Bible Passage Scripture Block

Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

Since I'm talking with those that know the law [of Moses], I know you know that it is binding as long as the person lives. Furthermore, a husband and wife are bound by law until death, at which point the surviving spouse is released from the law of marriage and free to marry another. This is why one is called an adulterer if they take up with a third party while their spouse lives.

Paul is making the broader point of the richness and fullness of God’s grace toward sinful man (chap 5) before turning to man’s response to God’s saving grace (chap 6) and a series of rhetorical questions (through chap 7):

1. 6:1 – “Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means!”
2. 6:15 – “Are we to sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means!” (where these verses fit to support his argument)
3. 7:7 – “What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means!”