It seems very difficult to establish doctrine out of words rather than context. Both Ephesians and Romans are talking about the exact same thing. Ephesians talking to the Gentiles and Romans talking to the Jews.

Ephesians 2: 11Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called "Uncircumcision" by the so-called "Circumcision," which is performed in the flesh by human hands--
12remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
13But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
14For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall,
15by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace,
16and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity.

Paul is very clear here that the problem is the separation that existed between the Gentiles and the Jews, those of circumcision (done in the flesh) and the uncircumcised. The Gentiles were excluded from the benefits of Israel and strangers to the Old Covenant that was full of promises of the Messiah. But now Jesus has brought them near through His death. He has made peace between the Gentiles and the Jews by breaking down the walls that separated them, the Old Covenant, “by abolishing in His flesh the enmity”! What is the enmity? It is the law of commandments contained in ordinances? Notice that word “in”! It is the Greek word “eÍn” which is pronounced “en”. It means: in, by, with! It doesn’t mean “of”. The text simply says that the law of commandments were along with, along side of, next to, beside. It doesn’t say that the commandments were the ordinances, but that they were with them.

Simply put this is talking about the 10 commandments that is the source of the enmity. The broken law condemns us and in order to satisfy the law Jesus became sin for us by taking on our flesh and lived a perfect life and died a perfect self-sacrificing death to demonstrate His love. Through His death, His spilt blood, He has abolished the enmity. Jesus has made both the Jews and the gentiles God’s friends through His demonstration of love.

Paul is talking about the same thing in Romans 3. The difference between the Jews and the Gentiles! He makes a clear point in verses 10-18 that both the Jews and Gentiles are gross sinners and then look how he summarizes it in verses 19 & 20:

“Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are under the Law, so that every mouth may be closed and all the world may become accountable to God; because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.”

What law is Paul talking about that gives men the knowledge of sin? What law is it that we were under that makes us accountable to God?

You got it! It’s the 10 Commandments. Now in verses 21 and 22 Paul makes it clear that our righteousness is not by the works of the law, but through faith in God for both the Jews and the gentiles. He says in verse 22 and 23 that “there is no distinction for all and sinned and fall short of the glory of God”.

Paul says that our justification is by His grace that we experienced in Jesus’ redemption when He demonstrated His righteousness at the cross. Before the cross God passed over sins, but now His righteous is made known and He is the one who will justify us. We have nothing to brag about (verse27) because our bragging is excluded by the law of faith. Those who trust in God’s grace don’t brag! Notice the next few verses:

28For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law. (moral law)
29Or is God the God of Jews only? Is He not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also,
30since indeed God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith is one.
31Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law.

Romans is talking about the same thing as Ephesians. The Gentiles being saved by faith in the same way as the Jews. Jesus abolished the enmity through His death. The enmity is and was believing that God is our enemy. Jesus proved Him to be our friend, He changed our minds about God, He wrote His law in our hearts.

scott

I agree that Paul is dealing with the same thing in Romans and Galatians. Paul is clear as to what the enmity is:



The enmity is the carnal mind. Abolishing the enmity fixes the problem, because the problem was not the law, but the people. Simply put, in order to be brought together, the Jews and Gentiles had to be converted. Only in Christ can their be peace. So Christ is presented to all, whether Jew or Gentile, and for those who respond there is peace, and the enmity, the separation, the hostility, is taken away.

That's right Tom!

There has never been a law, 10 Commandments or ceremonial, that had the power to save a man! Because men are saved through an intimated knowledge of God and no law, no angel, no earthly temple, no candlestick, no feast, nothing could express God's love to us perfectly like Jesus did. There are lots of expressions of God, but Jesus is the only fullness of God.


scott

It must be on the basis of both. Paul uses the word “law” 102 times in his writings referring to both the moral law and the old covenant. Why would he, out of the blue, use “law of commandments contained in ordinances” if he meant the same thing? As I pointed out previously, “law of commandments” is redundant, unless the reference is to specific commandments – and it is, for the word “commandments” is modified by the expression “in ordinances”.


Could you then please explain this contradiction?

Eph. 3:15 "By abolishing [katargeo] in his flesh the law of commandments in ordinances".
Rom. 3:31 "Do we, then, abolish [katargeo] the law by this faith? Of course not! Instead, we uphold the law."


