ROMANS 12:9-21

There is a often a great deal of subjectivity regarding the way to divide up a given passage of Scripture into individual paragraphs. Below is a listing of a few such suggestions made by scholars and found in English translations:

NRSV, Davison and Martin, JB, NIV, RSV     9-13                     14-21

NEB, Morris                                                     9-10     11-16                          17-21

TEV                                                                  9-13                     14-16          17-21

Living Bible                                                     9-11         12-13   14-16           17-18      19-21

And then there are several other sources who treat verses 9-21 as a unity without attempting to further break that passage down into smaller units. The difficulty in pinning down the organization exactly as a table of contents probably arises from the way these verses are interrelated in a roughly symmetrical manner so that there is no strong demarcation point between each theme to the next. This is shown in Figure 1 below in which six different themes appear and then re-appear at regular intervals afterward, with a center point somewhere around verses 15-18 where there is a two-fold emphasis on the word “all.” Thus, we can say with some certainty that Paul's main point in this whole passage is that Christians should so behave that they can interact effectively with both other believers and unbelievers alike. Only in that manner can the Gospel spread throughout the world in the way it was intended.

                                                     Figure 1: Structure of Romans 12:9-12

I. Do's and don'ts (9-18)

        A. “Let love be genuine” (9a)

                B. “hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good” (9b)

                        C. “one another” (2x) (10)

                                D. “Lord” (11)

                                        E. Bless your enemies (14)

                                                F. Sympathize with all (15)

                        C''. “one another” (16)

                                        E'. Do not repay evil with evil (17a)

                                                F'. Live peacefully with “all” (2x) (17b-18)

I'. Do's and don'ts (19-21)

        A'. “Beloved” (19a)

                                        E. God will repay (19b)

                                D'. “Lord” (19c)

                                        E''. treat your enemies with kindness (20)

                B'. “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (21)

You can see from the above that vv. 9b and 21 act as an inclusion marking the limits of this overall section. Additionally, as Elliott notes, the thought in both Romans 12:17 and 21 can be traced back to Jesus' teachings in Matthew 5, thus approximately closing out both halves of the above passage.

By contrast, the second half of this arrangement (verses 19-21) is heavy in allusions to the Old Testament. See Deuteronomy 32:35 for the wrath of God in Romans 12:19 as well as Proverbs 25:21-22 for Romans 12:21-22.

It has been pointed out by several scholars that verses 9-10 actually contain three of the four different Gtreek words meaning “love.” If you would like to learn more concerning the different nuances between these words, a valuable resource is C.S. Lewis' The Four Loves.

This overall passage is mainly characterized by the catalog of things that Christians are to do as well as behaviors and attitudes to avoid. It is a little difficult to count how many of each type of command are present. However, it is possible to see exactly 21 positive comments and 7 negative ones. If so, then that is entirely appropriate considering that throughout the Old and New Testaments the number seven (or its exact multiples) symbolically stands for completion or perfection. In other words, Paul is presenting an exhaustive, or typical, list of behaviors to both emulate and avoid in order to guide the believers' thought patterns and subsequent resulting actions.

As a roughly chiastic (i.e. mirror-image) structure, Figure 1 leads us to the all-important passage(s) at the middle of the organization. This central teaching can be approximately located around sections F and F' which jointly instruct us to so conduct ourselves among those around us so that whether they are believers or not, we can live in peace with “all” (a word notably repeated in 17b-18) and perhaps win them over through our godly example of behavior. The concomitant goal of such a Christian life is that the Church will not be put to shame by our negative witness in the world.

It is sad to see how in many cases today, a liberal church group will completely lose its uniquely Christian prophetic witness to the world in its attempts to “fit in”with society and not make any waves. At the same time, the fundamentalist wing of the church often has no opportunity to witness to the world in the first place since it likes to spend its time huddled together in its small and isolated like-minded enclaves which devote an inordinate amount of time and effort to bad-mouthing everyone outside who doesn't agree with them 100%.

Below are some sample comments from the scholarly literature attempting to summarize the overall message of Romans 12:9-21:

Barclay takes a basically political interpretation of these verses when he says,“Paul's main view of the state was that in his day, as he saw things, the Roman Empire was the divinely ordained instrument to save the world from chaos...Paul saw in the state an instrument in the hand of God; the state preserved the world from chaos; those who administered the state were playing their part in that great task. Whether they knew it or not they were doing God's work, and it was the Christian's duty to help and not to hinder.”

Kasemann derives a more personal application out of this passage: “Verse 21 takes up again the heading in v. 17a and rounds off the section. Only love overcomes evil by the doing of good. This raises again the question whether love is not the guiding idea of the verses. It this is denied, one must grant that in any case it determines both the beginning and the end and repeatedly comes into view...When a person burns in the Spirit and simultaneously associates with the lowly, this involves eschatological conduct and the other requirements [in this passage] are also to be seen against this background...The individual is left unusual room to maneuver within the framework of his abilities and weaknesses. A church order can develop out of all this, as in the Pastorals. But it is not yet present here.”

Morris says of v. 9, “At this point Paul moves from the charismatic gifts, functions exercised by individuals, to virtues he expects to see in all believers. Characteristically he begins with love.” And when he comes to verses17-21 at the end of the passage, he states, “this should not be regarded as a hard-and-fast division. Some of what we saw in the previous section applies to the way Christians should behave towards outsiders and some in this section to their treatment of fellow believers.” His comments on vv. 9-21 conclude by saying, “We should be clear that Paul is not laying down some useful ethical precepts for the edification of the general public. He has spent a lot of time in this letter on the subject of justification by faith, and it is the justified person of whom he continues to write.”