Imputation of Sin (Rom 5:13)

In his commentary on Romans, John Murray offers these comments on Paul’s statement that “sin is not imputed when there is no law”: This “enunciates a general principle on which Paul is insistent. ‘Where there is no law, neither is there transgression’ (4:15). Since sin is transgression of law, it is apparent that there can be no sin if there is no law. It is not consonant with Paul’s teaching nor with the Scripture in general to suppose that what Paul means here is that although there may be sin yet it is not IMPUTED as sin when there is not a law. This would contradict 4:15. Apart from the provision of justifying grace, which are not in view in this verse [5:13], when sin is NOT IMPUTED it is because sin does not exist.” In a footnote, he adds that between Adam and Moses, sin must have been imputed: “If sin was not imputed during that period, then the sentence of death could not be inflicted. But the sentence of death was inflicted. Therefore it must have been inflicted on the ground of the sin that was imputed, namely, the sin of Adam, a sin that could still be IMPUTED because it was the violation of expressly revealed law.”

It must be admitted that Murray has a point here, especially in the final comments. If all men suffer death because of the sin of the “one man,” then they must somehow be participants in the guilt (by which I mean “liability to guilt and punishment” – with the Protestant scholastics and against the medievals I reject the distinction between reatus poenae and reatus culpae ) of the “one man.” If each man suffered only for his own sin, if Adam was the only one liable to punishment for his sin, then death would not have spread to all men.

Yet, Murray turns Paul’s statements into their opposites. First, he is clearly using “sin” and “transgression” in a different way from Paul. The point of Rom 4:15 is not to provide a definition of sin (as “transgression of law”) but to point to the effect of Torah. Those who are “of Torah” are not the heirs; those who are of faith are heirs (v 14), and the reason for that is that Torah does not have the effect of bringing life and health but instead of bringing wrath. And the reason for THAT is that Torah raises the profile of sin so that it becomes “transgression” (v 15). If sin and transgression are simply identical terms, then the intervention of Torah would be immaterial. Likewise, in 5:13-14, the problem that Paul addresses seems to be precisely the fact that sin exists without being transgression.

Second, Murray’s interpretation also turns the end of v 13 on its head. Where Paul says “sin is not imputed” before Torah enters the world, Murray says it MUST have been imputed then because people died. It appears that Murray is using “impute” in a different sense than Paul. I suggest (on structural and other grounds) that “imputed sin” is equivalent to “transgression”; when Paul reintroduces the problem of Torah in v 20, he says that Torah entered so that “transgression might increase,” and this involves also an extension and intensification of the reign of sin (v 20). Or, perhaps, Torah led to the reign of sin, since previously Paul has spoken only of the reign of death.

The sequence thus is (perhaps): Death reigns from Adam to Moses; Law comes in to increase sin and to rachet sin up to the level of transgression; and therefore, Torah has the effect of giving the throne to Sin. This may also be related to Paul’s statement in 1 Corinthians 15:56: “The sting of Death is Sin, and the power of Sin is Torah.” Torah, though intended for life, ends up playing kingmaker for Sin.

I don’t pretend to have resolved Rom 5:13-14, but I am fairly certain that Murray’s interpretation doesn’t fly.