https://youtu.be/ZpE8M7brqAg
In our verse by verse study of Romans last time we completed Rom 5:6; Expanded Translation Rom 5:6; "Yet in fact, Christ, while we were weak, yet he died at the right time in place of the ungodly."
We noted that this describes Jesus Christ's substitutionary spiritual death not His physical death.
We see in this verse that the judgment of Christ for our sins on the cross occurred exactly at the right time in history. God is perfect, so His timing is perfect. That means that God is never early or late, He is always right on time.
God's time is the only time; God's timing is the best time. Man is imperfect so man's timing is imperfect. The only way to be on God's time is to adjust to God's justice on the basis of His grace and His Word so that your time is in accord with God's perfect timing.
Verses 7 and 8 are a parenthetical that use motivation to create an analogy for comparison. Verse 7 describes human motivation in physical death and verse 8 describes God's motivation for resolving mankind's spiritual death.
This is a representative analogy rather than an exact analogy. Human motivation regarding physical death for another person is described in verse 7 and it is compared to God's motivation for resolving the problem of spiritual death for the entire human race in verse 8. Verse 7 describes substitutionary physical death; verse 8 describes substitutionary spiritual death.
Rom 5:7; "For one will hardly die for a righteous man" In the Greek the first word is an adverb "molis" (hardly) that indicates that it can be done and it has been done but it is rarely done. It could be translated, "Only rarely."
Plus the explanatory postpositive conjunctive particle "gar" (for) plus the substitutionary prepositional phrase "huper" (on behalf of) that is translated "for" in most English translations plus the ablative of "dikaios" (righteous) used here for human righteousness, human integrity or human honor to describe a "good" person.
A good translation is "on behalf of a righteous person." The subject is the nominative singular of "tis" (someone) an indefinite pronoun that is really definite because it represents a specific category of people but not to any specific individual.
Plus the future middle indicative of "apothensko" (die) The predictive future anticipates or predicts an event that is expected to occur at some future time if someone would give his life in place of someone else.
The middle voice is a permissive middle representing the agent as voluntarily submitting himself to the results of the action of dying. The indicative mood states what would happen.
"though perhaps for a good man some would even dare to die" In this phrase we have "gar" (for) and "huper" (on behalf of) plus the ablative of "agathos" (good) an adjective that refers to "a good person."
Then the adverb of probability, "taxa" (perhaps or maybe) plus the indefinite pronoun "tis" (someone or some person) again, referring to a category of people plus "kai"(even).
Next is the present active subjunctive of "tolmao" (to be brave enough or to dare). There are two verbs here: "tolmao" (to dare) and "apothenhsko" (to die). "Tolmao" is in the present active subjunctive with the iterative present tense that describes what may or may not periodically happen at certain times.
It refers to something that doesn't happen often but it does rarely occur. The active voice a brave or daring person produces the action when it does happen.
Then the aorist active infinitive of "apothensko"(to die). The constantive aorist refers to a momentary action that is dramatic indicating that whenever a person gives his life for someone else it is considered to be an unusual, honorable, and dramatic event.
The active voice: the brave person produces the action. The infinitive is the infinitive of result that assumes the event to be the result of a person who has nobility or courage.
Expanded Translation Rom 5:7; "For only rarely someone may die on behalf of a righteous person; indeed on behalf of a good person someone might even be brave enough to die."
The first clause of this verse, "rarely someone may die in behalf of a righteous person," emphasizes the person who is delivered by the death of another; while the second clause, "someone might even be brave enough to die," emphasizes the person who dies for another.
We see from this that a righteous person is sometimes delivered by the death of another and that a brave courageous person will sometimes be brave enough to die for someone else.
We see that in this situation where someone dies for another that the character of the person who is delivered and the character of the person who dies is emphasized because maximum sacrifice is the forfeiting one's life to deliver another from death.
What we have here is a representative analogy because there can never be an exact or real analogy between someone giving his life to deliver another that can be compared with the work of Christ on the cross on behalf of the entire human race.
Only a representative analogy is possible because in the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross for sinners only the integrity of Jesus Christ can be emphasized because the depraved sinners have no integrity.
Those delivered through salvation have no integrity or righteousness of their own, and from God's point of view that have no attributes that are worthy of commendation.
Rom 5: 8; "But God demonstrates his own love toward us" begins with the postpositive conjunctive particle "de" (but), emphasizing a contrast between divine motivation in this verse and human motivation in the previous verse.
The subject is the nominative "ho Theos" (the God) note that the definite article that makes it monadic is again not translated into the English. In this case "ho Theos" (the God) refers to God the Father because Jesus Christ is in the context.
Plus the present active indicative of the verb "synisthmi" (display, commend, or demonstrate). The retroactive progressive present tense refers to what started in the past and continues into the present.
God the Father's love is always demonstrated through Jesus Christ's work on the cross.
The active voice tells us that God the Father produces the action. The indicative mood is declarative for a dogmatic statement of fact. Then the object of the verb in the accusative singular of "agape" (love).
Plus the reflexive pronoun "heautou" (His, Himself or His own) that tells us that the action that expressed by the verb belongs to the subject so it is God the Father's love that is being demonstrated.
God the Father always expresses His love toward humanity in terms of Jesus' work on the cross.
The cross demonstrates God's love because on the cross God willingly gave His uniquely born impeccable Son Jesus Christ to die in our place as our substitute to fulfill the penalty of the wages of sin is death that is required by God the Father's perfect justice.
(that while) "oti eti" (that while) with the present active participle of "eimi" (we were or being) it is a temporal participle so it is translated "while we were. This is a retroactive progressive present denoting something that began in the past continuing into the present time.
The active voice: mankind produces the action. Plus a genitive plural from the adjective "hamartolos" (sinners) (in that while we were still sinners).
"Christ died for us" The nominative subject from the proper noun "Christos". The absence of the definite article makes the noun "Christos" anarthrous so it emphasizes the quality of person.
Plus the aorist active indicative of the verb "apothnesko" (died), describing the spiritual death of Christ on the cross; "for us" is "huper hemeis", a preposition of substitution that means (on behalf of us).
The aorist tense of "apothnesko" (died) is a constantive aorist that gathers into one entirety the approximately three hours of darkness where God's judgment occurred on the cross.
The active voice tells us that Christ produced the action of spiritual death. The indicative mood is declarative for a dogmatic statement of an absolute fact.
Expanded Translation Rom 5:8; "But the God demonstrates his own love to us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died on behalf of us."
We see here that God the Father's love is demonstrated or expressed through the function of His justice at the cross because he gave His uniquely born Son Jesus Christ to be judged for us.
We also wee that Christ was not dying for the righteous as seen in verse 7. He was dying for sinners, those who are described as hopelessly weak and ungodly.
That means that it was Christ alone who had integrity from His righteousness in His dying for us while humanity remained evil.