Romans 7:9-11 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

For I was alive In my own conceit; without the law Without the proper knowledge of its spirituality, extent, and obligation. I apprehended myself to be righteous, and in the way to life eternal; but when the commandment came That is, the law; (a part being put for the whole;) but this expression particularly intimates its compulsive force, which restrains, enjoins, urges, forbids, threatens; when, in its spiritual meaning, it came to my heart: or, when the spiritual meaning and full extent of the law, condemning desires of evil, was brought home, and closely applied to my conscience by the Spirit of God; sin revived My conscience was awakened and convinced, and I found myself guilty of many sins, which before I perceived not, and a lively sense of the guilt of them was imprinted on my soul; and I died My virtue and strength died away, and my former persuasions vanished: for I saw myself to be dead in sin, in a state of condemnation, and liable to death eternal. And the commandment The law; which was ordained to life Which promised life to them that kept it, saying, The man that doeth these things shall live in, or by them; and which, if rightly used, would have been a means of increasing spiritual life, and leading to life everlasting. “The law of nature, and its transcript in the moral precepts of the law of Moses, were intended for life; because the threatening of death for every offence, is virtually a promise of life to those who obey perfectly. This appears from the law given to Adam in paradise.” I found to be unto death To be attended with deadly consequences, both as it consigned me over to destruction for past sin, and occasionally, though not intentionally, proved productive of new guilt and misery. Perfect obedience being impossible, according to the present state of human nature, the law, which threatens death for every offence, necessarily ends in death to the sinner, although it was originally intended to give life to the obedient. For sin, as I said before, (see on Romans 7:8,) taking occasion by the commandment Prohibiting it under the severest penalties, but affording me no help against it; deceived me Came upon me unawares, while I was expecting life by the law; and by it slew me Slew all my hopes, by bringing me under guilt, condemnation, and wrath. In other words, Satan, the grand enemy of mankind, and author of sin, finding a law which threatened death to the transgression of it, takes occasion thence more earnestly to tempt and allure us to the violation of it, that so he may more effectually subject us to condemnation and death upon that account. Thus, when God had forbidden, under the pain of death, the eating of the forbidden fruit, Satan thence took occasion to tempt our first parents to the breach of it, and so slew them, or made them subject to death. Dr. Doddridge paraphrases the verse rather differently, thus: “Sin, taking occasion by the terror and curse of the violated commandment, and representing the great Lawgiver as now become my irreconcileable enemy, deceived me into a persuasion that I could be no worse than I was, and thereby it slew me; it multiplied my mortal wounds, and rendered my case still more desperate.” Instead of sin taking occasion, Dr. Macknight renders αφορμην λαβουσα, taking the opportunity, an expression which he thinks less likely to countenance the idea, that men's evil desires are owing to the prohibitions of the law; to suppose which, would be to make God the author of sin by his law. “The apostle's meaning,” says he, “is, that sin took the opportunity of men being under the commandment, first to deceive, and then to kill them.” According to Bengelius, the most approved copies read, not, sin taking occasion or opportunity by the commandment, but, by the commandment deceived and slew me; connecting the commandment, not with the former, but with the latter clause of the verse. In the words, deceived me, there seems to be an allusion to the excuse which Eve made for eating the forbidden fruit. The serpent deceived me, by assuring me that I should not die. “The apostle speaks of a two-fold opportunity taken by sin, while men are under the commandment. The first is, sinful dispositions, deceiving men into the belief that the prohibitions of the law are unreasonable, that the thing forbidden is pleasant or profitable, and that it will not be followed with punishment, persuade them to do it. This was the serpent's discourse to Eve; and it is what men's sinful inclinations always suggest to them. The second opportunity which sin takes under the commandment, is that of killing the sinner by the curse annexed to the commandment which he hath broken.”