How does Romans 2:16 relate to what precedes?

Explanation:

Paul says in Romans 2:16 that on the Day of Judgment, God will judge the secrets of men through Jesus Christ. The reason Paul includes this statement is that it is critical to his argument in this section. His argument in this section is that the Gentiles will perish without the law (Romans 2:12). He then explains that the conscience of the Gentiles is the natural law by which they know how well they have done. But when it comes to the day of judgment, God will judge them even according to their secret thoughts. ³ In other words, Paul is saying that the Gentiles will perish without the law because God has given them a conscience, and God will judge their secret thoughts.

Counterargument:

This argument suggests that Romans 2:16 is a critical aspect to Paul’s argument in this section. It then says that Paul’s argument is that the Gentiles are accountable to God without the law because God has given them a conscience, and that conscience accuses and sometimes excuses them, but in any case, God will judge the secrets of men. Unfortunately, this argument does not explain why Romans 2:16 is critical to Paul’s argument. What does God judging the secrets of men have to do with the Gentiles being accused and excused by the conscience? That is, how is Romans 2:16 critical to the fact that the Gentiles are accountable to God because of their natural conscience? If Paul’s argument in this section is that the Gentiles are condemned without the law, then Romans 2:15 is critical to Paul’s argument. That is, Romans 2:15 explains that the Gentiles will perish because they have a conscience and are therefore accountable to God. And while Romans 2:16 is important and insightful, it does not seem to be critical to Paul’s argument that the Gentiles will perish without the law, as this argument contends.

Response to counterargument:

When Paul says that God will judge the secrets of men, he is saying that the inner witness of men’s conscience is known to God. That is, the conscience accuses and excuses from an internal perspective, and God is aware of the internal states of men. And in fact, God will judge based on these internal states. So Romans 2:16 is critical to Paul’s argument. The Gentiles will perish without the law because God will judge their inner secrets, and their inner secrets reveal that according to the natural law of their conscience, they are more often accused, and sometimes excused.⁴

Explanation:

We want to understand how Romans 2:16 relates to Romans 2:15. One way to understand what Paul is doing is to notice that in Romans 2:15, he has the present state of the Gentiles in mind, while in Romans 2:16 he has the future in mind. That is, in Romans 2:15 he discusses the present state of the Gentiles who know they have moral obligations based on the working of their conscience. Paul then jumps to the future, stating that because the Gentiles are morally obliged based on the working of their consciences, God will judge their secrets through Jesus Christ. ⁵ Thus, Romans 2:16 and Romans 2:15 work together in the sense that in Romans 2:15, Paul says the Gentiles know they are morally obliged to God, which is why these are subject to God’s judgment (Romans 2:16).

Counterargument:

The trouble with this argument is that there is nothing in the grammar to suggest that Romans 2:16 is connected to Romans 2:15. Rather, if Romans 2:16 is supposed to modify Romans 2:15, the clause is awkward at best. When we read Romans 2:15–16 together, Paul says that the conscience of the Gentiles accuses and excuses them (Romans 2:15), on the day when God judges the secrets of men (Romans 2:16). What does it mean for the Gentiles’ consciences to accuse them in the present on the future day when God judges the secrets of men? Unfortunately, this view seems to insert grammar to smooth out the transition from Romans 2:15–16, but such grammatical clues are not present in the text. Thus, we ought to take Romans 2:16 to relate to what precedes in a different way.

The weakness of this view is the tense change between Romans 2:15 and Romans 2:16. For in Romans 2:15, Paul uses the present tense, while he uses the future tense in Romans 2:16. That a change in tense is called for here is not obvious to the reader.

