What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?
The apostle has been all along careful to guard his readers against the supposition that he was teaching them any absolutely new doctrine. New, it might indeed be called, in respect of the flood of new light which had been thrown upon it by the work of Christ in the flesh. But it was of the utmost importance to show that God's way of justifying the ungodly had been from the first the same that it now is; not only that it had been predicted and foreshadowed under the ancient economy (Romans 1:2; Romans 3:21), but that it had been in operation from the first. That accordingly is what the apostle now proceeds to do. And as Abraham, "the father of the faithful," and David, the "man after God's own heart," were regarded as the very pillars of the ancient economy (see Matthew 1:1), he first adduces the Scripture testimony regarding the one, and then confirms this by the testimony of the other.
First: Abraham Was Justified by Faith (Romans 4:1-5)
What shall we then say that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? - or, rather, 'hath found as pertaining to the flesh;' meaning, 'by all his natural efforts or legal obedience.' [Lachmann and Tregelles put heureekenai (G2147) immediately before Abraam (G11), on the weighty evidence of 'Aleph (') A C D E F G, several cursives, four manuscripts of the Old Latin, the Vulgate, and some Greek fathers; while Tischendorf abides by the received order of the words-on the authority of B K L, most cursives, both Syriac versions, Chrysostom, and one or two other fathers. Perhaps internal evidence should decide in favour of the received order, as being the more difficult.]