Romans 6:5

Rom_6:5-7

For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death.

Planted together with Christ

The idea is not of two or three plants all put into the same ground, though that would to a certain extent express blessedness--to be near Him is blessed, to have walked the same earth is blessed, to have a similar nature is blessed; but the meaning here is far deeper. The idea is of one plant with various branches (Joh_15:1). The root is Christ; we, the branches, are grafted in by believing. The plant out of the dry ground had no form nor comeliness; He came down and emptied Himself of His glory, and went down into death that we might be planted in the same ground and in the same grave. You see the same thing in your gardens; the plant put down into the ground, no appearance of life, no buds, no fruit there: yet if it were not put into the ground there would never be buds or fruit. So, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit. Here we have the planting of the Tree of Life, which, springing up in the Resurrection, bears twelve manner of fruits, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. We are planted in union with Him, in the likeness of His death; but when the spring comes, and the light, and dawn of God operate upon the plant, we know what the consequences are; it puts forth buds, and leaves, and fruit. And what a beautiful thing it is! The branches of the tree whose root was planted in winter, are the very branches which contain its fragrance and beauty in the summer time. It was winter time with Jesus when He was put down into the ground; but springtime and summer are coming, when the Tree of Life shall put forth its fruit, and we shall be in the likeness of His resurrection; even God Himself shall delight to rest under that shade, and eat His pleasant fruit. (M. Rainsford, B. A.)

Planted first

A short time ago a gentleman was preaching in the open air; his subject was growth in grace. At the close of the meeting a man approached him and said, Our minister has been preaching some excellent sermons on that subject, and I have been trying to grow in grace this long time, but I find I never can succeed. The preacher, pointing to a tree, said, Do you see that tree? Yes, was the wondering reply. Well, it had to be planted before it could grow. In like manner you must be rooted and grounded in Christ before you can begin to grow. The man understood his meaning, and went away to find Christ; and soon he was rooted in Christ, and brought forth fruit to His praise.

Improving the root of virtue

I will mention a very striking illustration of the difference between mens striving to improve one or another individual good quality, and the improving the common root of all of them, and thereby improving them all at once. The former is the way in which a human artificer works--a statuary, for instance, sometimes making a finger, sometimes a leg, and so on--while the latter, the workmanship of the Divine Artificer, is like the growth of a plant or a tree, in which all the various parts are swelling out and increasing, or, as we term it, growing at the same time. (William Wilberforce.)

The likeness of Christs resurrection

1. The resurrection of our Lord Jesus is apt to be considered mainly as a proof of the truth of the Christian faith, or in the light of the guidance, the support, the comfort it affords in our thoughts about the dead. But the apostle would have us consider it as the mould, the type, the model of our life and character. The likeness of His resurrection. How can we be anything like so preternatural an event?

2. Now, one answer may be, that at the general resurrection the bodies of Christians will rise just as Christ rose. This is undoubtedly true, but Paul is not here thinking of that. He is thinking of the soul and character, and he says that this resurrection is to be modelled on that of our Lord. The true Christian here is crucified with Christ; is buried with Christ; and rises with Christ. Call this mysticism if you will; it bears two certificates on its front--the certificate of apostolic authority and of Christian experience. St. Paul will have it that a Christian must die, be crucified with Christ, That mass of undisciplined desires and passions which is the governing body in the life of man in a state of nature, and which the apostle calls the body of sin, must not do what it would--its hands must be nailed to a cross; it must not go whither it would--its feet must be nailed to a cross; it must linger on that cross to which the Divine Will would fain attach it until it dies; and then it must be buried out of sight so as to have no further contact with the world in which it lived and worked its evil will in the days gone by.

3. Now, this death to sin must not be a fainting fit or a swoon. Jesus really died upon the Cross, and St. Paul insisted on a real death to sin in the convert to Christianity. The points of likeness between a true Christians life and the life of our risen Lord relate--

I. To the past.

1. Each has experienced a resurrection, and if the likeness be a true one, in each case the resurrection is real. When our Lord rose He took leave of death for good and all. Christ, being raised from the dead, dieth no more, etc. And a Christian life which is planted in the likeness of Christs resurrection, will resemble it in its freedom from relapses into the realm of death. Sin is the tomb of the soul, and if we have risen, let us be sure that we do not return into it. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God.

2. Not that St. Paul would have us believe that a baptized or a converted man cannot sin if he would. He knows nothing of any theory of indefectible grace. There is no absolute impossibility in the relapse of a regenerate Christian into spiritual death, but there should be the highest moral probability against anything of the kind. The strength which has been given the Christian warrants him in reckoning himself dead indeed unto sin, although he still may be overtaken in a fault.

3. Now, what is the case with a largo number of Christians nowadays? So far are some of us from dying no more, that we might almost seem to sink down into the tomb at regular intervals.

4. One predisposing cause of this is the empire of habit. Habit is a chain which attaches us with subtle power to the past, whether that past be good or evil. It is linked on to the action of the understanding, the affections, and the will. It was meant by our Creator to be a support of the life of grace; but when the soul has been enchained by sin habit is enlisted in the service of sin, and promotes a return to the grave of sin, even after the souls resurrection to the life of grace.

5. And do we not too often invite the reappearance of old habits by haunting the tombs from which we have risen, by playing with the apparatus of death, by visits to old haunts, by reading old books, by encouraging old imaginations that are fatally linked to the debasement of the past? How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? Surely we cannot dally with the ancient enemy, we cannot risk the reassertion of that power of habit of which we had broken the chains, we cannot forget that at our moral resurrection the whole power of habit was to be transferred to the account of the life of grace.

II. To the present.

1. The greater part of our Lords resurrection life was hidden from the eyes of men.

(1) During the forty days retirement was the rule, and His appearances to His disciples were so many suspensions of that rule. Now, a Christian life which is planted in the likeness of Christs resurrection will be to a great extent withdrawn from the eyes of men. A Christian must, indeed, let his light so shine before men, etc.; but the life of private prayer, of self-discipline, of motive faith, hope, and love, must in a true Christians career altogether preponderate over his external activities, and if it does it will thereby promote those activities. The forest tree ere it rears its branches to the skies strikes its roots far and deep into the soil beneath; and an active Christian life which is not rooted in devotion to an unseen Master will speedily degenerate into the existence of a philanthropic machine, looking for its reward to imposing statistics, to florid newspaper reports, to the applause of public meetings, and generally to the praise of men.

(2) Publicity is the order of our day, and the press, the railway, the telegraph all conspire to oblige men to live before the eyes of their fellows; everybody is observed, discussed, interviewed. No doubt this publicity has its good side. It may supply motives against wrong-doing, where none of a higher order are recognised; but who can doubt that it tends to impair that disinterestedness which is the very bloom of the higher Christian life; that it tends to make the worlds standard of excellence the standard also of the servants of Christ; that it impairs that note of likeness to Christ in His resurrection, a life hidden with Christ in God?

(3) It was the sense of this truth which was the strength of monasticism. Like other human efforts to give practical expression to a religious truth, monasticism made its full share of mistakes; but the truth remains forever, that the life lived wholly before the eyes of men, and probably with a view to the approval of men, cannot be in the likeness of Christs resurrection.

2. Another note of our Lords risen life was that when He did appear to His apostles He had a lesson to teach, a warning or a blessing to convey, as the reason for each separate act of contact with those around Him. Consider the account of His interviews; each does a separate work which had to be done, and does it with a point and a thoroughness which we cannot mistake. And here must we not admit that we modern Christians are unlike Him? Our life too often resembles those story books whose aim is to excite continuous amusement in the reader, and yet not to have any discoverable moral whatever attached to them. We shrink from speaking the word in season; we shrink from giving a reason for the hope that is within us. Can we wholly escape responsibility for the consequences of our silence, for the moral downward career, for the darkened or dying faith of those with whom we may have been brought into contact? You may have forgotten an interview which we had, so said a stranger to an older friend, twenty years ago. At the time I did not thank you for what you said; I was angry with you; but I must tell you now that under God I owe you my soul.

III. To the future. Our Lords risen life was passed in anticipation of the event which was close to it--forgetting the sepulchre which was behind, and reaching forward to the ascension which was before. And so it should be with us. Here we have no continuing city; we seek one to come; we look not for the things that are seen and temporal, but for the things that are not seen and eternal, Earthly greatness, as a rule, ends with the grave; the greatness of Jesus on earth begins with it. Why should it not be so in the life of the spirit? We should have done with the tomb of sin for good and all. When this new life is planted in the soul old things indeed have passed away; behold all things have become new! (Canon Liddon.)

Assimilation through faith

1. The text is an effort to convey by a curious and vigorous figure the close spiritual assimilation which faith produces between the Christian and Christ. What St. Paul says literally is, that believers have grown together into one with Christ, so as to become of like nature with Him in the matter of His death.

2. But how can any inward change, passing in the mind of a man today, be said to bear a likeness to what happened when Christ bare our sin? Easily enough. Consider the moral significance of Christs death for sin. Was it not, to begin with, the first full recognition ever made on this earth of the guilt of sin, and of the integrity of the law? The Son, being of one mind with the Father, owned that sin was hateful, and the Divine law holy, and its sentence just. Now, whenever I with my whole heart accept of that death as reconciling me to God by satisfying His law on my behalf, do I not enter into sympathy with Gods point of view, just as His own Son did? Can we call such an experience anything but spiritual incorporation into the likeness of Christs death? The man who has got such a view of his own sin does in a very real sense die in his heart to sin. Seek to know the fellowship of Christs sufferings; become conformed to His death; then the old evil self must die within the bosom, killed by the Cross that killed our Saviour.

