Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Romans 5:12

"Therefore, as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin; and so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned:--" — Romans 5:12 (ASV)

The one man through whom sin entered the world is not immediately named (see v.14). The same procedure of talking about a man before he is named is followed with Christ (v.15). Except for two nontheological references (Jude 14), every mention of Adam in the NT comes from the pen of Paul. In 1 Timothy 2:14 he makes the point that Adam, unlike Eve, was not deceived, but sinned deliberately. In 1 Corinthians 15:17, 56, as here in Romans, Paul institutes a comparison between the first and the last Adam, but confines his treatment to the issue of death and resurrection, whereas here both sin and death are named immediately and are woven into the texture of the argument throughout. In that earlier letter Paul made the significant statement, “For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22), in line with Ro 5:12. In the only previous mention of death in Romans (1:32) exclusive of the death of Christ (5:10), Paul referred to the inevitable connection between sin and death. Here in v.12 he pictures sin and death as entering the world through one man, with the result that death permeated the whole of humankind. It was the opening in the dike that led to the inundation, the poison that entered at one point and penetrated every unit of a person’s corporate life.

If Paul had stopped with the observation that death came to all human beings because all have sinned, we would be left with the impression that all sinned and deserved death because they followed the example of Adam. But subsequent statements in the passage make it abundantly clear that the connection between Adam’s sin and death and what has befallen the human race is far closer than that. Paul can say that the many died because of “the trespass of the one man” (v.15). Clearly the gist of his teaching is that just as humankind has become involved in sin and death through Adam, it has the remedy of righteousness and life only in another man, in Jesus Christ.

What, then, is the precise relation of Adam in his fall to those who come after him? Paul does not comment on that issue in this verse, though he later states that all sinned in the first man (v.19). Why does he not say so here? Was it his sudden breaking off to follow another line of thought in vv.13–14 that prevented the full statement? Or was it his reluctance to gloss over human responsibility, which he had already established in terms of universal sin and guilt (3:23)? Experience demonstrates that despite the inheritance of a sinful nature from Adam, people are convicted of guilt for the sins resulting from it that they commit themselves. Conscience is a factor in human life, and the Holy Spirit does convict of sin . Perhaps, then, as some hold, while the emphasis on original sin is primary in the light of the passage as a whole, there is a hint that personal choice and sin are not entirely excluded (cf. “many trespasses” in v.16).

That we could have sinned in Adam may seem strange and unnatural to the Western mind. Nevertheless, it is congenial to biblical teaching on the solidarity of humankind. When Adam sinned, the human race sinned because it was in him. To put it boldly, Adam was the race. What he did, his descendants, who were still in him, did also. This principle is also utilized in Heb 7:9–10: “One might even say that Levi, who collects the tenth, paid the tenth through Abraham, because when Melchizedek met Abraham, Levi was still in the body of his ancestor.” If one is still troubled by the seeming injustice of being born with a sinful nature because of what the father of the human race did and of being held accountable for sins resulting from that disability, one should weigh carefully the significance of the reconciliation statement of Paul: “that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them” (2 Corinthians 5:19). The sins committed, that owe their original impetus to the sin of the first man, are not reckoned against those who have committed them if they put their trust in Christ crucified and risen. God takes their sins and gives them his righteousness. Would we not agree that this is more than a fair exchange?