Romans 7:1–12

Released from the Law

¹Or do you not know, ^abrothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is master over a person as long as he lives?

²For ^athe married woman has been bound by law to her ¹husband while he is living, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law ²concerning the husband.

³So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man.

⁴So, my brothers, you also were ^amade to die ^bto the Law ^cthrough the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God.

⁵For while we were ^ain the flesh, the sinful passions, which were ^baroused by the Law, were at work ^cin our members to bear fruit for death.

⁶But now we have been ^areleased from the Law, having ^bdied to that by which we were constrained, so that we serve in ^cnewness of ^1dthe Spirit and not in oldness of the letter.

^7aWhat shall we say then? Is the Law sin? ^bMay it never be! Rather, ^cI would not have come to know sin except ¹through the Law. For I would not have known about ²coveting if the Law had not said, “^dYou shall not ³covet.”

⁸But sin, ^ataking opportunity ^bthrough the commandment, worked out in me ¹coveting of every kind. For ^capart ²from the Law sin is dead.

⁹Now I was once alive apart ¹from the Law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died;

¹⁰and this commandment, which was ^1ato lead to life, was found ²to lead to death for me.

¹¹For sin, ^ataking an opportunity ^bthrough the commandment, ^cdeceived me and through it killed me.

^12aSo, the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.