3. If faith in the Cross of Christ prove thus effectual to cut the nerve of a sinful life, surely we shall also grow together with Him in the likeness of His resurrection. The very object for which Christ and our old sinful self died, is that the believer, once set free from sin, should be point by point conformed to the likeness of the risen Jesus. It may appear to some as though this thing which we call faith were too feeble or uncertain for a work so great. What! may one say, shall a man reverse his tastes, break his habits, and change his life into the likeness of One so unlike him as Jesus Christ, merely because he puts faith in Christ to save him? What is there in this faith to work so astounding a revolution?

4. The answer to that, in part at least, is tiffs: that we have really no deeper or more powerful agent for working any such change than just this same faith. It combines the strongest motives and most sustaining elements in character; such as confidence, loyalty, affection, reverence, authority, and moral attractiveness. You constantly find that large bodies of men, parties in the State, armies in the field, schools of opinion, whole nations even at critical moments, are swayed simply by the transcendent influence of one outstanding trusted leader. Still more absorbing is the influence which an individual may acquire over one other soul that entirely believes in him. Take a single element in faith--the mere persuasion of one man that another is able and willing to aid him in his enterprises. Let it be a fixed idea with a poor individual that some influential friend will back him up in his business, and that in such backing lies his best chance of success. What is there he will not do rather than forfeit assistance from that quarter on which all his hopes are built? Add to such a selfish expectation of help the far deeper bond of personal reverence or of proud admiring love. Let the relation become like that of some tried and faithful lieutenant to a gallant leader, or like that of a maiden to the lover whom she both believes in and dents upon. Can bounds be set to the power of faith like theirs? Let the object of such devotion be really noble and wise, who shall say how far baseness and selfishness may be burnt out of the heart that cleaves to the idol it has chosen for itself? Let that idol be itself erring or misguided, who will wonder if the soul that worships it be dragged down the same devious and unhappy path to share the same fall? If to all this you could add in a rare instance some overwhelming obligation of a strictly moral kind, like a bond of gratitude deep as life for a benefit never to be forgotten, or a claim of supreme authority no less sacred than a fathers, more subduing than a kings--who does not see that in such a faith as that you would have the mightiest of all forces within human experience?

5. This is our faith in Christ--this, but beyond analogy greater and more masterful, because human parallels are infinitely too weak to express it. The Christian trusts in Jesus, but not as a man trusts in his fellows support, for our Saviour is the mighty God. The Christian is tied to Jesus with a heart devotion based on reverence and warming into love; but not as women cling to their lovers, or partisans to their hero-chieftain, for our Saviour commands a reverence which is worship, and wins an affection which is supreme. The Christian owes to Jesus obedience for the service He has rendered, and for the right He possesses to command; but not under such limitations as always environ human authorities, even the highest, since our Saviour is Lord of the conscience as well as of the heart, and His moral mastery is absolute, as His judgment shall be final. Does it seem, then, any longer a thing futile or unreasonable to say, that through such faith as that a man may come to grow together into one with the Divine Object of his devotion, until the mans life is penetrated with Christs spirit and conformed in everything to His matchless likeness?

6. Still, the tie which links a believer to His Saviour offers points of contrast quite as striking. Men do get assimilated no doubt to the objects of their earthly devotion. Still no union wrought by any such faith on earth can adequately represent the unique life junction which, through a special act of Gods Holy Spirit, makes these twain one--the living Head of Gods new family and each lowly, trusting sinner who cleaves to Jesus as his spiritual life. For one thing, the union of a believing soul to Jesus has its roots in a certain mysterious oneness which Gods gracious will has established between the heirs of salvation and their new representative and Second Adam, the Lord from heaven. For another thing, this relationship involves not a portion only of the mans experience, not some transient, or secular, or subordinate interest, but the believers very self--his true and deepest being. It is the old man which is crucified with Christ, that moral personality which has hitherto been the very centre and source of all my words and actions. The believers very self hangs thenceforward on Christs self. His spiritual being is new made, for it is informed by another Spirit as its inspiring and ruling influence, even by the Holy Spirit whom Jesus gives. Such a change as this is effected, indeed, by faith. But such faith comes of the operation of God. When the old man dies and the new man lives in a human being there is an evident re-birth; and for that we must postulate an immediate operation of the Divine Giver of life. (J. Oswald Dykes, D. D.)

Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him.

The old man

Why is original sin called the old man? Because--

I. It is derived from the eldest or first Adam.

II. It is first in everyone (1Co_15:46).

III. It is to be done away (Heb_8:13; 2Co_5:17).

IV. Of its cunning and craft.

As old men, by reason of their abundant experience, are more wise and subtle than others; this old man is cunning to deceive. Oh, what excuses does it bring for sin, what pretences! It hath much of Adam; but it hath somewhat of the wise and old serpent too, for it was begot betwixt them both. Conclusion: Observe that when the apostle calls original sin our old man, he distinguishes it from ourselves. It is ours, too, nearly cleaving to us; but it is not ourselves. Whence we must learn to put a difference betwixt the corruption of nature, and nature itself. Mans nature is from God; but the corruption of mans nature is from himself. (P. Vinke, B. D.)

The crucifixion of the old man

I. The old man.

1. Old as Adam, in nature, habit, spirit.

2. His features.

3. His vigour.

II. His crucifixion.

1. Effected with Christ.

2. The process.

(1) Painful.

(2) Protracted.

(3) Voluntary.

III. The necessity of it.

1. That the body of sin may be destroyed.

2. That we may be emancipated from its service. (J. Lyth, D. D.)

The old man crucified

1. Every new man is two men; he is what he was and not what he was: the old nature and the new exist in each regenerate individual. That old nature the apostle calls a man, because it is a complete manhood after the image of fallen Adam. He calls it the old man, because it is as old as Edens first transgression.

2. Every Christian has a new nature which was implanted in him through the Spirits working. That new nature utterly hates and loathes evil; so that finding itself brought into contact with the old nature, it cries, O wretched man that I am, etc.

3. Hence a warfare is set up within the believers bosom; the new life struggles against the old death, as the house of David against the house of Saul, or as Israel against the Canaanites. Neither nature can make peace with the other. Either the earthy water must quench the heavenly fire, or the Divine fire, like that which Elijah saw, must lick up all the water in the trenches of the heart. It is war to the knife, exterminating war.

I. The old man is to die in the likeness of Christs death by crucifixion. Our Lord died--

1. A true and real death. The Roman officer would not have given up the body if he had not made sure that He was dead, and made assurance doubly sure by piercing our Lords side. There was no make believe; it was no phantom which bled, and the death was no syncope or swoon. Even thus it must be with our old propensities; they must not be mewed up by temporary austerities, or laid in a trance by fleeting reveries, or ostentatiously buried alive by religious resolves and professions; they must actually die. Sometimes persons who are really alive appear as dead, because death reigns over a part of their bodies; their hands are powerless, their eyes closed, every member palsied; yet they are not dead. So have I known some that have given up a part of their sins. But no man shall enter heaven while one propensity to sin lies in him, for heaven admits nothing that pollutes. Without holiness no man shall see the Lord. Sin must be slain.

2. A voluntary death. Christ said, I lay down My life for the sheep … no man taketh it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. Jesus need not have died. Such must be the death of sin within us. Some men part with their sins with the intention of coming back again to them if they can; like Lots wife they set out to leave Sodom, but their eyes show where their hearts would be. They fight sin as stage-players; it is mimic conflict, they do not hate sin in reality. Ah! but we must have our whole hearts burning with an intensity of desire to get rid of our sins; and such we shall feel if there be a work of grace in our soul. The execution of sin, then, must be undertaken with a willing mind.

3. A violent death. By wicked men Christ was taken, and by violent hands put to death. Sin struggles awfully in the best of men, especially besetting and constitutional sins. One man is proud, and what prayers and tears it costs him to bring the neck of old pride to the block! Another man is grasping, and how he has to lament because his gold will corrode within his soul Some are of a murmuring spirit, and to conquer a spirit of contention is no easy task. Yet, cost us what it may, these sins must die. Violent may be the death and stern the struggle, but we must nail that right hand, ay, and drive home the nail.

4. A painful death. The suffering of crucifixion was extreme. So the death of sin is painful in all, and in some terribly so. Read Bunyans Grace Abounding, and see how year after year that wonderful mind of his had red-hot harrows dragged across all its fields. Some are brought unto salvation much more easily, but even they find that the death of sin is painful.

5. An ignominious death. It was the death which the Roman law accorded only to felons, serfs, and Jews. So our sins must be put to death with every circumstance of self-humiliation. I am shocked with some people who glibly rehearse their past lives up to the time of their supposed conversion, and talk of their sins which they hope have been forgiven them, with a sort of smack of the lips, as if there was something fine in having been so atrocious an offender. If you ever do tell anybody about your wrong-doing, let it be with shame and confusion of face. Never let the devil pat you on the back and say, You did me a good turn in those days. The old man is crucified with him. Who boasts of being related to a crucified felon?

6. A lingering death. A man crucified often lived for days, and even for a week. Our old man will linger on his cross. Each one of our sins has a horrible vitality about it. Expect to have to fight with sin, till you sheathe your sword and put on your crown.

7. A visible death. If there is no visible difference between you and the world, depend upon it there is no invisible difference. If a mans outward life is not right, I shall not feel bound to believe that his inward life is acceptable to God. Ah, sir, said one in Rowland Hills time, he is not exactly what I should like, but he has a good heart at bottom. The shrewd old preacher replied, When you go to market and buy fruit, and there are none but rotten apples on the top of the basket, you say to the market woman, These are a very bad lot.

II. This crucifixion is with Christ. There is no death for sin except in the death of Christ. Your killing of your sin is not in your power. If yon go to the commandments of God, or to the fear and dread of hell, you will find such motives as they suggest to be as powerless in you for real action as they have proved themselves to be on the general world. You must get to Christ, nearer to Christ, and you will overcome sin. Conclusion:

1. Fight with your sins. Hack them in pieces, as Samuel did Agag, let not one of them escape. Revenge the death of Christ upon your sins, but keep to Christs Cross for power to do it.