Explanation:

In Romans 2:16, Paul writes, on that day when…God judges the secrets of men. It is not clear precisely how this phrase is supposed to work with what immediately precedes it. For what immediately precedes Romans 2:16 is the fact that the consciences of those without the law accuse and excuse them in the present, while God judges the secrets of men in the future. It is not clear how the consciences of those without the law can judge them in the present when on the future day God judges the secrets of men.⁶

Now, if we look back into the text, we find a statement that works well with Romans 2:16. Specifically, in Romans 2:13 Paul also utilizes the future tense when he says that it is not the hearers but the doers of the law who will be justified. That Paul utilizes the future tense in both Romans 2:13 and Romans 2:16 suggests a connection between these. For if we put Romans 2:14–15 aside for the moment and combine Romans 2:13 with Romans 2:16, Paul is saying that the doers of the law will be justified (Romans 2:13) on the day when God judges men’s secrets (Romans 2:16). That the doers of the law will be justified on the day when God judges men’s secrets makes good sense.

So what about Romans 2:14–15? Likely, we can take Romans 2:14–15 as a parenthetical side note from Paul that is important to his argument in this section, but slightly disrupts his flow of thought. ⁷

Counterargument:

According to the grammar we ought to keep Romans 2:13–15 together as a unit, which rules out the notion that Romans 2:14–15 is a parenthetical side note. We can deduce that these belong together because Romans 2:14 opens with the conjunction for, which links Romans 2:14–15 with Romans 2:13. The conjunction for suggests a relationship between Romans 2:14–15 and Romans 2:13 in that Romans 2:14–15 explains or clarifies what Paul says in Romans 2:13. Given this grammatical connection, it is clear that Romans 2:13–15 is a unit, which implies that Romans 2:16 modifies Romans 2:15.⁸

Response to counterargument:

This counterargument will not do because, although the conjunction for suggests a connection between Romans 2:14–15 and Romans 2:13, it does not rule out whether Romans 2:14–15 is a parenthetical side note. Such a note is not completely unrelated to what precedes, but normally works by clarifying or briefly extending what precedes. Given that a parenthetical side note is used to clarify what precedes, we can detect that the conjunction for is not out of place but used to show that Romans 2:14–15 clarifies how it is that those without the law are held accountable to God.

Explanation:

Given that Romans 2:15 has to do with the present and Romans 2:16 has to do with the future, it is not clear how Romans 2:16 relates to Romans 2:15. In fact, we can detect that Romans 2:16 actually belongs with Romans 2:13 because the material from Romans 2:14–15 is catechetical material gathered by the Jewish Christians that Paul incorporates into the letter. We can detect this because we notice awkward syntax and uncommon terms in this section.⁹ Paul clearly approved of the general theological thrust of this material, and included it in his letter to demonstrate that he aligned with some of the views of his audience. Given that Romans 2:14–15 is inserted catechetical material, we can detect that Romans 2:16 was originally meant to modify Romans 2:13.

Counterargument:

According to this argument, since Romans 2:15 is in the present tense and Romans 2:16 is in the future, along with the fact that Paul uses uncommon terms and odd syntax, we should conclude that Romans 2:16 goes with Romans 2:13. The fact is, Paul is making a lengthy argument in this section, which is recorded by dictation to an amanuensis. Now, when an author makes a lengthy argument that is recorded by dictation, we should not expect to find perfect connections and flow of thought.¹⁰ Rather, dictating a long argument can result in slight disruptions of flow, even though what follows is directly related to what precedes.

Relatedly, if we argue that the reason there seems to be a disconnect from Romans 2:15–16 is that Romans 2:14–15 plucked catechetical material, this argument might explain why the internal syntax of Romans 2:14–15 is different from the rest of the letter, but it does not explain why Romans 2:14–15 does not fit with Romans 2:16. For we should not imagine that Paul dictated the whole letter to his amanuensis and then went back and added the catechetical material. This would not be possible to do with parchment and ink. So if Paul did add catechetical material, he could easily have streamlined Romans 2:16 to fit with the flow of Romans 2:14–15, making the insertion seamless. Instead, we notice a change in tense from Romans 2:15–16 that makes us wonder how these verses are connected.

The weakness of this view is that it does not point out or explain the apparent grammatical clues that are supposed to show that Paul quotes catechetical material. Thus, it is not clear that Paul does in fact quote catechetical material.