or, ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.)”
Parallel Translations
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or, ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.)”
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Other who shall descende into the depe? (that is nothinge els but to fetch vp Christ from deeth)
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Or, Who shall descend into the deepe? (that is to bring Christ againe from the dead)
Cross-references (3)
Passages linked to Romans 10:7 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Hebrews 13:20 Now may the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep with the blood of an eternal covenant, our Lord Jesus,
- Revelation 1:18 and the Living one. I was dead, and behold, I am alive forever and ever. Amen. I have the keys of Death and of Hades.
- Romans 4:25 who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (10 sources)
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 7 Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that…
7 Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.)
Ver. 7. Into the deep] Those deeps of the earth, Psa 71:20.
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.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Who shall descend into the deep? By the deep,…
Who shall descend into the deep? By the deep, here, understand hell: see Luk 8:31; Rev 9:1; 20:1,3. q. d. Do not inquire distrustfully, and despairingly, whether thou shalt go to hell, or who shall go thither, to see, and bring thee word, if such as thou are there.
That is, to bring up Christ again from the dead; this were in effect to frustrate and make void the death of Christ; it is as much as to say, he never died for us, or he must come again, and suffer, and shed his blood for the remission of our sins. He died to deliver us from death and damnation; he endured the wrath of God, that we may escape it. The sense of the whole is this, That the doctrine of justification by faith, doth not propose such difficult and impossible terms, as the doctrine of justification by works. The righteousness of the law, that speaks terror, and puts us into a continual fear of hell, and despair of heaven; but the righteousness of faith, that speaks comfort, and forbids all amazing fear and troubles about our salvation or damnation.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Or who shall descend into the deep? - These…
Or who shall descend into the deep? - These words are also a part of the address of Moses, Deu 30:13. But it is not literally quoted. The Hebrew is, “Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldst say, Who shall go over the sea for us, etc.” The words of the quotation are changed, but not the sense; and it is to be remembered that Paul is not professing to quote the words of Moses, but to “express the language of faith;” and this he does mainly by words which Moses had used, which also expressed his meaning. The words as used by Moses refer to what is remote, and therefore difficult to be obtained. To cross the sea in the early times of navigation involved the highest difficulty, danger, and toil. The sea which was in view was doubtless the Mediterranean, but the crossing of that was an enterprise of the greatest difficulty, and the regions beyond that were regarded as being at a vast distance.
Hence, it is spoken of as being the widest object with which they were acquainted, and the fairest illustration of infinity, Job 11:9. In the same sense Paul uses the word “deep,” ἄβυσσον abusson - “the abyss.” This word is applied to anything the depth or bottom of which is not known. It is applied to the ocean (in the Septuagint), Job 41:31, “He maketh the deep to boil as a pot.” Isa 44:27, “that saith to the deep, Be dry, etc.” Gen 7:11; Gen 8:2; to a broad place Job 36:16; and to the abyss before the world was formed, Gen 1:2. In the New Testament it is not applied to the ocean, unless in the passage Luk 8:31 (see the note on that place), but to the abode of departed spirits; and particularly to the dark, deep, and bottomless pit, where the wicked are to dwell forever. Rev 9:1-2, “and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit;” Greek, “The pit of the abyss.”
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Rev 11:7; Rev 17:8; Rev 20:1, Rev 20:3. In these places the word means the deep, awful regions of the nether world. The word stands opposed to heaven; as deep as that is high; as dark as that is light; while the one is as vast as the other. In the place before us it is opposed to heaven; and to descend there to bring up one, is supposed to be as impossible as to ascend to heaven to bring one down. Paul does not affirm that Christ descended to those regions; but he says that there is no such difficulty in religion as if one were required to descend into those profound regions to call back a departed spirit. That work was in fact done, when Jesus was recalled from the dead, and now the work of salvation is easy. The word “abyss” here, therefore, corresponds to Hades, or the dark regions of departed spirits.
That is, to bring up Christ ... - Justification by faith had no such difficult and impossible work to perform as would be an attempt for man to raise the dead. That would be impossible; but the work of religion is easy. “Christ, the ground of hope, is not by our efforts to be brought down from heaven to save us, for that is done; nor by our efforts to be raised from the dead, for that is done; and what remains for us, that is to believe, is easy, and is near us.” This is the meaning of the whole passage.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain Or, Who shall descend, &c.--another case of impossibility, suggested…
Or, Who shall descend, &c.--another case of impossibility, suggested by Pro 30:4, and perhaps also Amo 9:2 --probably proverbial expressions of impossibility (compare Psa 139:7-10; Pro 24:7, &c.).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 7. Into the deep—In the Hebrew and the Septuagint…
7. Into the deep—In the Hebrew and the Septuagint the phrase is to beyond sea. And as to the ancients the sea was conceived as unbounded, so this phrase would mean to a limitless distance. The apostle’s word is abyss, which was conceived as a bottomless deep. Where its place, is not distinctly said; but as earth to the ancient conception was the limitless plane of sublunary existence, (as being antithetic to heaven,) it would, verbally, be in the depths of earth. When our conceptions are purified by astronomy, however, the abyss, hell, is no longer necessarily located in our earth. In substituting the bottomless abyss for the limitless ocean, the apostle simply adapts the phrase to his present purpose; which is, to use the term abyss as hades, or the state of the dead, into which Christ descended after his crucifixion. (See notes on Luk_16:23.)
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 7. Who shall descend, &c.] The Heb. has “Who…
7. Who shall descend, &c.] The Heb. has “Who shall go over (or on) the sea?”; the LXX., “to the other side of the sea?” St Paul takes the sea, as surely Moses took it, to be the antithesis of “heaven”—the “great deep;” and thus the idea is of exploring depth rather than breadth. The Jerusalem Targum on Deuteronomy has a remarkable paraphrase: “Neither is the law beyond the great sea, that thou shouldest say, O that we had one like Jonah the prophet, to descend into the depths of the sea, and bring it to us!” (Etheridge’s Translation.) To Moses, sky and sea were suggestive of heights and depths of supernatural mystery. St Paul finds in this use of them the latent truth of the special Height of Christ’s pre-existent majesty and the special Depth of His entrance at death into the world of souls; and so sees here an inspired declaration that this His Descent and Ascent were so “finished” as to make the means of salvation a prepared and present reality to the believing soul, which is asked (thanks to Divine mercy) not to elaborate, but to accept, the “righteousness of God” in the Incarnate and Risen Christ.
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.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (7) Into the deep.—In the original, beyond the sea.…
(7) Into the deep.—In the original, beyond the sea. The word which St. Paul uses is found in the LXX. for “the sea,” but here means the abyss of Hades.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 7. Or who shall descend into the abyss? Another…
7. Or who shall descend into the abyss? Another stumbling block with the Jews was the death and burial of Christ. When Jesus died on the cross, they held it to be proof that he was not the Christ. They still were wont to demand that they should see the Risen Christ with their own eyes, or that he be produced from the realms of the dead. To have met the demands of the Jews would have been sight rather than faith.
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.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain 7. “Or, Who shall descend into the abyss? (that…
7. “Or, Who shall descend into the abyss? (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.)
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain or, Who shall descend into the abyss? [Hades, the…
or, Who shall descend into the abyss? [Hades, the abode of the dead-- Luk_8:31 ; Rev_17:8 ; Rev_20:1 ; Psa_139:8 ] (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.)
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.