Romans 7:3

3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

Romans 7:3 Meaning and Commentary

Romans 7:3

So then if while her husband liveth
True indeed it is, that whilst her husband is alive, if

she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress;
she will be noted and accounted of as such everybody, except in the above mentioned cases:

but if her husband be dead;
then there can be no exception to her marriage:

she is free from the law;
of marriage, by which she was before bound:

so that she is no adulteress;
nor will any reckon her such; she is clear from any such imputation:

though she be married to another man;
hence it appears that second marriages are lawful.

Romans 7:3 In-Context

1 Do you not know, brethren--for I am speaking to those who know the law--that the law is binding on a person only during his life?

2 Thus a married woman is bound by law to her husband as long as he lives; but if her husband dies she is discharged from the law concerning the husband.

3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

4 Likewise, my brethren, you have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that we may bear fruit for God.

5 While we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.