2. If you will not have death unto sin, you shall have sin unto death. There is no alternative, if you do not die to sin you shall die for sin; and if you do not slay sin, sin will slay you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The old man crucified

I. what does the apostle mean by our old man? Simply our natural self, with all its principles and motives, its outgoings, actions, corruptions, and belongings; not as God made it, but as sin, and Satan, and self have marred it. The old Adam never changes; no medicine can heal the disease, no ointment can mollify the corruption; it can only be got rid of by death. In Psa_14:1-3 we have Gods view of our sad ease. In chap. 3. the apostle quotes this passage to prove the universal depravity of human nature, and the necessity for the gospel which it was his privilege to proclaim.

II. What does it means to be crucified with Him?

1. This expression implies that we have suffered in Christ--

(1) A penal death (Gal_3:13). I have been crucified with Christ and suffered the penalty which the law demands and the sin of the old Adam deserves. This corrupt self was executed under the sentence of law on the Cross.

(2) A lingering, painful death. The knowledge that I have been crucified with Christ will be a constraining motive for mortifying my members which are on the earth, and make me try to crucify the flesh with its affections and lusts (Gal_5:24).

(3) A voluntary death. Christ was crucified as a voluntary agent, and the Christian voluntarily identifies his lot with the crucified One (Gal_6:14).

2. See, then, the importance of the statement crucified with Christ. It is--

(1) An act of sovereign grace, for God gives us union with Christ when He was crucified for sin.

(2) The realisation of this union. Christ lives in the man who has union with Christ, and the man who has union with Christ lives in Christ, and here lies the power for the practical crucifixion of the affections and lusts.

(3) It is the knowledge of this union which constrains us to go out with Him beyond the camp, bearing the cross, despising the shame.

III. The object of this crucifixion. The body of sin is another form of expression for the old man. It is not the human nature defiled by sin, nor the human body burdened by sin, that is to be destroyed (Php_3:21), but it is the sin that defiled and possessed it. Because sin has so poisoned the whole body, it is called the body of sin. The word destroyed is the strongest possible. It is the same as that used in 1Co_15:26, and translated bring to nought (1Co_1:28), put down (1Co_15:24), abolished (2Ti_1:10), made of none effect (Gal_3:17), done away (2Co_3:14).

IV. Its effect--that henceforth we should not serve sin, or be slaves to sin. How can we be slaves to a thing that is extinct? to a power that is abolished? to a principle that is set at nought, made nothing of, put down? See, then, what inconsistent and infatuated creatures we are when we minister in anywise to sin. (M. Rainsford, B. A.)

The two-fold function of personal Christianity

I. Its crucifying function. It crucifies--

1. Not any of his natures faculties or sensibilities. It energises, refines, and develops these.

2. Not any of the ties of his moral obligations. On the contrary, it gives a stronger revelation of duty, and mightier motives to obey. Christianity crucifies the corrupt character, called the old man, not because it is the original character of humanity, which was holy, but because it is the first character of individual men. This crucifixion is--

(1) A painful process. Crucifixion was the most excruciating death that the cruelty of the most malignant spirit could devise. To destroy old habits, gratifications, etc., is a painful work. It is as the cutting off a limb, the plucking out of an eye, etc.

(2) A protracted process. No wound was inflicted upon the most vital part, that the agony might be perpetuated. The agonised life gradually, drop by drop, ebbed away. There is nothing so hard to die as sin. An atom may kill a giant, a word may break the peace of a nation, a spark burn up a city; but it requires earnest and protracted struggles to destroy sin in the soul. No man grows virtuous in a day.

(3) A voluntary process. Christs crucifixion was voluntary. It is so with the crucifixion of the old man. No one could do it for us. No one can do it either without our consent or against it. If the old man is to be crucified, we must nail him to the cross.

II. Its resurrection function. We shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection. The spiritual life of a Christian is--

1. A revived life. It was not a new life that Jesus had when He came forth from His grave:--it was the old revived. The spiritual life of a Christian is that life of supreme love to God which Adam had, which belongs to our nature, but which sin has destroyed, and buried under evil passions and corrupt habits.

2. A Divinely produced life. None but God can raise the dead, etc.

3. An interminable life. I am He that liveth, said Christ, and was dead, and am alive for evermore. Once the true spiritual life of the soul is raised from its grave, it will die no more. It is an everlasting life.

4. A glorious life. How glorious was the resurrection body of Christ (Rev_1:13-18). We shall be like Him, etc. The subject teaches us--

1. The value of evangelical religion: which is to destroy in man the bad, and the bad only, and to revive the good.

2. The test of evangelical religion, which is dying unto sin, and living unto holiness. (D. Thomas, D. D.)

That the body of sin might be destroyed.--

The body of sin weakened

The whole body of sin, indeed, is weakened in every believer, and a deadly wound given by the grace of God to his corrupt nature; yet, as a dying tree may bear some fruit, though not so much, nor that so full and ripe, as before; and as a dying man may move his limbs, though not so strongly as when he was in health, so original corruption in a saint will be stirring, though but feebly; and thou hast no cause to be discouraged because it stirs, but to be comforted that it can but stir.

The body of sin

Sin, in Scripture, in called a body, because made up of several members; or as the body of an army, consisting of many troops and regiments. It is one thing to beat a troop, or put a wing of an army to flight, and another thing to rout and break the whole army. Something hath been done by moral principles, like the former; they have got some petty victory, and had the chase of some gross and external sins; but then they were fearfully beaten by some other of sins troops. As the sea, which loses as much in one part of the land as it gains in another; so what they got in a seeming victory over one sin, they lost again by being in bondage to another, and that a worse, because more spiritual. But faith is uniform, and routs the whole body of sin, so that not one single lust stands in its unbroken strength (verse 14). (W. Gurnall.)

The body of sin

Original corruption is a body of sin.

1. In that a body though it seems never so beautiful and fair, yet it is in itself but made of base matter, so sin, though it may seem specious and alluring, yet it is but an abomination.

2. As a body, being material, is visible; so original sin discovers itself to everyone that without prejudice will look to find it. It is discernible in its effects daily.

3. As the body hath divers members, so sin.

4. As a body is beloved and provided for, so is sin (Rom_13:12). Who would willingly part with the least member of his body? But if something of this body must be parted with, it is but hair and nails. And thus, till that day in which God puts forth His almighty power to make us willing, we are loath to leave any sin.

5. Sin, as a body, hath strength in it, and tyranny is exercised by it.

6. It is called here especially a body by the apostle, to answer to the metaphor of crucifying. Only bodies can be crucified, and this sin is crucified with Christ. (P. Vinke, B. D.)

Destruction of the body of sin

Five persons were studying what were the best means to mortify sin. One said, to meditate on death; the second, to meditate on judgment; the third, to meditate on the torments of hell; the fourth, to meditate on the joys of heaven; the fifth, to meditate on the blood and sufferings of Christ: and certainly the last is the choicest and strongest motive of all. If ever we would cast off our despairing thoughts, we must dwell much upon and apply this precious blood to our own souls. (S. Brooks.)

Destruction of the body of sin

Destroyed, not merely subdued, but annihilated--stripped of its dominion, deprived of its life, annulled as to authority and energy, and finally as to existence. Our sinful nature not to be improved but destroyed. Its place to be taken by a holy and Divine nature. As the old man dies the new man lives. Either grace must destroy sin or sin the soul. Four things observed in the destruction of the body of sin.

I. The meritorious cause. The crucifixion of Christ.

II. The efficient cause. The Holy Spirit (Rom_8:13).

III. The instrumental cause. The gospel of Gods grace (1Pe_1:22).

IV. The more. The infusion of new principles and affections (Gal_5:16; 2Co_5:14). (T. Robinson, D. D.)

That henceforth we should not serve sin.--

The Christian should not serve sin

I. It has cost him enough already. Sin never yields--

1. Real pleasure.

2. Solid satisfaction.

II. It is contrary to the designs of eternal love.

III. Its punishment is very great. It--

1. Destroys peace of mind.

2. Obscures fellowship with Jesus.

3. Hinders prayer.

4. Brings darkness over the soul.

IV. It crucifies the Lord afresh and puts him to an open shame. Can you bear that thought? (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Slaves to sin

When the morning sun is bright, and the summer breezes are gently blowing from the shore, the little riverboat is enticed from the harbour to start on her trip of pleasure on the clear, calm sea. All Nature seems to enlist in her service. The fair wind fills her sails, the favourable tide rolls onward in her course, the parted sea makes way for her to glide swiftly and merrily on her happy voyage; but having thus been her servants, and carried her whither she would, these soon become her masters, and carry her whither she would not. The breeze that swelled her sails has become a storm, and rends them; the waves that quietly rippled for her pleasure now rise in fury, and dash over her for her destruction; and the vessel, which rode in the morning as a queen upon the waters, sinks before night comes on, the slave of those very winds and waves which had beguiled her to use them as her servants. So it is with sin. (Canon Morse.)

For he that is dead is freed from sin.--

Freed from sin

To arrive at the meaning of these words, we must consider that law regards all punishment in the light of satisfaction. By a crime, the law has been aggrieved; and by the punishment, the law is satisfied. When, therefore, the guilty person has undergone sentence, the law has no further claim upon that man.

I. Christ died and underwent the extreme punishment of the law.

1. He was the One, only, sinless being that ever walked the earth. But He was made sin. The sins of the world gathered upon that spotless One, and He was treated as if He was one concentrated essence of sin.

