Adoption and the Spirit in Romans 8

Abstract

The apostle Paul’s ambivalence towards the Law (Rom. 7) is investigated against the many pneumatological statements in Rom. 8 and the suggestion is made that the eschatological Spirit–often ignored or overlooked–could be one solution to the subject of Paul and the Law. Not only does the OT and Jewish literature of the period look forward to a time when the Spirit would replace the Torah as a way of life but adoption too is depicted as an eschatological blessing and Paul, aware of such promises, brings the two gifts together in the phrase pneuma huiothesias. For Paul the era of the pneuma is also the era of adoption and-now that the last days have arrived–the apostle wants his readers to be in no doubt as to the moral responsibilities upon them as God’s children. Thus, the expression ‘to be led by the Spirit' (v. 14) is best understood against the immediately preceding phrase 'put to death the misdeeds of the body' (v. 13b). The dual testimony of the Spirit with the adopted son’s spirit not only assures the believer of their new position of sonship but may also point to contemporary practice (not excluding the OT) as a more likely milieu from which Paul got his adoption term.

Children in the New Testament

“…Parenthood is not a major theme in any of the New Testament texts, however, reading between the lines of these texts can offer glimpses into the relationships between parents and their children (Collins 1972; Balla 2002; Balla 2005; Lindemann 2010; S.U. Lim and Lindeman Allen 2022), including the desire of some adults, in the face of infertility, to parent children (Moss and Baden 2015) and the practice and metaphor of adoption (Burke 1998; Burke 2001; Burke 2006; Bartlett 2008). Because of the gendered roles within the first-century household, it is often helpful to focus such readings specifically upon a child’s distinct relationship with their mother or father, respectively.…”