Romans 1:4

The context

Romans opens without the usual thanksgiving for its recipients. Paul introduces himself, states his commission, and then, within two verses, gives what may be the earliest christological formula in the New Testament. He writes to a church he has never visited, on his way to Spain.

The formula in verses 3 and 4 is balanced and probably pre-Pauline: David's seed according to the flesh, Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness, by resurrection from the dead. Paul quotes it and appends "Jesus Christ our Lord," his own gloss.

The words

The participle is horisthentos, from horizō, "to mark out, appoint, install." Older English has "declared," which suggests announcing an existing status; "appointed" suggests installation into a role. The Greek can carry either, and the choice changes the theology a reader hears.

En dynamei, "in power," modifies the appointment, distinguishing resurrection existence from the prior one. The pair kata sarka and kata pneuma, "according to the flesh" and "according to the Spirit," sets the clauses in parallel; they mark two phases of his existence more than two parts of him.

Pneuma hagiōsynēs, "Spirit of holiness," is unusual, Semitic in flavor rather than the ordinary Greek phrase for the Holy Spirit. It may designate the Spirit, or describe a quality of resurrection life. The Greek does not force the decision.

What this passage establishes

The resurrection is the hinge of Jesus' identity in Paul's preaching. Whatever sonship belonged to him before, the resurrection is the act by which he is installed in power as Son of God. The verse also ties the Spirit to the resurrection, a link Paul develops later in the letter.

What it does not establish

It does not, by itself, prove pre-existence. Read alone, "appointed Son of God in power by the resurrection" is compatible with a Christology in which Jesus becomes Son at the resurrection. Read with the letter's assumptions about the one through whom all things exist, it fits a fuller Christology — but that argument must be made from the whole, not from verse 4, and critics of orthodox Christology have made exactly this point.

It does not settle the two-natures doctrine. The kata sarka and kata pneuma phrases are not the Chalcedonian formula, and reading them as if they were flattens the text's own chronology.

It does not define "Son of God." The title carries royal overtones from Psalm 2 and 2 Samuel 7, and Paul does not stop to say which he intends.

How the church has read it

The Greek fathers read horisthentos as a declaration of what the Son eternally was, and used the verse against adoptionist teaching. In the fourth century both sides of the Arian controversy claimed it. Modern exegetes have reopened the question of whether Paul inherited a two-stage formula.

First pass, written October 2026. Corrections welcome.

Cited in these answers

• It’s irrational to believe that people rise from the dead. Even if it is possible, shouldn’t it always be judged improbable since it has happened so few times…even according to Christians?
• Aren't naturalistic explanations for the resurrection stories more probable than the resurrection itself, since they appeal only to elements common to our experience, whereas the resurrection must appeal to God?
• Christians make assertions; atheists just ask for evidence. What Old Testament evidence is there that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah?

Part of Scripture, Opened — the exegetical layer behind every citation on this site. Scripture quotations are from the ESV.