2. When He died, it was death indeed. No other death was like that.

(1) Is death the rending of the fine tissue by which spirit and body are mysteriously one? His was the most sensitive and delicate frame that ever was seen--and the soul of Jesus broke through its tabernacle--the body went its way to the sepulchre--the soul winged its flight to Paradise--and Jesus died.

(2) Is death the parting from those whose love makes life? The tender farewell to Mary, and the beloved disciple, showed the dying of the heart of Jesus.

(3) Is death separation from God? Then there was a passage in that dark valley which Jesus walked without a ray of His Fathers presence.

3. But the death passed, and it could never be repeated. It was not compatible with the justice of God that Jesus should die again.

II. See how this bears upon ourselves.

1. It is Gods plan always to deal with man as seen in some federal head. The whole of our race fell in the first Adam, and became involved in his condemnation. Is it arbitrary? See the balance. Christ came to be a federal Head. As the natural members of our body gather up into the natural head, so spiritual believers gather up into Christ.

2. Observe the consequence of this representative system. As soon as ever you are really united to the Lord Jesus Christ, you have died in your covenant Head. There was a sentence of death against you which must be executed--but in Christ you have undergone it. What is the result? You can never be required to pay the forfeit which has been paid, or to die the death which has been died--it is done in Christ, and you are dead--and he that is dead is freed from sin. And as impossible as it would be that God should take His risen Son, and nail Him to that Cross again, so impossible is it that God should ever demand satisfaction at your hand for any of those sins, which being once laid on Christ, have already received satisfaction in the death of your Redeemer.

3. This was the only conceivable way in which it was possible that any man should be freed from sin. Gods government of this world is a moral government, and it is essential to moral government that every sin should have its retribution. Therefore, God laid it down at the first, The soul that sinneth, it shall die. But He vindicated His truth, and upheld the law, when, gathering the sins of all, and laying them upon one great Substitute, He crucified all in One, saw all dead that He might acknowledge all alive--and simply carried out the one grand principle, He that is dead is freed from sin.

4. Look at the condition of a man who is freed from sin. Had sin never entered into our world--or, having entered, had it been simply forgiven by a word--we should have been, I suppose, just as Adam was. We should have lived in a beautiful garden, where we should have eaten sweet fruit, and done gentle labour, and at times we should have enjoyed the presence of God, and had some measure of communion with Him. Conclusion: It is a certain fact that no other process, except the grace of Christ--no fear of punishment, no hope of reward, no self-respect, no consideration for human affection, have ever proved sufficient in this world to make men really good. But let a man be once brought under a real feeling that through the grace of Christ he is free from condemnation--let him begin to look at that Saviour as his own Friend, and live, day by day, in converse with that love, and contemplation of that example, and we know what is the consequence. We know how the mind of Christ enters into that mans spirit, and how the pattern of Christ becomes reflected upon his conduct. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)

Dead with Christ

What is it to be dead? We all know what it is to turn away from the grave side, in which we have laid to its last rest the cold body of a friend. All is done and over now. Something has been in the world which will never be again. A story, a presence with its good and evil, with its joys and sorrows is wiped out. Everything is ended. The great silence closes over it, as the waters close over a sunken ship, and leaves no sign. It is all dead and over! We have said the last word; we have taken the last look. Now, let it go! Come away! Leave it to lie hidden! For you must go your way without it. That is death, and we are dead if we are in Christ. We have buried our old manhood. That old natural self of ours--the man in us that is born and lives its little day and dies--the self, as is by human laws, as a creature of this earth--that is with us no longer. It has had its day. It has done its business. We have wrapped it in its white shroud. We have carried it out to its burial; down in the dark grave we have laid it; it is buried, with Christs burial. All that old past, so onerous, so tangled, so burdened, so sick--it is all gone and over, as completely as a life that is dead. Never, never can it be again, The blood of Christs death lies between us and it; and it cannot touch us. Its sorrows, its sins, are remote and alien, as the voice of a torrent that we have crossed in the night, whose dull and smothered roar comes to our ears only in faint gusts of wind. The old is dead and buried. (H. S. Holland.)

Freedom from sin

The original means justified or acquitted from sin--absolution from its guilt and merited penalty. Law has received its rightful claim in the Person of the Surety. Freed from sins penalty, we are also freed from its power. We are dead to sin, because in Christ we have died for sin. Consequently we are also freed from its practice (Job_3:19; Rom_7:24; 1Jn_3:6-9). (T. Robinson, D. D.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 6:5-7. For — Surely these two must go together; so that if we have been united to Christ by faith, (to which baptism engages us,) and have been made conformable to his death, by being dead to sin, we shall also know the power of his resurrection, by rising to newness of life. Knowing this — Not in theory merely, but by experience; that our old man — Coeval with our being; our evil nature derived from Adam; the whole system of our former inclinations and dispositions. It is a strong and beautiful expression for that entire depravity and corruption which, by nature, spreads itself over the whole man, leaving no part uninfected. This in a believer is crucified with Christ, mortified, gradually killed by virtue of union with him; the remembrance and consideration of his cross co- operating in the most powerful manner, with all the other motives which the gospel suggests, to destroy our corrupt passions, and former sinful habits, and inspire us with an utter aversion to and detestation of them: that the body of sin — The body belonging to sin, including sinful tempers, words, and works. The apostle personifies sin, after the custom of animated writers, who, to make their discourses lively and affecting, speak of the virtues and vices of which they treat, as so many persons. Corrupt passions and evil actions are the members of the old man, Col 3:5. Might be destroyed — Utterly and for ever; that henceforth we should not serve sin — Should be no longer under its power, as we were before we became savingly acquainted with Christ and his gospel. For he that is dead — With Christ; is freed from sin — From the guilt of past, and the power of present sin, as dead men from the commands of their former masters. The original expression, here rendered is freed, is δεδικαιωται, which properly signifies, is justified; that is, he is acquitted and discharged from any further claim which sin might make upon his service. The word as here used implies, that a sense of justification by the cross of Christ is the great means of our delivery from the bondage of sin, as it animates and exercises us to shake off its yoke, and is accompanied with the Spirit of adoption and regeneration, the fruit of which is always liberty, 2Co 3:17.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 6:5. Σύμφυτοι) LXX. βουνὸς σύμφυτος, δρυμὸς σύμφυτος, a planted hill, a planted forest, Amo 9:13; Zec 11:2, and on this account ὁμοιώματι here may be taken in the ablative. But Hesychius has σύμφυτον, συμπορευόμενον, συνόν, and so σύμφυτ with the dative is a word very significant; comp. Rom 6:4; Rom 6:6. Cluverus translates it, engendered together [connaturati, endowed with the same nature together] grown together[57].) All spiritually quickening power is in Christ, and that power has been conferred upon [brought together into] baptism; ΣῪΝ is used [in the compound ΣΎΜΦΥΤΟΙ], as in the opposite word ΣΥΝΕΣΤΑΥΡΏΘΗ; and the simple [root] word ΦΎΟΜΑΙ refers to ΘΆΝΑΤΟΝ, and ἈΝΆΣΤΑΣΙΝ.—ἈΛΛᾺ, but) The contrast is between death and the resurrection.—τῆς) that is, Τῷ ὉΜΟΙΏΜΑΤΙ Τῆς ἈΝΑΣΤΆΣΕΩς, in the likeness of His resurrection.—ἐσόμεθα) scil. ΣΎΜΦΥΤΟΙ, we shall be, viz. planted in a new life. The future, see ch. Rom 5:19.

[57] Concreti.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom_6:5. Confirmatory elucidation (γάρ) of the previous ἵνα ὥσπερ κ.τ.λ[1402]

σύμφυτος, which in classic authors usually means innate, naturally belonging to (see the passages from Plato in Ast, Lex. III. p. 313, Eur. Andr. 955; comp 2Ma_3:22), is here grown together (Theophr, de caus. plant. v. 5, 2; LXX. Zec_11:2; Amo_9:14). This figurative expression represents the most intimate union of being, like our coalescent with anything (qui or quod coaluit cum aliqua re). Plat. Phaedr. p. 246 A; Aesch. Ag. and Klausen in loc[1404] p. 111. In the classics συμφυής is the more usual form for this idea, especially with γίνεσθαι (Plato, Soph. p. 247 D, Tim. p. 45 D, p. 88 A; Plut. Lycurg. 25). Hence: For, if we have become (through baptism, Rom_6:3-4) such as are grown together with that which is the likeness of His death, (comp on Rom_1:23), i.e. persons, to whose nature it inseparably belongs to present in themselves that which resembles His death, so also shall we be grown together with the likeness of His resurrection. On ὁμοίωμα comp Rom_1:23, Rom_5:14, Rom_8:3. The rendering of σύμφυτοι by complantati (Vulgate, Luther), in. connection with which Chrysostom, Origen, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret, Theophylact, Beza, and others explain the figure of the plant by the fruits of the ethical burial, is linguistically incorrect, as if the word came not from συμφύω, but from συμφυτεύω (comp φυτευτός, Plat. Rep. p. 510 A, ἀφύτευτος, Xen. Oec. 20, 22). The interpretation engrafted (Erasmus, Calvin, Estius, Cornelius à Lapide, Klee) is likewise without linguistic evidence, and does not suit the abstract τῷ ὁμοιώματι.

