irony: "This is the grand difference: the Jew is saved ex fide, the Gentile per fidem!"

Possibly the intention of the apostle was to direct the Jew away from his works, and his

rites, to the one great source of his justification, ek pisteos, out of faith, while the Gentile,

who had no background of law and tradition, was directed rather to the faith as the

instrument of his justification, dia tes pisteos, "through the faith", the article being added

to give the sense, "through the self-same faith" as that of the Jew.

The law was by no means "made void" through faith. It was rather established, for,

whether we look upon "the law" as the whole teaching of the O.T. or of the Mosaic

covenant, or limit it to the one rite of circumcision, it is evident that the types, shadows,

and living examples set forth in the law, pointed forward to the work of the Lord Jesus

as the one and only way of escape and acceptance. Prejudice, however, dies hard, and

so the apostle leaves the general references to Jew and Gentile and Jewish failure

(1: 18 - 3: 19), and to the typical teaching of the law (3: 21-26), and takes up the case of

Bishop Lightfoot shows that Gen. 15: 6 was a standing feature of contention in the

Jewish schools. Philo mentions it at least ten times, and in I Macc. 2: 52 we read: "Was

not Abraham found faithful in temptations, and it was imputed unto him for

righteousness?" Here we see that Gen. 15: 6 and Gen. 22: 9, 10 are not kept distinct

as they are by Paul in Rom. 4: and by James in Jas. 2: The object, too, of Mattathias

in Macc. 2: 64 is the upholding of the law: "Wherefore, ye my sons, be valiant, and

shew yourselves men in behalf of the law, for by it ye shall obtain glory."

Paul, as a Pharisee and student of Gamaliel, and one who had been "an exceeding

zealot for the traditions of his fathers", knew exactly the difficulties that were in the mind

of his kinsmen, and knew that to deal effectively with the case of Abraham was to deal

with the very centre of the argument. To enlighten the minds of his bigoted countrymen

on the true meaning of circumcision would be to rob them of their last ground of

boasting. The whole of chapter 4: is taken up with the lesson drawn from Abraham's

faith, but before we give either the structure of the chapter, or deal with the

subject-matter, we believe a word or two upon the words "imputed" and "imputed for"

will be of service in helping us to appreciate the true relation of faith and righteousness,

which, of course, is the main theme of the chapter.

One word, occurring eleven times in this chapter, is so important that it will warrant a

separate investigation before proceeding further. Logizomai is translated in Rom. 4: as