Romans 8:36

36 As it is written: “For Your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” ^[a]

Romans 8:36 Meaning and Commentary

Romans 8:36

As it is written, for thy sake we are killed
This passage is a citation out of ( Psalms 44:22 ) ; and the meaning is, that for the sake of God, and his pure worship, Old Testament saints were frequently put to death, or exposed to the persecutions of men, which often issued in death; as New Testament saints have been, for the sake of Christ and his Gospel, even

all the day long;
that is, they were liable to death all the day long; or every day, one or other of them was put to death:

we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter;
they were reckoned as fit for nothing else, and were continually exposed unto it; were used as sheep are, as if they were made for no other use and service, but to be slaughtered; hence they are called, "the flock of slaughter", ( Zechariah 11:7 ) ; and as this expresses the brutality of their persecutors, so their harmlessness, meekness, humility, and patience in sufferings, being under them like lambs or sheep. This testimony is produced, to show that suffering death has been the common lot of the saints in all ages: and is designed to animate the people of God under the Gospel dispensation, to suffer with cheerfulness; the allusion may be to the lambs and sheep daily slain for sacrifice; either to the lambs of the sacrifice slain morning and evening; or to others that were slain in any part of the day from morning to night, for other sacrifices, in the court of the tabernacle and temple.

Romans 8:36 In-Context

34 Who is there to condemn us? For Christ Jesus, who died, and more than that was raised to life, is at the right hand of God—and He is interceding for us.

35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?

36 As it is written: “For Your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor principalities, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,

Footnotes

• [a]. Psalms 44:22