Our righteousness
The primary discussion taking place in Romans 4:1-8 is a matter of how or by what God regards his children as righteous. This is commonly referred to biblically and extra-biblically as justification. The idea behind justification is that because of some reason God in some way deems the unrighteous human being as righteous and therefore worthy of communion with himself.[1]
But what is this “righteousness?” Or rather, what does this term “righteousness” refer too? According to W.E. Vine “righteousness” may carry a couple of different ideas with it. The first is the idea of “righteousness” as “right action.” We see this usage employed by Paul on five occasions in Romans 6, in Ephesians 6:14 and in other places throughout the New Testament. The other usage implies that of a gracious gift given by God to bring those who believe in Jesus Christ into right relationship with himself (Vine, 980).
In my estimation it seems to be this second definition which Paul is implying in his use of the word righteousness. There are two primary reasons here in support of this definition. The first is that we see this idea prominently throughout Paul’s writings and especially in close conjunction to his discussions of justification and reconciliation before God. II Corinthians 5:21 says, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” just after urging the Corinthians to be reconciled to God in verse 20. Titus 3:5 shows that our salvation is not because of any righteous works that we have committed but because of God’s own mercy upon us. Paul states a similar idea in Ephesians 2:8-9 and says that it is by God’s grace alone that we are saved through our faith with no relation to ourselves and completely apart from any works. And lastly Paul gives us these ideas in Romans just prior to the passage in question. No one will be declared righteous because of law observance, but the righteousness we do have is from God, apart from the law, and through faith in Jesus Christ.
The second reason for my understanding of the word “righteousness” is that if we take “righteousness” to mean “acts of rightness” or “right action” then all of the above statements by the apostle implicitly contradict themselves. We cannot affirm that our righteousness is granted to us apart from our own action while at the same time claiming that it is by our righteous action that we were justified before God. For if we do then either we need to seek a new understanding of such statements, or they must be accepted as logically false statements in which the case we must reject the whole of the gospel.
I believe that Paul was quite intentional of his use of the word righteousness. He quite clearly departed from Jewish tradition showing that the right action idea was wrong. According to both Josephus and Philo righteousness is an “ethical conception” or “chief cardinal virtue which originates in the soul” and “is meritorious” (Bromiley 171). So when Paul goes against the grain of popular Jewish thought and pairs righteousness with faith he is quite clearly making a statement about what he believes righteousness to be and how he thinks it should be viewed in light of the gospel message he is preaching.[2]
[1] The reason and way of God’s justification has yet to be addressed. The focus here is on Paul’s understanding of righteousness and how exactly God views this righteousness. Discussion of the means of obtaining righteousness will be included under point II (consult outline for reference.)
[2] It should be noted that Paul’s argumentation against the Jewish train of thought is important to this passage and integral to its proper interpretation. This idea of Paul’s argument against popular Jewish thought will be addressed more completely further on.
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