Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Romans · About this commentary
The Word Is Near You
Romans 10:5-10
5 For Moses writes about the righteousness of the law, “The one who does them will live by them.” · WEB
Moses himself supplies the voice of faith-righteousness — no heroic errands required — and the confession is two clauses long.
For Moses writes about the righteousness of the law, "The one who does them will live by them."
Two voices are set side by side, and both are from the law of Moses — that is the passage's quiet audacity. The righteousness of the law speaks first, from Leviticus: do and live Leviticus 18:5 — a real offer with a real condition, and three chapters of this letter have measured what the condition finds in human flesh Romans 3:20.
Then the righteousness which is of faith says — and it speaks in the words of Deuteronomy 30, Moses' own sermon about the commandment: don't say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?'... or, 'Who will descend into the abyss?' Romans 10:6–7. In Deuteronomy the point was that the word is not far off — not in heaven, not across the sea, requiring no expedition. Paul reads the pattern at its fulfillment, glossing the errands: no one need ascend to bring Christ down — the incarnation has happened; no one need descend to bring Christ up from the dead — the resurrection has happened. The two impossible journeys religion keeps proposing have already been made, from the other side.
What remains is Deuteronomy's own conclusion: the word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart Romans 10:8 — and Paul names it: the word of faith which we preach.
Then the nearness is cashed into the letter's most quoted formula: if you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved Romans 10:9.
Mouth and heart — Deuteronomy's two locations, given their Christian content. The heart believes one fact: God raised him from the dead — the resurrection as the faith's load-bearing wall Romans 4:24–25. The mouth confesses one sentence: Jesus is Lord — the earliest creed, three words, spoken in a city where the same formula was the emperor's. And verse 10 pairs the organs with the outcomes in strict parallel: heart-belief to righteousness, mouth-confession to salvation — not two stages but one movement seen from inside and outside.
The entire apparatus of attainment is gone. No ascent, no descent, no ladder Romans 9:31–32. The word is near — as near as the reader's own mouth — which is exactly what makes the coming questions about preaching so urgent Romans 10:14.
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