John Calvin Commentary Romans 7:22

"For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:" — Romans 7:22 (ASV)

For I consent to the law of God, etc. Here then you see what sort of division there is in pious souls, from which arises that contest between the spirit and the flesh, which Augustine somewhere calls the Christian struggle (luctam Christianam). The law calls man to the rule of righteousness; iniquity, which is, as it were, the tyrannical law of Satan, instigates him to wickedness. The Spirit leads him to render obedience to the divine law; the flesh draws him back to what is of an opposite character.

Man, thus impelled by contrary desires, is now in a manner a twofold being. But as the Spirit ought to possess the sovereignty, he deems and judges himself to be especially on that side. Paul says, that he was bound a captive by his flesh for this reason, because as he was still tempted and incited by evil lusts, he deemed this a coercion with respect to the spiritual desire, which was wholly opposed to them.

But we ought to notice carefully the meaning of the inner man and of the members, which many have not rightly understood, and have therefore stumbled at this stone. The inner man then is not simply the soul, but that spiritual part which has been regenerated by God; and the members signify the other remaining part. For as the soul is the superior, and the body the inferior part of man, so the spirit is superior to the flesh.

Then, as the spirit takes the place of the soul in man, and the flesh (which is the corrupt and polluted soul) that of the body, the former has the name of the inner man, and the latter has the name of members. The inner man indeed has a different meaning in 2 Corinthians 4:16, but the circumstances of this passage require the interpretation I have given. And it is called the inner preeminently, for it possesses the heart and the secret feelings, while the desires of the flesh are vagrant and are, as it were, on the outside of man.

Doubtless it is the same as though one compared heaven to earth, for Paul contemptuously designates whatever appears to be in man by the term members, so that he might clearly show that the hidden renovation is concealed from and escapes our observation, unless it is apprehended by faith.

Now since the law of the mind undoubtedly means a rightly formed principle, it is evident that this passage is very absurdly applied to men not yet regenerated; for such, as Paul teaches us, are destitute of mind, inasmuch as their soul has become degenerated from reason.