τῷ ὁμοιώμ. τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ] i.e. the condition corresponding in similarity of form to His death, which has specifically and indissolubly become ours. This ethical conformity with His death, however, the growing together with which took place through our baptism, is just that moral death to sin, Rom_6:3-4, in which the spiritual communion in death with Christ consists. τ. ὁμ. τ. θ. α. is to be joined with σύμφυτοι (Vulgate, Chrysostom, Beza, Calvin, Estius, Koppe, Tholuck, Rückert, Reiche. Olshausen, de Wette, Philippi, and others; now including Hofmann). Others however take it as the dative of the instrument, and supply τῷ Χριστῷ to σύμφυτοι: for, if we have entered into close union with Christ through the ὁμοίωμα of His death, etc. So Erasmus, Beza, Grotius, Flatt, Fritzsche, Krehl, Baumgarten-Crusius, Maier, Baur, van Hengel, and Reithmayr; also Weiss, bibl. Theol. p. 344. Nevertheless it is arbitrary to separate τω ὁμ. from σύμφ. γεγ., seeing that it stands beside it and in a structural respect presents itself most naturally with it, and also as belonging to it yields a very appropriate sense; and on the other hand to attach to σύμφ a word which Paul has not put in, and which he must have put in, if he would not lead his readers astray. Still more mistaken is the view of Bisping, that σύμφ. belongs to τοῦ θανάτ. αὐτοῦ, and that τῷ ὁμοιώμ. comes in between them instrumentally. Hofmann has rightly abandoned this tortuous interpretation, which he formerly followed. Comp on the right connection Cyril, Catech. iii. 12; and even Martyr. Ignat. 5 : ἐμαυτὸν.… σύμφυτον θέσθαι τῷ τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ ὁμοιώματι.

ἀλλὰ καί] but also. ἀλλά, for the speedy and more emphatic introduction of the contrasted element, as frequently also in the classics, at the head of the apodosis; see on 1Co_4:15; Col_2:5.

τῆς ἀναστάσεως] cannot, in keeping with the protasis, depend directly upon the σύμφυτοι to be again understood (Erasmus, Calvin and others; including Rückert, Olshausen, de Wette and Krehl), but only upon the τῷ ὁμοιώματι to be supplied (Beza, Grotius, Estius, and many others; including Winzer, Fritzsche, Baumgarten-Crusius, Maier, Philippi, Tholuck, Ewald, van Hengel, and Hofmann), so that when completed it would run: ἀλλὰ καὶ τῷ ὁμοιώματι τῆς ἀναστάσεως αὐτοῦ σύμφυτοι ἐσόμεθα. The former view is indeed likewise unobjectionable grammatically, for σύμφυτοι may also stand with the genitive (Plat. Phil. p. 51 D, Def. p. 413 C, Bernhardy, p. 171); but the latter is suggested by the context, and presents itself easily enough and without harshness. Further, it is self-evident, after Rom_6:4, that in τ. ἀναστ. we are not to think of the resurrection of our body (Tertullian, Chrysostom, Ambrosiaster, Oecumenius, Cornelius à Lapide, and others; comp also Ewald), or of this as included (Koppe and Klee).

ἐσόμεθα] receives its only correct interpretation from its relation to, and bearing on, the clause expressive of the purpose, ἵνα.… ἐν καιν. ζ. περιπ in Rom_6:4, according to which it must express the necessarily certain. Matthiae, p. 1122; Kühner, II. 1, p. 148, ed. 2. Compare πῶς ἔτι ζήσομεν Rom_6:2. The sense of willing (ut reviviscamus curabimus, Fritzsche) is not suggested by the connection; nor is that of a summons (Olshausen, Rückert, and older expositors); but it is rather the expression of what shall certainly be the case, as the consequence of the σύμφυτοι γεγόν. τῷ ὁμοιώμ. τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ assumed as real in the protasis; it cannot be otherwise; with the having become σύμφυτοι this ἐσέσθαι is given; with that fact having begun and taken place is posited this further development, which necessarily attaches itself thereto.

[1402] .τ.λ. καὶ τὰ λοιπά.

[1404] n loc. refers to the note of the commentator or editor named on the particular passage.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 6:5 . This verse proves the legitimacy of the reference to a new life in the preceding one: union with Christ at one point (His death) is union with Him altogether (and therefore in His resurrecton). εἰ γὰρ σύμφυτοι γεγόναμεν τῷ ὁμοιώματι τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ : it is simplest to take συμφ . and τῷ ὁμοιώματι together if we have become vitally one with the likeness of His death; i.e. , if the baptism, which is a similitude of Christ’s death, has had a reality answering to its obvious import, so that we have really died in it as Christ died, then we shall have a corresponding experience of resurrection, τῆς ἀναστάσεως is also dependent on ὁμοιώματι : baptism, inasmuch as one emerges from the water after being immersed, is a ὁμοίωμα of resurrection as well as of death. It does not seem a real question to ask whether the ἀνάστασις is ethical or transcendent: one cannot imagine Paul drawing the distinction here. (On the word ὁμοίωμα , see Cremer.)

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Vv. 5. “For if we have become one and the same plant [with Him] through the likeness of His death, we shall be also partakers of His resurrection;”

The apostle had used the rite of baptism to illustrate the impossibility experienced by the believer of continuing in his former life. Now he expounds the same truth didactically. The in order that of Rom 6:4 becomes as it were the text of this development (Rom 6:5-11), of which Rom 6:5 contains the summary.

The for bears directly on this in order that. The idea of Rom 6:4 was: “We were buried by baptism only with the intention of rising again.” This intention is demonstrated by the moral fact formulated Rom 6:5 : “The man who participates in the death of Christ cannot but participate in His resurrection.” There is much said in a certain theological school about the possession of the life of Christ. This vague phrase seems intended to take the place of all Christian doctrine. Does it really mean what St. Paul understood by it? I do not examine the subject here. But in any case it should not be forgotten, as is usually done from this view-point, that the participation in the life of Christ of which the apostle speaks, has as its necessary and preliminary condition, participation in His death. The docile acceptance of the cross is the only pathway to communion in the life of the Risen One. Forgetfulness of this point of departure is full of grave consequences. For the second fact has no reality save in connection with the first.

The construction of each of the two propositions of this verse has been understood in a variety of ways. Bisping has proposed to make τοῦ θανάτου, of death, the complement not of τῷ ὁμοιώματι (the likeness), but of σύμφυτοι (partakers), while taking τῷ ὁμοιώματι as an adverbial clause, meant to indicate the means or mode of this participation: “If we were made partakers of His death in a likeness;” this notion of resemblance being applied either to the figurative rite of baptism, or to the internal fact of death to sin, which would thus be as it were the moral copy of Christ’s death. This construction would enable us to establish an exact parallelism between the two propositions of the verse, for the genitive τῆς ἀναστάσεως (of the resurrection) in the second proposition would depend on σύμφυτοι (partakers), exactly as τοῦ θανάτου (of death) in the first on this same adjective. But one cannot help feeling how harsh and almost barbarous this construction is. Besides, it is now abandoned. The complement of death depends naturally on τῷ ὁμοιώματι, the likeness, as has been acknowledged by Chrys., Calv., Thol., Rück., Olsh., de Wette, Mey., Philip., Hofm. By this likeness may be understood either the external act of baptism, as representing figuratively the death of Christ, or our own death to sin as spiritually reproducing it. But whether in the one sense or the other, it is surely uncouth to connect so concrete a term as σύμφυτος, born with, partaking, with an abstract notion such as likeness. One is made a partaker not of the likeness of a thing, but of the thing itself. Besides, baptism is not the representation of death, but of burial (see above). It therefore appears to us, that the only admissible construction is to join the adjective σύμφυτοι with the understood regimen σὺν αὐτῷ, with Him; “born with Him, united to Him, by the likeness of His death.” This is the opinion of Er., Grot., and others. The ellipsis of this pronoun arises naturally from the preceding phrase: we were buried with Him, Rom 6:4; it reappears obviously in Rom 6:6 (συνεσταυρώθη, was crucified with). The expression: through the likeness of His death, refers, according to what precedes, to the inner fact by which the death of Christ for sin is reproduced in us, that is to say, to our own death to sin implied in the act of faith.

The term σύμφυτος (in classic Greek more commonly συμφυής) is derived from the verb συμφύω, to be born, to grow together. This adjective, therefore, denotes the organic union in virtue of which one being shares the life, growth, and phases of existence belonging to another; so it is that the existence, prosperity, and decay of the branch are bound up with the state of the stem. Hence we have ventured to translate it: to be made one and the same plant with Him. Not a case of death to sin passes in the church which was not already included in the death of Christ, to be produced wherever faith should be realized; not a spiritual resurrection is effected within the church, which is not Christ’s own resurrection reproduced by His Spirit in the heart which has begun by uniting itself to Him in the communion of His death.

It must, however, be remarked (and we shall meet with this characteristic again in the sequel of the passage) that the fact of participation in the death is put in the past (we have become one and the same plant...), while participation in the resurrection is expressed in the future: we shall be partakers...Some of the Fathers have concluded from this change of tense, that in the latter words the apostle meant to speak of the future resurrection, of the bodily glorification of believers. But this idea is foreign to the context, which is governed throughout by reference to the objection of Rom 6:1 (the relation of the believer to sin). The expression, therefore, denotes only sanctification, the believer’s moral resurrection. The contrast indicated between the past and the future must find an entirely different explanation. As the communion of faith with Christ crucified is the condition of sharing in His life as risen, the apostle speaks of the first event in the past, and of the second in the future. The one having taken place, the other must follow. The past and future describe, the one the principle, the other the consequence. We begin with union to the person of Christ by faith in that mysterious: He for me, which forms the substance of the gospel; then this union goes forward until His whole being as the Risen One has passed into us. Gess makes τῷ ὁμοιώματι a dative of aim: “We have been united to Him in order to the likeness of His death,” to be made conformable to it (Php 3:10). But this meaning does not harmonize with Rom 6:2, where the reproduction of the death is looked upon as wrought in the believer by the fact of his death to sin implied in his faith.

The words ἀλλὰ καί, which connect the two propositions of the verse, might here be rendered: well then also! The second fact stands out as the joyous consequence of the first.

