Romans 8:22

The hope expressed in Romans 8:21 is justified in Romans 8:22. By the word we know, Paul appeals, not as Ewald supposes, to an old book that has been lost, but to a book always open to those who have eyes to read it, nature itself, the daily sight of which proclaims loudly enough all the apostle here says. Is there not a cry of universal suffering, a woful sigh perpetually ascending from the whole life of nature? Have not poets caught this vast groaning in every age? has not their voice become its organ? As Schelling said: On the loveliest spring day, while Nature is displaying all her charms, does not the heart, when drinking in admiration, imbibe a poison of gnawing melancholy? The preposition σύν, with, which enters into the composition of the two verbs, can only refer to the concurrence of all the beings of nature in this common groaning. But there is more than groaning in the case; there is effort, travail. This is forcibly expressed by the second verb συνωδίνει, literally, to travail in birth. It seems as if old Nature bore in her bosom the germ of a more perfect nature, and, as the poet says, “ sente bondir en elle un nouvel univers ” (feels in her womb the leaping of a new universe).

We should beware of giving to the expression until now the meaning assigned to it by De Wette and Meyer: from the first of time, or without interruption. This would be a superfluous observation. The context shows what Paul means: Until now, even after redemption is already accomplished. The renovating principle has transformed the domain of the Spirit; for it became penetrated therewith at Pentecost. But the domain of nature has remained till now outside of its action. Comp. the ἑως ἀρτι, 1 Corinthians 4:13. It is in this respect with the whole as with the individual; comp. Romans 8:10.