In Ephesians Paul is talking about a new humanity in Christ, while in Romans Paul is talking about the universal need of justification by faith. Of course the subjects are related, but the main emphasis is different.


The abolition of the 10 commandments would solve neither the enmity between man and God nor the enmity between Jews and Gentiles (which was based primarily on a perversion of the ceremonial law). The death of Christ is one thing. The abolition of the 10 commandments is completely another thing.

Why indeed? Therefore, by your argument, he must have something other than the law in mind.

I realize this is addressed to Scott. I expect he'll respond as well, but I feel constrained to comment.



First of all, Scott is correct. Both Romans and Ephesians are explaining the Gospel, justification by faith.

The law is upheld in Romans 3:31 when the justified person has the law written in the heart. In Eph. 3:15 the enmity (which is not the law!) is abolished when the person is justified.



And neither would abolishing the ceremonial law! As you correctly pointed out previously, the Jews perverted *both* the moral law and the ceremonial law. If abolishing the law were the solution to solving their problem of perverting God's will, that logic would apply just as much to the moral law as to the ceremonial law. But abolishing a law, any law, does not fix the problem because the problem is with the unconverted mind which was perverting the things of God.

Therefore God, to solve the problem, proposes to convert those with the problem, whether Jew or Gentile. When they come to Christ, the problem is solved!

As I said a little below in that post, in Ephesians Paul is talking about a new humanity in Christ (“so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, making peace between them”). This emphasis is lacking in Romans. The emphasis there is that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” Of course the subjects are related, but the main emphasis is different.


Christ’s death removed not only the enmity between Jews and Gentiles, but even that which had been the supposed cause for this enmity in the past - that which had been used as a pretext, or excuse, for this enmity. If in the past the ceremonial law had been perverted and made a reason for separation between Jews and Gentiles, even this reason had now been removed, for the ceremonial law no longer existed.


It obviously must have to do with "law," but he clearly qualified this law to avoid misunderstandings - it's a specific law.

Of course something will be different, or else he would have just faxed them a copy of Romans. But both deal with the issue of the enmity being abolished. Even the same language is used to an extent. Certainly the same concept is being addressed. In Romans Paul also speaks of our having peace with God:



Ephesians also deals with our obtaining peace by being justified by faith (Eph. 2:14).

Both are dealing with the fundamental issue of how we obtain peace with God. Once we have peace with God, we have peace with one another.



This is the same idea here. This is Galatians, not Eph. or Romans, but it has the same general argument. So does Col.

Paul's burden is identical in each one, which is that his readers will come to Christ that they may be justified by faith.

In Christ the hostility, the enmity, the division, is abolished, both between man and God and between man and man (w/o the former, the latter would be impossible) and there is peace.



Paul didn't argue that the pretext for enmity had been abolished, but that the enmity had been abolished.



This isn't Paul's argument at all. This is easy to see just by examining what Paul wrote:



Here I put in "something" for the part being debated. What would make sense here if this were just a blank to be filled in, just by looking at the argument?

Again, returning to the point you made previously, the Jews had been perverting *both* the ceremonial law and the moral law, and it was this perversion of both that led to hostility. So how could Paul be suggesting that peace came about by abolishing one of these things? This doesn't make sense.

Even Hebrews is saying the same thing. A new heart, a new man, a new creature in Christ.

All of these letters to the church address the issue of the time. It is ridiculous to think that they all cover different ground. Paul just uses different ways to explain the reconciliation we find in Christ. The issue of the time was whether the Gentiles are saved like the Jews or the Jews are saved like the Gentiles. Paul's conclusion is that the Jews are saved like the Gentiles through the righteousness of Christ. Justified through faith in God's grace. A gift of God's graciousness!

Some Jews insisted that the Gentiles had to come into Christ through the law as did the Jews. Paul traveled wide to fight this false gospel. He insisted that not only the Gentiles were saved outside of the law, but that the Jews are free from the law in Christ. What law? The whole law! We are saved by grace alone!

scott

I agree, Scott, but a point of clarification is that what Paul was preaching was nothing new, although it may have been new to many of his hearers. Indeed, Paul used David and Abraham as poster boys for his Gospel.