Romans 4:19

19 Without being weakened in faith, he didn't consider his own body, already having been worn out, (he being about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah's womb.

Romans 4:19 Meaning and Commentary

Romans 4:19

And being not weak in faith
Abraham was not weak in the exercise of his faith, on the promise of God; nor was his faith weakened about the accomplishment of it, neither by the length of time after the promise was made, nor by the seeming insuperable difficulties of nature which attended it; for

he considered not his own body now dead.
The Alexandrian copy reads without the negative, "he considered his own body now dead", and so the Syriac version: which makes his faith the greater, that though he did consider his case, yet his faith was not weakened: the phrase, "his body now dead", is an "euphemism" of the "merebrum virile", which by the Jews, when unfit for generation, is called (tm rba) , "merebrum emortuum" F20:

when he was about an hundred years old;
not being quite an hundred years of age, wanting a year or thereabout:

neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb;
how unfit she was to conceive and bear children: now though he might consider these things in his mind, yet they did not dwell upon his mind, nor he upon them; at least he did not consider them, so as to distrust the divine promise.


FOOTNOTES:

F20 T. Bab. Yebamot, fol. 55. 2. & Gloss. in ib. Sanhedrin, fol. 55. 1. & Gloss in ib. Shebuot, fol. 18. 1.

Romans 4:19 In-Context

17 As it is written, "I have made you a father of many nations." This is before him whom he believed, God, who gives life to the dead, and calls the things that are not, as though they were.
18 Who in hope believed against hope, to the end that he might become a father of many nations, according to that which had been spoken, "So will your seed be."
19 Without being weakened in faith, he didn't consider his own body, already having been worn out, (he being about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah's womb.
20 Yet, looking to the promise of God, he wavered not through unbelief, but grew strong through faith, giving glory to God,
21 and being fully assured that what he had promised, he was able also to perform.
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