The genitive τῆς ἀναστάσεως, of the resurrection, cannot depend on the verb ἐσόμεθα, we shall be: “we shall be of the resurrection,” meaning: we shall infallibly have part in it (in the sense of the expressions: to be of the faith, to be of the law). Such a mode of speech would be without ground in the passage; and the term resurrection is not taken here in the general sense; it refers solely to Christ’s personal resurrection. Meyer and Philippi, true to their explanation of the first proposition, here supply the dative τῷ ὁμοιώματι: “As we have shared in the likeness of His death, we shall share also in the likeness of His resurrection.” This ellipsis is not impossible, but it renders the phrase very awkward. Following the construction which we have adopted in the first clause, it is simpler merely to understand σύμφυτοι in this second, making the genitive τῆς ἀναστάσεως, of the resurrection, dependent on this adjective: “Well, then, we shall be partakers also of His resurrection!” This solution is possible, because the word σύμφυτος is construed indifferently with the genitive or dative, like our English word to partake (to partake of or in). This direct dependence (omitting the idea of likeness) is according to the nature of things. Jesus does not communicate to us His death itself; we possess only its likeness in our death to sin. It is otherwise with His resurrection and His life as risen. It is this life itself which he conveys to us: “And I live; yet not I, but Christ in me” (Gal 2:20). “Because I live, ye shall live also” (Joh 14:18). The believer being once ingrafted into Christ by faith in His death, and thereby dead to His own life, lives again through the Holy Spirit on the very life of the risen Christ. Thus the difference of form between the first and second propositions is perfectly explained.

This summary demonstration of the truth of the in order that (Rom 6:4) required to be developed. Rom 6:6-7 expound the contents of 5a; Rom 6:8-10 those of 5b.

Frédéric Louis Godet — Commentaries on Luke, John, Romans, and 1 Corinthians — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1870s–1890s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom_6:5

For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection. This is a confirmation of what precedes. We shall walk in newness of life, if we are partakers of Christs death, for community of death involves community of life. The general meaning of the verse is plain, although there is doubt as to the force of some of the words, and as to the construction. First, as to the words. Calvin and many others render σύμφυτος insitus, inserted, engrafted, as though it were derived from φυτεύω. It is, however, from φύω, which means both to bear and to grow. Hence σύμφυτος sometimes means born with, in the sense of innate; sometimes it expresses community of origin, or nature, in the sense of cognate, congenial; and sometimes it is used in reference to things born or produced at the same time. From the other meaning of the word φύω, come the senses growing with, overgrown with, etc. In all cases there is the idea of intimate union, and that is the idea which the word is here intended to express. As to the construction, so far as the first clause of the verse is concerned, we may connect σύμφυτοι with ὁμοιώματι, we have grown together in death, i.e. been united in a like death; or we may supply the words τῷ Χριστῷ, we have been united with Christ, as to, or by, similarity of death. The former as it requires nothing to be supplied, is to be preferred. In the second clause, the word ὁομιώτατι may be supplied, as in our version: we shall be (united) in the likeness of his resurrection. But as σύμφυτος; may be construed with the genitive as well as the dative, many commentators unite σύμφυτοι τῆς ἀναστάσεως ἐσὸμεθα, we shall partake of the resurrection. The sense is the same; if united in death, we shall be united in life; if we die with him, we shall live with him. The future ἐσόμεθα does not here express obligation, nor futurity. The reference is not to what is to happen hereafter, but to the certainty of sequence, or causal connection. If the one thing happens, the other shall certainly follow. The doctrine of this passage is not simple that the believer dies and rises, as Christ died and rose; that there is an analogy between his death and theirs; but, as before remarked, the main idea is, the necessary connection between the death and resurrection of Christ and the death and resurrection of his people. Such is the union between them and him, that his death and resurrection render theirs a matter of necessity. The life or death of a tree necessitates the life or death of the branches. Says Calvin, Insitio, non tantum exempli conformitatem designat, sed arcanam conjunctionem per quam cum ipso coaluimus, ita ut nos Spiritu suo vegetans ejus virtutem in nos transfundat. Ergo ut surculus communem habet vitae et mortis conditionem cum arbore in quam insertus est; ita vitae Christi non minus quam et mortis participes nos esse consentaneum est. That the resurrection here spoken of is a spiritual rising from the dead, seems plain, both from what precedes and from what follows. The whole discussion relates to sanctification, to the necessary connection between the death of Christ as an atonement for sin, and the holiness of his people. Those who are cleansed from the guilt of sin, are cleansed also from its pollution. Although this is obvious, yet all reference to the future resurrection of the body is not to be excluded. In Rom_8:11, the apostle represents the quickening of our mortal bodies as a necessary consequence of our union with Christ, and the indwelling of his Spirit. If, therefore, we are baptized unto the death of Christ, united and conformed to him in his death, the sure result will be, that we shall be conformed to him in a holy life here, and in a life of glorious immortality of the soul and body hereafter. All this is included in the life which flows to us from Christ.

Charles Hodge — Commentary on Romans (1835), First Corinthians (1857), and Ephesians (1856) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The death of sin and the life of righteousness, or our ingrafting into Christ, and growing up into one with him, cannot be separated by any means, neither in death nor life, whereby it followeth, that no man is sanctified, which lived still to sin, and therefore is no man made partaker of Christ by faith, which repenteth not, and turneth not from his wickedness: for as he said before, the Law is not subverted, but established by faith.

For we become every day more perfect than others: for we shall never be perfectly sanctified, as long as we live here.

Insomuch as by the means of the strength which cometh from him to us, we so die to sin as he is dead.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

For if we have been planted together--literally, "have become formed together." (The word is used here only).

in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection--that is, "Since Christ's death and resurrection are inseparable in their efficacy, union with Him in the one carries with it participation in the other, for privilege and for duty alike." The future tense is used of participation in His resurrection, because this is but partially realized in the present state. (See on Rom 5:19).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 5. For if we have been planted together] συμφυτοι γεγοναμεν. Dr. Taylor observes, that our translation does not completely express the apostle's meaning. Τα συμφυτα are such plants as grow, the one upon and in the other, deriving sap and nourishment from it, as the mistletoe upon the oak, or the scion upon the stock in which it is grafted. He would therefore translate the words: For if we have been growers together with Christ in the likeness of his death, (or in that which is like his death,) we shall be also growers together with him in the likeness of his resurrection; or in that which is like his resurrection. He reckons it a beautiful metaphor, taken from grafting, or making the scion grow together with a new stock.

But if we take the word planted in its usual sense, we shall find it to be a metaphor as beautiful and as expressive as the former. When the seed or plant is inserted in the ground, it derives from that ground all its nourishment, and all those juices by which it becomes developed; by which it increases in size, grows firm, strong, and vigorous; and puts forth its leaves, blossoms, and fruit. The death of Jesus Christ is represented as the cause whence his fruitfulness, as the author of eternal salvation to mankind is derived; and genuine believers in him are represented as being planted in his death, and growing out of it; deriving their growth, vigour, firmness, beauty, and fruitfulness from it. In a word, it is by his death that Jesus Christ redeems a lost world; and it is from that vicarious death that believers derive that pardon and holiness which makes them so happy in themselves, and so useful to others. This sacrificial death is the soil in which they are planted; and from which they derive their life, fruitfulness, and their final glory.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. For if we have been ingrafted, etc. He strengthens in plainer words the argument he has already stated; for the similitude which he mentions leaves now nothing doubtful, inasmuch as grafting designates not only a conformity of example, but a secret union, by which we are joined to him; so that he, reviving us by his Spirit, transfers his own virtue to us. Hence as the graft has the same life or death in common with the tree into which it is ingrafted, so it is reasonable that we should be partakers of the life no less than of the death of Christ; for if we are ingrafted according to the likeness of Christ’s death, which was not without a resurrection, then our death shall not be without a resurrection. But the words admit of a twofold explanation, — either that we are ingrafted in Christ into the likeness of his death, or, that we are simply ingrafted in its likeness. The first reading would require the Greek dative ὁμοιώματι, to be understood as pointing out the manner; nor do I deny but that it has a fuller meaning: but as the other harmonizes more with simplicity of expression, I have preferred it; though it signifies but little, as both come to the same meaning. Chrysostom thought that Paul used the expression, “likeness of death,” for death, as he says in another place, “being made in the likeness of men.” But it seems to me that there is something more significant in the expression; for it not only serves to intimate a resurrection, but it seems also to indicate this — that we die not like Christ a natural death, but that there is a similarity between our and his death; for as he by death died in the flesh, which he had assumed from us, so we also die in ourselves, that we may live in him. It is not then the same, but a similar death; for we are to notice the connection between the death of our present life and spiritual renovation.

Ingrafted, etc. There is great force in this word, and it clearly shows, that the Apostle does not exhort, but rather teach us what benefit we derive from Christ; for he requires nothing from us, which is to be done by our attention and diligence, but speaks of the grafting made by the hand of God. But there is no reason why you should seek to apply the metaphor or comparison in every particular; for between the grafting of trees, and this which is spiritual, a disparity will soon meet us: in the former the graft draws its aliment from the root, but retains its own nature in the fruit; but in the latter not only we derive the vigor and nourishment of life from Christ, but we also pass from our own to his nature. The Apostle, however, meant to express nothing else but the efficacy of the death of Christ, which manifests itself in putting to death our flesh, and also the efficacy of his resurrection, in renewing within us a spiritual nature.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(5) If we have been planted together.—“If (so surely as) we have grown into—become conjoined with.” The metaphor is taken from the parasitic growth of a plant, but applies to natural growth, not “planted together with,” as in the Authorised version. The idea would correspond to the growth of a bud or graft regarded as part of that of the stock in which it is inserted. but without reference to the operation of budding or grafting. It is used here to express the closest intimacy and union.

