural men organized as a state. This is what St. Paul has thoroughly marked, and what, according to him, gives a moral and even religious character to the institution of the state, as we have just seen in explaining this passage. But, on the other hand, we must beware of confounding this religious character of the state with the Christian character. It is impossible to distinguish the Christian sphere from the civil more exactly than Paul does in these two chapters, xii. and xiii. The one belongs to the psychical order; hence the , every human soul, Rom 13:1; the other is spiritual or pneumatic, and supposes faith (Rom 12:1-6). The one has justice as its principle of obligation, the other love. To the one belong means of constraint, for we have the right to demand of every man that he discharge the duties of justice; the other is the reign of liberty, because love is essentially spontaneous, and cannot be exacted from any one. There is therefore a profound distinction between the state and the church, according to Paul’s teaching, but not opposition, any more than between law and grace, or between justice and love. As the law paves the way for grace, and as the conscientious practice of justice prepares the soul for the exercise of love, so the state, by repressing crime, preserves public order, and thereby the condition in which the church can tranquilly pursue her work, that of transforming the citizens of the earth into citizens of the kingdom of heaven. There is thus a reciprocal service which the two institutions render to one another. But we must beware of going further; the church has nothing more to ask of the state than her freedom of action, that is to say, the common right. So Paul himself declares, 1Ti 2:1-2. And on its side the state has not to espouse the interests of the church, nor consequently to impose on this society, which it has not contributed to form, any belief or procedure whatever. The essence and origin of the two societies being different, their administration ought to remain distinct.
Such is the result of the exposition which we have just studied in chaps. 12 and 13. In tracing these outlines of the philosophy of right and of the theory of the state, by how many centuries was St. Paul ahead of his own age, and perhaps of ours? We have palpable proof of the truth of the saying with which he introduces this whole moral doctrine (Rom 12:3): I declare unto you by the grace given unto me.
Fuente: Godet Commentary (Luke, John, Romans and 1 Corinthians)
Love worketh no ill to his neighbor: love therefore is the fulfillment of the law. [All divine law, whether of Moses and the prophets, of Christ or the apostles, is fulfilled by love, for those things that law requires are the natural, normal acts of a loving heart. “Love,” says Leibnitz, “is that which finds its felicity in another’s good.” Another has defined it thus: “Love is holiness, spelt short.” How easily, then, will it keep all precepts, whether toward man or God! “The expression implies more than a simple performance of the precepts of the law; true love does more than this: it adds a completeness to the performance. It reaches those lesser courtesies and sympathies which can not be digested into a code or reduced to rule. To the bare framework of law, which is as the bones and sinews, it adds the flesh which fills it, and the life which actuates it” (Webster and Wilkinson). “Nor is it possible to find for human life, amid all the intricate mazes of conduct, any other principle that should be at once as simple, as powerful and as profound” (Sanday). “How many schemes would it crush. It would silence the voice of the slanderer; it would stay the plans of the seducer and the adulterer; it would put an end to cheating and fraud, and all schemes of dishonest gain. The gambler desires the property of his neighbor without any compensation, and thus works ill to him. The dealer in lotteries desires property for which he has never toiled, and which must be obtained at the expense and loss of others. And there are many employments all whose tendency is to work ill to a neighbor. This is pre-eminently true of the traffic in ardent spirits” (Barnes). Love is the spirit of gracious addition, while covetousness, theft, etc., are the spirits of subtraction. Love emanates from God, whose name is Love, but selfishness is of the devil, who asserts himself even against God. Love, therefore, is the basis of all godlike action, the motive power for every noble deed.]