Passage

Romans 4.25

Book: Romans · ASV / WEB / KJV / YLT

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV

23. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was reckoned unto him; 24. but for our sake also, unto whom it shall be reckoned, who believe on him that raised Jesus our Lord from the dead,

25. who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification. (Romans 4:23-25, ASV)

WEB

23. Now it was not written that it was accounted to him for his sake alone, 24. but for our sake also, to whom it will be accounted, who believe in him who raised Jesus, our Lord, from the dead,

25. who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification. (Romans 4:23-25, WEB)

KJV

23. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; 24. But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;

25. Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. (Romans 4:23-25, KJV)

YLT

23. And it was not written on his account alone, that it was reckoned to him, 24. but also on ours, to whom it is about to be reckoned, to us believing on Him who did raise up Jesus our Lord out of the dead,

25. who was delivered up because of our offences, and was raised up because of our being declared righteous. (Romans 4:23-25, YLT)

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Setting

Speaker: Paul the Apostle
Audience: the Roman house churches (mixed Jewish-Gentile), whom Paul had not yet met
Location: Corinth, near the close of the third missionary journey
Time period: c. AD 56-57

Theological reading

The chapter's closing line, and very likely a piece of traditional confessional material Paul has taken up, given its tight two-member parallelism and its use of the divine passive in both halves.

The balance is exact: paredothē dia ta paraptōmata hēmōn, delivered up because of our trespasses, and ēgerthē dia tēn dikaiōsin hēmōn, raised because of our justification. The same preposition, dia, governs both clauses, which creates the interpretive question. Read strictly the same way in both halves, the second clause would say he was raised because our justification had been accomplished; read as purpose in the second, it says he was raised in order to secure it. Most readings take the parallelism as rhetorical rather than strictly logical, and the theological point stands either way.

That point is the verse's contribution: the resurrection is not merely the vindication of Jesus but part of the saving act itself. Paul does not assign the cross to atonement and the resurrection to proof; both clauses are soteriological. This is the same pairing as Romans 1:3-4 and the reason Paul can say a few chapters later that Christ "was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us." Paredothē also echoes the Servant of Isaiah 53, who was delivered up for transgressions. See Resurrection of Jesus and Atonement.

Key words

Theologically-loaded Greek or Hebrew words in this verse may have entries in the lexicon. Curated to roughly 100 contested terms across the corpus, not every word; see Lexicon Roadmap.

G3860 - paradidomi, paradidomi, Strong's G3860
G1453 - egeiro, egeiro, Strong's G1453

Quoted in

Arguments and defeaters:

Concepts:

Lexicon:

Passages:

1 Corinthians 15.3-7

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.