In the likeness of his death.—Not here “His death itself,” but “the likeness of His death,” i.e., an ethical condition corresponding to, or conformable to, the death of Christ. If our nature has grown “into conformity with” His death, it will be also conform able to His resurrection.

This conformity means, of course, dying to trespasses and sins, being completely removed from the sphere of their influence, and entering a new sphere corresponding to the glorified life of the Redeemer. The ethical resurrection of the Christian begins (or is ideally supposed to begin, and with the early Christian usually did begin) in baptism, is continued through life, and is completed with his physical resurrection.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

5. if] i.e. “as;” an assumed fact

planted together] Better (with regard to the form of the Gr. word), vitally connected. Not implanting but coalescence is the idea. (The word occurs nowhere else in N. T.)

in the likeness] Not His Death, but its Likeness; i.e. our “death unto sin” in Him. (See on Rom_6:2.) As believers, we have become vitally, inseparably, connected with that “death;” in other words, freedom from the claim of doom is an essential of our condition “in Him.” (Rom_8:1.)

we shall be] i.e., practically, “we are and shall be.” This is to be the sequel of justification, now and ever.

his resurrection] Which was not merely the reversal of His Death, but His entrance on the “power of an endless life.” So the justified live, not merely “not unto sin,” but “unto God.”

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For if we have been planted together,.... This is not to be understood of an implantation of Jews and Gentiles together in One body; nor of an implantation of believers together in a church state; but of an implantation of Christ and his people together; which is openly done at conversion, in consequence of a secret union with him before; when they are transplanted from a state of nature, and are ingrafted into Christ; have the graces of the Spirit of God implanted in them, and grow up under the dews of grace, and shinings of the sun of righteousness upon them, and bring forth much fruit; now as these persons, by virtue of their secret union with Christ from eternity, as their head and representative, with whom they were crucified, in whom they died representatively, share in his death, enjoy the benefits of it, and feel its efficacy, and through it become dead to the law, sin, and the world, which is meant by

the likeness of his death; so these same persons shall be also planted

in the likeness of his resurrection; that is, they shall share in the benefits, and feel and enjoy the effects of it; not only their bodies will be raised at the last day, as their souls are now regenerated by virtue of it, and in resemblance to it; but their are, and shall be so influenced by his Spirit and grace, which has raised them from death to life, that they shall walk in newness of life; of which baptism is a lively representation, and to which it is a constant obligation.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:

Ver. 5. For if we have been planted] Burying is a kind of planting. The Dutch call the burial place God’s Acre.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For if we have been planted together - The word used here σύμφυτος sumphutos, does not occur elsewhere in the New Testament. It properly means sown or planted at the same time; what sprouts or springs up together; and is applied to plants and trees that are planted at the same time, and that sprout and grow together. Thus, the name would be given to a field of grain that was sown at the same time, and where the grain sprung up and grew simultaneously. Hence, it means intimately connected, or joined together. And here it denotes that Christians and the Saviour have been united intimately in regard to death; as he died and was laid in the grave, so have they by profession died to sin. And it is therefore natural to expect, that, like grain sown at the same time, they should grow up in a similar manner, and resemble each other.

We shall be also - We shall be also fellow-plants; that is, we shall resemble him in regard to the resurrection. As he rose from the grave, so shall we rise from sin. As he lived a new life, being raised up, so shall we live a new life. The propriety of this figure is drawn from the doctrine often referred to in the New Testament, of a union between Christ and his people. See this explained in the notes at Joh 15:1-10. The sentiment here inferred is but an illustration of what was said by the Saviour Joh 14:19, “Because I live, ye shall live also.” There is perhaps not to be found a more beautiful illustration than that employed here by the apostle of seed sown together in the earth, sprouting together, growing together, and ripening together for the harvest. Thus, the Saviour and his people are united together in his death, start up to life together in his resurrection, and are preparing together for the same harvest of glory in the heavens.

In the likeness of his resurrection - This does not mean that we shall resemble him when we are raised up at the last day - which may be, however, true - but that our rising from sin will resemble his resurrection from the grave. As he rose from the tomb and lived, so shall we rise from sin and live a new life.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

He prosecutes what he had before propounded, and illustrates it by an apt similitude, which is taken from grafting or planting. He takes it for granted, that believers are

planted together in the likeness of Christ’s

death, i.e. are made conformable to him in his death: see Phi 3:10. Christ died, and believers die; the one a natural, the other a spiritual death: the one by way of expiation, suffering, and satisfying for the sins of others; the other by way of mortification, killing and crucifying their own sins.

We shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: in the original the sentence is elliptical and imperfect, the words running thus, we shall be of his resurrection; our translation therefore fills up the sense with a word borrowed from the preceding clause. See the like, Joh 5:36, I have a greater witness than of John, i.e. than that witness of John. The sense of the whole is this, That believers are not only dead, but risen with Christ, Col 3:1. They partake of such a resurection as resembles his; as Christ arose from the dead to a new life, so we rise from dead works to walk in newness of life, Rom 6:4. Moreover, they are raised and quickened by a power and virtue that flows from Christ and his resurrection: this is that virtue which the apostle Paul so earnestly desired to be made a partaker of, Phi 3:10. The graft revives with the stock in the spring, and that by a virtue which it receives from the stock; so as a believer is raised to newness of life, by virtue flowing from Christ, into whom he is ingrafted.

Question. Why doth he say believers

shall be planted, &c.? Are they not so already, upon their believing in Christ?

Answer. The apostle rather chooseth to speak in the future, than in the present tense; rather we shall be, than we are, or have been; because the work is only begun; it daily increaseth more and more, until it comes to a full perfection in heaven.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. Planted together—Rather, grown or germinating together, like two fellow slips from the same root.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection. So the Authorized Version. But the English word "planted" (though the idea expressed by it has the support of Origen, Chrysostom, and other ancient Fathers; also of the Vulgate, and, among moderns, Beza, Luther, and others; while some, including Erasmus, Calvin, Estius, Cornelius a Lapide, understand "engrafted") probably suggests what was not intended. Sumfutov is from sumfuw (not sumfuteuw), and need only express being made to grow together in close association. In classic authors it commonly means innate. It seems here used, not to introduce a new figure, whether of planting or grafting, but only to express the close union with Christ, already intimated, into which we entered in baptism. The Revised Version has "have become united with him," which may perhaps sufficiently express what is meant, though hardly a satisfactory rendering of sumfutoi , Tyndale and Cranmer translate "graft in deeth lyke unto him;" and perhaps "graft into" may be as good a rendering as any other. Meyer, Tholuck, Alford, and others take the dative tw omoiwmati as governed by sumfutoi , equivalent to omoiwv apeyanomen wsper autov (Tholuck). But it may be better to understand Cristw : "Graft into Christ, in the likeness of his death," tw omoiwmati being added because Christ"s death and ours, in the senses intended, are not the same kind of death literally, ours only corresponding to, and in a certain sense like his. The main purpose of this verse, as of ver. 4, is to press resurrection with Christ as following death with him. But why here the future esomeya ? Did we not rise with Christ to a new life when we emerged from our baptismal burial? Future verbs are used also with a similar reference in ver. 8 and ver. 14.

Now, there are three senses in which our resurrection with Christ may be understood.

(1) As above. (cf. Col_2:12, etc., where the expression is sunhgeryhte)

(2) Our realization of our position of power and obligation in subsequent life actually in practice "dying from sin and rising again unto righteousness" (cf. below, vers. 12-14).

(3) The resurrection of the dead hereafter. Some (including Tertullian, Chrysostom, (Ecumenins) have taken sense to be here intended; but, though the words themselves, esomeya and suzhsomen in ver. 8, suggest this sense, it can hardly be intended here, at any rate exclusively or prominently, since the drift of the whole passage is to insist on the necessity of an ethical resurrection now; and it is evident that the clause before us corresponds with outw kai hmeiv , etc., in the previous verse, and to ver. 11, et seq. The future esomeya is understood by some as only expressing consequence a necessary conclusion from a premiss, thus: If such a thing is the case, such other thing will follow.

If so, sense (1) might still be understood; so that the idea would be the same as in Col_2:12, etc., viz. that of our rising in baptism itself to a new life with Christ, in which sin need not, and ought not to, have dominion. But still the repeated use of the future tense (especially amartia umwn ou kurieusei in ver. 14), together with the whole drift of what follows, seems rather to imply sense (2); that is, our realization of our position in our actual lives subsequent to baptism. If it be objected that in this case we should expect "we ought to be" rather than "we shall be" it may be replied that it is what God will do for us, rather than what we shall do for ourselves, that the apostle has in view. If he has made us partakers in the atoning death of Christ, having forgiven us all trespasses, etc. , (Col_2:13, seq. ) he will also make us partakers, as our life goes on, in the power of his resurrection too, delivering us from sin"s dominion. Further, if this be so, the thought may also include sense (3) For elsewhere the future resurrection seems to be regarded as only the consummation of a spiritual resurrection which is begun in the present life, Christians being already partakers in the eternal life of God, of which the issue is immortality; of. Eph_1:5, 6 Col_3:3, 4 Gal_2:20; also our Lord"s own words, which are peculiarly significant in this regard, "He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, I say unto you. The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live". (Joh_5:24, Joh_5:25) Again, "I am the Resurrection, and the Life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. (Joh_11:25, Joh_11:26)

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For - Surely these two must go together; so that if we are indeed made conformable to his death, we shall also know the power of his resurrection.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Observe here, 1. A supposition, If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death; namely, by dying unto sin: If as Christ died, we die, he a natural, we a spiritual death: he for sin, and we to sin; he by way of expiation, suffering, and satisfying for sin; we by way of mortification, killing, and crucifying of sin.

