The Law Always Accuses
Via On Being a Theologian of the Cross, pp. 95-97
Thesis 23. The law works the wrath of God, kills, curses, accuses, judges, and damns everything that it not in Christ.
Harmensz van Rijn Rembrandt, "The Apostle Paul in Prison" (1627)
The law does not work the love of God, it works wrath; it does not give life (recall thesis 1!), it kills; it does not bless, it curses; it does not comfort, it accuses; it does not grand mercy, it judges. In sum, it condemns everything not in Christ. It seems an outrageous and highly offensive list. As Luther’s proof quickly demonstrates, however, it comes right out of Paul in Galatians and Romans:
Thus Gal. 3[:13] states, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law” and “For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse” ]Gal. 3:10]; and Rom. 4[:15]: “For the law brings wrath”; and Rom. 7[:10]: “The very commandment which promised life proved to be the death of me”; and Rom. 2[:12]: “All who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law.” [LW 31.54.]
The usual defense of theologians of glory is to attempt some sort of accommodation, to water down the law in some way to make it less demanding. Trapped by the law, they can only become its secret enemy. Whether overtly or covertly, the only defense theologians of glory have against the destructive nature of law is some kind of antinomianism (anti-law-ism).
Antinomianism comes in many forms. The law will be rejected as old fashioned or pietistic or fundamentalistic, or it will be contextualized or modified according to the latest scientific discovery or genetic theory, and so on. But then we are only delivered into the hands of a different fate, today usually some kind of genetic determinism. The law doesn’t let up, it only comes back in a different form. As Melanchthon said several times in the “Apology to the Augsburg Confession,” “The law always accuses.” Therefore he who boasts that he is wise and learned in the law boasts in his confusion, his damnation, the wrath of God, in death. In spite of our attempts to bring it to heal, the law all the while goes its own way. There are no loopholes. It kills, curses, accuses, judges, and condemns. It is the first and cutting edge of the intervention from without into the closed cell of the addict. “The very commandment that promised life proved to be the death of me.” But just at the end of the thesis there is a glimpse of hope that is destined to become clearer as we mover into the final theses. The law condemns everything that is not in Christ. In Christ there is a way out.
