Chapter 7

  Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law) that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?  

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  For the woman who hath a husband, is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband is dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.  

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  So then, if while her husband liveth, she is married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband is dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.  

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  Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit to God.  

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  For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit to death:  

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  But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead by which we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.  

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  What shall we say then? Is the law sin? By no means. No, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.  

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  But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead.  

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  For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.  

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  And the commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be to death.  

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  For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me.  

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  Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.  

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  Was then that which is good made death to me? By no means. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.  

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  For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.  

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  For that which I do, I allow not: for what I would, that I do not; but what I hate, that I do.  

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  If then I do that which I would not, I consent to the law that it is good.  

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  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.  

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  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not.  

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  For the good that I would, I do not; but the evil which I would not, that I do.  

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  Now if I do that which I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.  

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  I find then a law, that when I would do good, evil is present with me.  

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  For I delight in the law of God, after the inward man:  

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  But I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.  

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  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?  

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  I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.  

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