Learn thence, That all baptized persons ought to labour for, and endeavour after, a conformity to the death of Christ, in their dying daily unto sin. As he died a painful and shameful death for us, such a death should sin die in us; living a dying life, and dying a lingering, but a certain death.

Observe, 2. The apostle’s inference drawn from the foregoing supposition; If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection; That is, we are under an obligation to imitate his resurrection, by rising from the death of sin, unto newness of life. Did he rise early out of his natural grave? so must we out of our spiritual. Did he rise to a new life? so must we arise and walk in newness of life. Did he arise never to die more? so must we that are dead to sin, live no longer therein.

Observe, 3. How the power enabling us thus to die unto sin, and to live unto holiness, is derived from Christ by virtue of our implantation into him by faith: If we have been planted together, &c. As the graft liveth, groweth, and fructifieth by the juice drawn from the stock into which it is planted: so Christians being taken out of the old rotten stock, degenerate Adam, and planted into the noble stock, Christ Jesus, are, by a virtue derived from him, raised to newness of life, into whom they are ingrafted.

Learn hence, That we experience the power of Christ’s death and resurrection, in enabling us to die to sin, and live unto God, only by virtue of a real implantation into Christ, by an operative and lively faith. If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

5. “For if we have been grown together in the likeness of his death, we shall also be in the likeness of his resurrection.” “Planted together” in E. V. is wrong (see R. V.), the translators mistaking sumphuoo, grow together,” for sumphuteuoo, “plant together.” Hence the true reading is, “we have been grown together,” a beautiful allusion to frugiculture, in which the graft, having been inserted into the trunk, grows fast, assimilating itself, and the two becoming organically identical. The fruit-grower supplies his nursery with seedlings whose fruit is utterly worthless, symbolizing the people born into this world in a state of total depravity, bearing fruit which is good for nothing. Then he proceeds to cut down these seedlings, at the same time grafting into each trunk the scion which produces the good fruit he proposes to cultivate for the market. This is regeneration, each branch growing fast to the trunk and bearing fruit. If these trees remain in the nursery, they will be stunted and dwarfed for want of room and prove a failure. Therefore they must be transplanted into the orchard, putting each one off alone where it has plenty of room to grow and develop; meanwhile, the strong winds beating against it, no longer protected by its comrades in the nursery, bend it hither and thither, circulating the sap, and keeping it from becoming bark-bound, and at the same time loosening up the roots so they can penetrate deep down into the earth and lap around the great rocks, thus holding it steadfast amid all the storms, the roots penetrating into deeper depths, running far out, and absorbing new fields of fertility, while the branches mount high and spread out, bearing an abundance of delicious fruits, making glad many hearts. This is the sanctified experience contemplated in this beautiful metaphor.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection [The apostle here meets the cavil of some objector who supposes that we might die to sin in baptism, and still be under no obligation to retrain from it after baptism. The answer is, that we can not be united to Christ in one part of the ordinance (the burial, or immersion), and severed from him in the other part (the resurrection, or emersion). If, says he, we have become united with Christ in that part of the ordinance wherein he died to destroy the power of sin, it is morally certain that we shall continue to be united with him in that other part, wherein he rose to lead a new life--a life no longer confined to earth and its sinful environment, but one far removed from the realm of wickedness in the courts of the Father. If, therefore, we died with him to sin, we must also rise with him to lead a new life in the (to us) new kingdom of God, which looks forward to the enjoyment of those very changes wrought in Christ by his ascension. Neither in dying nor living do we accomplish the actual in the ordinance. We are not actually united with Christ in death, but in an ordinance which resembles it. We do not actually die as to sin, as did Christ; but we do profess a likeness to his death. We do not rise, as did he, to a glorified life, but we strive to maintain a similitude, or likeness, to it. When at last, in a real death and resurrection, Christ actually unites us with himself, we shall indeed be dead to sin, and alive to righteousness; for there is no sin among the immortals, and there shall be no lack of perfection in those who have been changed into Christ's image];

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death. As the seed, planted, buried out of sight, rises again in a new life, so we are planted in the likeness of Christ's death when we are buried in baptism, and rise in the likeness of his resurrection, when we are lifted out of the water, and are found henceforth to have a new life. Compare Col. 2:12: “Buried by baptism, wherein ye are also risen with him.”

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

5. γὰρ expresses what was implied in καὶ ἡμεῖς, we are risen as Christ rose: this argument is continued to Rom 6:11.

σύμφυτοι, here only N.T. Cf. ἔμφυτος, Jas 1:21. = if we have been born (γεγόναμεν) with a (new) nature characterised by or wearing the likeness of His death. The new nature is stamped with the likeness to Christ’s death, as a death to sin; the idea is expanded in Rom 6:6. συμφ. = ‘of one growth or nature with.’ γεγόναμεν, cf. Rom 16:7, Rom 1:3; Jas 3:9. ὁμοίωμα, cf. Rom 8:3, Php 2:7, implies true assimilation, but of things different. There is that in the Death of Christ which transcends the capacity of men, yet the life of the redeemed man is truly assimilated, in its degree, to that Death. R.V. supplies αὐτῷ and takes τῷ ὁμ. as instrumental; possible but not quite natural.

ἀλλὰ καὶ κ.τ.λ. =ἀλλὰ καὶ σύμφυτοι τῷ ὁμ. τῆς ἀν. ἐσόμεθα: explained by συνζήσομεν, Rom 6:8 and ζῶντας, Rom 6:11. The stamp of the risen Life of the Lord will also be shown in this new life—as a ‘life to GOD,’ and therefore not under sin. ἐσόμεθα is a logical future: it follows that our lives will show etc.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

5.] The Apostle confirms the last verse by a necessary sequence that those who are united to Him in His Death, shall be also in His resurrection. For (confirmatory) if we have become united with the likeness of His Death (σύμφυτος = either (1) ‘congenital,’—as διὰ τὴν σύμφυτον δικαιοσύνην, spoken of Samuel, Jos. Antt. vi. 3. 3,—or (2) ‘cognate,’ of like nature,—or (3) ‘arising simultaneously,’—or (4) ‘grown together,’—or (5) ‘planted with,’ ‘consitus.’ The rendering of Syr., Vulg., Luth., E. V., ‘planted together,’ is inadmissible, -φυτος being not from φυτεύω, but from φύω: as also is that of Erasm. and Calv.,—‘insititii.’ The fourth meaning, ‘grown together,’ ‘intimately and progressively united,’—‘coaluimus,’ as Grot.,—seems here to apply best. Obs. σύμφ. is to be connected with τῷ ὁμ., not with τῷ χριστῷ understood, as in ver. 6: in which case we should have to supply τῷ ὁμοιώματι again before τῆς ἀναστάσεως, which would be not only grammatically difficult, but would not correspond to the sense: for Christians, it is true, partake of the likeness only of Christ’s death, but of His actual Resurrection itself, as the change of construction shews: see below), so shall we be also (ἀλλά after a hypothetical clause serves to strengthen the inference: see reff., and Hartung, Partikellehre, ii. p. 40) with His Resurrection (a change of construction: because it could not well have been said σύμφυτοι τοῦ ὁμοιώματος τ. θ. above, the gen. after adjectives compounded with σύν denoting the thing actually partaken (cf. Kühner, § 519, and Bernhardy, Syntax, p. 171: who cites examples in σύντροφος, Soph. Philoct. 203,—σύννομος, Eur. Hel. 1508,—σύμφωνος, Aristoph. Av. 658,—συμφυής, Plato Legg. iv. p. 721,—συνήθης, ib. v. p. 739,—σύμψηφος, Cratyl. p. 398), and hardly the mere figure or likeness of it,—and similarly it could not well here be said σύμφ. τῇ ἀναστάσει, because the dat. would not be strong enough to denote the state of which we shall be actual partakers.

The future is used perhaps because of the inference, as a logical sequence,—‘If, &c., … A shall = B:’—but more probably with a deeper meaning, because the participation in His Resurrection, however partially and in the inner spiritual life, attained here, will only then be accomplished in our entire being, when we ‘shall wake up after his likeness’).

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

5. σύμφυτοι: ‘united by growth’; the word exactly expresses the process by which a graft becomes united with the life of a tree. So the Christian becomes ‘grafted into’ Christ. For the metaphor we may compare 11:17 σὺ δὲ ἀγριέλαιος ὢν ἐνεκεντρίσθης ἐν αὐτοῖς, καὶ συγκοινωνὸς τῆς ῥίζης καὶ τῆς πιότητος τῆς ἐλαίας ἐγένου, and Tennyson’s ‘grow incorporate into thee.’

It is a question whether we are to take σύμφ. γεγόν. directly with τῷ ὁμοιώμ. κ.τ.λ. or whether we are to supply τῷ Χριστῷ and make τῷ ὁμοιώμ. dat. of respect. Probably the former, as being simpler and more natural, so far at least as construction is concerned, though no doubt there is an ellipse in meaning which would be more exactly represented by the fuller phrase. Such condensed and strictly speaking inaccurate expressions are common in language of a quasi-colloquial kind. St. Paul uses these freer modes of speech and is not tied down by the rules of formal literary composition.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

We have been planted together [συμφυτοι γεγοναμεν] . Rev. gives more accurately the meaning of both words. Sumfutoi is not planted, which would be formed from futeuw to plant, while this word is compounded with sun together, and fuw to grow. Gegonaman is have become, denoting process, instead of the simple einai to be. Hence Rev., have become united, have grown together; an intimate and progressive union; coalescence. Note the mixture of metaphors, walking and growing. We shall be also [αλλα και εσομεθα] . It is impossible to reproduce this graphic and condensed phrase accurately in English. It contains an adversative particle ajlla; but. Morison paraphrases : "If we were united with Him in the likeness of His death (that will not be the full extent of the union), but we shall be also united," etc. For similar instances see 1Co 4:15; Col 2:5.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.